A little more than a week ago, the Melbourne Tigers sent shockwaves through the Australian basketball community with their announcement that Boomers point guard Patty Mills would be plying his trade in a Tigers uniform - at least until the NBA lockout was over.

Talk about a coup for Australian basketball.

In the time since, there has been talk of other NBA stars joining the NBL revolution during their imposed hiatus, highlighted by the prospect of Andrew Bogut joining the local league.

It appeared a win-win scenario, the Tigers added an import who automatically slots into the ranks of top-5 players in the league; and the NBL got the type of widespread media coverage and hype that it has sorely missed in recent history.

Yet, Daryl Corletto's defection to the NZ Breakers has thrown a spanner in the works for the Melbourne Tigers.

As reported exclusively by BackPageLead's Daniel Eade today, Corletto has walked out on the Tigers. After spending a decade at the club - and playing 277 games - 12 days ago Corletto was unceremoniously dumped from the Tigers playing squad.

What was behind the benching of a franchise favourite?

The Tigers needed an extra roster slot to fit in their brand new recruit in Mills, and Corletto was in his spot. The veteran was in the wrong place, at the wrong time.

It is believed that the Tigers' decision to bump him sideways was the reason Corletto chose to take his talents elsewhere. Who could blame him? Corletto stuck with the Tigers through all of the ups-and-downs of the past decade, only to be dumped, as the league appears to be on the verge of resurgence.

But at the same time, it's hard to blame the Tigers. Signing Mills was a unique opportunity to greatly improve their playing squad, while enjoying a huge spike in media coverage.

However, the sting could very much be in the tail for the Tigers.

In the past few days, optimism has risen that the NBA lockout might not be as dire as we thought.

The NBA and the NBPA have met twice this week, in meetings that NBA Commissioner describes as "intense", when speaking to ESPN.

Chris Sheridan - one of the most highly regarded NBA writers - wrote on Tuesday that the sides are much closer in their negotiations than it appears from the outsiders' perspective. Sheridan is so confident, that he even timetabled a possible timeline for the agreement being reached, that would allow the NBA league to start as scheduled.

That deadline is that a deal could be ratified by October 19 at the latest.

This is very bad news for the Melbourne Tigers.

The Tigers are set to tip off the NBL season on October 7, just 12 days before the proposed NBA deadline. Assuming that the NBA and the NBPA reached an agreement on their new collective bargaining agreement on October 19, which would mean that the marquee star would only feature in two games, maximum.

Mills has an opt-out cause in his contract, allowing the Portland Trailblazers to immediately rejoin his NBA squad, as soon as the lockout ends.

In the wake of Corletto's decision to walk out on the club today, Melbourne will be hoping that the NBA lockout runs well into the NBL season. If not, they could end up with the scenario that they sacrificed a team stalwart and fan favourite, for just two games from an NBA-star.

Suddenly, the risk of the Tigers move has become more apparent. It is a gamble that might produce no winners.