HOOPSWORLD | Basketball News & NBA Rumors

The players and owners haven’t made any progress toward a new collective bargaining agreement and the general consensus is that this will be a lengthy lockout. However, there are many who believe that the players will budge when their paychecks don’t arrive in November.

Noah Sheer – the Director of the Sports and Entertainment division at Cherry, Bekaert & Holland – provides financial services to many professional athletes, actors and musicians. Sheer has many NBA clients, but felt that the majority of players weren’t changing their habits in the months leading up to the lockout.

“Players are not preparing,” Sheer said in December. “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”

Now, he believes that players will be in for a rude awakening if a portion of the season is lost.

“In the NBA, players are going to feel the pain on November 15,” Sheer said. “Spending is fine right now, but many players live paycheck to paycheck and that’s when they’ll be affected. I’m not the first one to say this, but players have to be preparing for when the paychecks stop showing up.”

“This is a situation everyone hoped to avoid,” he added. “We have prepared our clients for this possibility and will do all we can to be with them in the challenging time ahead. The state of the worldwide economy touches everyone. Solid financial and tax planning is even more critical for success in these times. Taxes are the largest expense, bar none. Federal and state income, real estate, sales, excise, foreign income taxes all must be scrutinized and planned. This is our forte and often overlooked by many athletes.”

Professional athletes are expected to maintain a certain lifestyle, which is why many have such a difficult time saving money and preparing for situations like a lockout.

“The problem with a lot of athletes is that they’ve learned to live out of their means,” Sheer said. “They become so accustomed to a certain lifestyle – being able to spend $100,000 over the course of a few months, which is something the average person just can’t do. When they need money, they’re asking for enormous loans to maintain that lifestyle. It doesn’t make much sense for players to take these loans, but they feel like it’s their only option because nobody wants to be seen without any money during the lockout.”

However, if players are low on money, Sheer says that they have several options.

Because most players are still under contract, they will be able to take out loans, but they must be careful. Sheer advises his clients not to accept loans from hard money lenders. Instead, he says that a number of banks are willing to work with NBA and NFL athletes during the lockouts.

“There are a lot of hard money lenders out there that are willing to loan at ridiculous interest rates with points on top, but you come out paying upwards of 20 to 40 percent to borrow the money,” Sheer said. “There are better ways to find money. A lot of players think that’s their only option, but that’s not the case. There are a lot of banks that are talking with players in the NBA and NFL. One, in particular, is SunTrust. They’re doing a great job and if these players want to get serious, banks like SunTrust will get serious too and help them through this lockout.”

Another option for players is to revisit their tax returns and receive money that they previously missed out on.

“A lot of players aren’t involved in the preparation of their tax returns. With the amount of money that these players are receiving, they’re paying a lot in taxes and they should be getting large refunds. If a player isn’t getting a large refund, it’s because he’s not involved in his accounting, bookkeeping and tax preparation. If their accountant doesn’t know who they are, they don’t know what expenses you’ve had in the past year that relate to them being a professional athlete. You can amend your prior tax returns and, more often than not, you will get money back. Some guys went from owing money to receiving nearly $10,000 in tax refund. That’s their money – it’s just a matter of going back and looking over the expenses that relate to being a professional athlete.”

Sheer advises his clients to do something productive with their free time during this lockout. He believes that players should be going back to school, training on a rigorous program or finding other ways to make money such as camps and appearances.

If the entire season is lost, Sheer believes that a lot of players will be in trouble.

“Living off of debt is not a good situation,” he said. “A lot of players will find themselves in a bad position because they’ll be living off of other people’s money. That’s a high cost of living.”

Many NFL players have come crawling to Sheer’s firm, completely broke and out of answers. NBA players must prepare for the worst if they want to avoid a similar fate.

Taylor Excited for Free Agency: Jermaine Taylor wasn’t surprised when the Sacramento Kings waived him last month. In fact, he was expecting the news.

During his exit interview with the team, Taylor requested to be released because there simply weren’t any minutes for him in Sacramento. The Kings had a logjam at shooting guard, which is why he was inactive for nearly every game in the final month of the season.

“The whole reason that I asked to be released was because I didn’t feel like I was going to play,” Taylor told HOOPSWORLD in a phone interview. “From the looks of the roster and what happened last season, I didn’t think I was in the plan. I wanted to be somewhere I could play. I didn’t want to sit out another season so that’s why I asked to be released.”

Now, Taylor is excited to test free agency for the first time in his career. He’s hoping to sign with a team that can put him in the rotation. He has received limited minutes in each of his first three seasons in the NBA, and he hopes that will change now that he can choose the right situation for him.

“I’m definitely excited. I told my agent to look at teams that are going to be able to play me. I want to go to a team that not only wants me, but needs me. I can’t sit on the bench again. I’m tired of that. After three years in the league, I think it’s time for me to play,” Taylor said.

“I’m excited to see where I end up,” he added. “I played in Houston, then Sacramento and now I’m ready to see what’s next for me. It would be good to end up on one of these Florida teams, but it’s always a blessing just being in the NBA.”

Prior to the lockout, Taylor’s camp heard from 16 teams that were interested in the shooting guard. Now, he’ll have to wait until the work stoppage comes to an end before communicating with any of those teams.

“That’s really the hardest part,” Taylor said. “Every team is saying the same thing. They’re all telling me that they’re interested, but nobody knows what’s going to happen with the lockout. They all say that we’ll talk after the lockout. I just don’t know what’s going to happen, that’s the frustrating part.”

In the meantime, Taylor is open to playing overseas and will explore that option in the coming months.

“It’s definitely something I’m considering,” Taylor said. “Nobody wants to just sit around, we all want to play. If the lockout continues and lasts longer than November, that’s probably what I’ll try to do. I’ll go overseas and play there until the lockout ends. My agent has already talked to teams in Turkey, Spain, China and Italy.”

While his future is up in the air, Taylor has plenty of options going forward.

Stokes Transfers to Oak Hill: Last week, Fran Fraschilla worked with some of the top prospects in the nation at the LeBron James Skills Academy. He ran the players through drills and offered instruction, but he also spoke to the group and delivered a quote that may have changed Jarnell Stokes’ life.

“If you’re the best player at your playground, then you need to find another playground,” Fraschilla said.

{AUTHOR_BOX}Stokes, who is one of the top prospects in the class of 2012, decided to transfer to Oak Hill Academy yesterday and admitted that the quote inspired him to leave Central High School in Memphis.

“You should always be looking for new challenges,” Stokes told HOOPSWORLD in a phone interview. “Playing against guys you’re better than won’t help you. I’m going there for the better competition. Ultimately, I decided to go there because I know we’re going to have a great team.”

“They say once you go to Oak Hill, you’re already basically a sophomore when you get to college,” he added. “It prepares you and gives you a step ahead of the other high school players. A lot of guys will go to a high-level prep school and then end up being one-and-done. It’s definitely a big step for me.”

Rivals.com ranks Stokes as the tenth best player in the country. Oak Hill now has five players ranked in the top 100 and the group has gotten to know one another in recent summers.

“I see these guys every weekend at tournaments and camps,” Stokes said. “When I’ve been playing at things like LeBron’s camp or adidas’ camp, I’ve seen Jordan Adams, D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera, A.J. Hammons and Jordan Tebbut. I’ve also played with Damien Wilson when we were on the Atlanta Celtics.”

Oak Hill is a prestigious school that has produced NBA players such as Carmelo Anthony, Rajon Rondo, Brandon Jennings, Stephen Jackson, Ty Lawson, Josh Smith, Jerry Stackhouse and Rod Strickland. After Stokes made his decision, Anthony called to welcome him to the Oak Hill family.

“I was just amazed to hear from someone that I have admired since I was eight or nine,” Stokes said. “For him to know who I am, that meant a lot. He went to Oak Hill and I feel like I can continue the tradition.”

Stokes is one of the best power forwards in the country, but he hopes to play small forward eventually. He has drawn comparisons to Karl Malone, but is trying to improve his versatility so that he can follow in Anthony’s footsteps.

“Right now, I hear Malone a lot, but the goal is to be more like Anthony,” Stokes said. “I’m really working on my jump shot, outside skills and handles because that’s definitely the goal. He’s a mismatch nightmare. I just need to keep working my perimeter skills and being able to guard the perimeter too.”

“I think I can create mismatches,” he added. “If I have a guy that’s bigger and slower than me, I can take him outside and go around him. If I have a guy that’s smaller than me, I can take him in the post.”

Many colleges have expressed interest in Stokes, but he has six schools that are currently his favorites.

“I have a top six,” Stokes said. “I’m still wide open, but my top six are Memphis, Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky, Florida and Connecticut.”

With his high school decision now out of the way, he can use his senior year to decide on a college. Stokes is already one of the most talented players in the nation, but his coaches and teammates at Oak Hill will only make him better.

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