Some of the biggest winners of the newly ratified seven-year collective bargaining agreement are the NBA's retired players.

The new CBA has set up medical benefits for them, as a part of a much larger and improved player retirement package.

What spurred this was the shocking deaths of Darryl Dawkins and Moses Malone, both to undiagnosed heart issues. Several players spoke to Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN about the retirement package.

“I’ve said it a number of times: the biggest thing is the health insurance that we got for some of our former players and stuff like that,” said Chris Paul, the NBPA executive committee president. “No question. That was a huge priority. Well, I mean, it was a huge priority to keep the game going, first and foremost, for the fans. But at some point, one time or another, everybody out here is going to be a former player. You know what I mean? I think that shows how connected we are as a body of NBA players.”

“(Malone’s and Dawkins’ deaths) sent shock waves through the whole basketball universe,” said Dwight Davis, who played for the Cavaliers and Warriors in the late 1970s and now serves as vice chairman for the National Basketball Retired Players Association. “Some of the deaths of retired players could have been avoidable because guys didn’t have insurance and weren’t doing yearly checkups.”

“This is the first time in professional sports that this has happened,” Davis added of the NBA providing medical benefits for retired players and their families. “What it means, dollar-wise for a guy like me who is 67, steadily employed for a while, on Medicare, with this new plan, I am going to save thousands of dollars — in co-pays a minimum of $4,000 to $5,000 a year.”

While the headline-grabbers are retired players that have happened to end up in bankruptcy due to poor money management, gambling or addiction — that is not the norm for most. Retirees often find a way to keep themselves active and employed and use whatever money they have left from their NBA days as a way to propel themselves farther.

This retirement package can be life-changing for most of them, as it's helpful money, but not necessarily a “retire-a-few-years-early” type of helpful. It's what they've been asking for so many years — just fair.