I'll say this about David Stern. He sure can put a happy face on things when he wants to. The NBA Commissioner struck a defiant, almost testy tone with reporters this All Star weekend about the state of his league; a league in which not just a few, but many of the so-called "leading indicators" of entertainment are heading in the wrong direction.
Television ratings down 12% from last year, which were already historically low. League-wide attendance down 4% (although Stern jousted with a reporter from Detroit on this, and insisted that attendance is "flat" not "down") and that figure only counts tickets sold, not tickets used. If they kept a true turnstile count (like the NFL) you would see some eye-popping numbers that confirm what anybody who watches SportsCenter already knows: gaping expanses of good lower level seats unused for games. Two franchises are ready to bolt in Charlotte and Vancouver. Both are especially embarrassing for the league. Here's why.
Charlotte once led the NBA in attendance for nine straight years, with mostly marginal to outright awful teams. It is also in the very heart of basketball country in North Carolina. Now, they have a pretty good team, that has won 50 or more games for three straight years, and will likely be playoff bound again. Where once they drew 24,000-plus like clockwork, now it's 13,500 on a good night, as the upper bowl of the stadium is curtained off out of embarrassment.
The Charlotte Coliseum is a spanking nice place to watch a game, it's just that they only built a half dozen, very small luxury suites for corporate fat cats. It is also (gasp!) 15 minutes from the heart of downtown. The push is for a new arena downtown, with of course, lots of money-making suites. Once hailed as one of Stern's brilliant moves, the Hornets now need a stadium "buzzer beater" to avoid elimination in Charlotte.
But Vancouver takes the cake, although good luck getting Stern to come close admitting this blunder. Picked as an expansion city in 1995, it represented the NBA's hubris in the glow of the Magic-Larry-Michael run of hot dice at the pro sports craps table. Stern, wanting to further "globalize" the game, sought another north of the border team, and fell in love with Canada's version of Seattle.
At the time, the feeling was that the NBA brand was so powerful, it could melt away all the pitfalls with Canadian franchises in American sports leagues. Things like exchange rates which fluctuate wildly, taxation on salaries far beyond even the top American brackets, cultural issues and the plain fact that, excuse me, it's Canada!! No offense to our friendly neighbors to the north and their otherwise fine country, but this much is evident: even though David Stern is thinking globally, young men who dunk basketballs are most definitely not! I bet if you asked players to pinpoint Vancouver on a blank map of North America, they would have a scatter pattern all the way from Montana to the Bering Straits. And people were shocked when Steve Francis called the Grizzlies' bluff and refused to report?
But two teams getting ready to move does not a crisis make, since even the mighty NFL has that problem. What is really staring David Stern in the face is the possibility that his "business model" for the league from the '80s and '90s might be obsolete in the new millennium.
It was once pretty easy to "sell the stars" and watch ratings soar. Now, it's more complicated. The new "stars" are struggling to earn their stripes. They are coming to the league out of high school, with some very rough edges. The racial and cultural divide between players and ticket-paying customers is quickly becoming a gulf.
Most African-Americans (and anyone 22 or younger) I think, can tell the difference between hip-hop and gangster rap. Most of white "middle America" over 35, I am betting, can't. And with the cost of NBA tickets now averaging more per game than any of the four "major" sports, the most likely ticket buyer to an NBA game is still old and white, not young and black.
All that aside, the league's future could be decided on the outcome of what could be called the NBA's "Bay of Pigs" crisis unfolding as we speak in Los Angeles. The Cuban missile crisis was a crucial turning point in American and world history. So, too, is Kobe v. Shaq to this league. Right now, tensions on the court with these basketball superpowers are on "DEFCON Level 1" alert. Both have stated publicly that they wouldn't mind being traded away from each other, despite the lingering glow of last summer's NBA title. Both are pretty well dug in to their respective positions on life and basketball.
Shaq finally got the respect he deserves after eight years of some pretty hard knocks in the media about one thing or the other. The team was his. After all, who got to LA first?
Kobe points out that Shaq didn't win in LA until he blossomed. Who was there to carry the team when Shaq fouled out in the NBA Finals in Game 2? Who is the best weapon with the game on the line with under a minute to go, and not a free throw clanking liability? Kobe won't say it, but he knows he's the "Air Apparent," so don't try to stop him. Who's the man? I am. No, I am!!
Stern knows these two giants must stand down, find peace and make it back to the finals in June. Otherwise, we'll have gone three straight years in the NBA Finals, with two new teams (and no repeat teams) for the first time since 1979-'81. It's like making "DieHard 2" and "DieHard 3" but casting George Clooney and Tom Cruise in the lead for the sequels instead of Bruce Willis. Hey, when you have a formula that works, stick with it. For David Stern, the formula is to get superstars on good teams, get them to the NBA Finals where the TV ratings triple and get those stars back to the finals as often as possible.
Here's a telling stat: From 1980-89, either Boston or Los Angeles was represented in the NBA Finals every June. The Detroit Pistons bridged the gap to Michael Jordan's ascendancy with three consecutive finals appearances, including back to back titles. MJ and the Bulls then carried the league for six of the next eight years. Even losing NBA Finals teams had the courtesy of showing up for more, as Portland and Utah made several brave runs in June during that span.
As one anonymous NBA Team official said to Mark Heisler recently in the LA Times: "We were on such an incredible roll, there was admiration to the point of reverence (about David Stern). Every sport and every league said 'We've got to have David Stern.' In hindsight, we were riding Michael Jordan's coattails while we were telling ourselves, 'Boy are we good.'"
But it's not just that Stern must hope for Kobe and Shaq to return to the June stage, he has to now grapple with the angry public face of this silly feud to decide who's "the man." To most fans (whether they like the Lakers or not) the thought that either of these two young stars would want out of LA is insane! They are wealthy beyond belief, living in the league's glamour capitol, and have a string of potential championships stretched out in front of them for the taking.
Did McHale ever want to get out of Boston to get away from Bird? Worthy splitting from Magic? I don't recall Joe Dumars begrudging the number of shots Isiah was taking. All I remember was Dumars shutting down Jordan on defense. Even Scottie Pippen happily rode shotgun with Jordan, all the way to a dubious honor as one of the NBA's 50 Greatest Players. In the end, Scottie only wanted out because of money, not pursuit of rings. Even Clyde Drexler, twice denied the ultimate prize in Portland, went cherry picking for his ring in Houston and got it. Stockton and Malone defined the lethal power of twin talents working closely together.
Already, the NBA is morphing into a very expensive, loud and excessively tattooed pick-up league. Players, coaches, and even owners so regularly berate the referees, we might as well start calling our own - just like in pickup games. Free agency has prompted players to switch teams for no good reason other than a few more million dollars. Rosters are in constant flux -- just like in pickup games.
There are spectacular plays which get showcased on SportsCenter, while the other 44 minutes of dreck each night is filtered out of our sight. You can see some amazing dunks and long range bombs on the best blacktops in America as well, but you'll also see much of the same selfish, disorganized, and pitiful play that costs $75 to watch in David Stern's neighborhood.
Pick-up hoops in the city is largely a young man's game. What a coincidence, look where the NBA is headed. Yesterday's NBA stars saw a championship as a life changing, monumental accomplishment. Today's NBA stars look at it like just another chance to "run it back," as they say on the playground.
Kobe vs. Shaq may seem like a trivial little spat between two young stars, but it's not. It could be the traces of lead in the aqueducts that some say helped bring down the mighty Roman Empire. The underlying reason why the NBA is such big business, the reason why idiot celebrities scream "I love this game!" is that, for years, sports fans have bought into the premise that the players really do care about winning championships above all else.
That, at the end of the day, no amount of gold, girls, or groupies could make up for "the ring." These two numbskulls are poisoning the public's perception that there's a reason for 82 games and almost eight months of basketball every year. Once that public perception is eroded, the league is cooked. David Stern can talk all he wants about globalization, technology, the internet, and whatever else he and the boys in marketing have on their day-planners.
But when it's all said and done, fans want a good answer to the question: "So why are we playing these games anyway?"
Steve is a native Washingtonian and has worked in sports talk radio for the last 11 years. He worked at WTEM in 1993 anchoring Team Tickers before he took a full time job with national radio network One-on-One Sports.
A graduate of UC Santa Barbara, Steve has worked for WFNZ in Charlotte where his afternoon show was named "Best Radio Show." Steve continues to serve as a sports personality for WLZR in Milwaukee and does fill-in hosting for Fox Sports Radio.
