NBA Strike

  I thought I would not miss NBA basketball, but I was wrong.  I knew that the NBA was going on strike this summer and I thought, ahhhhh, who give's a hell?  Apparently I do.  

   Anyone who knows me, know how much I love basketball.  I have always said basketball was my 'mistress'.  It's what I thought about 90% of the time.  It consumed me for much of my life.  I do believe that I am over that obsession, however; I still enjoy basketball above all sports (even baseball!).  Watching basketball in a great pleasure for me.  I appreciate the athleticism of the game above all.  I don't care what anyone says, basketball athletes are the greatest athletes in the world.  The ability to run, jump, move with agility,  their physical strength and skill level is unprecedented in sports.  Soccer advocates call their sport 'the beautiful game' but I ask you; what is beautiful about twenty-two guys chasing a ball around and scoring a goal every other week?.  Basketball is the beautiful game.  It combines teamwork, athleticism, conditioning, skills, physical toughness, intelligence, excitement and a flow, that when played well, far exceeds any other sport. And I am being deprived of enjoying it because a bunch of billionaires and millionaires are arguing over how much more rich they can get.  

    Now there are many things I don't like about the game.  

I don't miss LeBron's talents;  

I don't miss the tattoos; 

I don't miss the showboating; 

I don't miss today's players thinking they are among the games greatest players in history without having accomplished anything (LeBron, Wade, Howard, and dozens of others), 

I don't miss the lack of teamwork played now,

I don't miss everyone trying to just dunk or shoot threes all game;

I don't miss sport center highlights that glorify the dunks and threes over what basketball is really about; 

I don't miss listening to the players crying about being 'disrespected'(whatever the fuck that means!), 

I don't miss Baron Davis dribble down and hoist up a thirty footer without anyone else on his team touching the ball (and he's the point guard - someone who is supposed to facilitate the team's offense - YIKE!),  

I don't miss Kevin Garnett pretending to be mean  (Mr. Meanface),

I don't miss Kobe's selfishness, and I don't miss many other things that grind me about today's game.  

However…

     I miss the game.  I love the game and to not be able to watch it pisses me off.  There is not anything else, sports-wise; to watch on TV.  I cannot watch a whole hockey game, although I have started to watch some of the Oilers games, for the the first time since the late 80's.  But a whole hockey game… not fucking likely!  So what is there to watch on TV without basketball?  My beloved Tar Heels open their season last Friday, with the opportunity to rip my heart out again (they are the top ranked team in the country - which means I will die a long, slow, death this winter, with the inevitable upset being the culmination of my torture - Do you know the Greek story about Prometheus?.  Read it and you see how it is a metaphor of my thirty-five year relationship with the Tar Heels!).  But college basketball is not shown on TV until December at the earliest, so the drought continues. 

     I have read quite a bit about strikes in sports.  Everyone, me included, is disgusted by the amounts of money in sports.  Is Albert Pujols really worth 30-35 million a year to play a child's game. The average salary for most sports is way over a million dollars per person.   Should anyone really have to play hundreds of dollars a night to just sit in the stands to watch a game, as well as the money spent on food/drinks/parking?  The whole system is fucked up.  It is so fucked up that maybe cancelling some seasons and starting over, may be the only solution.  

   I am a firm believer that the only way for sports to get under control is for the system to go back to the 'old days' when the owner ruled the system.  I know that it's not the best, but to me that is the only way to get things under control.  When the owners are the controlling party, it is not the best for the players.  Players were like chattel.  That is obvious, but look back in sports history and you will see that when the owners ruled, the sports were at their strongest.  Players were beloved, because they were much more real.  Players were not super-duper stars, with entourages, chains, tattoos, Hummers, mansions, ho's, talent, reality shows, entitlement, and fucked up attitudes.  Athletes made enough money to live a good life.  And the owners made the most money.  It's not fair but sport was great.  There were sporting heroes, dynasties, long term loyal players, a faithful fan base and a love for the games.  Now you have a bunch of selfish, entitled, spoiled, overbearing, disloyal, felonious, money hungry jerks. Yes they have the skills and without them, there is no game, but; having the players rule the roost has led us to this point in sporting history: A FUCKING DISASTER! 

    The NBA strike will not end soon.  The owners don't care whether of not there is a season.  No games mean that some of the owners lose less money than if the games were played.  And besides that, the owners are already rich people, with other incoming continuing to roll in.  They don't need the NBA to live large.  It is true that the owners have brought all the financial problems on themselves (spending) but too bad.  Without the owners, the players talents would not been seen.  No one will pay to watch Kobe play at the park, no matter how good he is.  The owners provide the stage, without them there is no professional sports.  Forget talent.  Money talks and the owners have it.  

    I can remember clearly reading a 'Sport' magazine in about 1970, with a picture of Johnny Bench on the cover and the headline was 'Who will the first one hundred thousand dollar a year player?'.   In the latest proposal to the players, in five years the average salary will be seven million dollars per year. And the players have the arrogance to turn it down.  The players have zero leverage.  NOBODY FUCKING CARES IF THEY PLAY OR NOT!  Sign the agreement and do the only thing you know to do: put an orange ball in an orange hoop.  

    This is an another example of today's spoiled, entitled athlete.  They think because everyone has kissed their asses all their lives that the owners will roll over like a whore in the grass and let them have their way.  They are fucking clueless.  The owners are rich powerful men who get their way, not because they are genetic mutations, but because most of them are smart, hard working people who have made their billions.  These kind of people always get their way and they know it.  The players are playing a game in which they have no chance, but are too stupid to realize it. 

    Let's see LeBron take his 'talent' to Miami now.  No one will give a fiddlers fuck.