As November approaches, some people look forward to basketball season. However, this season will not start as planned. The basketball season has a tentative start date that is later than normal.
The start date is tentative because of the ongoing lockout, occurring because National Basketball Association (NBA) players are upset about the amount of money they are being paid.
Basketball players are arguing they should receive 50 percent of what their owners receive. In general most athletes receive a lot more money than they deserve. The fact that the players are complaining that they are not making enough is beyond me.
As basketball players they play 82 games a season and that does not include playoffs. When players make $5.15 million (2010-2011 basketball season) that is more than non-athletes make when many of the non-athletes work all year.
I am not saying basketball players don’t work hard and don’t deserve a lot of money, but they could still be making less money for a lot more work.
Basketball players in my opinion, and many others’ as well, are being greedy. People who are basketball fans enjoy watching games and even going to games. However, if there is no season, or even if it’s starting late, the fans start to talk.
They’re talking about the fact that every night there will not be a game on television for people to watch and cheer on. Basketball players are, in a way, entertainers. People look at watching sports as an entertainment. If we are not being entertained why should we agree with the fact that they should be getting more when right now they are not producing and giving us what we (the fans) want?
Basketball is not the only sport to have gone through a lockout. Hockey and football have both gone through lockouts. They both ended because the players and owners/commissioners were able to come up with an agreement and it didn’t mean cancelling a season.
Hopefully this will be good news for NBA fans as well, meaning they will not have to say goodbye to a whole season.
A season without basketball would not be right; however, there is still college basketball, which might get more coverage and gain popularity if there was no professional ball.
So now that the NBA is going through its lockout this year I am hoping that the Major League Baseball won’t get any ideas and start a lockout of its own in the future.
The point I am trying to make is what exactly is the purpose of playing a professional sport? Children and even young adults look up to athletes for their athletic abilities.
When “big shots” get greedy and start complaining about how much money they’re making and how much they want to make that doesn’t create a positive figure to look up to.
As a child playing sports he or she may think he or she wants to be a professional athlete. At that age they are not concerned with how much money they’ll make playing it.
So when does this change? When people stop playing for the love of the game, that’s when. Why can’t athletes accept the amount of money their coach or owner is willing to pay for them?
Anybody I know would gladly do their job for them and not complain one bit about how much money they’d be making. I think athletes should never lose their playing “for the love of the game” attitude. If they hadn’t lost it there would not be an NBA lockout right now.
Ellissa Coburn can be contacted at ecoburn1@ksc.mailcruiser.com
