When the New Orleans Hornets were announced as the winners of the NBA Draft Lottery this past Wednesday night, speculation began instantly about the legitimacy of the lottery process and whether or not the entire thing had been rigged from the start.
The Hornets had just a 13.7 percent chance of winning the draft lottery, yet somehow they managed to land the top pick despite having lower odds than the Cleveland Cavaliers, Washington Wizards, and Charlotte Bobcats.
First, in 2010, Washington landed the rights to select number one overall pick John Wall despite having the fifth-worst record in the league during the prior season and having just a 10.3 percent chance of winning the draft lottery.
Coincidentally, former owner Abe Pollin had just recently passed away and his widow, Irene Pollin, was planning to sell the team to current owner Ted Leonsis. Any guess whether or not having Wall on the roster helped persuade Leonsis to purchase the team? My money says it definitely didn't hurt.
Then there was the 2011 NBA Draft Lottery, where the Cavaliers landed the first and fourth overall picks as they won the draft lottery with a pick they had acquired from the Los Angeles Clippers. The pick that landed them the top selection, which was the one they had received in the trade with the Clippers, had just a 2.8 percent chance of winning the lottery.
Coincidentally, the Cavaliers had lost hometown hero LeBron James in free agency prior to the 2010-11 season in a very messy and public divorce (see Decision, The), which sent owner Dan Gilbert into a fit that you might expect from a young child, including the infamous letter he wrote to Cavaliers fans and the media that absolutely trashed James only hours after his announcement that he would be "taking his talents to South Beach."
And finally, we have this season's draft lottery and the New Orleans Hornets, who now will almost certainly land Anthony Davis, the consensus top pick who dominated college basketball this past season during his only season at Kentucky.
Coincidentally, this isn't the first time since Stern and the league took over control of the Hornets that they have found themselves in the midst of a glaring controversy.
The first time came in December 2011, when Stern vetoed a three-team trade that would have sent Chris Paul, who had openly wanted out of New Orleans for quite some time, to the Los Angeles Lakers (full proposed trade: the Lakers would have received Paul, the Houston Rockets would have received Pau Gasol, and the Hornets would have received Luis Scola, Kevin Martin, Lamar Odom, Goran Dragic, and a 2012 first-round pick).
While the trade with the Clippers brought New Orleans some solid talent, it's hard to argue the fact that the original trade might have landed the Hornets a better overall haul of players.
Now let's skip forward to April, when Stern and the league announced that New Orleans Saint's owner Tom Benson would be purchasing the team.
After all of the shady moves Stern has made over the past year and a half and the growing stack of "coincidences" surrounding him, would it be too much of a leap to consider the possibility that Stern may have promised Benson the top pick in negotiations to buy the franchise and take it off the league's hands?
Apparently it's not too much of a leap for some league executives and current players to take.
Two anonymous league executives made some negative comments to Yahoo! Sports soon after the lottery on Wednesday night, with going as far as to say the process was a joke.
"It's such a joke that the league made the new owners be at the lottery for the show. The league still owns the Hornets. Ask their front office if new owners can make a trade right now. They can't. This is a joke."
Then there was the player backlash, with many going to Twitter to voice their opinions.
"I just wanna know why they don't show the lottery balls getting picked anymore ..." tweeted Minnesota Timberwolves forward Derrick Williams.
"The fix is in," was Portland Trail Blazer Jonny Flynn's response to the Hornet's landing the top overall pick.
When the league's own employees are beginning to question the growing pile of "coincidences", maybe it's time to consider the very real possibility that David Stern is starting to abuse some of his powers as commissioner of the NBA.
What are your thoughts on the New Orleans Hornets winning the top selection in this month's 2012 NBA Draft? Is it just another coincidence or is it perhaps a part of something bigger?
No comments:
Post a Comment