Representatives for NBA Players Vote to Decertify Their Own Union

In a move to spur negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement, the National Basketball Assn. Players Assn. voted unanimously Friday night to withdraw as the exclusive bargaining agent for the league’s players. The union also agreed not to strike or boycott this weekend’s All-Star game.

Players’ union general counsel Larry Fleisher said the vote by the player representatives from the 23 teams does not mean the end of the union, only its withdrawal as the labor bargaining agent for the players.

A majority of the players must still vote to validate the decertification process before it takes effect. Fleisher said the player representatives also agreed not to strike or boycott Sunday’s All-Star activities or the playoffs, which had been announced as one of their options.

Charles Grantham, executive vice president of the union, said the players’ suit currently on file in federal court would “continue full blast. But since there will be no collective bargaining agreement--the whole notion of labor antitrust exemptions assumes a collective bargaining agreement and a union--this should put us in a better position with this suit.”

Fleisher and Grantham initiated the idea of withdrawing the union as the collective bargaining agent as a way to prevent the NBA from continuing what the union considers restraints on player freedom.

In the lawsuit and in failed negotiations with the league, the union had sought the end of the college draft, the salary cap system and the right-of-first-refusal free agency system.

The former agreement expired at the end of last season.