NBPA Exec Dir Michele Roberts last week said that she is "optimistic that not only a new deal could be reached without another work stoppage, but perhaps prior to the current CBA expiration," according to Gary Washburn of the BOSTON GLOBE. Roberts said, "There’s going to be a deal and my view is let’s get it done. [NBA Commissioner Adam Silver] has said the same to me, so I think the good news is we don’t have the backdrop of poverty. There’s all this money. The game is growing in popularity. Everyone should be singing, ‘Hallelujah.’" Roberts: "Wouldn't it be great for everybody ... if we could say these were the major issues that we knew we had to deal with and we saw no reason to wait until 2017, so we got them done? ... Wouldn’t everybody just be delighted? It would be great for the game." Roberts said there "ain't a problem" with the league's nine-year, $24.9B TV deal. Roberts: "There’s only a problem because the owners have suggested that there is, that there’s a problem with the injection of that money into the system. Frankly, we don’t quite understand why that’s a problem. If it’s not a problem that the teams can make more money, why is it a problem if the players are going to make more money?" She added, “It’s too bad that this successful [TV contract] negotiation has suddenly become a problem that I can’t get my arms around.” Roberts added that "substantive talks can begin perhaps this year" (BOSTON GLOBE, 3/29).
