Shaq is whining again about the new zone defense. The more he whines, the more I'm starting to look forward to the zone defense. The man makes some really stupid comments in this article. I especially like the one about the price of tickets. He inadvertly puts the blame for high ticket prices on himself. LOL http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/basketball/heat/sfl-talalay16sep16.story?coll=sfla-sports-heat Changes a concern for Shaq by Sarah Talalay Posted September 16 2001 Already worried about the upcoming NBA season? So is one of the game's biggest stars. "It's going to be an ugly season," Shaquille O'Neal said this month during a private memorabilia signing session at Mounted Memories, a Sunrise company that has an exclusive agreement with the Los Angeles Lakers star. "It's going to be ugly." The combination of an increasingly arrogant ownership, soaring ticket prices and uninspired play are a recipe for disaster, O'Neal said. "There's too many suits making the rules," O'Neal said. "Not enough guys played the game, know the game." Read: out of touch. "They have to realize what their market is," O'Neal said as he signed dozens of basketballs. "Are we doing these games for the kids or are we doing them more for the corporate people? I think it's more kids, so you have to see what they like. These kids don't care about zone defense. They want to see spectacular plays, but they're not going to see any of that." O'Neal said fans aren't going to be happy with the low-scoring games that will come with the institution of zone defense. "The game is going to be ugly. It's going to be messed up," he said. After all, it was Michael Jordan's thrilling play that drew more fans to the game. One criticism of the league is that it hasn't learned how to promote its current stars. "They're a lot of heroes in the NBA," O'Neal said. "The NBA just needs to market them right. Instead of looking for the next Jordan, market a guy how he is. Market (76ers star) Allen Iverson how he is." And while a few teams, including the Heat, Detroit Pistons and Phoenix Suns, are reducing ticket prices for the upcoming season, O'Neal says the prices -- which average $51.02 a game -- are way out of line. "They are charging these stupid, outrageous prices," said O'Neal, who earns $24 million annually. O'Neal said as a kid he remembers mowing lawns and working other jobs to scrape together enough money for a ticket in the last row of the San Antonio Spurs arena, but times have changed. At the time, every team had a franchise player, O'Neal said. "Back in the day, when I was coming up every team had a great player, even Denver," O'Neal said. "Nobody is going to pay $60 to see [the Dallas Mavericks'] Shawn Bradley play."
I would actually pay to see Shawn Bradley play instead of him standing there trying to act like he's intimidating
When Shaq made his comment about the ticket prices, the reporter should've come back with something like this: Well Shaq, since you make $24 mill per year for 6 1/2 months of actual work, maybe you would consider taking a pay cut to help out those kids. I bet Shaq would've made like a crawfish & backpeddaled all the way back. By the way, NugzFan, did you notice that slam he put on Denver? I wouldn't take that if I were you. What's McDyess, chopped liver? As far as marketing Iverson, let's wait another year or two, just to make sure he's gotten his head on straight for the long term. I wonder why he didn't suggest they market Kobe?
No, I thinks he's not right. Do you think the NBA never really considered what their target audience wanted? who they were? The suits aren't there by accident. The league knows who they are trying to please much better than Shaq does, I'm sure.
Shaq's just pissed, because now he'll have to work on his free throw shooting in the off season. Apparently, with the zone defense, the NBA is just trying to screw him out of his summer vacation. After all, you need a lot of free time to spend $24 mill.
Shaq is right, people want to watch star players being able to play their game without being swarmed by 3 defenders, people want to see penetration and dunks, nobody wants to watch stars getting smothered then having role players shoot 20 foot jumpers all day. Instead of having Mcgrady going one on one with his man and dunking on him, you'll be seeing more of Pat Garrity spotting up and shooting. The quality of play in college basketball sucks, a lot of games get too boring to watch, I just hope the NBA doesn't become like that.
I also agree with ShaqKobe. To me the league wants to par out the players. Make it more equal. This is what Barkley was snipping about during the draft. Think about it. Even our own coach doesnt talk about letting his explosive talents rule the team lately. All you hear is how we need Rice, or Collier to be the person to hit the shots. Ive said it a million times through my tenure here at Clutchcity. If the league ever really wanted to scoring to go back up all it needs to do is what I do. Watch some old 70's or 80's games. And pay attention to how many times the whislte is blown. Very very rarely. You can actually watch 5 minute spans without a whistle. Which leads to players hitting their stride, staying in grooves. Less interruption of the game will lead to a more flowing offensive game. Then watch a game from 95 and up. I promise if you watched every game played youd probably never find a 5 minute stretch of whistle-less game. Heck youd be hard pressed to find 1 minute of game time without a whistle. The game is constantly being stopped. Sometimes I think the NBA wants it that way so that they can be assured of commercial breaks oftenly for NBC. Seriously, sometime watch a game from the 80's if you have one. You might be shocked.
Wouldn't it be terrible if basketball became a team sport again - oh wait a second... it IS a team sport! If people want to see fancy plays then they should establish a 3 on 3 full-court league or something. The flashy plays are all the more flashy when they're a little bit rarer.
I agree with you, but didn't they already set up a forum for high flying, razzle dazzle, one on one, slam dunk, types of games? I believe they call it the All Star game. I'm really starting to look forward to the new zone defense. If a team is hitting from the outside consistently, the defense is going to have to come out & play defense on him, which will open the middle up. Imo, the teams with good passing skills(Mobley, have you been working on this part?), good outside shooters & quick players are going to be the most successful. Look out for the Clippers. Is the Laker's Triangle offense an isolation, passing, or dump it down low type of offense? I've never really paid much attention. Where's Crispee, he should be able to answer this question.
