The important point in the recent Kobe Bryant suspension wasn't that he finally got caught smashing defenders in the face with his elbows, but rather that the league office - in overruling the officials who failed to make the call - finally acknowledged, in effect, that the game has gotten away from it's officials.

Of course Shaq - Kobe's former partner in crime - has gotten away with even worse murder on the court than Kobe, & to my knowledge has yet to ever be suspended. And before Shaq even there was the Mailman. And other stars & occasionally lesser players have benefitted from the game having utterly gotten away from the referees, in some cases to a degree that is beyond the scope of this write-up.

Whether officials are intimidated by star players (especially BIG ones) or just favor them is up for debate. In any case things have gotten sufficiently far out of hand that this post is not calling for debate on the subject, but rather calling for action on the problem.

The league at this point simply needs to re-evaluate ALL of it's officials after the current season ends. Probably 85% need to be removed or re-trained. This would be costly to the league, especially if most of the 85% were re-trained. My suggestion would be to re-train maybe 60%, give the 15% top refs a raise, remove the other 25%. Still, this would be costly to the league in the short run, but in the long run the league might well come out ahead because of the reduced salaries paid to the incoming refs (who would make considerably less than the retained officials, but considerably more than they made at the levels they previously officiated at).

Not to mention that the integrity of the game would be elevated to former levels once again, thereby encouraging the game's fan base. Enough already, the league is to be encouraged for taking a stand in the aforementioned overruling of it's officials, now they need to follow up & finish the job.

No sooner does Carmelo Anthony come back from a 15-day suspension than Kobe Bryant goes to work on his own suspension, once again pounding defenders in the face with his elbows. In a recently published photograph on Foxsports Kobe is shown in an extremely agitated state toward Phil Jackson while coming off the court. Son, if you're not going to listen to the man with 9 rings you have a long way to go as a basketball player. I don't care if he has Zero rings. And who could forget Darius Miles getting in the face of Portland coach Maurice Cheeks. Maurice Cheeks? The defense shredding / defense playing point man who led teams to NBA Championships? And Darius Who? is going to tell Cheeks what the game's about?

It's serious enough when you have a slew of NBA High School players & College dropouts who don't even have the words defense & fundamentals in their vocabulary, but with the fans, media & almighty dollar(s) sending the message to kids in the NBA that it's all about them these all-about-me players will rarely ever grasp that basketball is a team sport - on both ends of the floor. For every Josh Howard, Tim Duncan, Robert Horry, Mike Bibby & Eric Snow who know how to play the game you have 10 or 20 guys in today's NBA who don't know how to play basketball - & that much more so with the kids.

Yeah, I was too stupid to listen to my coach too while playing the game in High School. If you won't listen to your coach so you can learn how to play basketball right you don't have any business being in the NBA. I don't care if you have more skills than Micheal Ray Richardson. People are getting tired of wannabe primadonnas mucking up the NBA. And tired of the disgrace that high school kids / college dropouts in particular have brought on the NBA. Bring on the NBA age limit, & the older the better.

[And speaking of Zen, is it me, or does a  very possibly mythological figure named Buddha get most of the credit for Phil Jackson's success - while his mentor from his playing days, old school master/ N.Y. Knicks Championship coach Red Holzman gets virtually no credit].

Hall Of Famer & former Atlanta Falcons Coach Norm Van Brocklin: "Coach Van Brocklin, Joe Namath has guaranteed that his Jets will beat the Colts; what do you think about that? "We'll find out Sunday when he plays his first Professional game."

[Can someone explain to me how a team that has no clue on defense - with a coach who doesn't even have the word defense in his vocabulary - has a record of 34-8? The best record in the NBA].

If you listen to Charley Rosen & some other experts Maurice Cheeks has little ability to coach a basketball team - & the Philadelphia 76'ers are so far from being a basketball team that even Greg Popovich couldn't lead this team out of the cellar in the next 2 or 3 years - that is until last night when the '6ers won on the road in Double Overtime against the fully healthy Cleveland Cavaliers, thus leaving the Boston Celtics alone in last place (& that after Philly losing both of their star players in A. Iverson & C. Webber).

Once again Charley Rosen (not unlike many other experts) proves that he is a great X & O's man (like a coach, in other words) but has little ability to evaluate players or coaches (like an NBA scout or Front Office person, in other words). Although Rosen - & other X & O experts may be able to comment on which hand a player blows their nose with, when it comes to the question of whether or not a player - or coach - is really good or not forget it. It's called not being able to see the forest for the trees. [ Keep in mind that this is the same Charley Rosen who claims with a straight face that neither Elgin Baylor, Calvin Murphy or C-Webb played a lick of defense in their careers - in other words a guy who when he runs out of things to write about makes up some of the most ludicrous bologna anyone's ever churned out on the NBA ].

Granted, the Philadelphia 76'ers are not that much of a basketball team - all the more evidence that it is foolhardy for the experts to be berating Maurice Cheeks as a Coach in the NBA. Cheeks is an old school NBA veteran who is among the best point guards to ever play the game (anyone who would question this fact should move on to the next post). And as for his coaching ability - who has done any better in Portland since Cheeks left? When you work for people who have no business running NBA teams ( I won't mention names, but there are at least two of them high up in the Portland organization) many experts will fail to realize that teams start at the top, and what's at the top works down through the coaching staff & down to the players.

So what does Cheeks have left to work with in Philly? Andre Miller at the point, a fairly capable passer & scorer with marginal defense; A. Igoudala (22) at the 2 (or 3 - or young Willie Green at the 2 when AI moves to 3) who is still very young and shows it on both ends, but has improved with Miller at the point; no-defense / some offense Kyle Korver (25) or rookie mid-first round pick Rodney Carney at the 3; aged Joe Smith or inexperienced Steven Hunter (25) at the 4 (or Hunter at the 5); & young S. Dalembert (25) at the 5.

So there you have an 8-player rotation with an average age of 24 not counting Smith's age. And were any of these players - besides the aged Smith - ever rated as blue-chippers? So you have a problem with Maurice Cheeks as an NBA coach? We'll see. Now that Larry Brown is back in the organization - assuming he's honest in saying he isn't eyeing the coaching job - & now that the '6ers have three first-round draft picks coming up, we will see just what Cheeks can do with something resembling a real basketball team (Brown will make sure the '6ers resemble a real basketball team real soon, bank on it).

Ultra informs us on another blog that; "Wishing violence on people with ideological differences is a bit extreme, isn't it. Sounds like what Christians & Muslims would do, no."

The last estimate I heard was that 1,000,000 - 2,000,000 Christians have now been martyred around the world. Which continues today. And you want to talk about violence against people with ideological differences? And then blame the biggest victims?

As for Christians wishing violence on people, Jesus said; "Since my kingdom is not of this world, my people will not fight." And when Jesus changes your heart & saves your soul so that it is growing - rather than stagnating or dying - the last thing you do is wish violence on people who are not Christians. Jesus is about Love, not hate.

The Orthodox Church is not now, nor has it ever been involved in violence - except as victims. If you are somehow confusing the "Fundamentalist" republiclan /Evangelical/ Protestant /Denominational church (or "Christian Right") with Orthodox / historical Christianity, then at least remember that the Christian Right is generally not exceedingly more militant than the rightwing/Republican Party in general - and that liberal factions are now well-represented in many Protestant denominations and/or sects. And as for the worst violent "Christian" offender maybe start with the Vatican-led slaughters in the Inquisitions (1184--), Crusades & Reformation Period (c. 1520) wherein the executions involved killing scores of Christians from the Orthodox Church, "Anabaptist Christians", other ascetics, Muslims, etc. [ This very persecution, along with persecution from Muslims & others, being one of the driving forces that led to the international presence of the Orthodox Church - with the existence even of the Orthodox Church In America, complete with an Orthodox Church in most U.S. cities ].

Mouth-flapping primadonna Joe Namath guaranteed his Jets would win Super Bowl III against the Baltimore Colts. His prediction came true in the most mystery-shrouded NFL game  ever played.                                
                                                  
                                                  
                                    Some

Some of you understand that Johnny Unitas is the guy, the guy who almost singlehandedly ripped some of the best NFL teams in history in Championship Games, who almost singlehandedly put football on the map. So you who have a clue know Unitas doesn't fix any football game anywhere, anytime, not even a sandlot game, period.

So now I'll cut the b.s. and get to the point: Unitas life - & that of his family - are threatened; Unitas is in on the fix. I'll give one example - only (go watch the video if you don't remember, don't take my word for anything): it's late in the game - but still early - Unitas is on a short drop near the Jets red zone, he sees the Jets defender ( cutting straight across the field near the goal line; when the Jets defender is SQUARELY IN FRONT OF UNITAS, WITH UNITAS VIEW COMPLETELY UNOBSTRUCTED, Unitas makes eye contact WITH THE JETS DEFENDER, before THROWING THE BALL SQUARELY IN HIS HANDS/STOMACH FOR THE INTERCEPTION.

You say Unitas choked? Please, little kiddies go to the sandbox and play with the other little kiddies. He was ####ed up and rusty from injuries that year? Go watch the video. You say the Colts "receiver" was a viable, real-world option on the play? Listen, I've been nice up to this point - don't try my patience.

Okay, one other quick example, if you don't remember, or watch the video for the first time, you're going to want to pay very close attention to the flea-flicker play. And while you're doing that you're going to want to keep firmly in mind  that this play was in the Colts playbook, that qb Earl Morrall was used to running the play, and that he knew full-well the play was designed for Jimmy Orr (as Coach Shula himself would later affirm).

And there are other very serious problems. Any coach worth their salt knows the fundamental objective of any NFL game is to win the battle of the clock/line of scrimmage. You do that by running the football. You don't run the football, you lose. The # of exceptions aren't even worth talking about. Shula's Colts did run the football that day, 11 times. And I'm talking about seriously running the football, in other words the times their star running back Tom Matte got the ball in his hands. So what does the Colts offensive line do the 11 times Matte gets the football? Exactly what all the experts & every real football person knew they would do: blow the Jets overmatched defensive front out. So what's the problem. Why does Matte get the ball 11 times? The game was never lopsided to explain the Colts refusal to fight the battle of the clock & run the ball. It ended 16-7. So what was the problem when Matte gained 117 yards on his 11 carries. For those mathematically challenged that's 10.7 yds. per carry. In those days it was normally the quarterbacks who called the plays.

Knowing what I do of Earl Morrall, do I think he'd be any more likely than Unitas to ever throw a football game?  Forget it: his life was also threatened, & probably that of his family.

Of course Bubba Smith called Namath & the Jets on the fix, but Namath's lame-beyond-belief  "argument" was that anyone who thought the fix was a fix didn't see the Jets play that year [PLAY WHO? THE OTHER SEMI-PRO TEAMS THEY  BARELY SCRAPED BY IN THE SEMI-PRO AFL, BEFORE JUST GETTING PAST OAKLAND to "earn" their way into the Super Bowl? Meanwhile the Colts were BONECRUSHING a very respectable Cleveland Browns team 34-0 to earn their way into the Super Bowl. And it's no surprise to any real football person that just 2 years later they were back in the Super Bowl beating one of the greatest football teams of all-time, the Doomsday Defense Dallas Cowboys].

The Jets? En route to a 4-10 record just 2 years later neither Mr. Big Talk Joe Namath, or the New York Jets, would ever return to the Super Bowl again.

The Congress of The United States of America, & the FBI, have an investigation to do. Whether - as I suspect - that investigation will lead squarely to the doorstep of people associated with the old AFL & Organized Crime or not, remains to be seen (& just who were the "unsavory characters" Namath partnered with in his barroom business so that Pete Rozelle ordered Namath to sell his interest in the business, prompting Namath to temporarily retire before submitting). In any case the people of the United States of America need to know just who it was that threatened the lives of two of the most decent men in sports history: Johnny Unitas & Earl Morrall.

The latest SI cover shows a U. Wash. PF, & behind him a guard who looks like he should still be in high school. One Slam cover out is hailing Chris Paul as the "New Era Point God." Another Slam cover is hailing Arame Stoudamire as........., well, I'm not sure, I think like the New Era #### basher baller, or something like that, maybe. No wonder today's HypeBA produces more Primadonnas than real basketball players. I can only wonder if by "New Era" Slam isn't referring to an era where players forget how to play defense altogether! Where players have no clue left of the team concept. Maybe the game will be further reinvented so that the New School ballers of today won't have to play any defense at all! After all why should these poor "gods" have to do the years of work that it takes to learn how to play defense.

And is it any wonder that few even know who holds the record for points in a game 7 - even though that record is becoming one of  the most enduring in Sports, now almost 50 yrs. old. Even though that record (47 pts.) was set with no 3-pt. line, set against a primary defender named Oscar Robertson. To give Sam Jones his due would mean having to give the old school game of the 60's-70's it's due, & thereby recognize that today's "gods" are the most overinflated, overhyped, overrated athletes in history.

And this brings us to the question of Michael Jordan. Paul Arizin, the former Warrior, NBA scoring leader, & now NBA 50 Greatest Players member - & the man many credit with establishing the jump shot - says of MJ: "He's certainly a great player. Jordan is more a forward than a guard. You can name the 15 greatest. He'd probably be in that category."                                        
                                                  
Favorable MJ comparisons with Jerry West / Sam Jones/ Big O involve a failure to realize how seriously the game had deteriorated by the late 80's [& a failure to realize that West was a superior passer/playmaker, a better rebounder (though 3 inches shorter), had vastly superior shooting range, & had they kept stats on steals in West's day Jordan wouldn't be close]; the partial exception being the Detroit Pistons, who pounded Jordan & the Bulls out of the Post Season 3 straight years between '88-90. The Bulls returned the favor in '91 when Detroit was a team in serious decline, fast heading for .500 mediocrity. Jordan & the Bulls won Championships in the weakest NBA the league had seen since the early days. There was hardly anyone in the league who even had the word Defense in their vocabulary at that time. An NBA which was/is playing around the Sweet 16 level of the  60's-70's (wherein we sent our college players to the Olympics to win gold medals; now our top pros are sent out and are lucky if they can handle Lithuania). [Lithuania itself is a mere shell of a team compared to the powerhouse Russian pro teams our COLLEGE KIDS held their own against in the Olympics of the '60's-early 80's].

Although it is tempting to blame the demise of the NBA on New Era player attitudes, which are certainly part of the problem, there are clearly two other factors which have to be considered: 1) The Spencer Haywood Ruling maintained that Haywood could not be required by the NBA to go through college before receiving eligibility to play in the NBA. Thus in the late 70's the influx of college drop-outs & no-college players began. This was most unfortunate for the NBA & most of the concerned players since: it has been this influx of immature, unseasoned drop-outs & high schoolers that has contributed heavily to both the degradation of NBA New Era attitudes & the degradation of play itself.  2) Burgeoning expansionism also helped to pulverize the league in the 80's, as the league went from 23 teams in 1983 to 29 in 1989. Thus, between the Haywood Ruling in the late 70's & the expansionism of the mid-80's we see what more-or-less constitutes the divide between the Old School game of the 60's-70's -roughly - and the New Era game since.

Barry Bonds & other pro sports figures have sent the message to our young athletes that it is no longer enough to be an honest, hard working, committed athlete - as in the Real Deal - but that you should become Dopers & Cheaters like them. Bonds' BALCO steroid ring trainer (Anderson) has already been convicted in the BALCO case, & is doing hard jail time again for refusing to talk about Bonds doping. Bonds may yet be indicted himself for probably lying when claiming to a Grand Jury that his Balco arm "cream" was a supplement compound - with indications for arthritis - that contained flaxseed oil. The last thing any sane person would use topically for arthritis would be flaxseed oil - even using it internally for arthritis would only be done by the poorly informed as there are many oils, e.g., fish oils, Evening Primrose, & Borage which have far more consistent validation in scientific studies for arthritis (particularly rheumatoid arthritis).  Further, to use flaxseed oil topically for arthritis would be beyond ludicrous for at least two important reasons: 1) flaxseed oil is notoriously unstable; the polyunsaturated fatty acids in it would rot in your skin long before your skin would have a chance to completely absorb them. As peroxides formed during the rotting process the peroxides would be absorbed into joints & exacerbate arthritic conditions 2) Anyone even remotely informed about topical oil-based treatments for arthritis knows that the kind of oils that are used are aromatic essential oils, namely camphor (& eucalyptus, rosemary, etc. can be used).  Hank Aaron was more than just the Real Deal: he is a class man who earned his records the old-fashioned way. He is a man who did much to lay out the path that Barry Bonds walks on. Barry Bonds needs to gracefully bow out of the game NOW - if for no other reason than out of respect for Hank Aaron. If you choose to do the Right Thing Barry, those of us who are at all informed & have any ethics left, thank you in advance.