I strongly dislike how he got involved in politics early on but I appreciate him staying out of them in the last couple years. I would much rather b**** about Durant, refs and 37 straight missed 3pt'ers than to listen to drama similar to what the NFL is currently going through. The ref situation is difficult to deal with. I feel there is an attempt to deal with the perceived favoritism. However its hard for the refs to make the right calls when players are getting better and better with deception and forcing the refs to make bad calls. The challenge is going to be bringing parity to the NBA. However I do not think this issue will be resolved. Lesser players are perfectly content with all the big stars taking less money to pile on teams which then gives them the opportunity to get bigger contracts with smaller markets.
The VAR in the World Cup really has been a revelation. Imagine if it hadn't awarded a penalty to Peru (that they subsequently sailed over the bar) after the head ref didn't point to the spot? The narrative would've been that Peru was screwed, but VAR prevented that from happening. After watching some of the calls in this year's playoffs, I think the NBA desperately needs some sort of VAR system. The inconsistency in officiating was egregious and shifted the flow of entire games. If I, as a television viewer, can see a replay of a foul call in <3 seconds, why can't there be a VAR that confirms/overrules blatant foul and out-of-bounds calls? Any argument about "the flow of the game" is moot because tactics like Hack-a- and never-ending timeouts at the end of the fourth quarter still exist.
I don't have much of an opinion on him. I guess he's tried to make some "reforms" but the results so far as the same as always. He doesn't seem to confuse himself with a mob boss the way Stern used to do, so I guess that's something.
There seems to be a lot of confusion over this. David Stern didn't nix the Chris Paul trade as commissioner under some all-powerful "basketball reasons" clause the commissioner has. He nixed the Chris Paul trade as acting owner of the Hornets, since the NBA was holding the team until a new owner could be found. As owner, obviously he could choose not to let "his" team make a trade. He couldn't have prevented the deal if the NBA weren't in control of the team. He couldn't have blocked a free agent signing like Durant to the Warriors as commissioner, unless some rule were being broken. Adam Silver, likewise, had no power to block it. This urban legend that Stern wielded some power to block anything that happens in the NBA, that Silver opted not to use, is very weird.
I never said he should/could block the signing... everyone in the NBA is free to sign wherever they please, as we've witnessed most recently. My point was that as soon as Silver heard the rumors I would have went to Durant's camp (probably his agent) and found a way to sway him away from signing with the Warriors. Could have been by an incentive or some sort of agreement that they could have reached (idk) but at the end of it at least let it be known that the league was completely against his decision and would want to help keep the parity in the league. Obviously he can't just say "NO" you can't sign with X team... that's just r****ded and would never happen.
Try again. I mean - most of these posts against Silver aren't based in reality but this one in particular is just ignorant. It was Silver and the league who advocated for cap soothing - it was the players association(we want our money now and not years in the future) and some of the owners(the ones who stood to benefit from the cap spike like the Warriors) who advocated for the sudden cap jump. You can't pin that on Silver - he was the voice of reason there trying to prevent the worst case scenario that allowed the Warriors to become super dominant. Agree that the officiating sucks though but again there have been notable changes made to attempt to right that ship - whether they have been successful is debatable, but it's MUCH more of an attempt than what David Stern made.
Ridiculous. He also can't interfere with team/player negotiations like that - it's a form of collusion. As mentioned earlier, the Stern "basketball reasons" decision was made while Stern was acting as a representative of the Hornets and NOT the league. The league telling a player not to sign with a specific team is the same as telling a team not to sign a specific player - it creates an unfair advantage to some players/teams. The CBA sets the rule that the league, its teams, and its players have to follow and while Silver is one of the ones negotiating those rules, he does not represent a majority of the influence in the decision - he is outnumbered by players and team representatives.
What's ridiculous is one stupid ass**** ruining any sort of competitive balance to take the easy way out. Now it's just going to incline other players to perform the same act(s), with much less scrutiny and ridicule. For MANY years to come. That's ridiculous.
Then that’s tough. That’s life. Unrestricted free agents can go where they want. End of story. Nothing Silver could have done.
Yes. That's what the players wanted, and Silver gave in. He knew the consequences as they were well publicized, but he gave in on that.
Silver had no choice. The CBA mandated it, Silver was pushing for a change to the CBA but he had no power to unilaterally force a change. The only thing the owners could have done was a lockout to try and force the issue but A. that would have been overkill, they only use such extreme measures when their profits are being negotiated and B. that would have been up to the owners, not Silver.
Subjectively: Silver has not done too bad. He has handled non-basketball related issues better then Stern in many ways (especially compared to Stern’s last 3-5 years as commissioner) and he is one of the better commissioners in US sports, which I guess is good although that bar is super low. Some of the changes he has made to the league are long term corrections, but for the most part have not done badly and/or need a little bit more time to develop. Objectively: I am highly frustrated that the biggest issue that has been complained for close to TWO (2) decades now is still not being address (officiating). The transparency reports are doing little to nothing to provide visibility for the 46 (excluding OT) minutes in the game it does not cover, and they have not address bad and/or potentially/allegedly corrupt referees that are constantly called out on. We potentially lost a really shot at the finals partially as a result of this mess. So, he’s been ok but he’s not getting anymore mulligans from me. If the NBA/Silver does not fix the ref situation they will be in deep water.
Silver was decent in his early days as commissioner, particularly with off-the-court issues. I think some of the things he did early on bought him some good will. But lately he's been unimpressive. When it comes to the ref situation, he's been just as bad as Stern. The officiating in the Rockets/Warriors series reminded me of the Lakers/Kings series in 2002.
this was my point as well, not that he could do what stern did by owning the team. you figure out a way to make it happen. you can't let not owning the team stand in the way.
i never got the impression silver tried at all. he basically said "can do we do this?", they said no, and he was like "cool, going back to expanding our social media presence." he could have made it a much bigger deal if he had really wanted to do it but he didn't want to make waves. explained it much better so the players weren't offended by it. and y'all keep saying there were no rules to prevent durant signing. i agree. that's when a leader gets involved like FLASH21 is saying and makes things happen behind the scenes. silver represents the owners and can basically do what he wants if the owners are behind him. you get the other owners together and say we're not going to have this crap and then let GSW know it's not ideal for them to pursue durant. maybe the other owners wanted it, but i have trouble believing milwaukee and charlotte were jumping up and down at the idea of creating a super team in california. i don't think david "i know where the bodies are buried" stern needed rules to get things done.
You are again talking about blatant collusion to prevent KD to GSW. Zero chance Silver would survive that. Zero. Silver has a law degree from university of Chicago. He knows what he can and can’t do.
Owners brought it upon themselves with the putting a max on contracts to offset poor management. KD might be willing to give up $5mm a year for a better situation, but you give him a option where he can get paid $65mm a year and I guarantee you its much harder for him to want to stay in GSW for $25mm
I don't understand where this mythology about Stern as some kind of mob boss came from. He certainly was never considered this Illuminati-level powerbroker when he was the active commissioner. What evidence do you have that Stern had this remarkable ability to do whatever he wanted regardless of the rules? His biggest actions, like bringing the hammer down on the Timberwolves for the illegal Joe Smith deal or nixing the Chris Paul deal, were by the book. I recognize that his "behind the scenes" stuff may not be daily news copy, but if he were really so legendary at pulling strings, there would be reports of it somewhere from someone. The best we have is a conspiracy theory about the Patrick Ewing draft, I guess. It's fine to be pissed that Durant decided to go to Golden State. But blaming it on Silver makes no sense. Stern would have been just as powerless and there's no evidence to suggest otherwise. Investing Stern with unseen superpowers isn't all that compelling, really.
