Using NBA math, talk is cheaper than silence.
The Bulls get docked $50,000 for keeping quiet, and then Phil Jackson gets fined $10,000 for speaking up.
What’s the lesson here? You can’t cry fraud in a crowded press conference, I guess.
If these absurd and rapidly conspicuous fines are what caused the Bulls to return to the splendor of their game–a 19-point drubbing of the Pacers on Wednesday night–the money is well spent.
This may be the best value since the Louisiana Purchase. Ooops. Didn’t mean to make a historical reference. I expect to be fined tomorrow.
Even less costly than honest opinion is physical malice, as expressed by those two notable hoops pugilists, Ron Harper and Reggie Miller.
Miller called what happened in the closing seconds of Game 4 one of those macho things where “everybody wants to stick his chest out,” at least those who have a chest.
“A typical NBA fight,” said Miller, giving it a definition even the NBA could not agree to. In any kind of fight, Harper and Miller would have been gone from Game 5.
In a real fight, one or both of them needs stitches, and only Michael Jordan required a cut man.
And who was missing from Round 5 of the Bulls-Pacers gripe-and-grope? The inquisitive Jalen Rose, who may or may not have been merely, as Larry Bird suggested, a little anxious to get to the scorer’s table.
Standing up carries a greater penalty than knocking someone down. A curious accounting system the NBA uses.
Suspending Miller and Harper would have been the fair solution for what happened, and a push in terms of loss. While Miller had hit the two winning shots in Indianapolis, had he played as well as Harper has, there would have been no need for last-second dramatics.
As it turned out, Miller’s presence in Game 5 was as handy as a parking meter.
In prizefights the winner gets the biggest share. So if Harper gets hit for $3,500 and Miller for $2,500, who’s the winner?
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Well, the Bulls are the winners, and huge, putting into motion the emotions of the lost weekend in Indianapolis, as if there could be any other kind.
No complaints, no conscience. This was rebuttal, reprisal and punishment. This was lesson-giving time.
“I don’t know deep down in their hearts if they feel they can do it,” Bird said before the game. “If they’re just satisfied beating Chicago two times, they’ll never win a championship.”
Curious how Bird refers to his team as “they,” while Phil Jackson, defender and truth teller, leaves no doubt that he and the Bulls are in this together.
And speaking of Jackson, his fine is the silliest and most unreasonable of all, since he is the one who should have been paid for the entertainment value of his observations.
Comparing what happened with the U.S.-Soviet game in the ’72 Olympics was an inspired bit of mockery. Jackson could have used the assassination of Rasputin or Larry King’s weddings, any example of never-ending ordeals, but apparently the more clever you are, the higher the cost, so he stuck with a familiar basketball reference, just so the hoop heads would get it.
And Jackson’s offhand mention of an eight-man defense by the Pacers certainly drew the biggest laugh of the day, the exact effect Jackson wanted.
No groans, no gasps, just sympathetic mirth for a well-aimed quip.
I asked Jackson directly if he meant any more than that and he said no, and passed out the proper praise, including admiration for Miller’s ability to make the shot.
From all of this, the Bulls, and Jackson in particular, were made to be crybabies who can dish it out but cannot take it. And by the same folks who were saying silent “thank yous” under their breath while Jackson filled their dead air and their notebooks.
Free of charge, it might be mentioned.