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Playoff Update: The Fisher-Artest double standard
Last night's games really intensified interest in the second round, as both the Celts and the Lakers evened their series yet still face the lack of homecourt advantage moving forward. Here's my quick take:
Let's stipulate now that if Ron Artest had done what Derek Fisher did and Derek Fisher had done what Ron Artest did, Artest would be looking at a two-game suspension and Fisher wouldn't have been tossed from the game.
Fisher cheap-shotted Luis Scola. Nobody reasonable person looking at the video can conclude otherwise. You can celebrate it as LA declaring they won't be soft all you want, but it was an egregious cheap shot that included an elbow to the head as he was launching himself into Scola so hard that it looks like Scola's teeth put a divot in his head.
Meanwhile, Artest held his cool much better than I imagined he could. Yeah, the refs missed the elbow Kobe delivered (and there should be no suspension there; if it went higher than the shoulders it was only because Artest was draped all over him) but compounded it by calling the foul on Artest then compouned it some more by tossing him out of the game when he went up to Kobe and told him off. Anyone who knows Ron Artest knows that getting tossed in the 4th quarter of the playoffs after he is the one who got elbowed and after he didn't instigate any rough contact afterward, has to admire what for him was incredible discipline. And it really is good news for the Rockets.
Meanwhile, Houston is so much fun to watch. (Of course I liked the way the Spurs played before this season, so take this in that context.) That said, LA played the right way last night, getting Yao in foul trouble, which, with their front line and penetrators, should be a regular occurrence.
Watching Rafer Alston stupidly swipe at Eddie House in the Magic-Celtics series, is it any wonder the Rockets are improved with Brooks/Lowry? That and removing T-Mac, which allows Battier and Artest to share the floor and bring Wafer off the bench as a microwave, proves that addition by subtraction can be really pronounced.
Feeling good about my against-the-grain pick of the Celts in 7. Orlando is a strangely soul-less team. Also feeling good about my Cavs sweep call, also a minority opinion. And for those of you who thought the Lakers would mop the floor with Houston, behold these Rockets. The one series I didn't capture the flavor for is Denver and Dallas. I really thought the Mavs would provide a tougher matchup than what has occurred thus far. Right now, based on confidence and offensive-defensive balance, Denver and Cleveland seem to be the logical finalists. I don't think the Nuggets can surmount either Houston or LA, but their performance thus far promises that the Western rep will be much more battered and tempered than the Cavs, who are clearly the class of the East and may not drop more than two games before the Finals.
16 Reader Comments
I concur with all the above. The League has a Kobe fetish. Kobe is lucky he didn't grow up in Ron-Ron's 'hood.
Orlando is a big dissapointment. I think more than anything Boston is outcoaching the Magic.
It feels to me as though the East is mostly bowing to the Cavs (Boston will need to notch it up again a couple times to make the Confernece Finals competitve). Finals odds:
Cavs 70%
Celts 25%
In the West, Houston and Denver both seem to have really stepped it up. Much more up for grabs:
LA 40%
Denver 30%
Houston 25%
I'd really like to see the Rockets take the Lakers, but if they don't...how great would it be to see Artest put a Detroit style beat down on Kobe?
I can just imagine that smug punk cowering as Artest rains punches down on him.
I know, not very mature, but I CANT STAND Bryant.
Please, the league does not have a "Kobe fetish". Kobe has been suspended plenty of times in the past by the NBA. And Kobe threw an elbow, yes, but only after getting mugged by Artest during that same play.
And I disagree with the claim that Fisher would not have been ejected if he did what Artest did last night. Artest was not ejected for approaching Kobe. He was ejected because he gestured towards his throat and Joey Crawford - not knowing that Artest was upset about the elbow to the "throat" - thought he was making a 'slit throat' gesture. If Fisher had done that, he would've been ejected, too.
I don't think there was anything too controversial about how the refs handled those incidents. Fisher was ejected, as he should've been. Artest looked like he was picking a fight with Kobe and the ref maybe panicked a little bit. It's hard to do a hypothetical with Fisher doing what Artest did, because Fisher would never run from a ref conversation across the court to hunt down a player. He obviously deserved a technical. Either way, the game was in hand at that point and Ron won't get suspended or anything.
Great game, though. Houston is a legitimate contender at this point. If Kobe doesn't get easier shots, then the Laker bench will have to step up. That isn't something they're going to want to rely on, given their history.
By the way, I know its all a hypothetical, joke kind of a thing...but I wonder what Britt and some of the other T Wolf die hards thinks of Bill Simmons' new campaign to become GM.
TimAllen:
In one of his Twitters (or Twits or whatever you call one of those posts), Simmons actually said he would hire Britt Robson as his Assistant GM. Now there's a duo I can get excited about!
Don't forget the little people, Britt.
Hey,
Thanks for all the feedback. First of all, I'm a reformed Kobe hater and think TimAllen is right about Kobe's culpability, or lack thereof, in everything that happened.
But I disagree with both TimAllen and Andy G about Fisher. If Fisher does the thing across his throat, he doesn't get tossed. He just doesn't, because he's Derek Fisher with the child who was near death and an all around upstanding citizen. But on the other hand, this Derek Fisher also purposefully blasted Luis Scola and did it to send a message. Message-sending cheap shots deserve big punishments and if it had been Artest, it would be more than one game. As it is, I bet Fisher gets one game at most. As for Fisher never running over to a player like Artest did, I'd agree with you...except that I bet 24 hours ago we'd have been saying Fisher never would have deliberately and obviously launched himself into somebody unprovoked like he did Scola. So who knows what Fisher is capable of?
As for Simmons, I'm going to give you a serious answer. If I believed Bill Simmons was ready to give up sportswriting and become a basketball executive on a permanent basis for as long as it lasted, I'd carefully consider him as a GM for the Wolves. I say this because I happen to think Simmons really knows the game--his NBA knowledge and his humor, much more than his take in any other sport, is what compels me to read his stuff. The guy is legitimate fount of solid info and instinct on the NBA.
But Bill Simmons is also first and foremost a sportswriter, which is why he is offering the first year for free, provided he can write a book about his experiences. In other words, he has no intention of making this a permanent second career. We know this because we know that Simmons is smart enough to realize that writing a book about what goes down in year 1 totally hamstrings his ability to interact with anyone in an honest and forthright manner. You really think opposing GMs are going to discuss deals with a guy planning to print those opinions in the next couple of years? Ditto agents, ditto owners, ditto players on his team and other teams. It is too much of a wild card.
As for the assistant GM thing, I'm honestly surprised he knows who I am.
The Artest thing probably just had too close of a feel to the Palace Brawl for the refs to handle--in that regard, it was probably a double-standard. It just isn't often that a player literally starts running around the arena looking for a fight to pick. Artest has a history of that, and it sure as hell looked like that was his plan, last night.
About the basketball being played:
I'm afraid that Odom is headed down his usual path of shrinking in big moments. Now that the easy series vs. Utah is over, his averages are down to 8 & 8 in 33 mpg, and he's shooting a remarkable 33% from the free throw line. Aside from Alex Rodriguez, I'm not sure that there's another athlete today that has a bigger mental struggle with post-season play and clutch moments.
This is by far the least-impressive that I've ever seen Kobe look (after his first few years out of high school). He can't get to the hoop and he settles for incredibly hard shots. I keep repeating this, but I don't know why the analysts aren't bringing it up. The guy has been the best, most consistent offensive player in the world for the last 5-10 years and now he's all-of-a-sudden relegated to hoisting Tracy McGrady-style jumpers? I'd like to see some different offensive sets, but it's a little late in the year for that. It's why I don't expect LA to win the title.
Cleveland has the same problems with LeBron, when defenses totally collapse and help off their man, but they have much better shooters around him and are generally a better defensive team.
Switching the places of Artest and Fisher is an interesting hypothetical. I agree that both cases, if reversed, would have been handled differently by the officials. You make a clear case that Artest's reputation/history played a role - subconscious, or conscious - in the ref's decision to eject him. The underlying question here, at least in my mind, is how much a player's history should play in making those sorts of calls? Perhaps Artest's surprisingly calm reaction will earn him a longer leash the next time around?
Thank you for calling the Fisher foul for what it was: a cheap-shot. "Toughness," in the basketball sense, should not be confused with what, by all accounts, was just a dirty play.
Britt, I think your columns are more pervasive about the NBA-osphere than you realize. With the exception of Big Al and Love, there really aren't any reasons for me to follow the 'Wolves. But I invariably come back here because I love your writing style and the way you break down the game. In fact, I wish we had someone like you covering the Warriors.
Aside from Simmons, are there any other writers (national, or local) that you would strongly advise I follow?
ts--
This is becoming something of a golden age for basketball writing. It used to be Bob Ryan, Terry Pluto and punt, for the most part, when I was growing up back in the dark ages. Now, I'd hesitate to start mentioning folks because I'd leave someone out I really respected. I'm sure you know about Henry Abbott's True Hoop on the espn site and freedarko.com and the folks at Ball Don't Lie. That's a hell of a lot of reading right there. My two favorite beat writers are Dave D'Alessandro (I probably spelled it wrong) in New Jersey and Jonathan Feigen in Houston.
Locally, the folks at canishoopus.com are superb, and I think between Ben at citypages.com, Myles Brown at Slamonline.com and Steve Aschburner at cnnsi.com, the talent and coverage at Wolves games rivals that in much bigger cities.
My apologies to the three or four people I will slap my head at forgetting in the next few hours.
Interesting comments - haven't read Simmons' column yet, but I'll have to check it out.
As for Artest-Fisher, it's tough to swap roles in those situations - the low block is a LONG 15 feet from the perimeter. Fisher put his body into that blow, and Artest (despite his rep) is just too big and smart (yeah, I said it) to do anything like that. Fisher can at least acknowledge he's wisely being picked on as the least capable defender on the floor for the Lakers most times - no team can mess with a top-notch defender like Ron that way.
As for the quality of our current online hoops journalism, well, I agree that this is a great time. People who are passionate about topics usually have the most insightful things to say, and the internet has provided a wonderful voice for those people. That increased visibility should naturally lead towards jobs where that insight can be utilized best. A Simmons-Robson management combo isn't as farfetched as it seems, but there are many qualities that don't involve writing that are a big part of the job.
anto--
Let's be clear: I am not front office material. I like what I do too much, which is write about music, sports and politics in whatever order you want to assign. The ability to write about the other two things sharpens my desire to write about the third. I suspect I'm easily bored and easily burned out if forced to tow one particular line. And consequently, I suspect that if I ever were thrust into a position where I was a GM or coach or whatever, the lack of depth in my knowledge would become apparent against the lifers of the sport. Bottom line, I'm in the right place.
I'm not a reformed Kobe hater, never was one. But there are certain select marquee players who the referees have a "fetish" for: Kobe, Wade, and yes, KG come to mind immediately.
It's possible the refs missed the Kobe elbow. If they called the play (as Stu Jackson finally did) then is entirely possible that Ron-Ron wouldn't have had to remind the anointed one that he doesn't like the cheap shot (which it was). I don't blame Ron-Ron for doing what he did, no player should simply accept the cheap shot (as Kobe is known for).
Britt and others likely give Kobe the benefit of the doubt now that Kobe is willing to be a team player. Fine. But the League still has a double standard for the select marquee players, and Kobe gets away with cheap stuff more than anyone.
Rick Adelman has got to be the best NBA teacher of team basketball in recent memory. The Rockets are amazingly unaffected by the absence of their "stars." Before that, his Kings broke a decade-long trend of one-on-one being the staple of every NBA offense. Even if LA sucked, today, that was a phenomenal showing by the depleted Rockets team.
On to the pathetic Lakers, it's probably not a coincidence that LA played their best basketball after Fisher was ejected from Game 2 and absent in Game 3. In Game 4, he was a team-worst (-26) and Shannon Brown was a team-best (+14). Fish needs to take a seat. He can't guard Brooks and he's not even knocking down shots when he's open.
Odom and Bynum combined for 2 points and 8 rebounds in 37 minutes of action. Yikes.
This thing is probably going 7 games, since I don't think the Lakers can beat Houston on the road.
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