--- Who is to blame for Yao's injuries?

I can't speak for the other planets, but Ballerblogger.com is the best 1-stop place for NBA basketball on our world's world wide web, and today they posted an interesting quote from China's state-run media:

"A commentary in the Communist Party-run People’s Daily dismissed the widely-held view in the United States that Yao’s repeated injuries stemmed from training with China’s national team during the NBA off-season.

“It can only be said that the NBA game has worn Yao Ming out,” the paper fired back.

“The physical beating taken by every player due to the long season, the high level of match play and the endless travel cannot be overlooked.

“The NBA should consider changing its match scheduling from the standpoint of safeguarding players.”

--- Does China have a point?

Now I am one of the last people on earth who would side with a communist-run newspaper. In fact, I stopped buying my favorite computers in the world, IBM Thinkpads, when IBM sold the line to Chinese run Lenovo, because I didn't want my dollars going to support an ideology I do not believe is good for us.

Neverthless, the communist-run Chinese media is 100% right, and are saying something that has already been a topic of hot debate in the United States for years.

The reality is the NBA treats its players like tires on a sports car: it rides them hard and fast, then tosses them aside, and it does it because the fans pay them to."

The NBA kills the golden geese to get the eggs, but they are okay with that because there is always another draft of geese eager to take their place -- and now international players are flocking to the draft as well.

--- Does defense win championships? Or luck?

The NBA isn't baseball: players don't stand around for half the game waiting for something to happen in their area of the field, then sit around the other half of the game waiting to bat.

Basketball is a very physically and emotionally demanding sport. Heck, at the end of some games, even the FANS are exhausted!

Every season attrition plays as big a role as anything else in determining who becomes an NBA champion, as every season championship contending teams are knocked out of contention thanks to an injury to a key player.

For example...

Los Angeles Lakers fans contend that in the 2008 NBA Finals, the Boston Celtics benefited greatly thanks to injuries to Andrew Bynum and Trevor Ariza. Many dismissed that as sour grapes, but then the next season the Lakers seemed to bear that out by sweeping the Celtics in the regular season. With all Celtic players healthy and accounted for, the Lakers beat them in Boston 92 to 83 on Christmas day 2008. And then on February 5, 2009, the Lakers beat the Celtics again, and this time they did it without Andrew Bynum who was out injured again.

Then it was Boston's turn to deal with injury. In fact, in the 2008-2009 season, all the Celtics' starting 5 missed games, 40 man games in all, with 25 of those missed games belonging to Kevin Garnett. With the emergence of Rajan Rondo, it seems likely that a healthy Boston would have easily defeated the Orlando Magic in the Eastern Conference Semi-Finals. Instead, with key players on the bench in street clothes, the Celtics fell to the Magic in 7 games.

Likewise in the West, the always contending San Antonio Spurs had similar struggles. Tony Parker lost 10 games, Tim Duncan was out 7 games (and played hurt for more), and Manu Ginobli missed a whopping 38 games due to injury. That obviously affected the Spurs regular season record, playoff seeding and championship hopes.

--- A 72 game regular season?

If you are tempted to argue that injuries happen and maybe these key players would have been out in a shorter season anyway, you are missing the point.

The Chinese said, "The NBA should consider changing its match scheduling from the standpoint of safeguarding players."

Changing the schedule, including putting more space between games, would certainly reduce the role injuries play in determining NBA champions.

And championships should be determined by teams, not by luck. That's not basketball, that's Yahtzee.

That altering the regular season playing schedule is EXACTLY what the Phoenix Suns did with aging superstar Shaquille O'Neal.

The Suns played Shaq in only 72 games and made him sit out 10 games at strategic times of the season so that he could rest and recover from the rigors of NBA play and travel.

The result? Shaq had his best season since the 2005-2006 season.

Think about it.

Even though Shaq was a year older, he went from scoring 16.2 points per 36 minutes, to scoring 21.3 points per 36 minutes.

Even his free throw percentage got better.

And before you try to dismiss those stats by claiming the Suns have a different system than the Heat, those stats I just quoted have been adjusted to account for only for Shaq's games with the Phoenix Suns.

Without a doubt, altering the NBA season would NOT eliminate injuries, but it would positively affect how large a role injuries play in determining NBA championships.

What is more, getting a 72 game season is easier than you might imagine.

There are 30 teams in the NBA. If every team played every team in their conference 3 times, and every team in the opposite conference 2 times, that would give each team a 72 game season. That is a totally reasonable schedule.

--- The downside?

That is a 12% reduction in games, which will result in a reduction of revenue for the NBA. However, expenses are also reduced, so that has to be accounted for. Also, it would be a mistake to assume 12% less games means 12% less revenue, because while ticket sales and television revenue would be reduced, other income sources would not such as merchandising. People will still buy Kobe Bryant jerseys even if he is playing 72 games a year instead of 82.

So, here's the big question: Would the NBA curb its lust for money by 10% or so to keep the likes of Yao Ming, Shaquille O'Neal and Manu Ginobli in the game, and to allow better teams to excel rather than just younger teams?

Probably not, so here's another idea.

--- A pre-playoff qualifier round?

The money lost by reducing regular season games can be made up and more by having a qualifier round just prior to the playoffs.

Right now the system the NBA uses to determine who qualifies for the playoffs is Byzantine and (frankly) idiotic.

For example, the NBA is divided into 2 Conferences: Eastern and Western. Each conference is then divided into 3 divisions -- which are totally meaningless. Winning each division doesn't mean much in terms of seeding, because in 2006 that rule was tweaked to favor teams with better records anyway.

If having divisions doesn't mean anything, why have them?

Another problem with the playoffs is that many of the teams that earned a spot in the playoffs aren't given one because they happen to be in a tougher conference.

For example, in the 2008 playoffs, all 8 teams in the Western Conference playoffs had 50 or more wins, while only 3 Eastern Conference teams had 50+ wins... and 3 others didn't even have winning records. That's messed up.

And of the Western Conference teams that didn't qualify for the playoffs, 3 of them had better records than Eastern Conference teams that did.

So, give the first 6 seeds of each conference to the teams with the best records in each conference, and then let the next 8 teams in terms of regular season wins, regardless of conference, play for the 4 wild card spots in a playoffs qualifier round in a best of 3 or best of five qualifier series.

The buzz of the qualifier round will sell more tickets and television spots than regular season games, thus making up the revenue lost by cutting the regular season by 10 games, PLUS...

Plus the qualifier round will give the playoff teams a week or so to rest from the regular season and heal up for the playoffs.

--- The moral of the story?

By:

(1) Reducing the regular season to 72 games,

(2) Eliminating back to back games and spacing the schedule better, and

(3) Having a qualifying round prior to the playoffs for the bottom 4 seeds...

Athletes would have a better chance at staying healthy, the better teams would have a better chance at the championship, and better teams would be in the playoffs which should greatly enhance the fan appeal of the first round.

Unfortunately, these great reforms, while they may have support in China, will likely never see the light of day in David Stern's NBA will they?

That's too bad, because the really NBA treat its players like tires on a sports car: riding them hard and fast, then tossing them aside, and there is a better way.

--- EDIT: Or how about this?

In baseball, there are rules for how many innings (or pitches?) a pitcher can pitch in a given time period. These rules exist to protect the health of the players.

Why not do something similar in the NBA?

Why not set up a set of rules that limit how many minutes a player can play in a week, and set how much rest teams should have between games?

Again, the president already exists in professional sports, so this isn't a radical idea at all.

While I'm sure the minutes take their toll, I'm also confident that it is the inadequate rest for recovery that plays a big part in wearing down players and making them susceptible to injury. That is really where the NBA needs the most reform on this matter.

Back in the day when college players could compete for the USA in international play, the NBA's off season may have been adequate in terms of rest.

Times have changed though, international competition has grown up, and TeamUSA demands commitments from NBA elite.

Today it is Yao that is injuried, but soon it could be LeBron, Kobe, or Dwight whose year 'round commitment for high level basketball threatens to derail a team's championship aspirations for a season... or even a player's career.

And when they come back, who is to say they will be the same player? There have been plenty of NBA players who never were the same after an injury.

That's where I really admire the Phoenix Suns: they would rather risk a mid season loss than a player's health.

If the league could have the same priorities and the same discipline, then perhaps there wouldn't be so much worry that (for example) Pau Gasol will be playing for Spain in a European tournament just prior to the NBA preseason.

The bottom line is that most fans, if not all fans, wouldn't even notice a season shortened by 10 games.

On the other hand, all fans notice when the star players from their teams are out injured.

If this work hazard for missed time, and potentially career ending injury existed in other industries other than professional sports, people would get behind the reforms in a blink.

On June 16, 2009, in a blog entitled "Dynasty for Sale or Rent," I wrote, "Maybe beating Orlando was the easy part. The hard part might be bringing the band back together next year."

I may have jinxed the Lakers because since then Trevor Ariza left the Lakers for the most incomprehensible of reasons, and now, things seem to have fallen apart with Lamar Odom.

It's amazing how many parrots accuse Kobe Bryant of being selfish while completely overlooking Lamar Odom's LONG history of self-serving and very bad judgment -- a history of bad decisions that goes very far beyond candy bing eating.

--- HIGH SCHOOL

Lamar Odom played for 3 different high schools, not because his family was moving, but he dumped teams in perceived furtherance of his basketball career.

--- COLLEGE

Lamar Odom started off at UNLV taking classes in the summer. Unfortunately, he was also taking money. Odom received payments amounting to $5,600 from UNLV booster David Chapman. That, and the academic scandal that also ensued got UNLV coach Bill Bayno fired, and got UNLV placed on probation by the NCAA for 4 years. UNLV's storied basketball program never really recovered from the mess Lamar left it, and left it he did... for the University of Rhode Island.

In the wake of his scorched earth, after sitting out a year, Lamar played just 1 season for Rhode Island and then ditched them after his freshman year for a career in the NBA.

--- CLIPPERS

Drafted 4th overall in the 1999 NBA draft, Lamar's career started with L.A.'s other NBA team, the Clippers, where he showed much promise and made 2000 NBA All-Rookie First Team. A year later, in Novemeber of 2001, Odom was suspended for having been caught in his SECOND violation of the NBA's drug policy.

--- HEAT

Odom played 1 year for the Miami Heat, along side rookie Dwayne Wade, before finding himself in Los Angeles once again, being one of 3 players traded by the Heat for Shaquille O'Neal.

Interestingly, Odom never sold his house in Miami; he still owns it.

--- LAKERS

With the Lakers, Lamar Odom has been a mixed blessing. On the one hand, his skills, particulary for his size, made him one of the most versitile players in the NBA. On the other hand, Odom's decision making can be quite horrible.

And Odom has shown a tendency to vanish in big games, particularly in the playoffs.

In the 2006 playoffs, the Lakers gave up a 3-1 series lead to the Suns in large part to Odom going M.I.A. In fact, in critical game 7, in 42 minutes of play, Odom's line was 12 points, 37% shooting, 5 rebounds, 2 assists.

In the 2007 playoffs, Odom, then the Lakers #2 option, vanished again (10 points in game 2 on 33% shooting), and the Lakers lost to the Suns in 5 games.

And in the 2008 NBA Finals, when the favored Lakers fell to Danny Ainge's all star team, Pau Gasol took much of the heat for the Lakers "being soft," but power forward Lamar Odom's numbers for the series were well below his regular season performance.

That's not to say Lamar Odom hasn't shown tremendous promise though. Odom's 28 points, 17 rebounds and 2 assists in a rare defeat of the Cleveland Caveliers in Cleveland this last season shows why the Lakers are high on Odom.

Or at least they were.

--- DEAL OR NO DEAL

Dr. Jerry Buss, owner of the Lakers, recently asked Mitch Kupcheck to withdraw the Lakers' offer to retain Odom.

The Lakers had been offering Odom a deal for $9 million a season for 4 years at $36 million, or $10 million a season for 3 years for a total of $30 million.

Odom is reportedly holding out for a 5-year, $50 million deal.

I guess I’ve always felt that Odom has been overpaid pretty much his entire career.

Specifically, Odom has been paid (I won’t write “earned”) over $69 million 9 seasons playing in the NBA, or in other words, Lamar Odom has averaged $7.7 million per year.

Odom’s 1999 draft classmate Manu Ginobli has averaged $5.6 million per year over the course of his career.

As one of San Antonio's "big three," Manu has been a CRITICAL component of 3 NBA championships for the Spurs. What is more, Ginobli shows his team first mentality by coming off the bench or starting — whatever Pop wants — without a peep.

By contrast, Odom has been an inconsistent flake his entire career. In fact, much of the infuriating inconsistency the Lakers have shown is directly attributable to Lamar Odom.

--- JEOPARDY

As NBA announcers Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy were saying as they called the 2009 playoffs, "As goes Lamar Odom, so go the Lakers."

Lamar's problem is he has been paid primarily on potential, not production. If you look at potential, I can see why Lamar is demanding what he is.

But if you look at consistent production, Manu Ginobli gives his employer far greater bang for the buck than Lamar Odom ever has.

If Odom really feels like $10 million a year for 3 years is beneath him, then perhaps he ought to refund the Clippers, Heat and Lakers the money he didn’t actually EARN in previous years, THEN from a position of equal footing, start making his demands of the Lakers.

It's time for Odom to grow up and start giving back.

Odom isn't in demand because he’s earned everyone’s respect over the years, but because there is no one else available with that skill set at his height at the current time.

I’m with Buss on this one.

Odom can eat some humble pie and redeem himself by “settling” for $36 million, or he can walk and prove himself the donkey we’ve so often seen from him in his checkered basketball career.

--- DOG EAT DOG

I don't think Lamar Odom will be a Laker next season. Just as Ariza walked for no comprehensible reason, it looks as if Odom will be gone for no reason a reasonable person could believe.

Miami looks like a possibility, even for less money. Odom still has a house there, and the Heat have a place for Odom that isn't on the bench when its tipoff time.

Everyone talks about the Blazers, especially now that Millsap is staying with the Jazz, but the Blazers haven't seemed interested. Yet.

And now noise is coming from San Antonio.

Even if Odom doesn't go to the Spurs though, the Spurs' championship aspirations for the 2010 may well rest in Lamar's hands.

For as goes Lamar Odom, so go the Lakers.

Yahoo! Sports is reporting that a 3 way deal is underway to send Carlos Boozer to Miami (via Memphis), and that Miami has offered Lamar Odom the deal the Lakers would not in terms of contract length.

It has been reported elsewhere that Odom wants a longer contract than the Lakers are willing to offer, specifically 5 years for $45 million, but now Miami is waving a 5 year, $34 million deal in front of Odom. Odom likes Miami and played there before he was traded for Shaq.

Additionally, Miami could pay Boozer his $12.7 million salary this season and own his Bird rights to sign him to an extension next summer.

Dwayne Wade, Carlos Boozer and Lamar Odom? I'm not sure that would make Miami a contender, but it ought to at least get Miami to the 2nd round of the playoffs.

The Lakers have been shallow at the small forward position for years until they benched Odom and Ariza developed into a fine small forward. To lose both Odom and Ariza would be a significant blow to the Lakers.

Artest isn't really the answer.

One of the big advantages the Lakers had was their considerable size at every position. Artest is shorter than both Ariza and Odom, and frankly is probably a stocky shooting guard more than he is a small forward.

It isn't just a matter of how Artest will play, the length of the Lakers gives opponents fits on both the defensive and offensive ends of the floor, and if the Lakers end up losing both Ariza and Odom and gaining only Artest, the look of the Lakers could be altered for good, making them just as big as any other team. How tall is Adam Morrison? ;-)

Factor in the possibilty of injury next season to Pau Gasol or Kobe Bryant, who rack up minutes in NBA basketball and FIBA competition as well, and the Lakers might not even see the Western Conference Finals next season.

Meanwhile, the Cleveland Caveliers' all-star point guard, Mo Williams, has tweated a Twitter challenge to Cavs' management to try to pick up Odom.

If Odom wants to play for a contender, Cleveland, with Shaquille O'Neal and LeBron James would certainly fit that bill. That would perhaps be the best way for Lamar to prosper and screw the Lakers over in the same move.

It's amazing, simply astonishing to me how PROFESSIONAL athletes can go so far in their careers and never learn the value of maturity, character, selflessness and team.

Odom may yet sign with the Lakers, but boy did he destroy his goodwill with Lakers fans in the process.

Okay, this is my first time ever "publishing to" a group (Lakers Fans), we'll see how that works.

Also, it seems as if Foxsports has worked out my difficulties for me and that Tom7 will be my I.D. here.

Phil Jackson often uses the metaphor of a journey when he talks about winning a championship. Using his metaphor, the road back to an NBA Championship next season looks like it may be a bit harder than it was this last.

A few days ago I wrote a blog I called, "The Rich Get Richer." In it, I looked at this last season's title contenders and one by one talked about what they had done to get better (or worse) from where they were this last season. It contained draft information, trades, and people who, due to healing from injuries, would be more of a factor this coming season than they were last season.

Then I clicked "Submit" (or whatever it is) and the browser waited forever then crashed and the story was lost.

Annoyed, I stayed away for a time.

I'm still unwilling to redo it, but to (very) roughly summarize, the Mavericks, the Celtics, the Cavaliers, the Magic and especially the Spurs appear to have SIGNIFICANTLY improved themselves over the teams they had last season.

And let's not forget the Blazers, who seem to have the Lakers' number, matured and got better as well.

That's not to say the Lakers didn't shake things up a bit as well in the off season, and Odom is not yet in the bag so more may come, but it isn't at all clear that the Lakers have improved themselves with the loss of Ariza and acquisition of Artest.

Also weighing in for the Lakers is Andrew Bynum. Without a doubt the kid has shown promise, but this season will need to start making good on that promise -- and in a consistent way (assuming Artest's scoring reflex doesn't stunt Bynum's growth).

Of particular concern is Pau Gasol.

Gasol will be playing for Team Spain in September in the European Basketball Championship.

Pau Gasol logged 931 minutes in the playoffs, 4th most of any player in the playoffs, but the only 7 footer. And they were active minutes as Pau was the 2nd best rebounder in the post season, and #2 in blocked shots as well.

And in the regular season, Pau Gasol ranked #14 in minutes played for the entire NBA, and was the only 7 footer in the top 20.

That is a lot of wear and tear -- especially for a big.

Factor in the fact that Spain played as many Olympic games as Team USA last summer and was in the gold medal game, and that Pau was Spain's main go to guy, then Lakers fans HAVE to be concerned about Pau in the coming season.

What if Pau goes down this coming season and the Lakers' hopes for a repeat fall onto the inconsistent shoulders of Andrew Bynum doing the big man duties? In the post season Bynum could hardly keep himself on the floor due to foul trouble, much less be counted on to defend, rebound and score in the post.

And what of the miles on Kobe's legs as well?

Last year's team with the second best regular season record may well find this coming year's road fraught with even more peril. They may find their wills, and their chemistry, tested and proven.

What does Phil Jackson think of the Ariza / Artest situation?

"I wasn't given the either or [the choice between Ariza and Artest]. I know Ron has been on our wish list for what, 3 years now? We needed a defender besides -- I mean somebody that was a lock down defender besides Kobe Bryant that could take on the chores, and, you know, Trevor turned out to be that guy this year.

"And so I was quite surprised, as was most of our fans I think, that, you know, negotiations did not go well with Trevor and his people. "

"And uh, you know, we think we have a player [in Ron Artest] that has probably a little more dimensions than Trevor, but still Trevor has that youth and that speed that we'll miss."

-- Phil Jackson to FSR's Myers and Hartman

Far more interesting, however...

Prior to the Lakers acquiring Artest, Phil Jackson told KLAC/570 that after the Lakers eliminated the Rockets from the playoffs in game six of the Westen Conference Semi-Finals, Ron Artest "eagerly" sought out Phil Jackson for an awkward meeting...in the Lakers' locker room shower!

"Ron said, 'Coach, I can help your team. I can help you get that championship,'" Jackson said.

"He’s an unknown," Jackson said. "He’s a player that even I think his own teams don’t know exactly what he’s going to do that particular night."

But what does seem to be a known, is that Ron Artest wants to win an NBA championship ... enough to approach an opposing coach in a locker room shower to make a pitch for it.

Very interesting indeed.