Stern HAS to be fired...

[Court_vision]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

Bill Simmons NAILS it





For the right players, it's not about cities as much as teams, uniforms, histories, owners, fans, titles … and Chris Paul cares about the right things. He's the best teammate in the league. As much as it killed me that my least favorite team landed him, the "basketball fan" side of me loved it. Chris Paul and Kobe Bryant … together? Playing across the street from my office? How cool was that? I remember when KG landed on the Celtics, one of my Lakers-fan buddies told me, "I hate KG and I hate the Celtics, but this is going to be cool."
That's how I felt about Chris Paul and the Lakers. If you love basketball — if you truly love it — you appreciated what was happening. And it had nothing to do with the Washington Generals. Believe me.
Of course, that's not how December 8, 2011 will be remembered. Years from now, I won't remember anything about that day except for David Stern losing control of his own league. Once upon a time, it was reassuring to look there and expect to see him, and darn, he was there. It was kind of neat. Those days are long gone. The National Basketball Association has lost its way. I feel like crying.

[ProfessaPackMan]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

More crap from that clown, that's why I can never take anything he says seriously.

Especially when he's missing the whole point or just leaving out facts that don't support his case. Me thinks it's a combination of both.

But yeah anyway, we fire Stern....then what? Who replaces him and how much time would people be willing to give that person? 2K Trade logic does not apply here people so it's not like we could acquire Roger Goodell or get Paul Tagliabue out of retirement either lol.

[StankonYa]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

I'm just glad that today is my time hearing all of this...

[chelios7]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

To come directly out of a prolonged work stoppage and to immediately throw a wrench in the works and block 3 teams from making a deal they all agreed to is unacceptable. To let Gilbert have ANY part in it just makes it worse. To have talked about any of the items in the new CBA being better for the league, and then blocking a trade in the interests of the league is ridiculous. In the interest of everyone except for New Orleans, Houston and LA maybe.

I bet the Knicks and the Nets arent looking at the prospects of putting together a big three now the same way they were yesterday.

[ManiacMatt1782]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

I would say the league saved the Lakers from themselves, but I don't see Odom or Gasol being productive now. But say the trade goes through? The do not have a PF. Not even a backup 4. I think the league actually tried to save them from themselves, because despite getting the best player I feel they got the worst end of that deal.

[bigeastbumrush]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

Bill Simmons NAILS it





For the right players, it's not about cities as much as teams, uniforms, histories, owners, fans, titles … and Chris Paul cares about the right things. He's the best teammate in the league. As much as it killed me that my least favorite team landed him, the "basketball fan" side of me loved it. Chris Paul and Kobe Bryant … together? Playing across the street from my office? How cool was that? I remember when KG landed on the Celtics, one of my Lakers-fan buddies told me, "I hate KG and I hate the Celtics, but this is going to be cool."
That's how I felt about Chris Paul and the Lakers. If you love basketball — if you truly love it — you appreciated what was happening. And it had nothing to do with the Washington Generals. Believe me.
Of course, that's not how December 8, 2011 will be remembered. Years from now, I won't remember anything about that day except for David Stern losing control of his own league. Once upon a time, it was reassuring to look there and expect to see him, and darn, he was there. It was kind of neat. Those days are long gone. The National Basketball Association has lost its way. I feel like crying.

He nailed it because he wants 2 All-Stars playing across the street from his offices?

Get outta here.

If he was traded to the Toronto Raptors...would he still feel the same?

What a stupid reason.

[VDusen04]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

He nailed it because he wants 2 All-Stars playing across the street from his offices?

Get outta here.

If he was traded to the Toronto Raptors...would he still feel the same?

What a stupid reason.

I often find myself agreeing with Bill Simmons, but this is not one of those times.

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

I often find myself agreeing with Bill Simmons, but this is not one of those times.

Same. He might be my favorite sports writer, but I can't jive with this at all.

[aa2ba]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

Good points Macca...but i say this thing gets done this weekend.

Stern just looks old and clueless. He'll have to pass it at some stage to retain 'any' sort of cred...great article by Bill Simmons below:

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/...-nba-christmas

Was it the worst moment of David Stern's entire tenure? I never thought anything would top an official fixing games, but man … how can anything be worse than this? Imagine this happened in your fantasy league. Imagine spending weeks shaping a deal, executing it, then having your commissioner waltz in and say, "Nah, I'm vetoing that one." Would that ever happen? And now this is happening in a PROFESSIONAL SPORTS LEAGUE?

The above happend to me once. I left the league mid-season and don't speak to said comish anymore.

[stephenyoungchoi]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

2. In a lockout that was supposed to be about revenue sharing, competetive balance, and most of all, players no longer being able to pout their way out of town, this would have been a disaster move in principle, and allowed LAL the cap space to get Howard also. Obviously, the Lakers were stacked, and thus have the ammo to make this kind of deal, and NO would have gotten BY FAR the best deal out of all the teams that saw their franchise player walk, but again, letting another player twist arms like this would look terrible for the league. Stern had no choice.

I didnt like the idea of giving up both Pau and Lamar for 1 small PG with bad knees, but I do have a problem with what went down. It's not about competative balance, or whatever stuff people say is fair, or about adding contracts etc... it's about Stern or the other owners doing whats NOT right...
This is NOT right... they gave Demps all the power to make decisions without the league stepping in... and this trade and whatever went down is all LEGAL, and within the rules... the new CBA and what they tried todo to keep players with their teams wont work 100% of the time... it's made to discourge this type of movement, but it will happen... and if it does happen, you can't just step in and say "NO" to it...

very bad for the league...

[Haval93]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

Wow... I am embarrassed to call myself an NBA fan after what Stern just did. For anyone saying it wasn't a fair deal is completely beyond me. The Lakers were getting what they wanted, Rockets would of gotten Gasol and enough cap room to sign Nene, and the Hornets got a hell of a deal with four players and a first round pick. Hopefully Chris Paul sues the NBA because of this.

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

Wow... I am embarrassed to call myself an NBA fan after what Stern just did. For anyone saying it wasn't a fair deal is completely beyond me. The Lakers were getting what they wanted, Rockets would of gotten Gasol and enough cap room to sign Nene, and the Hornets got a hell of a deal with four players and a first round pick. Hopefully Chris Paul sues the NBA because of this.

If it's true that CP3 refused to go to Boston despite not having a no-trade clause, I think he's going to have an extremely difficult time making any sort of case.

[King_B_Mack]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

So just so everyone is clear, Dell Demps is the owner of the New Orleans Hornets, not GM, right? No seriously, that's basically what a lot of people are saying brinigng up the NBA giving him power to be in charge. Even a hands off owner for every other team in the league will allow the GM to do his thing, he makes the decisions, he works the deal with the other GM, they come to an agreement and then he takes the deal to the owner who either says yes or no. Basically what y'all are saying is that Demps...the GM mind you, doesn't have to get the final approval of a deal from the owner of the team. Cool. Basically Demps went Tony Montana with Frank's (the NBA) money while talking to Sosa (the Lakers).

[Colts18]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

Is Demps basically a fall man? I mean his name is on the operation but in the end he doesn't really have the final say? That is a question.

[wwharton]

Re: Stern HAS to be fired...

I haven't heard anywhere that Paul said he'd play for only the Lakers. I've heard that he'd be cool with the Clippers (coming from his mouth). I heard that he'd like to play for the Knicks. And I've heard that he'd like to play for the Lakers but never that he wanted to be traded there or he'd hold out.

I also heard that there was a deal with the Celtics and that he didn't want to go there because the big 3 are on their last legs and he didn't want to go into another rebuilding situation. That talk was a while ago bc a couple of days after was about how Rondo's feelings were going to be hurt bc he's so sensitive. Back then they didn't say anything about demands to be traded to the Lakers.

Either way, he still has a leg to stand on and it's the fault of the league structure. The bottom line is he can tell Boston or whoever that he won't resign if they trade for him and that's that. He does have that power being in the last year of his contract. As long as the rules work this way, players will have this kind of power. That's what makes this move so bad. Any other team, this wouldn't have happened... it couldn't. It only happened bc the league owns the Hornets. Any other team would've made the trade so they don't end up with nothing. The hornets will end up with nothing which is much worse than any description of how bad they want to make this trade seem.