NBA (Basketball)
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my main beef is really with the league office. basically stern for dictating the policies. these refs are just calling the games how they are told to.
ever since the pacers & pistons brawl the league has been terrified of having another fight. so they have overreacted and now there are flagrant fouls and double technicals handed out for almost any "hard" foul that results in a player landing on the floor. what sucks is the refs look at the replay every time a flagrant is called and have the opportunity to downgrade the call upon review yet rarely do. a lot of times it is the way the fouled player lands that results in the flagrant, not the actual foul.
i cannot stand the double technical. it reminds me of how fights are now treated in school. the person who merely defends himself(or sometimes has the misfortune of getting hit) gets in trouble, too.
and the technicals issued for "taunting" drive me crazy. during the course of a heated game if player A dunks on player B and stares too long or talks trash he is getting T'd up. last year stephen jackson hit a big corner 3 and stared at OKC's bench as he got back on D. the same bench that was undoubtedly yelling at him, clapping or stomping the floor to try and distract him. it was in a big moment of the game but of course he got a tech.
what made basketball so great in the 80s and 90s were the rivalries. guys like bird, MJ and gary payton are some of the best players of all time and part of their legend is the trash talking. imagine if reggie miller and spike lee went at it today like they did in the 90s. the nba has no problem running the highlights to get everyone hyped for the playoffs. even though he never won a title, those battles are what reggie is known for to most people. that shit would be cut off instantly today and it sucks.
i love watching games when van gundy is doing color. he calls it like it is. last night you had steve kerr and marv albert exaggerating the physicality of the game, backing up the refs the whole time. i'm not saying the game wasn't chippy, but it would've been nice to hear steve say that some of the fouls weren't even hard, let alone flagrant. barkley wasn't having any of it at halftime, though.
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Oh man, this is so "on point." The game will never return to the physicality of the 80s and 90s. It's not even worth wasting time thinking about. I agree the Malice at the Palace played a large part in the shift of the game, but I would argue it has even more to do with the league's image problem with older generations.
My father's generation can't relate to the NBA because they view the game as "street ball." The tattoos, salaries, and attitudes don't help the problem. Obviously, this is more of a cultural issue than an issue with the game, itself; but the league has made a concerted effort to make the game more presentable. The dress code, mandatory community outreach programs, and strictly-enforced rule changes are evidence of that.
I won't dive deep into this because there are a lot of factors that go beyond the game of basketball. The NBA, like the NFL, will never be the game we grew up loving, though.
I never have any issues bad-mouthing Stern, however. Bad-mouth away, sir. And Van Gundy is indeed the best color the league has. CWebb is actually improving, too. He was rough to listen to, at first; but he is getting better.
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you are dead on in regards to the league having image problems long before and deeper than the malice at the palace. i often make a point to ask middle-aged white guys i interact with at/through work if they caught the game the other night(not league pass nerd nov-feb matchups between cleveland and boston either; games like bulls snapping heat's streak, 3OT bulls over nets, san antonio vs. golden state game 1, etc.). very rarely do i meet a guy who watched more than the sportscenter highlights.
i fully agree with your take on the reasons behind this. i love the universally accepted response of "i don't like the nba. they get paid too much and the regular season sucks(a lot don't even watch the playoffs). college basketball is better. while the ncaa tournament is very exciting, college basketball's level of play has declined and the game isn't what it once was.
my thoughts are stern are complicated. he has done so much to advance the league, but some of the stories you hear about his tyrannical behavior, bullying and corruption are disheartening. his wit and charisma are very entertaining. very shrewd businessman and a visionary. also, aside from the bullying, i don't mind having the head of a very powerful league have some vince mcmahon in him. sure makes things a lot more entertaining than bud selig.
i agree with you about c webb. i didn't see it happening but i really enjoy the stockton-webber tandem.
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^Absolutely. I didn't want to say anything because I figured you guys were tired of my Sonics rants. These guys aren't playing to lose, though.
The Kings were valued at $300 million last year, FYI. Hansen has more than doubled that.
Just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about, here is a graph of the value of one of the two spearheads for a new team in Seattle, compared to the value of the rest of the league.
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That was brutal…
Go Indy! They've at least shown they can make it a series.
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crazy game. paul george combined some incredible play with a few lapses. the pacers just couldn't afford him to make any mistakes down the stretch.
vogel has done a really fine job but he outcoached himself down the stretch.
that memphis/san antonio game the other night was pretty wild, too. it took hollins too long to stop playing TA and prince together. hopefully he adjusts his substitutions/lineups going forward cause memphis has no shot of winning otherwise. even with adjustments, memphis has little room for error. they just don't have enough good players. gasol, z-bo and conley ALL have to play good games, bayless and pondexter have to hit some 3s, darrel arthur has to play good pick-and-roll defense and hit the midrange shots he gets. san antonio can survive an off game from one or even two of their best 3 players.
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Funny how close the Pacers are to a 2-0 lead…
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And to your previous insights, jackie17, you're absolutely right about MEM's depth. That's why their starters have to play such big minutes. They just can't score without them. I think they're really regretting that Rudy Gay trade, right now.
The Spurs, on the other hand, have such an efficient offensive system that they can plug in and carry on. It also helps that Parker and Ginobli work as well together as they do independently. Splitter and Duncan are just so solid on BOTH ends of the court, too.
If MIA ends up pulling this thing out (which I still think they will), the Finals is shaping up to be an epic series.
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my favorite development of the playoffs is the combination of the spurs health/level of play ascending as the playoffs progress and the heat actually showing some vulnerability.
just got done watching the heat dismantle the pacers. what a clinic in offensive efficiency and solid D. even with that great performance, i can conceive of the spurs beating the heat in the finals. while i wouldn't put the odds very high in this happening, the odds are much higher than a month ago.
it would be great to see duncan and pop win one more championship to cap off one of the greatest runs in history.
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My good buddy is a neurosurgeon at the Cleveland clinic and lives right down the road from lebron. Here is a picture of his gate. The gate probably costs more than all our homes put together
As I'm sure you know, Cuyahoga county has been a buzz since the kings announcement to return to his homeland.
