Monday Insider

[Guest]

Making peace with

the game of basketball

by Chad Ford

Send an Email to Chad Ford

Also Below: Kidd, Duncan still courting each other | KG looking for a sidekick | Magic: Hill may not be coming back | Peep Show

ATLANTA -- David Stern might not want to believe this. But the NBA has had a rough couple of months. From sagging attendance, to players and coaches who prefer boxing to boxing out, to a luxury tax system that is preventing top teams from staying competitive, all has not been well in the NBA.

Stern's task isn't an easy one. He really has one shot each year, the All-Star Game, to convince the world that despite the league's regular-season hiccups, there's a larger, much more positive picture out there.

On Saturday, Stern, along with union chief Billy Hunter, gave us the first sign in years that labor peace was possible. On Sunday, Stern was back at it, stumping for his league. He was on Crossfire, ESPN's Outside the Lines, and just about every other program that would give him the time of day, trying to convince the masses and the media that the NBA's flaws are heavily outweighed by it's strengths.

MJ closed out his All-Star career with a 20-point effort.

Yes the league has problems. The NBA may have the most talented athletes in the world, but they're also the most spoiled. The average family of four can no longer afford to attend a game. Violence and selfishness both on the court and off threaten to drive away even more paying customers.

Stern is a master salesman, but as good as he is, he knows as well as anyone that it won't be the commissioner that sways the average fan. The future of the NBA, for better and for worse, ultimately is in the hands of the players.

So here we were in Atlanta on Sunday night with so much more on the line than should even seem possible in an All-Star Game. Michael Jordan is going away, for good this time. The future of the NBA now rests squarely on the shoulders of the most talented young players -- Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, Allen Iverson, Kevin Garnett, Vince Carter, Tracy McGrady, Yao Ming and a slew of future All-Stars.

The proverbial torch has been passed.

"I leave the game in good hands," Jordan told fans in a halftime ceremony. "So many stars, great stars still in the game, so many great stars rising and playing the game. I have passed on the things that Dr. J and some of the great players -- Magic Johnson, Larry Bird -- passed on to me. I pass on to these all-stars here, as well as to the rest of the players in the NBA."

The kids finally have to grow up. Whether they like it or not.

"I'm in no hurry to see greatness leave," said Garnett. "I think these are the times that we need to cherish."

"It's not possible to fill Michael Jordan's shoes," Iverson said Sunday night. "It's going to take the efforts of a lot of guys ... Once Michael Jordan walks away from the game, the pressure is now on us to keep the league successful."

On Sunday night, they took a huge step in the right direction. A brilliant 155-145 double-overtime victory for the West was more than entertaining basketball. It was real, fiercely contested basketball. It was a statement from both the old guard and the new guard about the state of the game.

For once, the All-Star Game was about everything that is right with the NBA. Respect. Passion. Vision. Hope. Four qualities that have been in short supply in the NBA in these troubling times.

Michael Jordan can go home now and "feel at peace with the game of basketball." And for once, at least for one brief moment, so can we.

A torch has been passed

Jay Mariotti / Chicago Sun-Times

The Last of the Dreamers Is the One, and Only, Jordan

Michael Wilbon / Washington Post

From Air to Yao, history's hard to script

Fran Blinebury / Houston Chronicle

Like Mike still a good thing to be

Terry Pluto / Akron Beacon Journal

Kidd, Duncan still courting each other

The coming of age of some of the NBA's brightest young stars wasn't the only story coming out of Atlanta on Sunday. Here's what we've been hearing . . .

Jason Kidd looks like he's ready to bolt the Nets for the Spurs this summer. Sources told Insider that he's been buddying up with Tim Duncan all weekend and has hinted to several players, for the first time, that his decision will be between New Jersey and San Antonio.

Couple that news with the fact that the Spurs recently discontinued talks with the Hawks about Shareef Abdur-Rahim (his contract would've prevented the team from signing Kidd) and his comments to the media this weekend concerning the Spurs and Duncan and the writing may be on the wall.

While Kidd insists that he's happy in New Jersey, he says his decision will be based on which team will give him the best shot at winning an NBA Championship.

"San Antonio happens to be one of the teams ... that I feel that I can help that team win a championship," Kidd told the media. "But we have to see come July 1. . .It would be hard to turn down playing with a big man like Tim Duncan. ... But I'm happy with the guys that we have in K-Mart [Kenyon Martin] and R.J. [Richard Jefferson] right now. But come July 1, I will see what the Alamo has to offer."

The big question is, will it be enough? The Spurs do have the reigning MVP, but little else in terms of young talent. Their other best player, Tony Parker, happens to play point guard. While Duncan believes the two could play together, more likely the team would try to package Parker in a trade to bring in some more low-post help. However, that will be difficult considering that Parker will make just $856,000 next season.

Other than Duncan and Parker, the only other players signed for next season are small forward Bruce Bowen, rookie two guard Emanuel Ginobili and sixth man Malik Rose. If the Spurs max out Kidd and Duncan, there won't be enough cap room left to add any more top talent to the team.

Is a combo of Kidd and Duncan enough to get it done in the West?

"That's a tough call," one Eastern Conference executive told Insider. "They're already playing well without him. But they could use some more young talent. The thing that's nice about New Jersey is they have some nice young pieces like Kenyon and Jefferson. If they could get a nice young big for Parker, but I'm not sure they'll have enough flexibility to get anything else done. If they don't find a legit center somewhere to back-up Duncan, they'll really be hurting."

KG looking for a sidekick

After months of heavy lifting for lone All-Stars like Kevin Garnett and Tracy McGrady, it was finally nice to have some help for once.

Kevin Garnett

Small Forward

Minnesota Timberwolves

Profile

2002-2003 SEASON STATISTICS

GM PPG RPG APG FG% FT%

49 22.0 12.8 5.7 .488 .766

Garnett, fresh off winning All-Star Game MVP honors, made a point of saying we'd see more games like that (37 points, 9 rebounds) out of him if the T-Wolves would just surround him with more talent.

"I think you put talent around any other kind of talent, things happen," Garnett said. "I'm not a GM. I don't really make any decision or anything like that. You look at a lot of teams, and that's what they have, a lot of talent, and that's why they are successful."

Garnett has shouldered much of the blame for the T-Wolves inability to get out of the first round of the playoffs. KG has grown increasingly frustrated by the team's inability -- due to the luxury tax and lack of assets -- to make a trade that brings in some veteran help. With Wally Szczerbiak still not 100 percent, KG has been doing it virtually alone this season.

If that doesn't change soon, according to one source close to KG, he'll never sign an extension. "He really wants to win. He likes Minnesota and wants to stay there, but if they can't give him more help, he's gone. That's the bottom line. The money's important, but he wants to have a sidekick like Shaq and Michael did. He thinks that's the key to the rings."

Magic: Hill may not be coming back

Tracy McGrady, on the other hand, has his sidekick. But with Grant Hill's future in serious doubt, it was nice for T-Mac to get away from everything in Orlando during All-Star Weekend.

Sunday's revelation that the Magic believe Hill's career may be over is just the latest in a series of bombshells in Orlando.

"We finally have moved forward as an organization -- that he isn't coming back, and if he does it's icing on the cake. Then it's an unbelievable bonus," Magic COO John Weisbrod told the Orlando Sentinel. "The way we got ourselves in trouble was believing he would be back soon."

"It gets to me, because I really thought we would be competing for an NBA title by now," McGrady told the Florida Times Union. "But it's to the point where I don't know when we'll be able to do that. My team hasn't been healthy in three years, and until I can play with a healthy Grant Hill, I don't know how far I can go. It's tough.

"It's frustrating, because I come to the All-Star Game and see guys like Kobe Bryant. He's got Shaquille O'Neal in the middle and three [championship rings]. You wonder what you could do if you had the big guy in the middle like that."

He's not the only one frustrated in Orlando right now. A series of front office mistakes has the Magic in turbulent waters. From signing Hill without fully realizing the extent of his injury, to re-signing Bo Outlaw instead of Ben Wallace, then trading away Outlaw and a draft pick that would become Amare Stoudemire for Jud Buechler, the Magic are running out of luck.

"Mistakes were made," Weisbrod told the Sentinel. "Some of our thinking, when you look back on it now, may sound like buffoonery. And as a small-market team, you can't immediately buy your way out of mistakes."

To make matters worse, the Magic, who made many questionable moves to clear cap space, are now only looking at four to five million in cap room next summer. That's not enough to land a top prize like Tim Duncan or Jermaine O'Neal.

"At times now, you say, 'God darn it, what were we thinking?' " coach Doc Rivers said. "But that doesn't do any good now. There were times we had our disagreements. It has been tense at times, especially early on in the decision-making process, but we really do work well together now. Obviously, we all know we have to improve our talent. That might be why I'm included more now."

"We don't disagree with the fans who are unhappy and frustrated. We know we've got to win," GM John Gabriel told the Sentinel. "The second-guessing, the finger-pointing, that all comes with the territory. We're a franchise that went from having the best player in the mid-'90s [shaquille O'Neal], lost him, then four years later got him back [McGrady]. We'll bounce back again. It just doesn't happen overnight."

Brain trust realizes its shortcomings

Tim Povtak / Orlando Sentinel

A vacation from Orlando

Bart Hubbuch / Florida Times-Union

Peep Show

Dallas Mavericks: Apparently, Ron Artest is at it again, only this time with someone his own size. Saturday night at the NBA Players Association party, witnesses told the Dallas Morning News, Artest and former Denver Nugget player James Posey were involved in a heated argument to which Nick Van Exel, a former teammate of Posey, joined in verbally. Two players were temporarily taken away in handcuffs though no arrests were made. "He didn't do anything," Steve Nash said of teammate Van Exel. "I don't know why they treated him that way. That was not cool, and it was not fair."

Vin Baker

Forward-Center

Boston Celtics

Profile

2002-2003 SEASON STATISTICS

GM PPG RPG APG FG% FT%

47 5.2 4.0 0.6 .486 .660

Boston Celtics: Jokes aside, Vin Baker has heart problems, and the monitor strapped around his chest will help give Boston experts a better idea of why he was feeling lightheaded with heart palpitations recently. "I'm chomping at the bit to get back on the floor," Baker told the Boston Globe on Saturday. "All I know now is I feel 110 percent, and I want to be on the plane in the morning, and I want to be with my teammates, and I want to on the court Tuesday night. I'm looking forward to that, and I hope it will happen. I'm not the expert on that. But I'm the expert on how I feel, and I think I feel great. They're going to have to tell me something different, because I want to be on that plane and ready to play on Tuesday night." He noted that there was a 99 percent chance he would play Tuesday night against his former team, the Seattle Sonics.

Miami Heat: Coach Pat Riley's war against NBA officials is picking up steam. His detractors had their say about his verbal altercations with at least two referees and ensuing $50K fine and now his backers are stepping forward. "One thing I know with my experience with Pat, if he said an incident happened, it happened, and two, he's not playing gamesmanship," said Jeff Van Gundy, a former assistant to Riley and current TV analyst. "He's not trying to create sympathies. I think he's telling it like he sees it and is being criticized for being honest."

Van Exel is detained at All-Star party

Eddie Sefko / Dallas Morning News

Baker hopes all systems are go

Shira Springer / Boston Globe

Commissioner, ex-coach stand up for rankled Riley

Harvey Fialkov / South Florida Sun-Sentinel