Heat owner Arison fined after comments
October 31, 2011
NEW YORK (AP)—Miami Heat owner Micky Arison has been fined by the NBA,three days after he made references to the locked-out league’s ongoingcollective bargaining process on his Twitter account.
The NBA did not disclose the amount of the fine, or say publicly why Arisonwas sanctioned.
Arison posted several tweets Friday night, including a reply to someone whoreferred to those involved with the lockout as “greedy … pigs.” Arisonreplied by saying “Honestly u r barking at the wrong owner.”
That tweet was deleted a short time later.
The NBA typically prohibits owners from speaking publicly about the laborsituation. Charlotte Bobcats owner Michael Jordan was fined in September afterhe told an Australian media outlet the NBA’s current business model was“broken.”
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NBA fines Heat owner Arison for tweets
October 31, 2011
NEW YORK (AP)—Miami Heat owner Micky Arison has been fined by the NBA,three days after he made references to the locked-out league’s ongoingcollective bargaining process on his Twitter account.
The NBA did not disclose the amount of the fine, or say publicly why Arisonwas sanctioned.
Arison posted several tweets Friday night, including a reply to someone whoreferred to those involved with the lockout as “greedy … pigs.” Arisonreplied by saying “Honestly u r barking at the wrong owner.”
That tweet was deleted a short time later.
The NBA prohibits owners from speaking publicly about the labor situation.Charlotte Bobcats owner Michael Jordan was fined in September after he told anAustralian media outlet the NBA’s current business model was “broken.”
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Humphries upset Kardashian wants divorce
October 31, 2011
LOS ANGELES (AP)—Just 10 weeks after their lavish, made-for-TV wedding andless than a month after the wedding special aired, reality starlet KimKardashian is canceling her marriage to NBA player Kris Humphries(notes).
The “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” star filed for divorce Monday,citing irreconcilable differences. “I hope everyone understands this was not aneasy decision,” she said in a statement. “I had hoped this marriage wasforever but sometimes things don’t work out as planned.”
Humphries told TMZ he was “devastated” to learn his bride had filed fordivorce and is “willing to do whatever it takes to make it work.”
The filing in Los Angeles County Superior Court provided few details, otherthan to state the couple have a prenuptial agreement that will dictate how theydivide up their assets. Kardashian is asking that both sides pay their ownattorneys’ costs and that a judge terminate Humphries’ rights to spousalsupport.
Kardashian, 31, and Humphries, 26, were wed Aug. 20 in a star-studded,black-tie ceremony at an exclusive canyon estate in the seaside enclave ofMontecito, Calif., near Santa Barbara. The couple’s wedding registry at aBeverly Hills jeweler totaled $172,000 and included such items as a $1,650coffee pot and two $1,250 sterling silver vegetable spoons.
It was the first marriage for Humphries, who last played for the NBA’s NewJersey Nets, and the second for Kardashian, who was married to music producerDamon Thomas from 2000 to 2004.
Kardashian’s sisters and TV co-stars Kourtney Kardashian, 32, and KhloeKardashian, 27, served as co-maids of honor.
Kim Kardashian and Humphries began dating late last year and announced theirengagement in May. He proposed on bended knee with a 20.5-carat ring by spellingout “Will you marry me?” in rose petals.
The couple’s marriage was the subject of a two-part special on E!Entertainment Television, which televises Kardashian’s show that follows themodel and her family.
The special aired Oct. 9 and 10, two months after the ceremony, promptingonline card company someecards.com to offer a greeting last summer that read:“Here’s hoping Kim Kardashian’s marriage lasts until her wedding special airsin October.”
Entertainment media have breathlessly reported every available detail on therelationship since it began, including signs of trouble earlier this month.Court filings show that Kardashian signed the petition on Sunday.
Meanwhile, Kardashian appeared to be getting on with her life on Monday,tweeting that she was looking forward to Tuesday’s opening of her KardashianKhaos fashion boutique in Las Vegas. “We are so excited!! Kardashian Khaos hasarrived!,” said the message.
Kardashian’s divorce attorney, Laura Wasser, did not return a phone messageseeking comment. Humphries’ sports agent, Marc Cornstein, also did not return aphone message.
McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP
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Kardashian wants divorce from Humphries
October 31, 2011
LOS ANGELES (AP)—Just 10 weeks after her star-studded, made-for-TVwedding, reality starlet Kim Kardashian filed for divorce Monday from NBA playerKris Humphries(notes), citing irreconcilable differences.
“I hope everyone understands this was not an easy decision,” said the“Keeping Up With the Kardashians” star in a statement. “I had hoped thismarriage was forever but sometimes things don’t work out as planned.”
The filing in Los Angeles County Superior Court provided few details, otherthan to state the couple have a prenuptial agreement that will dictate how theydivide up their assets. Kardashian is asking that both sides pay their ownattorneys’ costs and that a judge terminate Humphries’ rights to spousalsupport.
Kardashian, 31, and Humphries, 26, were wed Aug. 20 at a lavish privateestate near Santa Barbara, Calif. It was the first marriage for Humphries, wholast played for the NBA’s New Jersey Nets, and the second for Kardashian, whowas married to music producer Damon Thomas from 2000 to 2004.
Kardashian’s sisters and TV co-stars Kourtney Kardashian, 32, and KhloeKardashian, 27, served as co-maids of honor.
Kim Kardashian and Humphries began dating late last year and announced theirengagement in May. He proposed on bended knee with a 20.5-carat ring by spellingout “Will you marry me?” in rose petals.
The couple’s marriage was the subject of a two-part special on E!Entertainment Television, which televises Kardashian’s show that follows themodel and her family.
Court filings show that Kardashian signed the petition on Sunday.
Kardashian said she and Humphries “remain friends and wish each other thebest.”
Kardashian’s divorce attorney, Laura Wasser, did not return a phone messageseeking comment.
McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP
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Compromise needed to end NBA lockout
October 29, 2011
NEW YORK (AP)—Anyone who has been to a car dealership, or bought a home,understands how negotiating works.
One side offers a number, the other counters, and they meet somewhere in themiddle and make a deal.
That’s not the way it’s working in the NBA’s labor standoff—even withpotentially $2 billion at stake for each side.
Owners and players keep insisting they are ready and willing to make thenecessary financial step for an agreement. Yet talks have broken down each ofthe last two weeks with little movement and the same type of answer: “We’rehere, they’re there, and that’s that.”
Derek Fisher fears the entire NBA season will be lost.(AP)
That won’t get players back on the court or fans in the seats.
And with both sides so entrenched, it might be a question of when, not if,another round of cancellations will be necessary.
“I don’t know,” Commissioner David Stern said Friday when asked about thenext deadline. “We just had a difficult day. We’ll go back, we’ll go to theoffice Monday and see what to do about this big mess.”
They could start with a phone call to the players’ association to schedulemore talks, and the sides likely will meet again soon. But it will remainpointless if neither side is prepared to offer compromise.
Owners are insistent on a 50-50 split of basketball-related income. Playershave proposed reducing their guarantee from 57 percent down to 52.5, saying thatwill transfer more than $1.5 billion to owners over six years.
And when neither side would go further Friday, NBA officials said unionexecutive director Billy Hunter ended the session.
“Billy said, `My phone is ringing off the hook from agents and playerstelling me I cannot go under 52 percent’ and he said unless you’re willing to gothere, we have nothing to talk about,” Deputy Commissioner Adam Silver said.
The difference between 50 and 52.5 percent is about $100 million annually,based on last season’s revenues, or $1 billion over the course of the 10-yearagreement the NBA is seeking.
The cost of not making a deal?
“We expect there to be a $2 billion loss for us for the loss of the season,which we will then begin to dig out from under and try to get back, if therewere a season’s loss,” Stern said. “And the players would lose $2 billion.Period.”
The losses already have been piling up. Stern said wiping out the preseasonschedule, which would have ended Friday, cost the league $200 million. The firstmonth of real games adds another couple hundred million, and Hunter has saidmissing a month would cost the players about $350 million.
But that’s not enough to make players agree to a deal they say would costthem money and limit their options in free agency.
“We think we gave more than enough, and that’s what we constantly said tothem: `Look, we did what it was you said you needed, we did it,”’ Hunter said.“And now all of a sudden, every time we did it, it’s like their eyes got biggerand they wanted more and more and more. So finally we just had to shut it downand just say it can’t be.”
Stern has made it clear that owners’ future proposals could be made with thelosses in mind. Players eventually will get their money, just less of it, butthe damage to businesses that rely on the game won’t be recovered.
“I think it is hard for the average person to understand what it is they’rearguing over,” said Jim Taggart, the manager of The Four’s, an upscale sportsbar across the street from Boston’s TD Garden. “A lot of the people that workconcessions at the Garden come in here, and their pay is budgeted into how theypay their mortgages, how they put their kids through school.
“Events at the Garden are just absolute big business. There’s a wholeancillary economy that depends on the Garden, and it’s pretty far reaching, allthe restaurants and parking garages.”
The sides are much closer after three straight days of meetings inconsecutive weeks. Besides the BRI split, the list of remaining items is down tojust a handful, such as the ability of teams over the luxury tax threshold touse the midlevel exception or participate in sign-and-trade deals.
Those are important to players. The top-spending teams are mostly the onesin the biggest markets, and players want to know teams in the most desiredcities won’t be prevented from bidding on them.
“What we did not want to do and what we don’t want to do is take taxpayingteams completely out of the market for other teams’ free agents,” unionpresident Derek Fisher(notes) of the Lakers said. “We want our midlevel players to beable to sign contracts or at least have the opportunity to sign a contractwherever they would like to play.”
There had been a sense of optimism going into Friday after both sidesacknowledged progress on the salary cap system over the previous two days. Butthey hadn’t talked about the split, and sure enough, once they did things fellapart again.
Wasted was the meeting room the NBA had reserved through the weekend at atop New York hotel, where it hoped to be announcing a deal by Sunday. The nexttalks haven’t been scheduled, but the sides reconnected quickly after the lastbreakdown.
“Each time I come here, we’ve come in thinking we may be here for weeks andwe’re not going to leave the room,” Fisher said. “But sometimes they end andyou assume you won’t talk again for weeks and you’re back the next day.”
AP Sports Writer Howard Ulman in Boston contributed to this report.
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Puerto Rico All-Star Classic postponed
October 29, 2011
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP)—Organizers say a scheduled exhibition gameincluding NBA stars has been postponed and will be rescheduled next week.
A spokeswoman for the World All-Star Classic—set to include Kobe Bryant(notes),Kevin Durant(notes) and Dwyane Wade(notes)—says a new date will be announced by Nov. 3.
According to an earlier press release, the game was also going to featureAmare Stoudemire(notes), Blake Griffin(notes), Carlos Boozer(notes), Chris Kaman(notes), Chris Bosh(notes), DwightHoward(notes), Kevin Garnett(notes), Kevin Love(notes), Paul Pierce(notes), Rajon Rondo(notes) and Tyson Chandler(notes).
NBA players have taken part in many charity exhibition games across thecountry during the lockout.
A portion of the proceeds will be donated to various charities on behalf ofthe players and the event.
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World All-Star game in PR postponed
October 29, 2011
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP)—Organizers say a scheduled exhibition gameincluding NBA stars has been postponed and will be rescheduled next week.
A spokeswoman for the World All-Star Classic—set to include Kobe Bryant(notes),Kevin Durant(notes) and Dwyane Wade(notes)—says a new date will be announced by Nov. 3.
According to an earlier press release, the game was also going to featureAmare Stoudemire(notes), Blake Griffin(notes), Carlos Boozer(notes), Chris Kaman(notes), Chris Bosh(notes), DwightHoward(notes), Kevin Garnett(notes), Kevin Love(notes), Paul Pierce(notes), Rajon Rondo(notes) and Tyson Chandler(notes).
NBA players have taken part in many charity exhibition games across thecountry during the lockout.
A portion of the proceeds will be donated to various charities on behalf ofthe players and the event.
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NBA cancels Nov. games, full season out
October 28, 2011
NEW YORK (AP)—The NBA will play a shortened season—if it plays at all—after labor negotiations broke down for the second time in a week.
NBA Commissioner David Stern canceled all November games on Friday, the120th day of the lockout.
“It’s not practical, possible or prudent to have a full season now,” saidStern, who previously canceled the first two weeks of the season.
Just a day earlier, Stern had said he would consider it a failure if the twosides didn’t reach a deal in the next few days and vowed they would take “oneheck of a shot” to get it done.
Derek Fisher fears the entire NBA season will be lost.(AP)
Owners are insistent on a 50-50 split of revenues, while players lastformally proposed they get 52.5 percent, leaving them about $100 million apartannually. Players were guaranteed 57 percent in the previous collectivebargaining agreement.
“Derek (Fisher) and I made it clear that we could not take the 50-50 dealto our membership. Not with all the concessions that we granted,” unionexecutive director Billy Hunter said. “We said we got to have some dollars.”
But with more games canceled, the losses will begin to mount.
“We’re going to have to recalculate how bad the damage is,” Stern said.“The next offer will reflect the extraordinary losses that are piling up now.”
No further talks have been scheduled.
After two days of making some progress on salary cap issues, the two sidesbrought the revenue split back into the discussion Friday and promptly got stuckon both issues.
Stern said the NBA owners were “willing” to go to 50 percent. But he saidHunter was unwilling to “go a penny below 52,” that he had been getting manycalls from agents and then closed up his book and walked out of the room.
Hunter said the league initially moved its target down to 47 percent duringFriday’s six-hour session then returned to its previous proposal of 50 percentof revenues.
“We made a lot of concessions, but unfortunately at this time it’s notenough, and we’re not prepared or unable at this time to move any further,”Hunter said.
Union president Fisher said it was difficult to say why talks broke down, orwhen they would start up again.
“We’re here, we’ve always been here, but today just wasn’t the day to tryand finish this out,” he said.
Fisher said there were still too many system restrictions in the owners’proposal. Players want to keep a system similar to the old one, and fear owners’ideas would limit player movement.
And though they might be inclined to give up one if they received moreconcessions on the other, players make it sound as if they are the ones doingall the giving back.
The old cap system allowed teams to exceed it through the use of a number ofexceptions, many of which the league wants to tweak or even eliminate. Hunterhas called a hard cap a “blood issue” to players, and though the league hasbacked off its initial proposal calling for one, players think the changesowners want would work like one.
“We’ve told them that we don’t want a hard cap. We don’t want a hard capany kind of way, either an obvious hard cap or a hard cap that may not be asobvious to most people but we know it works like a hard cap,” Hunter said.“And so you get there, and then all of a sudden they say, `Well, we also haveto have our number.’ And you say, `Well wait a minute, you’re not negotiating ingood faith.”’
When players offered to reduce their guarantee from 57 percent to 53percent, Hunter said that would have transferred about $1.1 billion to ownersover six years. Now, at 52.5, he said that would grow to more than $1.5 billion.
But even a 50-50 split would be too high for some hard-line owners, becauseit would reduce only $280 million of the $300 million they said they lost lastseason. Owners initially proposed a BRI split that players said would have hadthem around 40 percent.
Though they will miss a paycheck on Nov. 15, Hunter said each player wouldhave received a minimum of $100,000 from the escrow money that was returned tothem to make up the difference after salaries fell short of the guaranteed 57percent of revenues last season.
The small groups that were meeting grew a bit Friday. Union vice presidentsChris Paul(notes)—wearing a Yankees cap for his trip to New York—and Theo Ratliff(notes)joined the talks, and economist Kevin Murphy returned after he was unavailableThursday. Mavericks owner Mark Cuban stayed for the session after taking partThursday.
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NBA cancels games through Nov. 30
October 28, 2011
NEW YORK (AP)—NBA Commissioner David Stern has canceled all NBA gamesthrough Nov. 30.
The move came Friday after labor negotiations broke down for the second timein a week.
Says Stern: “It’s not practical, possible or prudent to have a full seasonnow.”
After two days of making some progress on salary cap issues, the two sidesbrought the revenue split back into the discussion and got stuck on both.
Derek Fisher fears the entire NBA season will be lost.(AP)
Owners are insistent on a 50-50 split of revenues, while players lastformally proposed they get 52.5 percent, leaving them about $100 million apartannually. Players were guaranteed 57 percent in the previous collectivebargaining agreement.
No further talks have been scheduled.
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NBA sides end talks after about 6 hours
October 28, 2011
NEW YORK (AP)—NBA owners and players have ended negotiations for the dayafter meeting for about six hours.
Both sides had pointed toward Friday as the day they hoped to close the gapon the finances. Owners are insistent on a 50-50 split of revenues, whileplayers last formally proposed they get 52.5 percent, leaving them about $100million apart annually. Players were guaranteed 57 percent in the previouscollective bargaining agreement.
The sides met for 7 1/2 hours Thursday following a 15-hour marathon theprevious day.
Without a deal, Stern must decide whether to add more cancellations to thetwo weeks that have already been lost.
Derek Fisher fears the entire NBA season will be lost.(AP)
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