By Kevin Gregory
I’m not hating on the Heat, but I must admit that some things going on don’t seem “Kosher” I like that these young African American men are now exploiting a game that once exploited their predecessors, in the words of Jay-Z. “Pay us, like you owe us, for all of the years that you Hoed us”. But, in the same breath let me say this, Lebron needs to download that old blues song that says, “It ain’t what you do, but the way you do it”; and this was done ALL WRONG. Aside from the that, the thing that rocks me to the core is the folks who call themselves Basketball Fans.
A real basketball fan roots for: #1-The Game Itself, #2-The Team, #3-The Player. These brand new folks now root for the name on the back of the jersey as oppossed to the name on the front of the jersey, as Hashim Kelly already said, “These fans switch teams like underwear!” Real fans follow their team through the bad times, the really bad times, the Gawd awful times and even worse, but we stick with them! It’s why we appreciate the championships! Real fans act like fantasy GM’s and try and figure out who to trade and/or draft to make their team better! Hell right now I’m trying to figure out how Joe can trade Rip and/or Tay to bring in AL Jefferson, WHY, because I want MY TEAM to be good. These fake fans just hop on a great player playing for a contender and get to supporting…..suckers!
Now to me it’s become quite obvious that this whole Miami Heat deal has been in the works for a few years now. All 3 players signed odd contracts where they could opt out in the same year. This caused teams to begin clearing cap space like roach exterminators. I think that the plan was for all 3 to get to NY and play in Madison Square Garden, but NY couldn’t get Eddie Curry’s $11Million off the books, enter Pat Riley.
Let’s look at Pat’s history in free agency. Summer of 1996, Juwan Howard (the top free agent that summer) signs to play for Miami for over $100 Million, the league rescends that deal because they (Miami) violated the Collective Bargaining Agreement by having an agreement with Alonzo Mourning in place already ( http://www.nytimes.com/1996/08/13/sports/an-angry-pat-riley-insists-the-heat-broke-no-salary-cap-rules.html ).
The summer of 2003, the Clippers have Andre Miller, Corey Maggette, Elton Brand and Lamar Odom, all are restricted free agents. Riley publicly targets Brand and offers him an $82M contract that the Clips match….JACKPOT! because Riley really wanted Odom, once the Clips matched Brand….they couldn’t afford to keep Odom and Riley got him for $20M less than what they offered Odom ( http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/wire?id=1594256 ).
In short NOBODY has manipulated and flirted with breaking the CBA in summer free agency markets more than Pat Riley. Ever since Wade signed his extension Riley has refused to sign any player beyond the 2010 season so that they would clear the books for this class, why would he do that unless he knew that Wade, Bosh and James were determined to play together, folks this is indeed bordering on tampering and collusion, and it’s bad for the game, remember real fans always root for THE GAME first.
Why do I think this way, because there were better teams than any 2 of them could have joined. Wade&James in New Jersey playing with Harris, Lopez, Favors, Courtney Lee and Terrance Williams would have been a much better team than 3Heat + Min contracts. Same can be said about James and Bosh or Wade and Bosh. I could use Chicago and the Clippers as similiar examples, but those 3 colluded to play with each other. Smells fishy to me.
But again I’m not mad, I still love the game, I still love my PISTONS, plus this crap never works remember the summer of 1996, the Knicks bring in Allan Houston and Larry Johnson tot play with Patrick Ewing. Same summer Barkley to Hou to play with Drexler and Dream, in ‘98 they pickep up Pippen. Summer of 2000 Grant Hill and T-Mac to Orl (who were the Wade and LeBron of that time). Summer of 2003 Malone and Payton to LA to play with Kobe and Shaq (who ‘d already won 3 rings BTW)……NONE OF THOSE TEAMS WON THE TITLE!