Flip

And no one could be rested before this?

The conventional wisdom is that getting the extra days rest at the end of the long trip, not to mention the extra night at home, is more valuable than a night off in a hotel. There's probably little to no evidence on this, but I can almost guarantee that's the line of thinking.

Kind of like sitting your star with 1 minute to go in the first and third quarters.

What about when stars get hurt? Do the fans get refunds then? Does every fan that paid to see the Bulls this year get some money back?

Not the same thing, for obvious reasons.

What's Stern going to do when Pop brings those guys, starts them and has them play one minute, and then they sit the rest of the game? Fine him for his player rotations?

I have said in every post that I don't think Stern should do anything. You should take this issue up with jmurph if you want to express diagreement about it, who suggested that Popovich should be suspended. I do think that Popovich deserves some criticism, though, and I have given him some.

I paid damn good money for two on the Sunday before D'Antoni packed it in. Carmelo Anthony sleepwalked, pouted, and generally acted like a dog biscuit ##### the whole game. He's lucky he didn't get cited for larceny.

Is Stern going to get me my money back?

May be wrong here, but I haven't seen anyone mention that part of why Pop did it last night is that the Spurs' next game is an important one with Memphis.

1. Pop is a great coach, almost certainly the best in the business.
2. David Stern is an ass who should have retired years ago, and routinely suspends and fines people for terrible reasons.
3. Pop essentially threw the game last night (What is the difference between what he did and throwing a game? It was less subtle?).
4. The Spurs, hilariously, almost won the game that their coach was in the process of throwing.

I think all of those things are true. But I think #3 is the most important one in this case.

It should be noted that Stern and Poppovich serve two completely different masters. No coach is ever going to retain his job if the team's ratings and ticket sales are doing well but the team is losing. Conversely, the commissioner's office does not care which teams succeed on the court (outside of probably preferring some big markets in the Finals) as long as the league is popular and healthy.

If the league really wants to preserve the TV vitality of game 17 on a Thursday night, it needs to agree with the teams (and the players' union) about an acceptable way to incentivize the coaches to balance the competitive interests of the team (and self-preservation) with the entertainment interests of the league. I do not think anyone is saying that Stern ought to enforce some nonexistent rule, but if there was such a rule, these are the competing interests it would have to address, at a minimum.

I would rather try to avoid ascribing moral imperatives to sports franchises or their constituent parts because I do not think you will find common ground on which all participants believe they have agreed. In other words, there are plenty of players and coaches who participate because they can and have no interest in our psychotic compulsions, nor should they.

Regarding the foreseeability- if you buy tickets to game 79, you might be able to do some anticipating to figure that a team might sit some players, but if you buy tickets to San Antonio's 4th road game in 5 days, you can probably anticipate that Duncan and Ginobili might not play, as well. That argument is not very compelling to me because it draws an arbitrary line about how smart and prescient the average fan is, and it could just as easily be drawn on either side of those two events.

Regarding the other examples- I absolutely do not think this situation is worse than tanking for the same reason NJ says- Popp is trying to maximize his team's competitiveness. If he thinks this is the best way to win the most games (or keep his team healthy enough to win the title) then I am not in a position second guess his knowlede of Duncan's knees or Ginobili's ankles. To get really reductionist, we look the other way on tanking because it is good for a bad team in the long run to maximize its chance to draft a young star and eventually get close to a title. Why would we second guess the Spurs for resting their stars in a game where they have a higher probability of fatigue or injury so they can maximize their chances to get close to a title in that very same season?

Also, regarding the gambling component, games like this are a feature, not a bug. Gambling is about deploying data in the most efficient way. The casinos try to conceptualize all of this data and translate it into a betting line that makes the public bet. The possibility that the Spurs might rest stars would draw more money to Miami, which would push the line up (and which ultimately turned out to be a BAD BET). It is exactly what Vegas wants. On the other hand, smart gamblers can look at the schedule and anticipate that the Spurs might rest guys in these situations and bet the more favorable spread before the announcement pushes the public money against them. Again, that is the very essence of gambling.

3. Pop essentially threw the game last night (What is the difference between what he did and throwing a game? It was less subtle?).

#### it then. Let's not let any players have any days/nights off ever. Matter fact, let's do away with subs and also have any strong bench players mandated as starters. And let's shoot Kendrick Perkins and Thabo Sefolosha.

EDIT: In '08-'09 (memory might be off on all sorts of details here) Mike D'antoni had one of his ever present player issues with Nate Robinson and benched Nate for about 14 or 15 games. The very first game Nate came back he scored 41 points in a Knicks victory over the Hawks. Shouldn't there have been substantial penalties for the team benching a guy who was a Slam Dunk Champion and one of their best players?

#### it then. Let's not let any players have any days/nights off ever. Matter fact, let's do away with subs and also have any strong bench players mandated as starters. And let's shoot Kendrick Perkins and Thabo Sefolosha.

Yeah that's fair, there's obviously no in-between. You got me.

Look I'm not particularly fired up about this. I think I'm right, but I'm not burning any witches about it or anything. I think Berg's comments have been interesting. But can you take a stab at answering my questions in parentheses? Because I genuinely am not seeing it.

707--a really thoughtful post....

but I wonder: should the ordinary fan's routine responsibility during the ticket-buying process include "I need to do due diligence to assume both teams will be trying to win?"

imagine coaches routinely adopt Pop's strategies here....."damn, it's a great matchup, but it's a back-to-back for the Thunder and the Lakers have played 3 in 4 on the road, better not risk it?"

suppose the Spurs have to refund full face ticket price to any fan in attendance who wants it--is this a fair penalty?

and as for gambling, what about the problem of perception this creates? given that it's not obvious to a bunch of hardcore NBA fans which of the games in this sequence would have made the most sense for Pop to rest those guys (read the past 50 posts)--given that strategic flexibility--the question "why rest them all TONIGHT?" is gonna always evoke a potentially disreputable answer.

jmurph- To me, there is very little difference between what he did and throwing a game. The distinction is in the bigger picture, where coaches are not hired to win individual games, they are hired to maximize team success over time periods we have defined as seasons. If you throw a game in isolation, there is no reason to do so. If you throw a game in this case, it is to rest players to maximize success over the season. If you tank several games, it is to maximize the chance of success in future seasons.

NJ is going the other direction with the reductio ad absurdum, because if we define a coach's success by individual events, they should absolutely never rest players in games. The question is the period of evaluation- 10 years? a season? a month? a game? a quarter? a possession? Popp is clearly using the season as is measuring stick. If you want him to use something else, you're going to have to give him a reason to do so.

Another thought: the Heat had to play the game, too. I know they get ESPN just like the rest of us, so they found out about 3 hours before the game that this one was just for fun and the Spurs didn't care about it. So then Spoelstra had to quickly decide whether to scrap the gameplan he had for the night and sit his stars, too, even though they presumably had a normal shootaround earlier in the day, so he was sort of committed at that point. And sitting them at home probably wouldn't exactly endear him to the owner. Or maybe that didn't happen at all, or it did happen but Spoelstra only spent about two seconds thinking about it and I'm overselling it, but isn't it just easier to act in good faith and assume a professional basketball game is going to be contested between two teams that are trying to win?

711- I guess I would say caveat emptor. Fans are certainly not required to review all circumstances to determine which starters are likely to see the court, but if they choose not to do that, they are probably stuck with the tickets they bought. Robin earlier mentioned buying tickets to the xmas day Lakers-Clips game for a kid who usually does not get to go to those games. The xmas day games are probably the highest profile regular season games, and the ticket price reflects that. Still, Kobe could get hurt. Blake could get sick. D'Antoni could get mad at Gasol and bench him. Who knows?

We don't have an NBA team in Seattle, but I buy about a dozen sets of MLB tickets each year. I definitely take into account things like who is likely to pitch that day, whether it is a day after night game where guys will rest, if it is a getaway day. It does not insulate me from seeing a bad game (especially for the Mariners), but I maximize my chances of seeing a better game. You could apply similar principles here.

TLDR- Since you can do research to minimize your chances of buying tickets to a game where the stars rest, you kind of have to assume the risk if you buy tickets to a game where they end up resting. It sucks, but that is the natural reaction to coaches being judged by season success.

Berg 712: Interesting points. But then the counter is that the league doesn't care about those things, and probably shouldn't. The season is made up of those isolated events. So the reductio ad absurdum in the opposite direction is that a season made up of unsporting individual events isn't much of a season.

Speaking of coaching, the start of the DEN-GS game was a master class in abusing a specific player. The Warriors started out isolating Lee on Faried and Lee just killed him for about three possessions. Then, Karl switched Faried to Festus Ezeli, who just sprinted down the court to post up under the hoop and continued to embarrass Faried. It staked them to a big early lead, which mattered quite a bit since the ended up winning by 1.

715- That is true, if the balance of the events are shaped like that. If we start seeing San Antonio tanking a majority of its games, Popp probably will be on his way out, too.

Pops is the anti-Thibs. Thibs would have played Deng 48 minutes last night, and prayed for double OT.

I don't have really strong thoughts on this, and even though there are conflicting views here I find myself agreeing with virtually every post made on the subject (save the silliness in post 709).

suppose the Spurs have to refund full face ticket price to any fan in attendance who wants it--is this a fair penalty?

Who says no to a refund? That's several hundred thousand dollars, if not more (what about concessions, parking, etc?).

In '08-'09 (memory might be off on all sorts of details here) Mike D'antoni had one of his ever present player issues with Nate Robinson and benched Nate for about 14 or 15 games. The very first game Nate came back he scored 41 points in a Knicks victory over the Hawks. Shouldn't there have been substantial penalties for the team benching a guy who was a Slam Dunk Champion and one of their best players?

I was at that game. Nate Robinson was literally unstoppable in the fourth quarter in overtime but that had a bit to do with 1) Mike Woodson insisting on playing Mike Bibby and 2) Mike Woodson refusing to send a second defender to help on Nate Robinson.

They just played Toronto and the Wizards. Didn't seem to be an issue then. I agree, though, that it wasn't at random.

In the Toronto game (the first game of 4 in 5 nights on the road), the Spurs won in double-OT, and Parker, Duncan, Ginobili, and Green averaged just under 43 minutes. That's probably when Pop decided that they would take the Miami game off. The Spurs have played the most games in the league thus far (4 more than their main division rival who they're facing tomorrow), they've also played the most road games, and their stars are old. Maybe the decision to send those players home was in part a calculated complaint against the league's schedule-making, or maybe not, but there's a strong argument that it improves rather than diminishes their chances of winning the title this year. If a coach isn't permitted to set his rotation in a way that maximizes his team's odds of a championship in the current season, then I think that's a much bigger problem than the fans' disappointment at not seeing all the stars they were hoping to see.

I don't know; it's not as though Stern is huffing about the integrity of the game itself, he's just mad because it was a TNT game on a night with only two games. It's hard to get upset about something so superficial and ancillary to competition.

The "throwing games" charge only works if Pop didn't think he'd get back more later than he was giving up last night.

I don't have really strong thoughts on this, and even though there are conflicting views here I find myself agreeing with virtually every post made on the subject (save the silliness in post 709).


I agree with this.

This is just a much larger arrow that points to a big problem in the NBA: the elite teams put little value on the regular season. We've seen this for years, last night just highlighted it nationally.

the points about what Pop should be doing are correct, obviously; the problem is systemic.

I guess what I'm thinking is: we've got a situation where the interests of the Spurs and the interests of all fans in attendance are starkly in conflict; now, since pro sports exist, the conflict has to be resolved in favor of that group of fans--no?

really the best solution would be for Stern to issue an apology for scheduling fail and cut refund checks to fans who attended. be the benevolent despot!

723- That gets back to the question of whethe a sports team is a public good or a private business. I tend toward the latter. Even though they are the recipients of huge amounts of public money, I think the legal relationships between teams and cities usually make it those sums of money more like gifts than investments. It is a complicated issue, though.

I know they did this a few times last year- does anyone know if any of those games were at home?

I know they did this a few times last year- does anyone know if any of those games were at home?


Sometimes. I'm pretty sure they did it here (in Portland) once.

now, since pro sports exist, the conflict has to be resolved in favor of that group of fans--no?

No. Really, the only way that happens is if people start voting with the wallets.

This is an entirely made up controversy. Anyone who has a problem with the Spurs needs to have their head examined. If ever there was a black and white issue, this is it. The NBA has no business interfering in coaching decisions and if they do levy sanctions the Spurs should sue the league. If I'm Popovich, I refuse to pay any fine, I make a huge stink, and I resign before I give the head office an inch. I mean seriously #### them and their tyrannical need to control everything which is much worse, much more anti-competition, than a very justifiable coaching decision.

This is an entirely made up controversy. Anyone who has a problem with the Spurs needs to have their head examined. If ever there was a black and white issue, this is it. The NBA has no business interfering in coaching decisions and if they do levy sanctions the Spurs should sue the league. If I'm Popovich, I refuse to pay any fine, I make a huge stink, and I resign before I give the head office an inch. I mean seriously #### them and their tyrannical need to control everything which is much worse, much more anti-competition, than a very justifiable coaching decision.

Stern is entirely driven by TV; he doesn't give a fig for the fans who bought tickets. If this is Spurs at Cleveland, shown only on Fox Sports Ohio and Fox Sports SW, he doesn't say a thing.

It's hard to get upset about something so superficial and ancillary to competition.

This assumes a world where professional sports and venues for competition exist as some sort of universal fiat, or, as nick swisher says in [723]:

we've got a situation where the interests of the Spurs and the interests of all fans in attendance are starkly in conflict; now, since pro sports exist, the conflict has to be resolved in favor of that group of fans--no?

Really, the only way that happens is if people start voting with the wallets.

And by fans, you mean TNT/ESPN/etc. executives.

That gets back to the question of whethe a sports team is a public good or a private business. I tend toward the latter.

While each team is a private business, they're also part of a federation (national tv deals, revenue sharing), with David Stern as appointed head of that federation. Stern is looking out for the interests of that federation. Given what we've seen of the growth of tv money over the past couple decades, there's big incentive for individual owners to maximize league revenue.

OTOH, how large is the difference between this situation, and speculation that Phil Jackson would do the exact same thing with _himself_ on road trips? Is there an implicit prerogative to have the best coach on the bench for every game?

And on the gripping hand, there's plenty of room for a fan-sourced index of predicted quality of NBA games that could easily be created. I have no doubt that the tv executives I referenced above are considering the same thing now.

The competitive game we got last night is the great irony in all this. But its hard to say where Miami's dial was at for the game.

This isn't about tanking (or about the fans, or competitive balance, or even TV), it's about Pops doing this in an intentionally visible way. If you choose to be the nail that sticks up, prepare to be hammered down.

...and I resign before I give the head office an inch.

Easy for you to say.

The NBA has no business interfering in coaching decisions and if they do levy sanctions the Spurs should sue the league.

I'm really uncomfortable with that line in the sand. I don't agree with Stern in this situation, but I'm not sure why coaching decisions are sacrosanct and ownerhsip and player decisions aren't. Teams have submitted themselves as part of the NBA. I think that there can be common sense rules that allow the league to protect its product that could put limits on allowing teams to make player decisions that damage the league. I don't think that Pop went to far here, but if he say decided that he didn't want his starters involved in the entire road trip, I would probably side with Stern.

So, is Stern going to start enforcing anti-tanking now? Because the last 1-2 months of the season, the 5 worst teams are usually "throwing games" in the same manner the Spurs did last night.

So, is Stern going to start enforcing anti-tanking now? Because the last 1-2 months of the season, the 5 worst teams are usually "throwing games" in the same manner the Spurs did last night.

Yeah...but nobody wanted to watch them anyway.

Examples of Spurs benching starters last year. Note- I am not trying to discern where there are legitimate injuries, so some of these may have other explanations-

1/21 @ HOU, b2b, 3rd in 4, lost 105-102. No Duncan, Ginobili
2/21 @ POR, b2b, 8th of 9 game road trip. Lost 137-97. No Parker, Duncan, Ginobili
3/26 vs. PHI, 3rd of b2b2b (traveled for game 2, ouch), won 93-76. No Duncan
4/9 @ UTH, b2b, h&h, 3rd of 4, lost 91-84. No Parker, Duncan, Ginobili
4/18 @ SAC, 3rd of b2b2b, won 127-102. No Duncan

So the point that he usually does it on the road appears to be true, although he did rest Duncan at home during a brutal stretch. In any case, this practice is only new in the sense that Miami is higher profile than those opponents.

Did anyone see this from Zach Lowe's Grantland piece?


Adam Silver, the league’s commissioner-in-waiting, gave the late-season version of this practice his blessing last April, as teams began resting guys in preparation for the playoffs, per USA Today:

“Strategic resting of particular players on particular nights is within the discretion of the teams.”

This controversy is the best thing that could have happened to this thread. It's been a shell of it's former self so far this season.

Yeah...but nobody wanted to watch them anyway.


I forgot the drawing power of the Spurs with regards to national tv audiences.

. That argument is not very compelling to me because it draws an arbitrary line about how smart and prescient the average fan is, and it could just as easily be drawn on either side of those two events.

That's secondary. The main thing is that the Spurs haven't clinched jack yet; they have not established their playoff seeding or anything else and anybody going to Game 17 is going to know that.

To reiterate, I don't think Popovich should be punished and it is his prerogative. But I don't buy the arguments that this = April.

This controversy is the best thing that could have happened to this thread. It's been a shell of it's former self so far this season.

Well it has been a while since someone foolishly tried to convince me that (a) Wilt was overrated and (b) Russell was the greatest center and perhaps greatest player ever.

I do agree the resurgence in the thread has been nice.

To reiterate, I don't think Popovich should be punished and it is his prerogative. But I don't buy the arguments that this = April.


This isn't college sports. November wins = April wins.

only doing it on the road, again, makes sense--travel is what's tiring, supposedly; and why screw your own home crowd when you can screw Heat fans with no financial repercussions?

again, the problem is the incentives don't line up right. Pop is making the right decision for him, the wrong decision for NBA basketball as a spectator sport. so why shouldn't the league change the incentives so they don't line up this way?

your home crowd should be most understanding of your team's longer-term interests, since they share those interests. let's see, why not something like this: announce you'll rest the guys on the first game of the homestand and do a promo: "Ride the Pine with Your Spurs!"--half price tix, fan who wins a draw gets to sit on the bench next to Manu! everybody wins!

Let me take this time to say that Popovich is the best coach ever. What the Spurs have done the last couple years is just surreal, the fact that they can keep running out 60 win teams where such a crazy amount of their production is coming from role players. I've never seen a coach better at getting the most out of his players.

when you can screw Heat fans with no financial repercussions

The Heat had sold out every game before the season. They'd be at this game regardless of who the Spurs put in uniform.

Chipper Jones missed 50 games this year. Several were his last game at an opponent. There were many fans that attended to see Chipper Jones play. Did Selig sanction the Braves?

743--right, but this isn't true for lots of hypotheticals. I'm actually not so upset about this case; I just think that this is a crappy situations for fans and the "vote with your wallet" argument doesn't work well....

And re 742, absolutely: I mean, compare Danny Green's career to Wayne Ellington's....

743--right, but this isn't true for lots of hypotheticals. I'm actually not so upset about this case; I just think that this is a crappy situations for fans and the "vote with your wallet" argument doesn't work well....



I was right earlier. I said that the Spurs did this last year here. Hollinger wrote about it today. The Spurs sat all their stars the game before the All-Star Break here, and the Blazers won by 40. No one made a peep about it nationally.

Chipper Jones missed 50 games this year. Several were his last game at an opponent. There were many fans that attended to see Chipper Jones play. Did Selig sanction the Braves?

I don't think this gotcha is particularly comparable; in baseball, sitting one player, even a good player, does not virtually guarantee defeat like last night's decision did.

Reading Henry Abbott's take on the subject has me convinced I'm on the right side of the argument. Just as a recap: flopping and tanking (by bad teams) merit daily hand wringing and proposals to change the rules. Tanking by good teams = excellent.

does not virtually guarantee defeat like last night's decision did.

San Antonio led for most of the game.

Tanking by good teams = excellent.

Sure, it promotes competitive balance.

Woj's lede:

Before the emperor of the NBA leaves his Olympic Tower office, this is the holy war that those within the San Antonio Spurs' extended family expected David Stern to eventually wage on Gregg Popovich and his program's culture.

If so, jeezy creezy. Half the advertising during the game is devoted to attempting to prove that the players are the kind of upstanding individuals the Spurs churn out. But the Spurs' "culture" is a problem for the league?

If you don't like the fact that the team is in a small market in San Antonio, then make them move somewhere else.

Just total madness (again, if it's so).