FJM has gone dark for the foreseeable future. Sorry folks. We may post once in a while, but it's pretty much over.
You can still e-mail dak,Ken Tremendous,Junior,Matthew Murbles, or Coach.
Thank Your God Of Choice That Jemele Hill Is Not In Charge Of Rigging the NBA
I'm sure when you pack up your bags and go to Official Sports Column-Writing School, the first thing they tell you is "Take a position and really argue it!" From what I've read, a lot of sportswriters are taking this rule of thumb and turning it into "Take a ridiculously, phenomenally imbecilic position and really argue it!"
(Also, as a corollary, should you ever get called out on the resulting column (say, on a sports metacriticism blog), you may claim, utterly disingenuously, "I meant for it to be controversial -- it got the Internet buzzing, didn't it?")
Now hold on one second. No. No, they shouldn't. This is an example, like many many others, of when the conventional wisdom is absolutely, one hundred percent correct. A Lakers-Celtics Finals would further reinvigorate the NBA. It would captivate a national audience like no matchup since perhaps Michael Jordan vs. Anyone. It would draw in lapsed basketball fans with fond memories of Magic and Larry in the 80's. It would feature some of the sport's biggest, most beloved and most reviled stars. Outside of Detroit and San Antonio, I imagine a poll of Americans would run something like 80% "Lakers-Celtics all the way!" to 20% "Get out of my face and stop asking me about basketball, a sport I hate!"
But Jemele Hill is taking a stand. A contrarian stand. A lousy stand. Forgive me, citizens of Easily Entertained, Need-Flash-To-Appreciate Nation for this blasphemous proposal:
Let's root for another edition of Pistons versus Spurs in the NBA Finals!
Note the immediate attack mode: if you do not agree with my ridiculous opinion, you are shallow. You are sheep. You are the Church and I am Martin Luther, here to tear down everything you thought you knew and enjoyed about basketball.
(Trying to block out the sound of 260 million people collectively groaning.)
Correctly groaning. Extremely correctly groaning. I'm hoping that suggestion doesn't make NBA commissioner David Stern lose his lunch. But if Stern could overcome his nausea at the thought of another clash of these underappreciated titans, even he would have to admit that Pistons-Spurs would be the best thing for the NBA.
Here we are with the overreaching again. You can argue that you personally prefer Pistons-Spurs. You can even argue that a fan with a refined basketball palate, a connoisseur of the game who always knows what to order from the basketball sommelier whenever he goes out to a fancy basketball dinner, should prefer Pistons-Spurs.
It's absolutely insupportable that Pistons-Spurs is the best thing for the NBA. Think about how many more kids might get sucked into a Lakers-Celtics Finals. Think of the TV ratings. The news stories. The personalities. My mom might buy a Sasha Vujacic jersey if Lakers-Celtics happens.
Full disclosure: As a Detroiter, I would love to see the Pistons in the Finals for the sixth time in my lifetime.
You don't say.
But this isn't about me. This is about the league's credibility....
The biggest NBA conspiracy theory going right now is that the league is trying to make a Boston-L.A. Finals happen, because it would mean insane television ratings and a return to the time when the dominance of those two franchises overshadowed everything else in sports.
Jemele Hill is arguing that a crushingly boring Finals matchup is better than the possibility of a scintilla of an insinuation that there potentially could be a chance that the NBA is rigged.
If this were any other NBA season, the insinuation that the league was somehow working to orchestrate the return of the Lakers-Celtics rivalry would be considered a real reach -- but not when the Tim Donaghy betting scandal is still looming....
If there are any controversial calls that favor Boston or Los Angeles, or if there are games in which either of those teams makes a ton of trips to the foul line, the CTs (conspiracy theorists) will ask: What would prevent the NBA from urging the officials to call games a certain way to ensure a Finals involving teams from two of the biggest media markets in the country?
There already has been a controversial call -- Fisher mauling Barry at the end of Game 4. The Lakers made it through anyway. Outcry is audible but not deafening. Overall, America is ecstatic (I took a poll (unscientific, sample size=five of my friends, margin of error=0%).
But if it's Pistons-Spurs, the NBA Finals will be conspiracy-free.
And viewer-free. Last year's Finals with the Spurs and Cavs drew the worst ratings in NBA Finals history with a 6.2 average. The second-worst-rated Finals? 2004, Spurs-Nets. Sixth-worst? 2005, Spurs-Pistons. Notice anything?
America hates the goddamn Spurs.
I anticipate the crybabies will complain that the Spurs and Pistons are boring to watch.
Crybabies = America.
But most real basketball and sports fans won't think that way -- just those casual NBA viewers who want it both ways. You know, the ones who deride the NBA for promoting individuals, but whine when Kobe, LeBron or some other one-named superstar isn't in the Finals. The ones who claim they love underdogs, but won't give the Pistons or Spurs a chance.
I wouldn't call myself particularly casual in my NBA viewing. I've watched 43,285.5 of the 43,286 playoff game this year (had to miss half of the Toronto-Orlando games due to massive quadruple-bypass open-heart surgery -- still mad about that). I'm fine with the NBA promoting individuals, and I think the league is better served when its most famous players are playing on its biggest stage.
Common sense, people. Don't let being a sportswriter get in the way of that.
If you're someone who grumbles that NBA players don't play defense,
I'm not.
you should root for Pistons-Spurs
even though Boston may play the best defense of the remaining playoff teams?
(although Boston may play the best defense of the remaining playoff teams).
Exactly.
If you complain you're sick of seeing NBA teams that don't play hard,
I don't.
root for Pistons-Spurs. If you love teams that win because of their commitment to team basketball, root for Pistons-Spurs.
I don't know if this is aimed at Kobe Bryant or what, but the Lakers play some of the most beautiful team-oriented offense I've ever seen. Gasol and Odom are terrific passers for big men, and everyone on the team is unselfish enough to swing the ball to the open man for a clear shot. I'm not sure Tex Winter has ever seen a team execute this pure a version of the triangle, and Tex Winter has been coaching basketball for fourteen centuries.
The Celtics are team-oriented almost to a fault. Apparently, "ubuntu" means whip the ball twenty-five feet behind you to a guy standing on the perimeter even if you're wide-open for a layup.
If you're sick of seeing basketball dominated by And-1 wannabes, root for Pistons-Spurs.
You know what I'm not sick of? Watching Kobe Bryant somehow twist his way past a quintuple-team and gently lay in a double-clutch reverse layup.
Also, watching Kevin Garnett cry tears of joy.
These are two teams loaded with unselfishness -- and they feature players who are among the NBA's best citizens.
Like Rasheed Wallace, America's greatest basketball talent who also may or may not be the homeless guy you pass on the way to work. It could be him. You've never seen them in the same place at once.
When people call Tim Duncan milquetoast, it makes me want to break kneecaps. First, Duncan is a thoughtful quote -- as are most of the Spurs. Second, Duncan shouldn't be penalized because he'd rather frustrate his opponents with precise passing out of double-teams and unstoppable bank shots, rather than trying to make the Top 10 Plays on "SportsCenter."
He's not penalized. He's considered boring -- because passing out of double-teams and shooting 16-foot bank shots are things that look more boring than things that, say, Kobe or Lebron or Chris Paul does.
Besides, unlike the Lakers and Celtics, the Pistons and Spurs didn't get to the conference finals with the help of questionable blockbuster deals. Talk about your NBA conspiracy theories. The Lakers got Pau Gasol for 10 rubles and a John Tesh DVD. And Kevin McHale forked Kevin Garnett over to the franchise he just so happened to win three NBA titles with. Nothing suspicious about that, right?
So are you pro- or anti-conspiracy theory? It seems like you actually believe that the Lakers and Celtics were rigged back into relevance, which I don't really buy. McHale and Wallace seem more inept than diabolically devious.
Seriously, maybe we shouldn't root for outcomes based solely on whether they give conspiracy theorists less ammunition. Is that really how you want to live your life?
The Pistons and the Spurs built their teams the old-school way --
By having their superstar get hurt for a year, improbably winning the lottery, and drafting arguably the greatest power forward of all time. Old school!
Pistons-Spurs -- that's what we all should be dying to see.
Except that anyone who enjoys basketball and wishes to see it continue to succeed in the United States should be rooting extremely hard for the exact opposite of that. Other than that, good job.
I don't know anything about basketball. Everytime I turn on a basketball game I say things like: "that guy plays for the Suns now?" or "there's a team in Memphis?" or "are you allowed to just, like, kick it?"
But! I know -- or I'm pretty sure -- that the Suns, Spurs, and Mavericks have better than a combined 3.7% chance of winning the NBA title. This is what John Hollinger is telling me, with his new NBA Playoff Odds Report.
The C's and Pistons each have more than a 40% chance of winning the title, and the Spurs have a .6% chance? Buh-wha? Mu-hurp? Ble-frap?!?
Been getting a lot of e-mails on this one. Let me add:
Yeah, I read the explanation. I get that it's based only on teams' performance so far.
Maybe what I should have said is: (a) does anyone really believe that the East has essentially a 8 in 9 chance of winning the NBA Title; and (b) if not (and I would hope not), shouldn't the formula be tweaked a little?
I don't really know anything about basketball. I understand there's a gentleman named Shack who's extremely good. The Dream Team is something that exists, I believe, and I know that Mark Eaton had a beard, and that Wilt Chamberlain once had sex with 100 women in one game, a record that still stands today.
The other thing I know about basketball is that the Knicks have surpassed the Chicago Blackhawks as the worst-run franchise in all of sports. And that somehow, despite several years of multi-faceted incompetence, Isiah Thomas has not been fired yet.
But don't worry. Finally, last night, Charles Dolan had a little sit-down with Isiah:
Despite back-to-back losses against the woeful Sixers, New York Knicks head coach Isiah Thomas was reportedly told by owner James Dolan that his job is not in jeopardy.
After Saturday night's 105-77 loss at Madison Square Garden where fans were chanting "Fire Isiah", Dolan continued to support his embattled coach, a high-ranking team official told The New York Post.
I ask you -- because again, I know nothing about basketball: what will it take to get this man fired?
A gentle sorbet courtesy of Kenny Smith's Eastern Conference rankings: 3. Miami Heat – Shaquille O'Neal and Dwyane Wade tasted the sweet smell of success two years ago and have the tools to get back to the NBA finals.
Oddly, the sweet smell of success actually tastes like the texture of an orchestra playing Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man." Ask Shaq about this next time you see him.
Hey, You Know What The Most Important Part Of This Enormous NBA Trade Is? Arrogance.
Listen, Michael Ventre, perennial all-NBA-er and surefire Hall of Famer Kevin Garnett just got traded. What do you think his impact will be?
Arrogance is not an admirable trait, but there are certain circumstances in which it is not only acceptable but welcome.
Correct! Exactly. The correct answer is: KG will make Brian Scalabrine more arrogant, and with an arrogant Scalabrine on the squad, other teams will cower and forfeit in terror. If you’ve watched the Boston Celtics for the past 20 years, you know what I mean. Once they were the most arrogant of sports franchises — more than any of their counterparts in other leagues, including the New York Yankees — simply because Red Auerbach was the face of their organization. And there is nothing more arrogant than having Red puff a cloud of smoke in your face after he’s handed you a whipping.
What if Mark Cuban vomited in a Broadcast.com promotional frisbee, drove over to your house, and dumped the vomit into your mail slot? Would that be more arrogant? How about if Paul Allen financed a private spacecraft, piloted it to the nearest planet with sentient life, collected the waste material of said life, drove back to Earth, and poured the waste onto your plate of fries? Is that more arrogant? I'm sorry, what were we talking about? Oh, right. Aliens. I'm for them.
Alas, Red is gone. And his Celtics’ swagger had disappeared well before that.
Back to the matter at hand. The thing they always said about Kevin Garnett: he was born swaggering. He swaggered out of his mother's birth canal. He swaggers when he sleeps. His favorite preacher is Jimmy Swaggart. Sometimes, instead of going for a rebound, he'll wink at the crowd and swagger into the locker room and put on a cowboy hat and cowboy pants. Sometimes he plays basketball, but not often.
The Celtics were only obnoxious if you liked to bathe in nostalgia.
Metaphor not working for me. Anyone else?
But in one offseason, all that has changed. The Celtics have their cherished arrogance back. They’re hateable again.
Also, they're better. At sports. Better players, you know? Not that important, but still.
Ah, forget it. We know the truth: when the Celtics come visit your home team, Ray Allen is going to strut out onto the court in a leather unitard, stride into the crowd, and insult your wife's personal appearance. Because Ray Allen is an arrogant shithead and that's what makes the Celtics good.
And the Celtics basically got Garnett for a bag of peanuts and a can of cling peaches. The T-Wolves are taking Al Jefferson, Gerald Green, Telfair and Theo Ratliff’s expiring contract. Jefferson and Green are nice players. Telfair is a waste of a good uniform.
This is wrong. Al Jefferson is neither peanut nor peach. Al Jefferson is a valuable commodity who averaged 19.8 PPG (on 55% shooting), 11.5 RPG, 1.7 BPG, and 1.1 SPG after the All-Star break. He was born the year Back to the Future came out.
In Ventre's defense, Jefferson could improve defensively and he's nowhere near the human mountain of arrogance Tim Duncan is. Although Boston will still have the little matter of surrounding those three with enough talent and depth to keep the stars from wearing themselves out, the extended forecast in New England is sunny for the first time in years.
More than their actual win-loss record, however, is the attitude. Arrogance is back. If Red were alive, he’d be so happy he could smoke.
More what than their actual win-loss record, Michael? More what?
Here I will offer some suggestions:
more important more consequential more significant more material more meaningful more influential
Or wait. I'll just rewrite the paragraph entirely.
More arrogant than their actual win-loss record, however, is their arrogance. Arrogance is king. If I had a racehorse or a fragrance, I would name it Arrogance.
And then, if I were you, Michael Ventre, I would conclude this article without mentioning basketball. Thank you for your time.
So of course I felt a little bad about mildly criticizing what basically amounted to a heartfelt obituary that Bill Simmons wrote for Dennis Johnson. Not you guys, though. A bunch of you wrote in with additional embellishments, overstatements, and just plain mistakes that Simmons made. Thanks, you heartless bastards.
Nearly all of the complaints I got centered around Simmons' hyperbole about DJ's signature play -- the post-Larry-Bird-steal layup in Game 5 of the '87 Finals. Here's what Simmons had to say (caution, extremely long):
Like everything else about his career, few remember his defining moment: The waning seconds of Game 5 in the '87 Eastern finals, when Bird famously picked off Isiah's pass and dished to DJ for the winning layup. Everyone remembers the steal and Johnny Most's call; nobody remembers DJ standing near midcourt, seeing Bird moving for the pass. Even as Bird snatched the ball out of Laimbeer's hands, DJ was already moving toward the basket with his hands up, ready to make the winning shot. From the mid-'70s to right now, I can only pinpoint a handful of players who would have instinctively known to cut toward the basket even as that steal was in the process of happening -- MJ, Magic, Frazier, Stockton, Reggie, Mullin, Rick Barry, Isiah (ironically, the one who threw the pass), Robert Horry, Dwyane Wade, Jason Kidd, Iverson, Nash, Kobe, and that's about it. Nobody else starts moving until after the steal happens. And by the way, if DJ never made that cut, Bird would have been forced to launch a fall-away 10-footer over the backboard to win the game -- which he probably would have made, but that's beside the point.
One more thought on that layup: the replay never does it justice. DJ was going full speed, hauled the pass from the left, then had Dumars coming at him from his direct right, so he had to shield the ball from Dumars, turn his body to the left and make a reverse layup that was much harder than it looked. My father and I were sitting on the opposite side of the main CBS camera, right in the tunnel where the players entered and exited (you can even see us at the end of this particular game), so you have to believe me on this one: that layup almost missed. Dumars changed the angle at the last second; DJ's layup struck the right side of the rim and somehow dropped home. Believe me, the layup was just as tough as the steal.
Whew. Now here's the play, which Simmons linked to in his article:
Notice anything? Many of you assholes did. Notably:
1. nobody remembers DJ standing near midcourt, seeing Bird moving for the pass.
When Bird steals the ball, at around 0:32 in the video, Johnson is pretty clearly standing just outside the three-point line, not "near midcourt".
2. Even as Bird snatched the ball out of Laimbeer's hands, DJ was already moving toward the basket with his hands up, ready to make the winning shot.
If you watch the video, this seems like a fairly large exaggeration. He sees the steal, then cuts. Heads-up play. He wasn't clairvoyant, though.
3. From the mid-'70s to right now, I can only pinpoint a handful of players who would have instinctively known to cut toward the basket even as that steal was in the process of happening -- MJ, Magic, Frazier, Stockton, Reggie, Mullin, Rick Barry, Isiah (ironically, the one who threw the pass), Robert Horry, Dwyane Wade, Jason Kidd, Iverson, Nash, Kobe, and that's about it. Nobody else starts moving until after the steal happens.
This is where a false premise devolves into borderline lunacy. Only those fourteen players would have cut during the steal (a thing DJ didn't really do)? As reader P.J. points out, how could he have left out Eckstein?
Also, Robert Horry? Robert Horry? You're telling me Robert Horry would have stormed the lane but say, Kevin Garnett wouldn't have. Or Scottie Pippen? James Worthy. How about, I don't know, Ginobili? The point isn't that the list isn't complete. The point is that the idea of even making such a list in the first place is sort of crazy.
4. DJ was going full speed, hauled the pass from the left, then had Dumars coming at him from his direct right, so he had to shield the ball from Dumars, turn his body to the left and make a reverse layup that was much harder than it looked.
I think the word you're looking for is "layup," not "reverse layup." Because what Dennis Johnson attempted and made on that play was a layup. A right-handed layup on the left side of the basket is not necessarily a reverse layup. A reverse layup is "A layup that's made after the shooter crosses under the basket to lay the ball in from the other side, usually because the shot might have been blocked on the original side of attack."
Again, we're still critizing an obituary here. Are people happy now? Jesus.
5. Believe me, the layup was just as tough as the steal.
Some of you passionately disagreed with this. Great.
Looking back, the main reason I wrote this post was to be the first guy on FJM to embed a YouTube video. Don't worry, everybody, baseball's in the air!
In DJ's honor, I'm going to needlessly nitpick an article written in his honor. I'm sorry. I'm a bad person. Yesterday, Bill Simmons wrote: He should have made the trip to Springfield when he was still alive. Instead, he'll be making it in spirit some day. Didn't have to be that way. If you're reading this, and you have a Hall of Fame vote and you didn't vote for Dennis Johnson the last few years, hang your head in shame.
Last fall, in an articlehe himself links to in the body of yesterday's column, Bill Simmons wrote:
So why was Dumars elected? For the same reasons most borderline candidates are: 1) He's a good guy, and 2) the voters don't know any better. But Joe D symbolizes an even larger problem. Fact is, neither Moncrief, DJ nor Dumars is a legitimate Hall of Fame choice.
The DJ stands for Dennis Johnson. I think Simmons' point was that the Hall of Fame has too many marginal guys, and he'd like to kick all the borderline members out. But paradoxically, that same lax standard is the only one by which you can argue today that Dennis Johnson truly belongs -- and Simmons not only makes that argument, he thinks anyone who voted otherwise ought to hang his head in shame.
So in the span of a few months, Simmons slams people who voted for Dumars, says neither Dumars nor DJ should make the hall, then abruptly does a 180 and slams everyone who voted against DJ.
I guess it's forgivable because a man died? Let's put it this way, on a scale of Dumars to DJ, my level of anger about this is Sedale Threatt.
In Basketball, "Intangible" Means "Good at Basketball"
Real quick:
ESPN GameNight, tonight, a little after 7:00. Freddy Coleman and some other guy, maybe Steve Czaban (though I thought he went to Fox) are saying that the thing that makes the Pistons so good is that they are maybe not the best individual players, but they work well together as a team. They have a lot of "intangibles," like not being ball hogs and stuff. So, okay. Then they say that they tried to put together a starting five from among all the players in the league, who would be the perfect "Team," the ultimate five-man Team, comprised of unselfish, smart players who would just work well together -- maybe not the best players, they keep saying, but the best TEAM. Loaded with intangibles.
Each host drew one up. Here's the first one:
G Steve Nash G LeBron James C Tim Duncan F Ben Wallace F Vince Carter
So, the Ultimate Team-with-a-Capital-T of Maybe Not the Best Guys But the Best Teammates contains: the reigning two-time league MVP, the widely-thought-of Next Jordan who finished second in the MVP voting this year, one of the best centers ever and a guy who not only seemingly always wins championships but also Finals MVPs, the like thirty-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year Award winner and rebounding champion, and a fifth guy who is awesome at basketball.
I did not hear the second starting five of Intangibly Good Teammates, but I assume it was Magic, Cousy, Shaq, Bird, and Jordan, with Dr. J, Kareem, Wilt, Teen Wolf, and Jesus Christ coming off the bench.
Several people who know far more about NBA basketball than I do have written in to make further points about Vince Carter's inclusion on the All-Intangibles Team. I am going to summarize their comments Zagat-style.
Are these people "crazy?" Vince Carter is a "whiny baby," who "literally quit on his team" and forced a trade to the Nets. What's his intangible -- "being a puss?" Or is it "not playing hurt" or "not driving the lane" or "not stepping up and being a leader?" The fact that he is on this list is a "travesty of justice" that makes the "O.J. trial look like '12 Angry Men.'" The ESPN announcers "should be ashamed of themselves."
