"Talk of the upcoming players union decertification vote
dominated discussion" at Magic Johnson's charity game yesterday,
according to Mark Heisler of L.A. TIMES. But, "of four players
polled before the game, none knew how he'd vote." Jazz forward
Adam Keefe, on the players and agents backing decertification:
"I completely disagree with the way they went about it. I think
they make some good points but don't think the deal is so bad it
needs to be killed. I think it needs to be worked on. ... It
seems so easy to me to negotiate it. Instead, it's turned into a
nightmare. You've got egos involved and it's not pretty. I went
to the decertification meeting here last week. I had heard it
was a players' meeting. It wasn't. It was more an agents'
meeting. I was the victim of a temper tantrum by one of the
agents. He cussed me out and he cussed out some others who were
asking questions." Heisler: "Keefe refused to identify the
angry agent but another player who attended the meeting said it
was Santa Monica-based Arn Tellem, who has been a leader in the
agents' decertification movement" (L.A. TIMES, 7/31). Kings
forward Olden Polynice: "It's having a great effect on a lot of
things. This game is a fixture in L.A. and it was reduced to
this. We couldn't really go at each other for fear of injury and
(Johnson) couldn't even play in his own game. We need to
negotiate first. We need to exhaust every other possibility
(before decertifying). ... And a lot of guys feel that way."
Gary Payton, on the proposed CBA: "They've got words in there
only lawyers can tell you about it. That's all Michael [Jordan]
did is give us some time" (SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, 7/31).
