300 players, exceeding the requirement for at least 260 signatures. Signature cards were sent to the roughly 440 players on rosters at the end of the previous season, as well as to the 60 rookies drafted in 2011 and to players who signed at least two 10-day contracts. The re-formation enabled further negotiations with the league on secondary issues such as the age limit for the NBA draft and rules on players being sent to and recalled from the NBA G-League. The players and owners concluded their voting on the deal on December 8, when the deal was ratified, and the lockout ended after 161 days. The owners approved the deal by a 25–5 vote, while 86% of the more than 200 players who voted approved the deal. The Miami Heat's Micky Arison and the Dallas Mavericks' Mark Cuban were the two owners who publicly disclosed that they voted against the new CBA. The players would receive 51.2% of BRI in 2011–12, with a 49-to-51 band in subsequent years. Teams were allowed a one-time amnesty exemption to waive one player and remove him from the team's salary cap. The player could be claimed off waivers by the highest bidder; the waiving team would be responsible for the remaining salary without it counting against their cap. In a rule dubbed the "Derrick Rose Rule" after the 2011 NBA Most Valuable Player Award winner, a player finishing his rookie contract could be re-signed at up to 30% of his team's salary cap—an increase from the previous CBA's 25%—if he was either a two-time All-Star starter, twice voted All-NBA Team, or won an MVP award. The maximum salary for a player otherwise would remain unchanged at 25, 30, or 35% of the salary cap, depending on the player's years of service. Racial comments Bryant Gumbel on his HBO Real Sports show in October likened Stern's role in the lockout to a "modern plantation overseer, treating NBA men as if they were his boys ... keeping the hired hands in their place". The NBA owners were predominantly white, while the players were mostly black. ESPN noted that William C. Rhoden in his book $40 Million Slaves had earlier dealt with the topic of players as "slaves" in spite of earning millions of dollars. Stern dismissed Gumbel's comments as "an occupational hazard" of being the NBA commissioner. In early November, NBPA attorney Jeffrey L. Kessler