Chris Paul and LeBron James will directly benefit from one odd rule change in the new CBA
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There are plenty of details in the NBA's new labor deal to pore over, and while there have been several changes made which will benefit the players, there's at least one of them that seemed odd to address.
Previous iterations of the league's collective bargaining agreement had an "over-36" rule in place, which made it difficult for players to receive a maximum-salary deal if they were going to reach that age during the lifetime of a new contract. Larry Coon (via SB Nation's Tom Ziller) explains the excruciating details here, but essentially it would make for a max-salary cap hit in year one of the deal, while a player would earn far less.
In the newly-agreed-upon CBA, however, it's now become the "over-38" rule -- and here's why that's extremely interesting.
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Chris Paul is the president of the union for the players, and Carmelo Anthony and LeBron James are both VPs. The three of them have been close friends for years, and they would all stand to benefit from this rule change when they sign what will likely be the last long-term maximum contracts of their respective careers.
Paul can opt out of the final year of his deal to become a free agent at the conclusion of this season, while Anthony and James can each become free agents under similar circumstances in 2018.
Did these three conspire to get this specific rule changed to earn millions more in salary before their careers are finished? Good for them, if that's the case.
The NBA is a star-driven league, and these guys have been among the game's biggest stars for more than 11 years. There's a difference between being rich and being wealthy (as Chris Rock once hilariously and profanely explained), and with NBA franchise values at an all-time high, the players who have made the league more popular than ever deserve a bigger piece of the ever-growing pie.
