What is the NBA thinking allowing advertising on uniforms?

Imagine every NBA jersey looking just like this.

When I first saw that the NBA was going to allow advertisements on uniforms starting in the 2013-14 season, I was appalled.  That feeling still has not changed.  I understand that the NBA has quite a few teams struggling to put butts in the seats, but putting ads on the jerseys is not the answer.  Can you imagine seeing a McDonald’s logo on the iconic Lakers purple and gold uniforms?  It disgusts me and makes me question how much the league really cares about its fans.  We could end up having the Sacramento Burger Kings and the Chick-fil-A Denver Nuggets.  We could joke all day about crazy team names but whats not a joke is this could be a reality!  If you are a Magic fan do you want Mickey Mouse on the Magic jersey?  I know I wouldn’t if I was a fan.

Can you see Spike Lee wearing this?

David Stern is falling victim to the lower market teams struggling to break even by giving them upwards of 100 million dollars a year in extra revenue.  What is even sadder to me is that NBA ratings were up 28 percent this year and popularity is booming thanks to LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Kobe Bryant.  David Stern you CANNOT sell out the sanctity of league uniforms for cash.  If you start putting ads on uniforms where does it stop?  Do we see an Apple logo on the ball?  Maybe Wal-Mart written straight across the backboard?

David Stern should have told all of the struggling owners not making money that if they want ticket sales to go up, put a better product on the court like the Oklahoma City Thunder.  If Oklahoma City, Oklahoma can sell out every game why can’t Detroit?  There is no reason whatsoever, except the quality of the product on the court.  This move is also going to kill jersey sales.  Who is going to want to buy a jersey of their favorite team with a giant corporate logo on it?  I know I wont be buying an NBA jersey with an ad on it.  Think Spike Lee will be wearing a Knicks jersey that saying Sony across it?  I bet he will be wearing ad-free “throwback” jerseys just like me.

Dear Commissioner Stern, please reverse your decision to allow ads on the jerseys and think of the fans.

Question of the Day: 7/17/12

Will “Team USA” men’s Olympic basketball team go undefeated?

POLL: Who Will Win the NBA Championship?

The NBA Finals start tonight with match-up between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Miami Heat.  I picked these two teams to meet in the Finals and picked the Heat to win it all, but right now I’m not so sure of what the outcome will be.  The Thunder lead their “Big 3” of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden against the Heat “Big 3” of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.  Durant (True MVP) vs James (MVP Winner)  Who’s your pick?  Feel free to leave a comment to explain why.

 

The Portland Trail Blazers Horrible Management Decisions

I think it’s a joke that everyone always tries to knock the Portland Trail Blazers on their decision to draft Sam Bowie over Michael Jordan.  That wasn’t a bad choice, mostly attributed to the fact that the Blazers already had a very good player at SG in Clyde “The Glide” Drexler.  Since Drexler was on the team, it wasn’t necessary to draft a similar player, so let’s not even go into this scenario.  I want to talk about the bad moves lately.

I want to talk about the decisions the Blazers made 5 years ago around the 2007 NBA Draft.  Prior to the draft, the team had a pretty good core of young and veteran talent.  Their starting lineup when healthy featured Zach Randolph, Brandon Roy, Jarrett Jack, Ime Udoka and Joel Pryzbilla, as well as bench contributors in LaMarcus Aldridge, Travis Outlaw, Martell Webster, Jamaal Magloire, Juan Dixon and Sergio Rodriguez.  Looking at that team you could tell they were talented, but still young and missing a piece or two to really contend with the elite teams, which was evident by their 32-50 record that season.

Zach Randolph had some issues, but he produced on the floor, but just needed some help.  Roy, Jack and Aldridge were young with plenty of upside and Pryzbilla, Magloire and Raef LaFrentz were good enough to get the job done at center.  Therefore, when the draft came up the decision should have been a simple one.  Kevin Durant!  Durant was much better than Udoka, Outlaw and Webster by far, but on the other hand Greg Oden was not a lock at the center position with Magloire and LaFrentz having a better offensive game and Pryzbilla a solid big man.  Oden was an injury and foul trouble prone, shot blocking center with a very limited offensive game.

Instead of drafting the scoring machine they chose to go with the bench warmer and to top it off, they decided to trade their best player at the time in Randolph.  The Blazers traded Randolph along with Dan Dickau and Fred Jones to the New York Knicks for Channing Frye and Steve Francis.  The move was made so that Aldridge and Oden could get more playing time and develop, but the team didn’t improve overall just the play of Roy and Aldridge which led to a better record.  The addition of Steve Blake didn’t hurt the process either.

Durant averaged 20 ppg and started 80 games for the Seattle SuperSonics/Oklahoma City Thunder as a rookie.  Oden missed the entire season due to injury and has only played in 82 games (1 full season) in the past 5 years.  The knock on Durant coming out of Texas was that he wasn’t strong enough to play with the “men” in the NBA, yet he proved those doubters wrong from Day 1.  If Oden was the type of prospect that Dikembe Mutombo or Patrick Ewing was, maybe I could agree with the pick, but he wasn’t even in the same league as Tyson Chandler coming out of high school.  Therefore, I feel that was the dumbest decision the franchise has ever made.

Just sit back and imagine a team including Roy, Durant, Aldridge and Randolph for the past 5 years and how far they could have went with some solid role players.  I definitely feel that was the direction the team should have went and had they moved in that direction, the franchise wouldn’t be rebuilding right now, not including the unfortunate matter of Roy’s early retirement.  The years after this draft have proved to be too hard to overcome and shows what can happen to a sports franchise with one bad decision.

2012 NBA Season Awards: My Thoughts

The NBA awards for the 2012 season have been given and I want to share my thoughts on them.  I can’t say that I agree with all of them either.

 

Most Valuable Player: LeBron James – Miami Heat

I completely disagree with this, because I feel that Kevin Durant and Tony Parker were much more important to their teams this season.  Yes, LeBron had one of the best overall seasons statistics wise, but his team just has too much star power for him to even be considered EVER in my opinion.  LeBron had the stats, but he still doesn’t show the ability to be the go to player in clutch situations.

Durant led the NBA in scoring for the 3rd season in a row as well as having one of the league’s top records.  His downfall in this voting was Russell Westbrook, because coming down the stretch of the season Westbrook just started shooting far too much.  Durant was the runaway winner throughout the season, but somehow the voters view of it differed from mine.

Tony Parker, on the other hand led the Spurs to the NBA’s best record even with the aging Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili missing time with injuries and “rest.”  Parker easily had the best season of his career on a team that not many felt had a chance to be that good this season.  I think both Durant and Parker should have had more votes than James, especially because Dwyane Wade had such a great season as well.

Coach of the Year: Gregg Popovich – San Antonio Spurs

This is a tough call for me, because Popovich had a great season.  The Spurs overachieved with the older players they have and no one really expected them to have the best record in the NBA (tied with Chicago Bulls).  The problem with Popovich winning this award with me was the fact that the Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau led his team to the same record and without reigning MVP Derrick Rose for most of the season and Richard Hamilton for many games as well.  That fact alone should have made Thibodeau a runaway winner for the COY, but he won last season and the NBA is too political.  Therefore, they didn’t vote him two years in a row.

6th Man of the Year: James Harden – Oklahoma City Thunder

I agree 100% with this selection.  Harden is by far the best bench player in the NBA and could easily start for every other team in the league.  Lou Williams of the Philadelphia 76ers was very important to their team, mostly with his scoring abilities.  Jamal Crawford of the Portland Trail Blazers and Jason Terry of the Dallas Mavericks also gains consideration every season as well.

Most Improved Player: Ryan Anderson – Orlando Magic

I agree with this selection.  Anderson had a very good season both scoring and rebounding.  He opened things up for a lot of players on the team especially Dwight Howard.  He also led the league in 3 pointers made.  I think that Kyle Lowry of the Houston Rockets would probably have won if he stayed healthy.

Defensive Player of the Year: Tyson Chandler – New York Knicks

I completely disagree with this selection more than the MVP and COY awards.  Serge Ibaka was by far the best defender in the NBA this season.  He led the league in blocks and made every team think before coming into the paint.  Chandler wasn’t even the best defender on the Knicks this season.  Iman Shumpert was a much better defender, especially on the ball.  The NBA voters need a do-over on this one.

Rookie of the Year: Kyrie Irving – Cleveland Cavaliers

This was the easiest decision for the NBA this season, since there weren’t any other rookies that could even be in the discussion with Irving, except maybe Ricky Rubio, but he missed most of the season with his injury and his numbers still weren’t in comparison.  The Cavaliers replaced LeBron with a very talented and exciting player to watch.  I’m not comparing the two, but the franchise is headed back in the right direction.

Kevin Durant will be All-Time Leading Scorer!

Source: The Sports Hound via AGAMEMAGAZINE.com from June, 2011

 

WOW!!! That’s a pretty bold statement and YES I said it. Looking at this from both a fan’s perspective and a basketball player’s perspective, I can easily see this happening.  Let’s look at the numbers and where Durant is compared to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (who is #1 overall):

Abdul-Jabbar          Durant

1,560 games           314 games

38,387 points          8,128 points

Due to the fact that Durant is a pure scorer and a good amount of his points will be from 3 point range, that amount of games will not be matched.  4 years into his career (still only 22), he’s missed only 14 games so durability I don’t think is in question.  His first season he averaged only 20.3 ppg, but now has a career average of 25.9 ppg.  Durant is still so young and has a lot to learn, so he hasn’t reached his peak yet.  He will become better, stronger and work on his post game as his career moves forward.  He is also the purest scorer I have seen in my lifetime.  He makes it look easy, because of his touch and his range.

Abdul-Jabbar shot a career percentage of 72.1% from the foul line averaging 5.9 attempts per game.  Durant averages 88.2% averaging 7.9 attempts per game.  That right there is a large advantage, because Durant not only gets to the line a large amount of times per game, he also makes a large amount.  We can expect his attempts to go up as he matures as a player.  Durant also shoots 35.7% from 3 point range and that is expected to go up as well.  I think he’ll realize what Dirk Nowitzki realized and shoot higher percentage shots more often than taking the long 3 pointer.  It all comes with maturity.

By the time Durant hits the age of 27, I think he’ll have his game figured out and score 32 ppg easily.  He plays in a smooth manner which would allow him to play the same game even as he gets older.  He’s not the most athletic guy out there, he doesn’t jump out the building, he’s not gonna blow by you with ease, but he will put points on the board.  Because I feel that he will have about 4 to 6 seasons during his peak that he will average 32+ ppg, he will not need to play as many years as Abdul-Jabbar, nor the amount of games.

Look at the numbers.  Look at the player.  Think about it.  I have.  When it happens just think back to when you read this and say WOW, he was right!

What I learned from the Clippers vs Thunder game

Wow, that was one exciting game last night.  It was controlled from the Clippers early on and once they got rolling it was tough for the Thunder to come back.  I want to cover a few different things for each team on my feelings for the teams and the rest of season.

Los Angeles Clippers:

If the Clippers continue to mesh and play together they can easily compete for a championship.  Chris Paul is still learning his teammates, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan included.  The alley oops are gonna continue to come more frequently and they are going to know where everyone is on defense as well.  Whether or not they continue to shoot at such a high percentage overall as well as the 3-point line, they will win games.  I do think that the bench needs more production from guys like Randy Foye and Ryan Gomes.  Mo Williams has been the only consistent part of the bench play.

Chris Paul has to continue to make smart decisions and know when to take over and when to get his teammates more involved.  He was perfect last night in his decision-making.  The team also doesn’t seem to care who takes the shots, they looked for the open man even when guys were hot…..they made the extra pass.  As long as they keep playing with that mindset, the talent alone can take them deep into the playoffs.  I do think Jordan needs another big behind him for their match-ups with the Lakers, Nuggets and Spurs.

Oklahoma City Thunder:

Russell Westbrook is so talented and explosive it’s beyond belief, but he may be the downfall of the Thunder.  His decision-making is still lacking and there is no reason “EVER” that anyone should shoot more shots than Kevin Durant, especially when Durant is shooting so well.  That is a major problem when you have probably the purest scorer in the history of the NBA.

Another major problem with the team is their turnovers.  They turn the ball over way too much.  They also need Thabo Sefolosha in the starting lineup for his defense and James Harden just didn’t look comfortable in the starting lineup.  He looked confused and a little nervous on what his part was in the game.  Coming off the bench he has the green light to fire away, but he seemed too passive next to Durant and Westbrook.

At the end of the day, the Thunder are explosive and will be in the mix when it’s all said and done.  They have some things to work on, because talent alone isn’t enough to win it all.  The Clippers are in the same boat.  I expect to see both teams late May.

P.S. Blake Griffin posterized Kendrick Perkins!