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playa2
Posts: 34922
Alba Posts: 15
Joined: 5/15/2003
Member: #407
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David Stern is a dead man walking!
Posted by theredyankee on Tue Jul 24, 2007 12:52 pm
David Stern is a dead man walking!
Judging from how he conducted himself at his press conference on Tuesday, July 24, he already knows this.
Gone was the persona of confidence to the point of arrogance, the conceited dictator that all of us have come to know. Instead, there was a man who was demonstratively unsure of himself, speaking at great length and in measured words and tone, not so much to inform the public, but rather to defend and validate his own actions.
The entire press conference of David Stern was only self serving.
There is a reason for this, and that reason is that David Stern knows details of the investigation that have not yet to be made public, details that published reports indicate that Tim Donaghy is going to implicate others in a wider conspiracy.
That is why David Stern abruptly called this press conference to get his side of the story out first before Donaghy does when he turns himself in at the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse, which published reports indicate will happen this week.
In other words, instead of attempting to deal with the problem and resolve it, David Stern has personally adopted the strategy that he is going to try to hold on to his job, by waging a PR campaign in the media, framing it as a matter of credibility. On one side, you have David Stern, and his self described NBA Security Department that is staffed with FBI, CIA, DEA, and other law enforcement agents, who say that "this is a isolated case" and that "games are decided on their own merit," and on the other side, you have the lying Tim Donaghy who is trying to save his skin by falsely trying to implicate innocent others.
By placing his own personal interests above the league, by protecting the status quo instead of addressing the problem, David Stern has signaled that he views himself as being under siege, and he has absolutely no intention on surrendering, and that the only way of fixing the problem is to get him out of the Commissioners Office, and the only way that that is going to occur is if both he and the NBA is burned to the ground first.
The simple fact is that David Stern had the opportunity to do the right thing at his press conference. He could have announced what everybody else knows, that the situation has grave and serious impact upon the credibility of competition, and in order to maintain the credibility of the league, a complete overhaul of the methods and practices of officiating in the NBA will be conducted.
Instead, David Stern selectively chooses to defend and protect the status quo, and he did so only to protect himself and his legacy and perseverance as Commissioner.
The fact of the matter is that the majority of the players, fans, and those who cover the game know that games ARE NOT decided on its own merit. While this is the first known instance of fixing games from outside the league, there is overwhelming anecdotal evidence that the NBA has long placed the business interests of the game above the competitive interests of the game, and in doing so, the NBA has mandated that preferential treatment be given to specific players and specific franchises so to maximize television revenue and marketing opportunities.
Over the years, this has led the NBA down a slippery slope, where the preferential treatment given to specific players and specific franchises, which started out as both rare and subtle, has become more and more pervasive and more and more direct and more and more obvious.
The simple fact that Joey Crawford was suspended for the rest of the season and the playoffs for ejecting from a game Tim Duncan of the San Antonio Spurs, a player and franchise who have greatly benefited over the years from the standard of inequality of officiating, makes it clear that all officials understood the consequences of not conforming to the officiating standards implemented by David Stern.
This status quo created an environment where the officials were required to forgo their integrity, and do so for the financial benefit of David Stern and his business partners.
From the perspective of the officials, everyone else involved except you is getting rich off of this arrangement, the players, the owners, the networks, the agents, the sponsors, etc., etc., etc.
In that the integrity of competition and the official has already been compromised, it is only logical and inevitable for the official to rationalize the situation and decide that they are going to look out for themselves and get theirs.
On Tuesday, July 24, David Stern held a press conference and declared in effect that none of this has occurred, and he in effect told all of us to not believe what we see, we should instead believe what he says, and that the NBA is going to back to the status quo as if none of this has occurred.
David Stern has announced that he is willing to completely burn to the ground the NBA in order to protect and preserve himself and his status quo.
The owners of all NBA franchises have a decision to make, they can either assemble immediately and vote to remove David Stern from office before he can do any more damage to the game, or they can leave him in office for now, allow him to continue to damage the game, and then remove him later.
David Stern has now made one thing abundantly clear, his days are numbered, and he is done as Commissioner, and his lasting legacy will be game fixing.
The only questions in doubt are when and how he will go, and how much more damage he will do to the game before he leaves.
JAMES DOLAN on Isiah : He's a good friend of mine and of the organization and I will continue to solicit his views. He will always have strong ties to me and the team.
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7/26/2007 9:38 AM
