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More information about the Oscar Robertson Rule
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Oscar Robertson was president of the National Basketball Players Association from 1965 until his retirement following the 1973-74 season. When he filed the class action lawsuit,** he had just concluded his 10th and last season with the Cincinnati Royals. Traded to Milwaukee prior to the 1970-71 season, he teamed with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to give the team its only NBA title. Robertson's fellow plaintiffs were the player representatives for the other 13 NBA teams:
Bill Bradley (New York Knicks)
Joe Caldwell (Atlanta Hawks)
Archie Clark (Philadelphia 76ers)
Mel Counts (Los Angeles Lakers)
John Havlicek (Boston Celtics)
Don Kojis (San Diego Rockets, later Houston Rockets effective 1971-72)
Jon McGlocklin (Milwaukee Bucks)
McCoy McLemore (Detroit Pistons)
Tom Meschery (Seattle Supersonics)
Jeff Mullins (San Francisco Warriors, became Golden State effective 1971-72)
Wes Unseld (Baltimore Bullets)
Dick Van Arsdale (Phoenix Suns)
Chet Walker (Chicago Bulls)
As NBA franchises were added in Cleveland, Portland and Buffalo in 1971, and New Orleans in 1974, the lawsuit was amended to include the owners of those teams as well.The National Basketball Players Association, founded by Bob Cousy in 1954, was the first organization of professional athletes to obtain a collective bargaining agreement. At the first nationally-televised NBA All-Star game in 1964, the All-Star players were prepared to strike unless the NBA recognized the NBPA and its executive director, Lawrence Fleisher, as their bargaining agents, and negotiated in good faith for a pension plan and better working conditions. Tom Heinsohn, who had succeeded Cousy as NBPA president, organized the boycott, which resulted in a quantum leap in sports labor relations. Moments before game time, NBA commissioner Walter Kennedy informed the players that the owners would meet both of those demands and the game proceeded.
It may be difficult to imagine a time in the NBA when (a) there was no minimum wage, health coverage or pension plan; (b) players were not paid for exhibition games; (c) trainers did not travel with their NBA teams; (d) no orthopedist was present at games; (e) a player was bound to the team that drafted him until released by that team; (f) players could be released or traded at the whim of an owner for any reason at all; (g) a player could not make a better deal for himself with another team once his contract had expired.
At the time the Robertson suit was filed, the average NBA player salary was still in the mid five figures. A few stars such as The Big O could earn perhaps in the low to mid six figures (the minimum for an NBA player today is more than |
$500,000), but even after the ABA began competing for draft picks, and enticing a few players away from the NBA, player movement and salaries within the NBA were severely restricted. Today many NBA players make in one month what this earlier generation of players earned in a career. "Everyone thought the ABA would pay huge salaries, but that turned out not to be the
**Four months to the day prior to the filing of the Oscar Robertson lawsuit, St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Curt Flood had sued Major League Baseball, challenging its reserve clause on anti-trust grounds after the Cardinals attempted to trade him to the Philadelphia Phillies. While the Supreme Court ruled against Flood in 1972, a year after he had retired, MLB eventually agreed to accept arbitration with respect to its reserve clause. In December 1975, an arbitrator granted free agency to pitchers Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally as individuals. The MLB player contract with the Major League Baseball Players Association was renegotiated in the summer of 1976 to eliminate the reserve clause.case," recalls Robertson. "They announced some big numbers, but most of the money was deferred. Most ABA franchises were struggling. We felt the proposed merger amounted to a bailout of the ABA without improving working conditions and wages for the larger pool of players who would now be working in the expanded NBA. On the positive side, we were also confident that paying NBA players salaries on a par with star entertainers would increase fan interest and add more value to the league’s franchises." Why were the NBA players successful where Curt Flood as an individual was not? For one thing, NBA players filed as a labor association, seeking class action status, and the association paid for the litigation. They sought injunctive relief immediately and prevailed; and they were successful in qualifying as a class in pursuing their case on antitrust grounds.
But just as Curt Flood paid a heavy price for challenging the status quo in baseball, so did
The Big O for leading the fight on behalf of his colleagues. NBA owners objected to his serving as color commentator for CBS in 1974-75 after his retirement, while litigation was still pending, and his contract was not renewed after that one season. Since then, he has never been offered an NBA coaching or general manager's position. In 1992 Oscar Robertson, along with Dave Bing, Archie Clark, Dave Cowens and the late Dave DeBusschere, co-founded the NBA Retired Players Association and served as its first President from 1992 through 1998.
Read the 1976 class action settlement: |
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Last update 02/26/2014
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