Sanctions coming for sitting of big 3

[Nolan]

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/8692304/san-antonio-spurs-sit-4-top-5-scorers-vs-miami-heat

MIAMI -- San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich sent stars Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili, plus key role player Danny Green, home for Thursday night's game against the Miami Heat, choosing rest instead of playing them in an early-season showdown.

NBA commissioner David Stern promised repercussions for the move, saying the Spurs will face "substantial sanctions" for their approach to the game.

"I apologize to all NBA fans," Stern said in a statement. "This was an unacceptable decision by the San Antonio Spurs and substantial sanctions will be forthcoming."

Personally I think its BS. If Stern and league don't want this to happen then lets play less games or space them out better.

Opinions?

[mikejames23]

The Spurs have never been about the glamor and stars. It's clear Stern would've preferred a blowout today with Parker, Duncan and Manu playing rather than this close game with the stars out. Ugh. What will these sanctions be? Any idea?

[Leaguepass]

I think it's the right move really to sanction the Spurs....I have nothing against you guys...in fact I always rooted for you in the playoffs because you guys have a completely classy organization and everything but this move was bull. Sending 4 of 5 starters home this early in the season is just ridiculous. You can throw games here and there because your team is strong enough to win 55 games anyways but this is kinda disrespectful to the game and especially the fans. Guys over there in Miami and all NBA fans around weren't eager to watch your bench play against Mia, whatever the outcome.

[Donald Kaufman]

What a joke. Stern shouldn't lay down the law for someone working the schedule in their favor. It was the 2nd game of a b2b against the defending champs, so Pop quite rightly thought we might drop the game even with all our guys...so why not send them home and let them rest?

[mikejames23]

I think it's the right move really to sanction the Spurs....I have nothing against you guys...in fact I always rooted for you in the playoffs because you guys have a completely classy organization and everything but this move was bull. Sending 4 of 5 starters home this early in the season is just ridiculous. You can throw games here and there because your team is strong enough to win 55 games anyways but this is kinda disrespectful to the game and especially the fans. Guys over there in Miami and all NBA fans around weren't eager to watch your bench play against Mia, whatever the outcome.

The insult here is the fact that the Heat barely pulled away against the Spurs "scrubs"

[watch1958]

I think it's the right move really to sanction the Spurs....I have nothing against you guys...in fact I always rooted for you in the playoffs because you guys have a completely classy organization and everything but this move was bull. Sending 4 of 5 starters home this early in the season is just ridiculous. You can throw games here and there because your team is strong enough to win 55 games anyways but this is kinda disrespectful to the game and especially the fans. Guys over there in Miami and all NBA fans around weren't eager to watch your bench play against Mia, whatever the outcome.

If SA was playing Sacramento or Charlotte, would Stern care?

[trevor0333]

I understand the concern but Stern needs to quit thinking he is the GM & Coach of every nba team just cause he is the commisioner. This after the blocked trades and obvious ways he tries to control everything. Its the Spurs right to do what they think gives them the best chance to win whether thats by playing every starter 48 min every game or giving them the occasional rest. The Spurs fans want to see a Championship not the most exciting Thursday November 29th.

What he obviously should have done is when he heard about it sit down with Popovich un officially and say I know "its your responsiblility to do what 's best for your team but do you really have to do it on a nationally televised game, I'll respect your decision but think about this one a lil for me will ya?"

Hopefully that is what happened and Pop said mind your own dann fing business and thats what pissed Stern off to go Sanctions Sanctions!

For Fairness in conversation it should be noted I despise Stern abnd this just adds to his laundry list of terrible moves.

[co_laper]

This is going to be really interesting.

I'm personally not a fan of sitting guys out, but it's understandable.

The biggest question here is simple. What rule did Pop break?

If Stern wants to start making a rule so that this doesn't happen again, fine. Create a rule, and if anybody breaks it, punish them. But there's no rule, and Pop did nothing wrong. I would be very surprised if anything happened to the Spurs or Pop.

The one thing I can see Stern doing is probably not televise anymore Spurs games because of this. Other than that, I doubt there's much even Stern could do.

[Leaguepass]

IMO it's just not in the spirit of the sport to throw games like that and it's also not black and white like some trying to defend/rationalize Pop's decision.
It shouldn't come down to teams starting to analyze the schedule and deciding what games they like to throw or where they'll rest their star players etc. Come playoff time (last week of the season) it's somewhat acceptable but doing it not even 1 month into the season is completely ridiculous. The Spurs aren't the only team in the league that at times has a bad stretch in it's schedule and usually teams play through it.

Tony Parker is just 30 years old and played 22minutes and 30minutes in the two games prior to this one.
Danny Green is 25 years old for crying out loud and played a combined 49 minuts in the last two games.
Ginobili has missed two games this season and is only averaging 24minutes a game and played 44minutes in the last two games.
Duncan is the only one you can make an argument for but he also profited from the past two games being blowouts, as he only played a combined 50 minutes in those games.

Essentially all those guys that seriously needed to rest yesterday played 25minutes per game in two games from monday till thursday. On top of that two of them are in prime basketball years and the other one is a 24minute per game backup. Pulling that move is just a big no go IMO.
It's one thing to rest old players that your team heavily relies on (like Duncan,Garnett etc.) but an entirely different thing to start resting prime players and backups.


I mean come on, who in his right mind does really believe this "resting" was really about the players. It's utterly ridiculous to "rest" those players 1 month into the season.

The Spurs played 4 sub .500 teams prior to this game. Two of them turned into blowouts. If Pops was really that concerned he could have definitely given a day off to one of his star players in one of those games.
No one cares about those games because they don't impact playoff seeding,HCA etc. Miami is heavy favorites to have the best record in the NBA anyways...if now other contending teams start throwing them game because they think that they'll lose there anyways so it's the best opportunity to rest players then might as well just cancel the regular season and only play playoffs.

[co_laper]

Sure, I won't argue that. If you want to say it's not in the spirits of the game and it was unethical or even if it was disrespecting to the game of basketball, coward move, anything you can think of... That's fine.

But that still doesn't give Stern the right to punish Pop or the Spurs for doing it unless a rule is broken. There has to be a rule that Spurs broke for Stern to give sanctions.

The way I see it, there's only two things Stern can do right now that is within his right.

Create a rule so that it doesn't happen again. Or just stop televising Spurs game on National TV. Other than that, what can he do? And Peter Holt is the chairman of the Owner's committee.

Hey, atleast we finally have some real drama going on in our team. And if San Antonio suddenly go on a losing streak and we see a lot of weird one sided ref calls, we'd know the power Stern actually has behind the scenes.

[Leaguepass]

This is going to be really interesting.

I'm personally not a fan of sitting guys out, but it's understandable.

The biggest question here is simple. What rule did Pop break?

If Stern wants to start making a rule so that this doesn't happen again, fine. Create a rule, and if anybody breaks it, punish them. But there's no rule, and Pop did nothing wrong. I would be very surprised if anything happened to the Spurs or Pop.

The one thing I can see Stern doing is probably not televise anymore Spurs games because of this. Other than that, I doubt there's much even Stern could do.

You are right...I agree that Stern's only way for punishment is through those nationally televised games. I think a reasonable punishment would be to scratch all 21 remaining nationally televised Spurs games. Why should the NBA respect those scheduled games if the Spurs do not respect them? I don't know what the financial impact would be for the Spurs but it'd definitely make a good symbolic punishment IMO.

[co_laper]

This is going to be really interesting.

I'm personally not a fan of sitting guys out, but it's understandable.

The biggest question here is simple. What rule did Pop break?

If Stern wants to start making a rule so that this doesn't happen again, fine. Create a rule, and if anybody breaks it, punish them. But there's no rule, and Pop did nothing wrong. I would be very surprised if anything happened to the Spurs or Pop.

The one thing I can see Stern doing is probably not televise anymore Spurs games because of this. Other than that, I doubt there's much even Stern could do.

You are right...I agree that Stern's only way for punishment is through those nationally televised games. I think a reasonable punishment would be to scratch all 21 remaining nationally televised Spurs games. Why should the NBA respect those scheduled games if the Spurs do not respect them? I don't know what the financial impact would be for the Spurs but it'd definitely make a good symbolic punishment IMO.

Yeah, but it's still laughable if that's what Stern does. It'll just confirms the theories that this is all about money. And while there will be some financial impact to the team, I hardly believe it'll effect the team much. We've always operated under the budget, and we're still winning games. Even without national tv games, we'd still be in better shape financially than most small market teams. If we can't survive, then teams like Milwaukee, Charlotte, Sacramento, Detroit, etc will do even worse. Those teams get how many televised games? I doubt a couple more televised games puts them in a much better shape financially than us.

[Leaguepass]

This is going to be really interesting.

I'm personally not a fan of sitting guys out, but it's understandable.

The biggest question here is simple. What rule did Pop break?

If Stern wants to start making a rule so that this doesn't happen again, fine. Create a rule, and if anybody breaks it, punish them. But there's no rule, and Pop did nothing wrong. I would be very surprised if anything happened to the Spurs or Pop.

The one thing I can see Stern doing is probably not televise anymore Spurs games because of this. Other than that, I doubt there's much even Stern could do.

You are right...I agree that Stern's only way for punishment is through those nationally televised games. I think a reasonable punishment would be to scratch all 21 remaining nationally televised Spurs games. Why should the NBA respect those scheduled games if the Spurs do not respect them? I don't know what the financial impact would be for the Spurs but it'd definitely make a good symbolic punishment IMO.

Yeah, but it's still laughable if that's what Stern does. It'll just confirms the theories that this is all about money. And while there will be some financial impact to the team, I hardly believe it'll effect the team much. We've always operated under the budget, and we're still winning games. Even without national tv games, we'd still be in better shape financially than most small market teams. If we can't survive, then teams like Milwaukee, Charlotte, Sacramento, Detroit, etc will do even worse. Those teams get how many televised games? I doubt a couple more televised games puts them in a much better shape financially than us.

That's true and I doubt it'd have a huge financial impact as well. That said it'd make a good symbolic punishment. Why should the NBA respect the Spurs' nationally televised games if they treat it like yesterday?For all the NBA knows today the Spurs could decide to rest their 4 starters again on a nationally televised game?Maybe it's just better to scratch them and give them to hungry teams who value those games instead of just throwing them.

In either case, Stern needs to come down with a severe punishment so that no other team even thinks about pulling such a move in the future. Just imagine what the NBA would come to if this was to become common practice.

And like I pointed out in my previous post...the "resting" argument can only be made for Duncan. Not for players in their prime, 25 year olds or players that play 24minutes per game. This move was about Pop wanting to make a statement to the NBA that he disliked the schedule, not about "resting" players...

[troza]

Well... with all the talk, I think that there was a rule against players calling each other and make a plan to play together... so... where is the big punishment there?

Also... For what I know (in Portugal I miss lots of news), Popovich has been the number 1 critic about scheduling... that was just a middle finger on Stern... the Heat had 5 days between the Spurs game and the other game... So... if Stern doesn't care about some teams, why would Popovich care about Stern?

[Patman]

I think it's the right move really to sanction the Spurs....I have nothing against you guys...in fact I always rooted for you in the playoffs because you guys have a completely classy organization and everything but this move was bull. Sending 4 of 5 starters home this early in the season is just ridiculous. You can throw games here and there because your team is strong enough to win 55 games anyways but this is kinda disrespectful to the game and especially the fans. Guys over there in Miami and all NBA fans around weren't eager to watch your bench play against Mia, whatever the outcome.

The fans saw a competitive, exciting game. Yes, they come out for the stars, but the Spurs' best players weren't going to be in the best condition anyway, playing their 4th game in 5 nights. This was set up as a national TV showcase for the Heat, who were coming off 4 days rest btw.

Kim Jong Stern is power-tripping again. If he really cared about the fans and the product, why is the schedule so bad? They don't care about players' health, or even putting the best product out there. They just want to get as many marquee match-ups on national TV as possible, no matter how tired either of the teams are.

What if one of the Spurs got injured? The Spurs would receive NOTHING from the league. Injuries is what's really killing the product. And the biggest reason for that is the schedule. Anybody who's played competitive sports, or even just someone who's regularly active knows the importance of rest and recovery for optimal performance and injury prevention.

With the schedule the way it is now, most "off days" aren't actually off, they're practice days. So coaches basically have to choose between not resting their guys, or skipping practice time, which could lead to sloppy basketball and a loss.

First of all, they should reduce the number of regular season games. Second of all, they should reduce the number of back-to-backs and the number of 3+ days rest. There shouldn't be ANY team playing 4 games in 5 nights. Ideally, teams would be playing every other night, with the occasional back-to-back and 2 days rest.

[Patman]

That's true and I doubt it'd have a huge financial impact as well. That said it'd make a good symbolic punishment. Why should the NBA respect the Spurs' nationally televised games if they treat it like yesterday?For all the NBA knows today the Spurs could decide to rest their 4 starters again on a nationally televised game?Maybe it's just better to scratch them and give them to hungry teams who value those games instead of just throwing them.

In either case, Stern needs to come down with a severe punishment so that no other team even thinks about pulling such a move in the future. Just imagine what the NBA would come to if this was to become common practice.

And like I pointed out in my previous post...the "resting" argument can only be made for Duncan. Not for players in their prime, 25 year olds or players that play 24minutes per game. This move was about Pop wanting to make a statement to the NBA that he disliked the schedule, not about "resting" players...

It's sad the the league revolves around nationally televised games. Maybe the league should stop playing teams 4 games in 5 nights then.

This will NEVER become common practice in the league.

If the Spurs and/or Pop do get sanctioned, it's just a personal beef between them and Stern. It's not about setting an example for the league, because no other coach would have the balls to do this, no other group of star players would agree to it, and no other franchise would back their coach up in doing so.

[Patman]

IMO it's just not in the spirit of the sport to throw games like that and it's also not black and white like some trying to defend/rationalize Pop's decision.

I wouldn't classify it as throwing a game. The Spurs still tried to win and almost did. You think Pop was happy they lost?

There are much more blatant attempts at "throwing" games (*ahem* teams tanking for the lotto). But the league has never done anything about that.

[tlee324]

I'm obviously not a fan of San Antonio, but have alot of respect for the team and coach. This sanction would be complete total bull if they pass it. Who the **** is Stern to tell ANY coach how to run their team? PERIOD. If a coach wants to bench players, he has all the right to do so. **** Stern.

Bottom line, end of story.... whether or not you agree with Stern's displeasure, he STILL has NO **** RIGHT to tell a coach how to run his team.

[Mr. E]

Add me to the list of NBA fans who respect what the Spurs did yesterday. Such a well-run franchise and now everyone knows that this is a team with some serious depth!

Stern is seriously overstepping his bounds if he follows through with his threat.

[Patman]

According to the San Antonio Express-News, Popovich rested core players three times last season as a way to keep them rested and healthy. When asked about it at a Board of Governor's meeting in April, deputy commissioner Adam Silver addressed the issue and indicated that the league would not discipline teams for these sorts of practices.

"The strategic resting of particular players on particular nights is within the discretion of the teams," Silver said then. "And Gregg Popovich in particular is probably the last coach that I would second-guess."

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