With no surprise and being on the clock since winning the draft lottery, the New Orleans Hornets drafted Kentucky’s Anthony Davis. Davis was last years AP Player of the Year, leading his Kentucky Wildcats to a National Championship victory. Davis will look to help the Hornets regain some confidence after a rough 21-45 season. Although Davis is defensively NBA ready, he will need to develop his offensive game to help make a bigger impact on both ends of the court.

The second pick of the draft belonged to the Charlotte Bobcats. The Bobcats finished the 2011-2012 season with the worst winning percentage in league history. With their pick, the Bobcats drafted another Kentucky star, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. This was the first time ever that the top two picks of the NBA draft were from the same school.

Washington was able to land Florida guard Bradley Beal with the third pick in the draft. The freshman guard has been compared to current NBA star and future Hall of Famer, Ray Allen.

Cleveland, who had their eyes on Beal, settled with Syracuse sophomore guard, Dion Waiters. This was a shock to some, considering Waiters did not start a single game for Syracuse last year, but should have an immediate impact for the Cavaliers.

Sacramento fans should be thrilled after drafting Kansas forward, Thomas Robinson. Through all the off court tragedy Robinson dealt with, he still led the nation with 27 double-doubles averaging 17.9 points per game and 11.8 rebounds.

Guard Damian Lillard from Webber State was drafted 6th by the Portland Trail Blazers. Lillard averaged 24.5 points per game, 2nd in the country. Lillard faces a tremendous amount of scrutiny based on the college competition he encountered. However, the 6’3 guard will look to make a quick impact for the Blazers.

Harrison Barnes, North Carolina forward, was drafted 7th by the Golden State Warriors. Barnes led the Tar Heels in scoring last season, averaging 17.4 points per game.

The second surprise of the draft was the Toronto Raptors’ 8th pick, Washington sophomore guard Terrence Ross. Ross, an excellent shooter, was not expected to be drafted so early; however, he can definitely make an impact on the Raptors 28th ranked offense.

Detroit decided to go big with their pick, drafting Connecticut center Andre Drummond. There is concern about Drummond’s youth, being only 18. Also, it was a bit of a surprise considering Detroit already has a young center, Greg Monroe.

The Hornets were back on the clock with the 10th  pick of the draft, and added Duke guard Austin Rivers. Rivers led Duke in scoring an average of 15.5 points per game. Rivers will likely play an important role off the bench behind current Hornet, Eric Gordon.

The Hornets can easily claim to be this year’s draft winners. Combining Anthony Davis and Austin Rivers with Eric Gordon gives the Hornets hope for a very bright future.

July 1st marks the 2nd day of excitement for organizations to make a push from being a good team to becoming an elite team with free agency.

Check out the rest of Round 1 and Round 2

Image Courtesy of  Anthony Davis

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The 2011 NBA regular season is in serious jeopardy of not starting on time as the lockout continues late into September. The 2011 season is scheduled to tip-off on November 1, as last season’s champions, the Dallas Mavericks, are set to host the Chicago Bulls. As the days march on, that start date looks less and less likely to be accurate.

With players and owners still in disagreement over the new collective bargaining agreement, training camps and the first week of preseason games, from October 9-15, were both cancelled Friday afternoon. Players were scheduled to report to training camp on October 3.

“We have regretfully reached the point on the calendar where we are not able to open training camps on time, and need to cancel the first week of preseason games,” Deputy Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement. “We will make further decisions as warranted.” This is unfavorable news for NBA fans, as the Summer League was already cancelled.

The Summer League serves as a venue for coaches to evaluate the talent level of rookies and young bench players. While the Summer League is not integral to having an NBA season, the combined cancellations do not provide hope for a prompt start. The only time the NBA season did not start on time due to a work stoppage was during the 1998-99 season, where the regular season was cut to 50 games.

The main issue of the 1998 lockout was that owners wanted to cut player salaries and set a salary cap because player salaries were significantly taking away from earnings. During negotiations in 1998, the problem wasn’t directly dealt with. While players’ salaries were capped between $9 million and $14 million, each party agreed to institute a soft cap.

This allowed teams to exceed the cap and pay players as much as they wanted if the teams paid a luxury tax to the NBA on the player’s salary. That decision to allow an exception is becoming a big problem 12 years later, and owners want to decrease salaries and set a hard cap.

The hard cap would prevent teams like the Los Angeles Lakers from having a $91 million payroll, when the salary cap is $57.7 million. The Lakers dish out $17 million more than the Orlando Magic, the team with the second largest payroll. Unlike smaller teams, the Lakers have a huge fan base to draw from, and can generate the revenue needed to pay the luxury tax.

There is a big push for the hard cap from smaller market teams like the Golden State Warriors, who are finding it hard to compete because they can’t pay high level talent what teams like the Lakers can pay. However, installing a hard cap would decrease every player’s salary, an issue the players are not willing to concede to at this moment.

The belief of the players is that they only earn a small piece of the money pie, and the owners want them to have an even smaller piece. It isn’t shocking to see that money is the main component for the cause of the lockout. However, owners and players need to come to an agreement soon before they lose something they both couldn’t exist without: a fan base.

 
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