Cyber Max

There are some things you just don’t do in life. You don’t watch a Steven Seagal movie, you don’t buy pills with an ‘X’ in the name, and you don’t bet on the Clippers to have a winning season. They picked up Mobley and Cassell, so will this year be any different for the Clippers?



They traded Marko Jaric for Sam Cassell to try to build veteran leadership on a team that clearly has none. Besides him, the player with the most experience in the league is Cuttino Mobley, who has played 6 years. On paper, the starting lineup looks good for LA: Cassell, Mobley, Maggette, Brand and Chris Kaman. All their scorers are one-on-one players though, who’ll stand forever on the perimeter trying to find a shot. Hopefully Cassell can fix that, although Cassell isn’t exactly a past-first-shoot-last Point Guard.



Their bench with Wilcox and Shaun Livingston is shallow to say the least. Cassell has more years on him than the entire Clippers bench. The Clippers have always had a pretty decent roster, but lack of experience has always been their weakness. The year they had Brand, Odom, Maggette, Richardson and Andre Miller was the year we all thought they’d make the playoffs. Trading for Cassell may honestly be the first time the Clippers have traded for an all-star in his 10th or more seasons.



Since becoming the Clippers in 1978, LA has made the playoffs 3 times in 27 years. I know it’s tough being the 2nd worst team in your own city, but Donald Sterling needs to get up and run the team. An outsider would think Elgin Baylor owns the team, as often as they see him. This season seems to be no different. Thanks to a complete lack of atmosphere and enthusiasm by their owner, and the fact that there’s a more interesting NBA team in their own city, the Clippers should be booked for another losing season. Like a company in Tahiti, the Clippers aren’t going anywhere.

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You may not like Trading Spaces, but you’re going to see a house cleanup anyway if you’re an NBA fan. Thanks to Ron Artest and Latrell Sprewell, the NBA’s reputation isn’t perfect anymore, and David Stern is out to change that. Starting last Thursday, NBA players will be fined if they aren’t wearing formal outfits during pregame.



It’s true that NBA players have the reputation of being overpaid jerks, but having them put on a Giovanni suit isn’t going to change that. Does the NBA think I’ll think more of Ron Artest if he dresses like Donald Trump? Remember when Vernon Maxwell, Dennis Rodman and Bill Laimbeer played? Yeah, those guys were the model citizens that these youngsters could learn a thing or two from.



Believe it or not, the war on fashion and leisure has been going on for a while in the NBA. Since last year, players can’t listen to walkmans in pregame sessions, something that Vince Carter found out. Chris Gatling was policed a couple years ago when his orange headband didn’t match the Cavs team colors.

These guys already wear uniforms, so is it really necessary to give them a dress code? If anything, making them dress fancy will hurt the NBA’s image. Showing players who dress casual and listen to music will help relate these people to the fans. But outfitting them in $1000-suits will only intensify our opinions of them as snobby jerks.



And that’s not all. NBA players will be required to attend even more sessions of community service, because David Harrison doesn’t have enough to do.



It’s not like improving the NBA’s image is a bad thing. Looking at the stats, the sheer number of fines and suspensions given weekly is astounding. In total money fined from the athletes last year, the MLB collected a total of $170,725 from all fines. The NFL collected roughly $3.3 million. The NBA gathered a whopping $13.9 million from league infractions in 2004. Stern fined Jeff Van Gundy $100K alone when Van Gundy suggested that the games were rigged. Not once since the start of the regular season did the NBA go a 2-week period without a suspension/fine.



Besides their drug policy, the NBA does a good job policing its league, but having the players wear suits won’t help the NBA’s image at all. The only good thing coming from this new dress code is the humor we’ll experience seeing these guys in suits. Could you imagine Allen Iverson, Dirk Nowitski or Yao Ming in a tux? That’s some funny stuff.

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October 3, 2005

Considering the mass popularity he has and the pressure that comes from it, it is hard not to be impressed with the way he has performed. The expectations we expected from Yao were way too high; his stats were gargantuan when he played in the Chinese league. I guess people imagined what Shaq would be like if he was 7′6, and how Yao should have an advantage over everyone.



Let’s look at some of the other 7′5 or higher NBA centers. Manute Bol at 7′7 was a great shot blocker (so was everyone else), but has been known lately for his stupid, zany shenanigans. Shawn Bradley at 7′6 simply is terrible; a field mouse could knock him down. Gourghe Muresan at 7′7 was a one-time all-star, but like Shawn Bradley was skinnier than most pencils, and became injured as well. In comparison, Yao is far and away better than any of the giants that played the game before him.



Yao Ming has the ability of some of the less tall 7-foot centers of the NBA’s past: Zydrunas Illgauskis, Arvydas Sabonis and Rick Smits. But the bottom line is that Yao can’t create his own shot the way those guys can. He averages 19 points and 9 rebounds a game, which are easily all-star status. However, Yao Ming averaged over 30 points and 20 rebounds a game in the pro-China basketball league, which in the NBA would set all kinds of records. So in comparison, he’s not great. But he’s better than Pervis Ellison.



But I am super-critical with his stats, because anyone with that size and talent should have better numbers. When you are the tallest person in the NBA you have to grab 13 rebounds a game. Charles Barkley got 14 rebounds a game, and he was only 6′6, a full foot smaller than Yao.



Ming doesn’t seem to assert himself in the action and become excited for a game, unless he plays Shaq. Superstars attempt more than 12 shots a game. And 2 blocked shots a game from a guy with a height advantage over everyone isn’t as productive as he should be. With a little more intensity, he could be the first Houston center since Hakeem Olajuwon to win the NBA title.

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