the suns whinning isnt needed. It's sort of apples and oranges. But should a ref be suspended/punished because he plays the nickel slots? or a game of black jack? Seems like it makes sense to me to not
Well there are a lot of differences in those two examples. But, I'll confine the argument to this: you don't abandon a rule because there are too many violators; they had too many violators because they didn't care enough about the rule to police behavior and enforce the rule. Without enforcement, the rule gets no respect (and it probably deserves none, since it seems more like a cover-your-ass legal safeguard than a clause aimed at affecting behavior). Then, when it blew up in their faces, what could they do with a rule they didn't believe in in the first place? If they suddenly punished people, they'd be hypocritical and, worse, arbitrary. That it's a stupid rule coupled with the fact they obviously didn't care puts them in a position that they can't enforce now, even if they wanted to. What if they had the same rule for players? We know players go to casinos plenty. If Stern today said he's going to punish all the players who have gone to casinos over the last decade, based on whatever reports they might have, how would that go over? Fine 200 players when there'd been an implicit understanding for years that the league would look the other way? That wouldn't work any better than it does for refs.
First of all, how in the world would Stern punish owners? Those are the guys who pay his salary. Fine them? He had no problem fining Mark Cuban? Also, as with many other things in life, it just comes down to money. Players make millions. They can get these millions from the NBA and nowhere else. Hence, Stern can make fairly crap rules and force players to abide by them, because players don't have much of a choice in their job market. The NBA competes with basically no one else for players, because the European teams cannot offer nearly as much as the NBA. And, as a result, fans are turning away from the NBA in droves. If you want to make up garbage rules expect to pay the consequences. Stern is paying the consequences with bad publicity and horrible attendance. Refs, on the other hand, make good but not incredible money. The NBA can't just say "screw you" to the refs because if they do, potential refs will more likely choose another career that isn't nearly as strict as the NBA. Hence, Stern can come down harshly on players but not the refs, because he knows that the consequences are not the same. Let them choose another career, we can get new referees.
Really? So if there was a labor dispute you don't think that Stern wouldn't shut down the NBA in order to win it? How is this any different?
I agree that if you are not enforcing it all along, you can't suddenly punish people. If you think the rule is important enough, you can do a sort of amnesty and warn future violation. If you think the rule is stupid, then just say let's scratch it. I don't know if the players have the same rule. If so, they should enforce it. In fact, I'd say player gambling has potentially more impact to the game. You either abolish the rule or you enforce it. To say that the rule is "outdated" and do nothing is pretty lame. BTW, I have a strong feeling towards gambling. It is as addictive and destructive, if not more, as drugs.
Terrible decision. This is saying, "Hey, they did something illegal but I feel that those things shouldn't be illegal, and even though they violated the rules at the time, I'm not going to punish them and just change the rules!" Major step back for David Stern. Bringing up the Suns incident does have some merit, because it shows how David Stern is now picking and choosing what he feels he should enforce, and if you want to claim to enforce rules as they are meant to be in black and white, then you should enforce the rules on everyone, not just who you feel you should. I'm not going to lie, I feel the rules in this case were outdated. I see no problem with a referee gambling in a casino in the offseason, or a player for that matter, as long as it is not on sports and isn't during the season. But you must still enforce those rules and punish those who broke them. Then you can go back and re-work the rules.
