Working the Refs in the Court of Public Opinion
Anonymous sources, huh? Normally, I try to stay away from writing pieces of pure opinion. As I've gotten older, the Crossfire-style talking heads yelling at each other about some #HotSportsTake in an essentially content free fashion has lost what little appeal it ever had. I prefer numbers and evidence, and like talking about what works and what doesn't. And the thing which drew me to sports in the first place is there is always an objective measure of what works. It's called the scoreboard.
I contrast this to the state of political opinionating, where everything quickly become a contest of competing narratives and exhortations to "Win the Morning" to draw the most eyeballs. And this works because in many ways political junkies are pro wrestling fans who simply have different tastes in costumes. The WWE has WrestleMania, the political world has an election every year or so. But in sports, and especially sports like the NBA where there's always another game soon, there is an objective, recorded reckoning 3 or 4 times per week.
Which is why the naked in-season message-sending, politicking, positioning and score-settling bothers me so much. I'm not Andrew Bynum's biggest admirer. As a Celtics fan, it's practically genetic. But it is absurd, bordering on ridiculous that he's now subjected to a slew of articles (no links) discussing his supposed lack of passion for basketball. Similarly, Pau Gasol is "letting the Lakers down" by not playing through illness These pieces are so obviously spoonfed to "friendly sources" by the Mikes Brown and D'antoni and respective team management as a way of "getting our side out," we might as well be told that both Bynum and Pau reached for the gun
Which is why the naked in-season message-sending, politicking, positioning and score-settling bothers me so much. I'm not Andrew Bynum's biggest admirer. As a Celtics fan, it's practically genetic. But it is absurd, bordering on ridiculous that he's now subjected to a slew of articles (no links) discussing his supposed lack of passion for basketball. Similarly, Pau Gasol is "letting the Lakers down" by not playing through illness These pieces are so obviously spoonfed to "friendly sources" by the Mikes Brown and D'antoni and respective team management as a way of "getting our side out," we might as well be told that both Bynum and Pau reached for the gun
We see this trend every year, with a glaring example being this piece which was essentially Raptors (now ex) GM Bryan Colangelo trying to save his own skin by "proving" how smart and ahead of the curve his management team is while also serving to throw coach Dwayne Casey under the bus as a useful scapegoat for the Raptor's extremely disappointing 2012-13 campaign. I think Casey is one of the very worst coaches in the league, and his resistance to analytics is certainly a part of that. That said, how does giving away proprietary, value-adding information and airing the organization's dirty laundry in public serves what purpose? I mean aside from Colangelo hamhandedly trying (and failing) to save his job with a new ownership group coming in. If it took me 2 minutes after reading the article to figure it out, how long did it take Tim Leiweke, 10 seconds?
Similarly, I think Daryl Morey butchered his attempted auction of Omer Asik, in part because he was caught up in trying to appear smart (and thus living up to his Dork Elvis moniker). All the leaks and public statements about how and when Asik would be dealt seemed calculated not to make a deal happen, but to make Morey look smart. Of course, this is counterproductive, as it would have the effect of making any GM dealing with Morey look dumb. This made a "fair" deal impossible, because any acquiring GM needed to "win" the trade to avoid getting out-narratived by one of the perceived sharps.
This isn't to say that off-court events are not or cannot be newsworthy. Injury news, trade rumors and player, coach and team reaction to actual in game happenings add a great deal of contextual value to following the NBA. Even today's meltdown over the Knicks cutting their fifteenth man us newsworthy, not because it tells us J.R. Smith is a headcase (dog bites man), but because it more or less confirmed what we long suspected, that Chris Smith's employment with the Knicks was part of some bizarre quid pro quo greasing the skids for JR re-signing this offseason.
But as far as the anonymous shot-taking, this doesn't happen in functional organizations. Maybe it's a function of successful teams being happier, but it also reflects leadership from the top down. If Bulls ownership was as concerned with winning titles as with making profits by avoiding the luxury tax, we wouldn't be hearing a word about what Derrick Rose thinks about the roster construction going forward. The only exception to this rule is the soap opera that was the Shaq/Kobe Lakers, and that situation didn't exactly resolve in the Lakers' favor until they were gifted Pau Gasol a few years later.
In any event, I like to subscribe to the "Proposition" Joe Steward ethos: buy for a dollar, sell for two. Later for the rest of the BS. Make good deals; win some games. Don't tell us about how smart you are, show us. Don't pass the buck for things not working out, do your job and get your team out of it. It insults our intelligence as fans that you think we think this shit matters as much as the product on the floor.
This isn't to say that off-court events are not or cannot be newsworthy. Injury news, trade rumors and player, coach and team reaction to actual in game happenings add a great deal of contextual value to following the NBA. Even today's meltdown over the Knicks cutting their fifteenth man us newsworthy, not because it tells us J.R. Smith is a headcase (dog bites man), but because it more or less confirmed what we long suspected, that Chris Smith's employment with the Knicks was part of some bizarre quid pro quo greasing the skids for JR re-signing this offseason.
But as far as the anonymous shot-taking, this doesn't happen in functional organizations. Maybe it's a function of successful teams being happier, but it also reflects leadership from the top down. If Bulls ownership was as concerned with winning titles as with making profits by avoiding the luxury tax, we wouldn't be hearing a word about what Derrick Rose thinks about the roster construction going forward. The only exception to this rule is the soap opera that was the Shaq/Kobe Lakers, and that situation didn't exactly resolve in the Lakers' favor until they were gifted Pau Gasol a few years later.
In any event, I like to subscribe to the "Proposition" Joe Steward ethos: buy for a dollar, sell for two. Later for the rest of the BS. Make good deals; win some games. Don't tell us about how smart you are, show us. Don't pass the buck for things not working out, do your job and get your team out of it. It insults our intelligence as fans that you think we think this shit matters as much as the product on the floor.
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