Adam Silver was asked shortly before the NBA Draft Lottery what he's most proud of after his first full year as commissioner.

"My proudest moment is just the quality of the play. I think since we entered into this latest collective bargaining agreement, plus the revenue sharing, we're seeing a much more equalization of markets. We want teams judged by management and players attracted to markets based on their likelihood and ability to win."

The Conference Finals feature medium and smaller markets in the Golden State Warriors, Cleveland Cavaliers, Atlanta Hawks and Houston Rockets, while big market teams like the New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers missed the playoffs.

Many professional leagues are now getting involved in legal sports betting.

Last November, Fan Duel signed a four-year exclusive deal with the NBA to be their daily fantasy partner.

Draft Kings has deals with several NBA teams directly and they have a similar deal with the NHL.

During a panel at the Sports Lawyers Annual Conference on Friday, Liz Mullen of Sports Business Journal reports that a panelist said that these types of deals could raise the salary cap for players by tens of millions of dollars.

The NBA responded to an article by Kevin Draper of Deadspin that asserted the owners are calculating basketball-related income in a way that is unfavorable to the players.

Within the piece, Draper reported that the NBPA will audit the books of up to five teams this offseason.

"Today’s @kevinmdraper Deadspin post is grossly misleading and contains many false assertions," wrote the NBA communications department on Twitter.

"FACT: Roughly 1/3 of teams losing $ this year. New TV money does not kick in until 2016-17 season. As in past, all league and team audited financials will be shared w/ NBPA in collective bargaining. Avg player compensation in ’16-17 projected to be more than $8 million, roughly 50% higher than ’10-11

"Notion that BRI rules disadvantage players is fiction. Specifically...

The NBPA has decided that it plans to exercise its option to audit the books of up to five teams later this summer. The union has held this right since at least 1995, but has rarely, if ever, utilized it.

The CBA doesn't expire until 2021, but either side can opt out after the 16-17 season, with notice needing to be given by December 15.

Michele Roberts has said it is a "pretty good bet" the union will opt out.

Under the CBA, the money allocated to players comes from a pool of what is known as basketball-related income.

Players get half of this revenue, which was almost $4.5 billion last season. BRI under the previous agreement was at 57 percent for the players.

While the drop in percentage of BRI was a huge concession by the union, not renegotiating the definition of basketball-related income was possibly an even bigger mistake. The CBA has little to say on matters such as franchises owning all or part of regional television networks and arenas.

Adam Silver recently warned the players against opting out, indicating that there are other CBA items the owners want addressed. Those comments could be perceived as the league wanting to preserve the status quo and not have the players opt out to renegotiate several key items.

Sports economist Andrew Zimbalist suggests that Roberts would likely argue for a broader definition of BRI, as well as arguing that teams receiving equity stakes in RSNs is a “capitalization of an income stream,” and therefore should count as BRI. 

Update: The NBA released the following statement via Twitter:

"Today’s @kevinmdraper Deadspin post is grossly misleading and contains many false assertions. FACT: Roughly 1/3 of teams losing $ this year. New TV money does not kick in until 2016-17 season. As in (the) past, all league and team audited financials will be shared (with the) NBPA in collective bargaining. Avg player compensation in ’16-17 projected to be more than $8 million, roughly 50% higher than ’10-11."

Adam Silver gave the players a subtle warning on Sunday that opting out of the current labor agreement in 2017 would open up the possibility of the owners trying to go for their preferred changes to system issues.

"There will be things that we're going to bring back to the table, too," said Silver.

Silver was presumably referring to a hard cap, salary rollbacks and perhaps an end to guaranteed contracts.

Michele Roberts has strongly implied, more than once, that the players do intend to opt out.

"And if they do, we'll deal with that," Silver said on NBA Sunday Tip. "There were a lot of things we left on the table [in 2011]. We went into collective bargaining seeking—I don't want to get into it now—but a number of things that we didn't accomplish. And we compromised. And they compromised as well.

"If there's a feeling that we should reopen the collective bargaining agreement…hopefully, just as we have in the past, we'll work through all those issues and there won't be any disruptions in the season."

If either side wants to opt out, they have to give notice by Dec. 15, 2016.

The NBA has never been in a better position financially with their nine-year, $24 billion television deal kicking in.

Under terms of the current labor deal, players are entitled to 51 percent of the new revenue.