After a whole lot of talk and calls for action, the Euroleague Players Association was formally launched on Saturday in Belgrade. Emmet Ryan on a big step for player welfare and why it can’t be the end of the story
Minutes after the first session with players on Thursday evening, the press gathered in Belgrade received a most unexpected leaflet drop. The launch of the ELPA, Saturday back here in Stark Arena on Saturday was confirmed.
The need for a union has been obvious for months. There have been rumblings of the need for a long time but the match was struck last June on Twitter when several prominent players justifiably vented their feelings.
The mini-reveal on Thursday came mere hours after yet another bizarre scenario of players being left hanging occurred. Two Americans on the Koroivos club in Greece, Marcus Posley and Jahlil Carson, found out at the airport that their tickets home had been cancelled. That, coupled with the imminent strike by players in Israel had observers anxiously waiting to see what the ELPA would be about.
In the short-term at least, it won’t have any impact at national league level so those kind of disputes are outside of the association’s remit.
Bostjan Nachbar, Kyle Hines, and Luigi Datome, were on hand at the Stark Arena early on Saturday afternoon to give some insight into the purpose of the group. The short version is that it’s still really vague and more concrete details are likely around late June.
“Over the last five to six months, I’ve done extensive work in trying to connect all the players to see if there is a desire to get united and organised. Through talking to players, I can say the desire is there and the players have expressed a big wish to create a platform to give them a united voice,” said Nachbar.
“Our main goal is that this association will be led by the players. At the end of the season the players will decide the executive board, who will be their president.”
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As it stands, the league will solely represent players in Euroleague. Players at Eurocup level or other competitions may yet get an opportunity to work with ELPA.
“Right now our focus is on Euroleague players. Euroleague is in general a popular and important competition. Whether we will include players from other leagues in future will take a lot of thinking and organising. Euroleague offers more stability because there are 11 teams with licences, 16 in the competition and 18 in the near future,” said Nachbar.
“Other leagues have teams jumping in and out of the competition so it’s more difficult but, yes, we would like to find a model that when players who have played in Euroleague continue in other European leagues that they would be able to remain as members of the association,”
“With domestic player associations, we welcome everybody to have open communications with them. It’s important to have positive communications with all stakeholders in basketball. We’re willing to talk to anybody but our competencies only go as far as negotiating with Euroleague, not with other leagues or federation.”
The issue of late payments to players was brought up from the floor and Nachbar deferred on answering in detail until there have been substantial talks with the players.
“The better way to answer this will be in a month. We will sit down with the players and see what issues should be addressed first. The same goes for benefits. We’ve already done some research on pension plans as well, which don’t exist in European basketball,” said Nachbar.
“We want to help players prolong careers. Right now they are under a lot of stress, it’s a very long and tough season. It’s difficult to have a long and successful career.”
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Nachbar also said he had been in talks with the NBA union, the NBPA, in the process of establihing the ELPA.
“I have a good relationship with the NBPA, they are very supportive of what we are trying to do. I think they will continue to be supportive. A lot of players go from Euroleague to the NBA and from the NBA to Euroleague, so it will make it easier for both associations to have a relationship for cooperation. Obviously they are far more ahead of where we are now but having their support is big for us and will help us in the future,” he said.
Hines, who has made the last seven Euroleague Final Fours between his stint at Olympiacos and his current role at CSKA Moscow, said getting the organisation off the ground was a big step.
“Today is an historic day for the players of Euroleague. We felt there was a need for us to come together as a group to help with the overall improvement on the rights and everything of the players,” said Hines.
“There was a series of events that led up to it. This past summer, people saw a lot being said on social media. It’s something that organically happened. I’ve been lucky enough to be a 10 year pro, around a number of different guys, and there are certain issues that continue to arise.”
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Datome, who is looking to win his second straight title with Fenerbahce, said it was the lack of an outlet to express his views that drove him to become more involved in getting players organised.
“I felt that around the windows for FIBA. As a Euroleague player I couldn’t join my national team and I couldn’t even say what I was thinking. That was a moment that I felt we needed a common voice to let everybody know our point of view,” said Datome.
“It was about time to be together and talk about what players think in order to make this product better, to bring ideas to the table and hopefully this will make basketball better.”
On the whole it’s a decent first step but a lot more detail is required before any call on how effective the ELPA will be. Every player deserves representation and some form of multi-national body getting off the ground has to be welcomed. The reality of getting those most at threat from exploitation, in national leagues with unreliable paymasters, is where the big test will come. Those are the ones who need the help of the top tier the most. Nachbar’s openness towards eventually reaching that stage has to be welcomed.
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