Actions like these are what make it so painfully obvious that the league’s ownership of the Hornets is turning into an absolute farce. But unfortunately that isn’t even the most damning piece of evidence.
Once Paul was traded to the Clippers, a perennial loser, there was no backlash. There were no letters written from bitter, unsuccessful owners. There wasn’t a league wide petition to veto the trade and keep Paul hanging in his version of basketball purgatory.
Why?
Because the Clippers aren’t the Lakers. The Clippers have been the league’s laugh track for decades. It’s not just that the team wasn’t successful, it’s that they were painfully dreadful. As prestigious as the Lakers franchise is, the Clippers are the exact opposite.
These owners see Chris Paul traded to a team like the Clippers and immediately assume it won’t hurt them. They don’t have a history of winning, so what does it hurt?
Over the last week the NBA has mirrored professional wrestling more than a legitimate sports association. David Stern’s ego and senility are rapidly inserting themselves into places they don’t belong. Even though the league has the right to negotiate a good trade for the Hornets, it never should have gotten this far in the first place. The inability to find an owner for a team is the responsibility of the league.
The bottom line is that each owner is going to look out for the well being of their own franchise. They don’t care about how successful the Hornets are, and they certainly don’t care if the Hornets get enough value in return for a player that was going to bolt for free agent waters at the end of the season anyways. Each owner is looking out for himself. And it will always be that way.
It would be unrealistic to ask the owners to put aside their glaring conflicts of interest and try and make a deal that would make the Hornets better. But hiding behind the guise of league parity and pretending that is the primary goal is utterly ridiculous. As fans of the league each one of you should be insulted that these owners are trying to shovel loads of nonsense into your mouths.
The approved trade that sent Chris Paul to the Clippers only proves my point. Where was the uproar? Where was David Stern’s apparent motives that declared he refused to let players dictate their way to a bigger market. That argument is perhaps the most flawed of them all when you consider that just six days later Paul ended up in the exact same market he would have been in the first place.
If the league wants to unload barrels of excuses onto the fans like piles of manure the least they could do is try and keep their story straight. Even though the deal New Orleans received from the Clippers was stronger than the one they got from the Lakers, all their excuses for vetoing the trade in the first place are nothing but heaping mounds of drivel.
Now, I’m certainly not one for conspiracy theories. I like to believe what I’m told. But when what I’m told is immediately contradicted less than a week later it becomes hard to accept that I’m being told the truth. Even though the Hornets got a better deal than they would have from the Lakers, the lies and deceit the NBA and its owners are cowering under is enough to make any stomach churn.
The bottom line, Los Angeles, is that you got hosed.