How dare the speaker of the house cast aspersions on the NBA? I am probably in the minority on this board, but I never got why taxpayers should foot the bill for sports arenas for professional teams, esp. when those teams charge outrageous prices from 5 bucks for a water to $100 for a decent seat. Amazing how capitalists all become socialists when it comes to funding the wet dreams of the wealthy. To move Seattle to Oklahoma City, at the same time Stern is targeting China as the big new market, is so clueless it is beyond comprehension.

Here's the article:

http://canadianpress.google.com/article ... buS1eCxipA

Not surprising. Actually, it's pretty similar to what happened in Vancouver with the Grizzlies. Seems like it's Sterns M.O.

Worst thing is that he even threatens the city, with that comment saying that "he sees no way the league would ever return to the city".

haha, his main argument is that Seattle will never have an NBA team. His main point? "That would be too bad."

I read that a few days ago.

The point that solves all this is - The nba has to fund things like arenas for the teams, as they make obey out of it all. If teams don't have money, player's salaries have to decrease. I remember back in 1992/93, Jordan had the highest salary at 4 million, then followed by about five Centers, including Ewing, Olajuwon and Robinson, all at over 3.5 million. In the few years after that, the highest salaries exploded to now over 20 million! The fans are the ones getting charged for it all and it just doesn't make sense and will someday, sooner rather than later, devolve

It's weird, in that Stern seems to have really poor PR instincts right now. His persona is associated with the game and I bet if you did a marketing survey, it is a negative, like Bud Selig and Gary Bettman.

David Stern is a fraud as NBA Commisioner. I'm tired of learning to live with it. 7-game suspensions, technical fouls for clapping, and constant freebee passes for proven cheaters like Bruce Bowen, along with a broken system that employs crooked referees with zero incentive not to make a horrid call... it all just adds up to what can only be describe as an all-time low in the game's integrity.

Sure, David Stern is a global marketing whore that can get ratings and money, but he's seriously destroying the game that I love. "Flopping", by itself, should have been dealt with immediately. Stern cares nothing about the game of basketball and is purely a businessman. That disgusts me.

yeah, but he serves at the pleasure of the owners, so clearly he is pursuing their agenda. Or at least the agenda of a majority of owners.

coltraning wrote:yeah, but he serves at the pleasure of the owners, so clearly he is pursuing their agenda. Or at least the agenda of a majority of owners.

And that is what counts most in this corporate ruled world

migya wrote:

coltraning wrote:yeah, but he serves at the pleasure of the owners, so clearly he is pursuing their agenda. Or at least the agenda of a majority of owners.

And that is what counts most in this corporate ruled world

yup - John Lennon said it best all those years ago in working class hero, and no one has said it better:

"keep you doped on religion and sex and TV
and you think you're so clever and classless and free
but you're still ****ing peasants as far as I can see"

Or as David Mitchell said "whenever tyranny becomes accepted as ordinary its victory is assured". Now where's my hi-def TV, goddamn it!