http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/18/AR2007051802092.html NBA's Bad Call Lingers Over Suns-Spurs Series By Michael Wilbon Saturday, May 19, 2007 It's a series that forever should carry an asterisk, a result that stains these NBA playoffs. Commissioner David Stern allowed the team that engaged in a flagrantly offensive act to benefit to the tune of a trip to the conference finals and to the detriment of the league's postseason. The best series the NBA had to offer is over, finished with as unsatisfying an ending as you'll ever see. Every court in the land can interpret laws, but Stern wouldn't interpret the league's rule on leaving the bench during a skirmish. Asking the Phoenix Suns to win a second straight playoff game on the road was simply too much. It usually is, especially if you've had two players, including your first-team all-league, suspended for the critical Game 5. Don't get me wrong. The San Antonio Spurs are a worthy conference finalist. They've won three titles in the past eight seasons. They're the most talented, toughest, versatile, consistent, and resourceful team in the league. And they were great at home last night in closing out the Sun in Game 6, 114-106. Tim Duncan's metronome steadiness, Manu Ginobili's bursts of brilliance, Tony Parker's cartoonish speed and Bruce Bowen's maddeningly effective defense might have gotten the best of the Suns in a fair-and-square series. But no team should get the kind of help the the Spurs received in beating the Suns. If the NBA is going to demand that its players not retaliate, that they refrain from taking the eye-for-an-eye revenge that traditionally characterized athletic competition since the beginning of time, then the league is obligated to protect the aggrieved party. In the case of the Phoenix Suns, the NBA did not uphold its end of the bargain. The San Antonio Spurs treated the Phoenix Suns like a piñata for 10 days. Even if unintentionally, Bruce Bowen stepped on Amare Stoudemire's Achilles', and Tony Parker's head bloodied Steve Nash to the point he couldn't be on the floor in the critical moments of Game 1, costing the Suns the series opener at home. Beyond that, Bowen kneed Nash in the groin (also said to be unintentional) and Robert Horry delivered a forearm to Nash with 18 seconds left in the Spurs' Game 4 home-court loss that precipitated the reaction that altered the series and very well could determine the league championship. Now, for the first 50 years of the NBA's history, we know what the Suns would have done, or seriously considered doing. They'd have called on their enforcer (kiddies, Google Maurice Lucas or Bill Laimbeer) to knock the daylights out of the other team's star, in this case Tim Duncan, at the opening tip-off. The NHL still lives by this credo, but the NBA has gone to great lengths to eliminate fighting, and admirably so. [b/But after having their all-NBA center Stoudemire and valuable reserve Boris Diaw suspended for running 25 feet or so toward where their teammate, and two-time MVP, had been tossed through the air like a Nerf ball, why would the Suns trust the NBA to protect them again? What's the incentive to not retaliate if the league won't be proactive and stand up to the instigator before something truly regrettable happens? [/b] Is it accurate to characterize the Spurs a dirty team? No. Does that matter? No. Behavior can be punished for being excessive or overly aggressive even without bad intentions. Just as the NBA has said it couldn't take into account Stoudemire's intent as he ran toward the scrum, thereby violating the league's strict cannot-leave-the-bench rule, the league shouldn't take into account the Spurs' intent in the Stoudemire and Nash incidents. Don't get me wrong, Commissioner David Stern is very persuasive in stating the league's case on why Stoudemire and Diaw had to be suspended. Every team is told every season to drill the rule and conditions on "leaving the bench area" into their players' heads. The rule was put in place more than 10 years ago to prevent the kind of incident that happened in, ironically, Phoenix, when Greg Anthony ran off the bench in street clothes to punch the Suns' Kevin Johnson, who was engaged in a dispute with another Knicks player. Stern argues that the best way to prevent a bench-clearing brawl is to keep players not already in the game on the bench. This is what the owners have asked for, what the league has instituted and there will be no exceptions. That way, Stern won't have to take into account the matter of intent. Live by the letter of the law; that's what the league has decided, which is pretty standard fare for lawyers who basically want to legislate against the most extreme action possible. In the process, the ruling has tainted the Suns-Spurs series because the instigators (the Spurs) weren't punished nearly as severely as the victims (the Suns), who lost the critical Game 5 having to play without two of its top players. It's not like Stern was happy about making the decision. In a conversation Tony Kornheiser and I had with Stern on ESPN's "Pardon the Interruption" the day after he made the ruling, Stern said he knew this was not a good result for the NBA, and he knew there would be a chorus of voices, not just in Arizona, calling his decision shortsighted and simply unfair. Suns Coach Mike D'Antoni referred to all the powerful telescopes used in Arizona to look into the heavens and said that even with their power they could find "not a shred of evidence of fairness" in the ruling. Of course, D'Antoni is right. There's nothing equitable about suspending Horry, the Spurs' seventh or eighth most important player, for two games and Stoudemire, who averages 20 points and nine rebounds a game, for Game 5. "Big Shot Rob" is one of my favorite people in the NBA, and this shot may have been his biggest of the series because it KO'd Stoudemire after Suns reclaimed control of the series. So the question becomes: What should Stern have done other than enforce the letter of the law? Make an exception. Lawyers may be slavishly devoted to rules as if their own rules were brought down from the mountain on tablets by Moses, but not all of us are, certainly not basketball players. Stern could have -- and I would argue should have -- noted that Stoudemire and Diaw did not get to the scrum on the court, did not encounter or engage any member of the Spurs, then fined them each $100,000. If they didn't want to pay it, then they could sit out a game. And he could have warned each team that if there was another incident of any kind in this series, there would be serious suspensions for the aggressor. Please don't tell me leagues shouldn't make exceptions. The NBA has been for 50 years, and especially the last 30, defined by the accommodations made for its superstar players on the court. Every night. Every season. The NBA popularized the phrase "superstar treatment." The league winks while letting its referees call the game one way for superstars and another way for scrubs. How do the lawyers reconcile that? Sometimes, and I'd argue this is one of them, it would be okay to act in the best interest of the game. The Suns and Spurs are the best teams left in the playoffs, two of the three best teams in the NBA during the regular season. The value of professional sports lies in the playoffs. And for each of the last two postseasons, the Suns have been less than whole because of injuries (to Stoudemire and Kurt Thomas last year, Joe Johnson the year before). This regular season has led everybody who loves basketball into a triangle of Mavericks-Suns-Spurs. A Game 5 without Stoudemire and Diaw isn't what anybody who gives a damn about playoff basketball wanted to see. It didn't help define the best team in this series. And the only way, subsequent to the suspensions to come to a fulfilling conclusion was for the Suns to win Game 6 in San Antonio - something they couldn't do. The series was diminished, even tainted, and two more rounds won't diminish the injustice done to a team that probably still should be playing.
Stoudemire and Diaw played in game six. If their absence was such a factor in the previous game, they should have won the game they played in. GO SPURS!
It was likely always going to be a 7 game series if all parties were playing every game... and as we all know, anything can happen in a 7th game. If it had gotten to that, as well played as the series was up to game 4, nobody would have been complaining. Now, its the only thing being said about the series... unfortunate.
I agree. Amare's individual defense is pathetic. He needs to provide some resistance to the TDs/Yaos/Boozer's of the world to be a great player. In fact Amare couldn't guard TD as well as Thomas or Marion despite having them both on height and weight, and Thomas big time on quickness. Amare is missing intensity and positioning skills on defense--it isn't a talent thing--a work ethic thing. Diaw is really soft and ineffective defensively as well given his size and quickness. Yes he did. Agreed on this too. Nash isn't one bit overrated according to Tim Duncan. It wasn't Nash's man who hurt them, it was other guys man. Marions' nads have always dissappeared when the going gets tough (missing badly on wide open shots, inconsistent presence), nothing new here. Barbosa isn't just a shoot off the dribble player. He has a great off ball jump shot, he shot over 40% from 3s this year. IMO he basically mentally broke down versus SA. SA played excellent defense on him early in the series--but then he went on to miss the shots he normally makes later in the series and had his confidence shaken. I think this series was major growing pains for him and he will be much tougher and more complete next year. The refs style definently had rewarded the physical teams--Utah and SA. At least we won't hear about any conspiracy to favor the Suns--neither the league brass nor the refs gave them any favors. Pretty clear the Suns have to learn to play tougher, traditional NBA playoff basketball, to advance. No excuses, it is what it is. I hope your a right that Detroit can save us from a Spurs-Jazz winner debacle. I do think Detroit can beat anyone. Detroit match-ups up well with the Spurs. The supension is overblow. The Suns lost game 1 & 3 & 6 with a FULL roster. In game 6 they even had an advantage with no Horry and two fresh toops (Amare & Diaw). The Suns need to do some things better to be a great playoff team instead of just a great regular season good playoff team--which is what they have been for 3 years now. ONE last thing MDA shows big flaws as a coach. MDA continues to not get enough rest for key guys going into and during the playoffs. Playing as hard as they did versus the Rockets late in the season was an example--utterly, utterly, stupid. The substitutions in game 5 was another (left his team with no gas the last 5). Another blunder was not turning into a hack-a-Bowen, hack-a-Duncan, defense (e.g., game 6) when SA had their rolling stretches. Similarly he must not have ever authorized any hard fouls on the Spurs stars. When you are not willing to do anything necc to get a win while the other team is you have to be twice as good as your opponents, and Phx is not close to that over the Spurs.
Suns will never win a championship or even go to the Finals! Their best chance was in 05 with joe johnson and quitten richardson. Its all down hill from here! Suns = Kings
