A lawyer for the National Basketball Players Association says the union will push to drop the age limit for going pro in the next round of collective bargaining with the league. Why?
“Capitalism means that if you’re 17, 18 years old and you’re a geek and you want to drop out of college and invent Apple or something else, you can do it,” Kohlman said. “In this country you can do that. And there’s nothing stopping you from doing it. If you’re an unbelievable blues singer at 17, 18, 19 years old, you can go out and make a fortune.”
Damn… I suddenly feel the need to salute a flag somewhere.
Now this wouldn’t be the first time the union has tried for this, and the NBA wants to go in the other direction, raising the age limit to 20 (natch). So it’s anything but a slam dunk.
But here’s a question for you: if the union were to succeed, what would that do to the Big Ten’s push for freshman ineligibility? Does Jim Delany hate America that much?
Get The Picture 
My first thought was: What’s John Calipari gonna do?
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There are only so many high school seniors who can be drafted, you know. He’ll be happy to sign the best of the rest.
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Sort of like: NBA to the front of the line, everybody else take one step back?
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Tell his boosters to get those FedEx envelopes ready!
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Posturing by Delaney and posturing by Kohlman of the Players Association. Kentucky’s freshmen are not members of the NBAPA. The older veteran NBA players who are trying to hold on to one more season with a salary they will never equal in the future are members. If 18 year olds can play that means a roster spot that a veteran in his 30s may lose. The PA members are risking their jobs just so 18 year olds have more freedoms.
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Well, as the article indicates, it’s not the first time the union’s tried.
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The union has used the age limit as a bargaining chip in the past in the manner of Tom Sawyer and the fence but it has never bargained away anything in order to lower the entry age. It has agreed to the nba’s request to raise the entry age in exchange for concessions it wants.
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And if you want to drop out of school and go brew beer, you CAN’T do that because there are age limits set in place for positions like that
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Are you sure? Brewing and consuming beer are two different things. I imagine a child can own a car, or build one for that matter, but not be licensed to drive (at least on public streets). Whether or not one drops out of school is yet another issue.
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The Clarett case is utter garbage and will be overturned eventually, IMHO.
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Boooooooooooooooring! You’re a broken record stuck on ‘Repeat’.
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Your lack of self-awareness is hilarious.
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LOL, look in the mirror pal.
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If you look up ‘irony’ in the dictionary, you will find Dawgbyte’s comment used as an example.
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Counselor or not, I know this gashead is out of touch when he references 18-yr. old bluesmen going out and bresking the bank. NO strictly blues singer makes dick, much less a teenager. (Unless you make one of those deals at 49 & 61 … and even then it usually only gets you strychnined by a jealous husband)
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Why can’t they put in a one-year exemption for high school players who want to take a shot at the pros? If it doesn’t work out or they don’t get drafted after a year, let them sit out a year of college and then have three years to play. There’s no reason to ruin a kid’s potential college playing days when he’s 18.
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Emmert has said he’d be open to considering something even fairer than that.
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Wow. I’m not sure how I missed that post but thanks for the link.
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