anyone hear dan patrick's interview with Tim Donaghy?

[madvillian]

I think its funny how people try to say a man who risked his money, his freedom, and his reputation against the clear biases and inconsistencies in this league's officiating is anything but a CLEAR indicator that the NBA pushes a certain agenda, and the refs go along with it.

WTF are you talking about? The guy was hundreds of thousands of dollars in dept to the mob. This is a guy who had NOTHING TO LOSE by taking his story to the feds and singing like a canary.

Furthermore, the only income this guy can get is from his book sales. You think this **** doesn't sell books?

Donaghy is about as reliable is any other addict. They will say and do anything to feed their addictions.

[BarneyGumble]

I think its funny how people try to say a man who risked his money, his freedom, and his reputation against the clear biases and inconsistencies in this league's officiating is anything but a CLEAR indicator that the NBA pushes a certain agenda, and the refs go along with it.

WTF are you talking about? The guy was hundreds of thousands of dollars in dept to the mob. This is a guy who had NOTHING TO LOSE by taking his story to the feds and singing like a canary.

Furthermore, the only income this guy can get is from his book sales. You think this **** doesn't sell books?

Donaghy is about as reliable is any other addict. They will say and do anything to feed their addictions.

Get a clue. You should work for the NBA's PR department.

Its like a white collar trader who gets busted saying that inside information does not exist. It does exist. If you know something others dont, and you exploit that knowledge to your financial benefit...it is a crime. No doubt Donoughy is a criminal....but to say because he is a criminal, then his claims about the league's officiating being prone to manipulation must be false is just fooling yourself......

[HootieRules]

First the league will rig it so that the Cavs make the finals. Then its the league is going to rig it so that Dwight Howard can get away with fouls so that Magic make the finals for a Lakers rematch. Now it's the NBA is going to rig it so that Boston and Lakers have a rematch....Kinda inconsistent don't you think?

The best part of the whole thing is everyone is ignoring the fact that the league doesn't really benefit from a certain Finals matchup. The networks benefit. The league has already made their money from television contracts.

If you want to say the league wants to extend a series to benefit from ticket sales, that's another story. But as someone else said, how many straws need to be grasped at before people stop taking Donaghy so seriously? His intentions are pretty simple, he's trying to sell books.

[ropjhk]

Remember when he guaranteed that the league would make the Cavs beat the Celtics?

The guy is just making things up as he goes along.

The conspiracy theorist would claim that by going public, he doomed the prediction so that the league could discredit him.

[ropjhk]

conspiracy or not, fact remains that the quality of officiating is very poor. The best way for the NBA to silence the conspiracy theorists is to improve the officiating.

[Xenopathic Investigator]

They rigged games because if they don't the next time the TV contract bidding war comes around they will lose money. let's say it wasn't rigged and the refs call the games fair What if they were told to mirror calls: call it on one side and call it on the other, and also do like football don't call ANY calls either way except when its really obvious. They would lose ALOT of money in the long run. The nba isn't football or baseball or nascar as far as ticket sales go. They NEED the tv contract deals to exist. The Ad revenue has to be VERY profitable or they will go bankrupt and the teams it divides the revenue up to would fold too. Only Cuban,Paul allen,Jerry Bus, the russian net owner and a hand full others would remain after the other team get liquidated. There would probably be only 8-10 teams.

Teams like the timberwolves,knicks or New Jersey might beat a top tier team like Dallas,Lakers,Celtics orlando the advertisers for the network would get p1ssed if their market player is getting handled by a young upstart or they have a slump and stink the game up.So they engineer stars.

If they make really good players untouchable on defense(pretty much a god-mode hack in video games) and let them travel,carry,elbow,knee,slap,punch,push people out of the way,drop kick,trip,grab,push,throw hold,etc and pretty much donate free points to them at the FT line said players would look kind of unstoppable. But the other way? A play like kobe would still be a good scorer and dirk a great jumpshooter or amare a beast in the fast break but they won't be "dominating" joe-no-name players as bad.

marketers don't won't pretty good or even situationally great. They want the next Jordan,shaq or magic. They can sell that. Its easier to sell a super scoring machine dunking kobe then a pretty good scoring player that is only great in certain match-ups. Seriously would a casual fan root for lebron or Dwight Howard if they got shut down by shawn marion and Chris kamen? No. The noob would say lebron sucks and turn the channel.

[A-Town Connection]

The flaw in all this....they rigged a series for Cuban

[s_other]

there's no happy medium here about how much of donaghy to believe. he made verifiable claims in his book. all of them were shot down emphatically by the statisticians. in other words, he has zero credibility.

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_ ... s-on-trial

Did you even bother reading your own link??

"Personal Foul" has dozens of interesting claims. A good portion of these claims are nearly impossible to verify. But there are some exceptions.

[BarneyGumble]

The flaw in all this....they rigged a series for Cuban

[Xenopathic Investigator]

The flaw in all this....they rigged a series for Cuban

what happened AFTER that series? PHX. Remember? Dirk got screwed in that series. Doesn't make up for 2003,2006,2007 and 2009(spurs series). What about the 1-17 record will danny crawford officiating the game. Pure random change..pfft get outta here with that apologizing crap.

[_BBIB_]

He's looking more and more credible as the day goes by.

Yeah he was wrong about LeBron, but his record for picking games is insane right now.

And he called both this Phoenix and Orlando comeback with extra help from the refs

[_BBIB_]

Does it concern anyone that this guy is like up to 15-1?

[Risensun]

It seems Donaghy was spot on...

[MilBucksBackOnTop06]

I don't believe 100% of what Donaghy says, but I do not dispute all 100% of it. I think there's a MEDIUM here-- in this world you get people only on two fences; people who believe or people who don't believe.

I'm not straddling on any of those. I think it's a case by case example. The one you mention OP, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Jeff Van Gundy at the time PUBLICLY state that a referee has warned them about calling more stuff against Yao & Tracy. And that led to a 100k fine on Van Gundy?

If so, that entire series was pretty poorly officiated. I remember significant calls in Game 5, in Dallas, that were atrocious. Particularly, Michael Finley stepping out of bounds and getting the ball back. This was with the referee right NEXT to him.

This and the Lakers-Kings series are the one's I certainly believe. It's hard not to. People say Tim is incredible, well, the officiating in both series surpass it if you were watching it in all perspectives.

Those who don't believe Donaghy are foolish. They don't want to beleive it because they either gamble on the games themselves or the teams that benefit are they're teams and they are usually fans who are frontrunners.
Cheering for any team that wins. There is no way in the world he is making this up and lying about this.
The NBA is a billion dollar scam business that is more under the umbrella of Sports Entertainment then it is a legitmate league. It is not all about the game and fariness which it should be. Those who think it is are fools...
It is about distributing money and wealth and power. And they do that by taking care of certain owners teams that are worth more to the league then others! That is common sense.
And the NBA is run by David Stern and he runs the officiating. The merchandise as far as the shoes and the uniforms and tickets will all favor the Stars and teams they anoint.
There are different rules for different players and different teams and owners. If you can't see that you don't want to see it.

[MilBucksBackOnTop06]

It seems Donaghy was spot on...

Of course he is!

[Cqc_Nastyn8]

Remember when he guaranteed that the league would make the Cavs beat the Celtics?

The guy is just making things up as he goes along.

lol i like how the doubters always bring this up. Dude did you think lebron played his heart out. He gave up on PURPOSE to leave cavs...dont be dumb now. Either way Tim is 15-1 in calling theses playoffs games based on who's refing them. Thats impressive

[MilBucksBackOnTop06]

Donaghy "True athletic competition and not an establishment referrering Personailities.
He implicated the Lakers by example as a team that gets benefits of calls. That 2003 Kings team was a great team and a better team.

And so was those Portland Trialblazer teams and that Seattle Supersonic team that the Bulls beat.
Utah should have a ring too...

The Bulls were probaly good for only 2 of their titles and should have lost the other 4! The only Bulls team that was clearly better was the team that beat the Lakers and Suns.

But the Jazz series and the Seattle Series and perhaps the Portland one was a gift. There is no way around getting around not have a Superstar on your team.

Especially if they are two in which the league can market...A flashy eccentric PG and if you can a very good white Big man who is really good which is a rarity in the NBA. If Yao Ming where healthy he would do...we have one in Andrew Bogut.

The NBA wants another Nash, another Nowitizki, and another Magic to keep those jersey's moving off the shelves and TV's clicking in this industry. Personalities...and faces and names people on major market teams preferably.

The NBA is going global so that is what what you need. To be relevant you need to get 'The Next' Isiah Thomas or Magic Johnson type player.
Or the next Micahel Jordan, Dr J or the next Larry Bird and Jerry West. The league is all about personalities and faces and names and street cred...Kevin Durant, Blake Griffin, get another guy in Sacramento to go with Tyreke Evans, if we can get another guy to go along with Bogut and Jennings here in Milwaukee...?

That is what you need in the NBA to win big. Or you need to have decent players in a major market of storied franchise like Boston.