Dumbest Ad Placement Ever

SIR - I have no idea what your marketing department is doing. Why is one of the world's most respected and smartest publications spending ad dollars on one of the world's least respected and dumbest sites?



YFBFB

David Stern's Off-Season To-Do List

Well, the season is over. The Spurs ruined King James' ascension to the throne, at least I think they did, apparently only 10 people saw this happen. The draft went mostly as expected with Grandpa Oden giving hope to Blazers fans for a championship in 2015 and Durant going to Seattle where Sonics fans will get all hopped up on espresso just in time to watch their team get into the lottery again and move to Oklahoma. And only Knicks fans could be jumping for joy by acquiring a player who is best known for punching out a teammate and having sexual assault charges filed against him. So now, it's the off-season, time for the capo di tutti capi to step back and take a look at how best to move forward. Lucky for him, even though he keeps refusing to give me a job, I'm going to handle his to-do list. David, if you're listening, you know how to reach me (the email link).

1. Ban Nate Robinson - Let's run down Nate's career accomplishments. Ruin two dunk contests? Check. Start a bench clearing brawl? Check. Do I need to do anything else to make my case here? This guy is worthless, ship him to China where he can dominate in the low post and leave me the hell alone.

2. Trade KG (to the Lakers) - KG has gots to go. It is ridiculously unfair to KG, Minny fans, and NBA fans the world over that one of the league's brightest stars that exudes everything the league wants to promote (teamwork, loyalty, personality, reverence for the greats, skills, heart, no off court troubles, etc) is trapped in the vortex of the McHale Management System. Stern has evoked the 'best interests of the league' authority before, he needs to do so now. KG needs to be moved, and he needs to be moved to somewhere that we, as fans, want to watch him. Phoenix? Ok, but it's not that different than having Amare there now. LA is the answer. Bigger than the draft, bigger than the finals, bigger than KG, Kobe has been the biggest NBA story since LeBron dropped his 48 special on Detroit. The Lakers are the big show in the NBA (deal with it, Knicks fans), and if Kobe is gone, the Lakers are the new Clippers. Which makes the current Clippers something to be determined later. Kobe + KG? That is something that not only NBA die-hards would want to watch, but it would bring casual fans back into the mix. Make it happen.

3. Promote the draft - Is there a draft in sports that has a bigger immediate impact on a team's future than the NBA's? I don't think so. Is there a draft in sports that has anywhere near the potential for unintentional comedy in the form of insane outfits or interviews in horribly bad English? I don't think so. With only a 5 minute interval between 1st round picks, names you know if you're a fan, the fact that these guys will make a difference next season, and a packed house of angry Knicks fans, the NBA draft has become must-see TV. It needs to be promoted as such. Move that puppy to Friday night, where losers like me that obsess over the NBA will be available to watch it. Now if you really want to spice it up, what you do is hold the lottery at the beginning, give the teams 1 hour to get their ducks in a row and let us watch some GMs make panic deals, and have at it. They can do their scouting and work-outs in advance, but nobody in the lottery will know where they are picking until that night. And give us unedited access into the war rooms for that hour. 20 execs chain smoking and cursing as they feverishly make decisions that will make or break their careers? That's entertainment. Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself, but the draft is too good to not push.

4. EBA - Unlike the NFL which just folded up the tent on it's European league, the NBA can thrive there. We've already got an influx of modern Eurobred stars in the likes on Nowitzki, Gasol, and Parker, and we have the NBDL. So why not open up 12 teams across the pond and put FIBA and it's worthless trapezoid out of it's misery. Basketball has already proven to be a viable commodity in Europe, and with the right marketing, it could take the place of soccer in the hearts of the Euro youth. Yeah, yeah, I know what you're thinking, "Soccer has been the #1 sport over there since time began. That will never change." Well, you're wrong. Remember, only 30 years ago our 'national pastime' was baseball. Now it's football. Go to any high-school in America and ask the kids who their favorite athlete is, I bet you it's not a baseball player. The skill-set is so similar to soccer, but in basketball there is actual scoring. You know, putting the ball in the net. And I don't care what you say, there is not a goal in soccer that can do for me what someone throwing down a vicious dunk on a 7 footer does. Global TV and the internet now allows anyone anywhere to watch Kobe drop 80 points, and it's hard not to love that. The Euro kids may have loved soccer for generations, but now they can watch D. Wade in real-time, or at least on demand the next day. It's not that hard of a sell. Ship the NBDL players over, sign some big Euro names, and have at it.

5. Fix the dunk contest - Luckily, if step one is followed and Nate Robinson is out of the league, we're halfway there. The dunk contest used to be one of the greatest spectacles in all of sports. No one that watched Jordan vs 'Nique was ever the same. Nike is a household name because of it. Spud Webb gave every short kid hope. Vince Carter reminded us why we love it. Now, yawn. So here's how we fix it. Get the shoe companies to include it in star player's contracts. Why doesn't Nike require Kobe and LeBron to show up for this? Give a real prize. NBA players don't care about $10k or $50k, so pony up $100k to get them interested. Make it work as follows. 8 guys, 3 chances to make a dunk (sorry, Nate). First and second rounds you get 2 dunks, highest cumulative scores advance. Final round you get one dunk, so you better bring it. Oh, and make sure to invite this guy.

6. T for Flopping - I love the globalised NBA. Not sure who it was, but when Cleveland won the East, one of the ESPN guys said "where else could you see a black inner city kid from Ohio jumping into the arms of a 7 ft white Lithuanian?" I think that's a beautiful thing. I love Varejao's hair, Manu's recklessness, Dikembe's finger-wave, Dirk's fixation on the Hoff, and everything else. But you know what I can't stand? The flopping. Maybe it's called 'gamesmanship' on the soccer pitch around the world, but on American playgrounds it's called "being a punk bitch" and it needs to stop. I'm tired of watching an offensive player try and make a move to the basket, only to have a whistle blown because someone with a last name I can't spell took a dive like an extra in a Jet Li movie. It may be hard to officiate properly, but NBA refs need to start callings Ts for flopping. Although this will put the Vlade Divac Camp for Kids out of business, it will improve the game. After a 1/2 season or so of fouling out on a regular, Manu will learn the difference between true man to man defense and hopping in front of a guy and acting like he got sucker punched on contact.

7. Stop the Ticky-Tack - Right next to the flopping, I'm tired of the ticky-tack calls that do nothing other than disrupt the flow of the game. Nobody wants to watch NBA players shooting free throws, unless it's Shaq and then it's just for shock value. 24 second violation but the other team has the ball? No whistle. Offensive player lunges into the defender to draw the foul without making a legitimate effort to get off a good shot? No whistle. 2 guys battling it out down low clean and hard? No whistle. Just let these guys do what they do best, play basketball.

8. Ban the Jump-Step - I'm looking at you, Mr. Iverson. The jump step is not one step, it is a jump. You jump up and come down with the ball, that's a travel. Plain and simple.

9. Stop the Music - Did you watch those Golden State games this year? Ever watched a game on ESPN classic from before 1990? Did you say to yourself or whomever you were watching with "Wow, the crowd is so loud. How come NBA crowds aren't like that anymore?" It's because of the music. Once the owners finally learned that the NBA was a 'hip-hop' league, they got the idea that we all need the newest 50 cent song blaring over the speakers during the game. Well, we don't. Side note- I love hip-hop, this is not a musical preference thing or a race issue so don't take it as such. Outside of a little "De-Fense! De-Fense!", once the game is on, the speakers should be off. Trust me, the game becomes so much more enjoyable. You hear the coaches, you hear the players reacting to what's happening, and you get trash talk. Yummy yummy trash talk. And when it's really good, you hear none of that because the fans are screaming so loud you can't even hear your own shouts. It also makes the fans more knowledgeable about the game itself, which in turns creates a greater love for the sport. Watch old games in the Boston Garden and listen for when the fans react and what they react to; they knew their basketball. Today's fans don't, unless they're in Golden State.

10. Flexible TV Scheduling - We all know that sports money is made on TV, not the ticket gate. The NFL did a great job of implementing flexible scheduling this past year, and the NBA needs to follow suit. Why should I watch a late season game between Washington and Cleveland when Arenas and Butler are injured, the Cavs are set in their place, but there are 2 spots up for grabs in the West that night? Give us the games we want to watch, and don't make decisions in August for what I'll be watching in February. Hell, use the internet. A week before the games are to be played, open up fan voting and let us decide what games should be televised. It might, I don't know, increase ratings.


Check ball, Stern. YFBFB