http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=aw-sternnba031511
I think this is a great article by Wojnarowski...it raises alot of legitimate points about Stern and the NBA. David stern making a gangster like threat to Van Gundy for his comments does not make him look any better.
Van Gundy is right...there is no freedom of speech in the NBA and because of that there doesn't seem to be "watch dogs" making sure the integrity of the NBA is intact.
If players and coaches can't be very critical about what goes on in the NBA, who can be?
It's a private enterprise. There doesn't need to be freedom of speech per se'.
Having said that...When somebody is fined or suspended for stating the obvious....It does absolutely nothing to preserve the "integrity" of the product.
IMHO, where the dominance is most revealing is in listening to the commentators....Jeff Van Gundy most specifically. VanGundy will go into coach mode when there's an obvious blown call and bloviate pretty heavily...Then it appears to occur to him what he's doing and he'll get completely off-subject and start gushing about the greatness of the NBA or a specific player.
I love the celtics and the NBA, but this is becoming the WWF. They are going to start to lose some people
It's becoming the WWF only in the context that stars are pretty much pre-determined to succeed. Like the WWE, there are times where the officials just don't appear to be looking when something that should be called happens right in front of them.