Conspiracy: Stern wants Gasol's legacy to disappear

[pearljammer10]

What?

David Stern: You know what'll really kill Gasol's legacy? Give him 2 straight championships... Yeah, that'll teach him!!

This makes no sense what so ever.

[Tai]

Yeah, I'm sorry, what?

Pau Gasol may easily go down as a first ballot Hall of Famer (keeping in mind it's the Basketball HOF NOT the NBA HOF...), how exactly can Stern hurt Gasol's legacy outside of a setup to get him into legal trouble and/or frame him for using PEDs?

I mean, giving Kobe the Finals MVP instead of Gasol? That's all it'll take?

You must think fans are real dumb.

[Tai]

And I'm gonna need a link proving Stern gives one iota about the Kardashians simply cause Odom's married to one of them.

[Alowesio]

He doesn't want Gasol to be forgotten because the NBA is trying to expand past the US lately.  A foreign star helps market the NBA across the world.  David Stern wants international interest in the NBA more than he does focus on the superstars

[freshinthehouse]

So now David Stern runs the media?  Got it.

[guava_wrench]

You are right, TM, about the Superman myth, I think. Even back in 2007-08, there was little mention of our defense winning it for us.

Yep, and thus, even the 2004 Pistons effort was forgotten.

You have to hand it to Stern - he knows that Offense sells tickets

This is the need to continually harp endlessly about Michael Jordan, from here till kingdom come. And the need to always have a new Jordan all ready, pre-packaged for the subsequent generation... see the saga of the late great King James. Now, he's just a knight in Wade's court.

The Pistons' effort was forgotten? What are you smoking? The Pistons got non-stop respect when they were at their peak, but they disappointed by only getting a single title.

Your perceptions are incredibly distorted by your fantasies of conspiracy. Still, it is very entertaining in the way a crazy homeless man talking to himself on the subway is entertaining.

It is sad how so many people take the most bizarre intuitions seriously without requiring any reasonable evidence.

[guava_wrench]

He doesn't want Gasol to be forgotten because the NBA is trying to expand past the US lately.  A foreign star helps market the NBA across the world.  David Stern wants international interest in the NBA more than he does focus on the superstars

Some people won't care for your astute point because it would show that Stern isn't in control of outcomes.

[Witch-King]

Kobe didn't deserve Finals MVP? Let's just look at it this way; Kobe has won the Finals five times, i.e. the same number of times as Magic Johnson. Johnson won Finals MVP 3 times, as has Shaq who used to play for the Lakers.

After the Los Angeles Lakers ran Shaq out of town Kobe Bryant has become the new face of their franchise, and as someone who has helped the Lakers win the championship 5 times already during his career and is the star player on their team he should have more than one finals MVP.

Kobe Bryant played relatively well in these finals, obviously the Celtics' lock-down defense is designed to shut him down and sort of force his teammates to pick up the offensive slack -- you never want the other team's best scorer to get hot during the course of an entire series so that might be why Pau Gasol's stats seem more impressive.

Kobe did have that 38 point outburst the game after Ray Allen set the NBA Finals record for number of three's made in a game; however, by Game 7 the flow of the series had shifted back to a more grinding, half-court, defensive style -- had Kendrick Perkins been ready to play we might have been able to fend the Lakers off for another quarter.

Either way, the last quarter of game 7 was literally just a bunch of free-throws for the Lakers, who started the 4th quarter trailing by 4 points and seemed to have little left in the tank until the refs intervened. The Lakers did have 7 more regular season wins than us this past season; maybe that's why the refs were in their favor??

[ToppersBsktball10]

Interesting. And valid points seeing as how Kobe was in no way shape or form an MVP quality player in the Finals.

However I'd rather the Gasol legacy be squashed and suppressed by  his team not being handed titles by the league.

Obviously Kobe got it. If the Celtics won it would have been Pierce or KG, the only way it would have been Rondo would be if Stern wanted to hype him up as a future hall of famer basically.

[nickagneta]

Stern must be trying to make Gasol's legacy disappear like he made Pippen's legacy disappear.

Oh shoot, that's right. Pippen just made it into the Basketball Hall of Fame and is widely considered by people knowledgeable in basketball as one of the best players ever and maybe the best defensive SF ever.

I guess when Gasol goes in the HOF maybe Titlemaster's fictional conspiracy theory will finally disappear to those that believe in it.

[nba is the worst]

Tell me what Stern has to do with the Finals MVP selection process.

The OP and Witch-King seem similar, "Stern's refs were in the Lakers' favor in game 7", Stern wants to diss Gasol?

Both fiction.

[Roy H.]

He doesn't want Gasol to be forgotten because the NBA is trying to expand past the US lately.  A foreign star helps market the NBA across the world.  David Stern wants international interest in the NBA more than he does focus on the superstars

Excellent post (and your first post, no less).  I think your observation is exactly right.  The more international stars the NBA has, the better the game does worldwide.

[Roy H.]

As an aside, it's funny to hear people talk about Pau Gasol going into the Hall of Fame.  I advocated trading for him for probably a solid two years, and at the time the majority of the blog seemed hung up on phrases like "doesn't play defense", "he's too soft", and "he can't win in the playoffs". 

I have no regrets with the KG trade, but I think the franchise would also be looking pretty good right now if we had a core of Pierce, Big Al, Gasol, and Rondo.

[nickagneta]

As an aside, it's funny to hear people talk about Pau Gasol going into the Hall of Fame.  I advocated trading for him for probably a solid two years, and at the time the majority of the blog seemed hung up on phrases like "doesn't play defense", "he's too soft", and "he can't win in the playoffs". 

I have no regrets with the KG trade, but I think the franchise would also be looking pretty good right now if we had a core of Pierce, Big Al, Gasol, and Rondo.

Well, that wasn't me but also his success in international competitions(multiple gold, silver and bronze medals, 2006 MVP FIBA World Championships, multiple FIBA Europe POY awards, etc) and his success here show he is clearly a winner and great player and with another great to solid 4-5 years of NBA play and more international success, I think he would be a shoe in for the HOF.

BTW, I agree. Whether we got Gasol or KG, I think this team would have been just as dominant over the last three years and maybe more so over the last 2 because of Gasol's health versus KG's health.

[Roy H.]

You are right, TM, about the Superman myth, I think. Even back in 2007-08, there was little mention of our defense winning it for us.

I don't know if I agree with this.  The "big three" might have gotten the face time, but almost every article talking that talked about our championship cited our historically good defense.  I don't think anybody but the most casual of fans assumed that our offense was the reason we won the title.