10 Small Changes I'd Make If I Was Commissioner

If Whoopi Can Act, I Can Be Commish

It's a fun contest they have kids play. Be the Mayor or Chief Of Police for a day. They'll go around as everyone pretends they're in charge to humour them. In the movies they take it to the next level and the winner will start making major decisions that, by god, save the town from inevitable disaster.

So what if the job was NBA commissioner and instead of a movie it was reality? Here's what I'd do. Not reducing the schedule to 40 games. No huge changes. I've previously made lists of big ways to fix All Star, the NBA twice and the useless discipline system. These are just small changes that would be felt across the NBA.

1. Mic Players And Refs

Why Can't An NBA Player Swear
Like A Hockey Player

I want to hear everything. This really only works with the near removal of fines for things players/refs say. Is it worth it? Yes. When I watched HBO's epic series, 24/7 - The Road To The Winter Classic I was constantly thinking one of three things. First, the supreme intensity and entertainment value of hockey at it's best. Nice come back NHL. Second: what if the NBA was not so paranoid about it's image that it let the game be a man's game again. Third: what if they actually let us see that raw, real hoop at the highest level for what it was always supposed to be?

I'm sick of NBA Cares. I want trash talk and stares.

2. Get Rid Of Homer Announcers, And Loosen Up The Heavies

Reggie Kind Of Sucks At His New Job
But He's Clearly Not Being Himself

Every once in a while when you watch feeds or downloaded games, they forget to flip a switch and you catch announcers talking when they don't know it's on. It's better. They give their real opinions instead of the postured ones. Their banter is better. (Reggie warned Kevin Harlen not to give him a golden shower during one game). Their analysis is better. Let them loose off the leash. Let them be themselves.

That would improve things. Removing Homer announcers would entirely change how the game is portrayed. Homers in general suck and the Homer Booth only creates more of them when they actually take something that Stacey King says seriously while openly cheer for the Bulls. Tommy Heinsohn also deserves strong mention. Get rid of all of them and replace them with real people who actually know how to call a game. Speaking of which...

3. Hire Gus Johnson To Call Everything

Gus Isn't Screaming, He's Calling
His Own Demise... With Excitement

If Marv Albert is the greatest hoops announcer ever, then Gus is #2, except Gus is actually #1. No one. No. One. Calls an exciting game better then Gus Johnson. He elevates how the sport of basketball is perceived by a brain processing it. I've mentioned in this space before how Gus Johnson got me excited calling the ball boys wiping up sweat after a foul. I looked up fully expecting them to do something miraculous and laughed at myself.

It's time for the NBA to hire this guy to call huge games and the playoffs. Announcers are all trying to be the next Chick Hearn. "Hand down man down" pretty much means nothing and we have to get back to people who actually get into what they're watching. I don't care about how the Van Gundy brothers used to play in their driveway. Why not put Dick Vitale beside Gus Johnson? Could you imagine how much better the Bulls/Celtics classic series would have been with them? How could this not make the NBA product better?

4. Remove All Canned Music From Stadiums, Only Organs Allowed

Humber Gardens: Home Of The
Corner Brook Royals Where My Dad's
Organ Rocked Fans Into A Frenzy

When I was a child, my father would take me to see the Corner Brook Royals play hockey in my sparsely populated home town. We didn't have to pay to get in. Why? Because my dad played the organ for all the hockey games. When they won the national title in 1986, they made sure to bring him with them.

Why?

Because in sports, organs matter. To this day, 25 years later and after he passed on, people still contact me about their memories of my father. He'd get them going to another level they didn't think possible a minute before. I sat beside him seeing him work an entire stadium on a PA I still own today. He'd see that the team was sluggish and knew what songs to play to get the crowd going for one last boost in the 3'rd. Musicians feel crowds, gather their energy, and feed it back in like an amplifier circuit. The Pussycat Dolls just suck.

I remember watching MJ, Reggie et al do some of their most amazing feats without fireworks or the latest pop sensation playing on speakers while the game was on. NYC still has that organ and I noticed it like an old friend I hadn't seen in a decade these past playoffs. It's still awesome and rockin MSG. Everyone agrees so I'd put them everywhere. Thanks for the memories Dad! Organs matter.

5.Buy The NBA On NBC Theme Song

It's just better. Yes, it was written by an enormous douche John Tesh, yes, he spent years wasting a nation's brain cells on Entertainment Tonight, but we'll give him this, he wrote the best sports theme song ever. So just shell out NBA, spend what it takes. Get the theme song from NBC and force everyone to use it. It's called branding and unfortunately you sold out the guys who branded the NBA better then anyone to ABC's Survivor money. It's not too late though and everything has it's price. Get the song and every opening to every game is instantly better. Fact.

Watch The 2009 ABC Finals Intro With
Roundball Rock And No Editing: Amazing!

6. One Ring To Rule Them All

Or one ring of announcers? Just out-right hire the announcers and broadcast staff from all the networks. Take some control over how the NBA product is packaged and published. Why are we listening to Magic say just about nothing in the NBA finals when TNT's crew is so much better? It's silly we listen to Mark Jackson when Marv Albert is alive. Just find a way so that the best people covering the game are there when it matters. Make it part of the TV contracts that networks have to share guys and make the best product possible for the good of all.

7. Let The Refs Give Interviews

If Refs Could Explain This Conversation Maybe
People Could Understand Why Their Horrible
Calls Ruin Games Instead Of Judge Them For It

Of all the baffling rules the NBA has this is the cake. Why not let officials give interviews after games? I'm sure they're grown men who won't buckle under the pressure and embarrass the league... the players do a good enough job of that. If a ref made a bad call he can explain what happened and 9 times out of 10 it's going to make sense. Let them defend themselves instead of just getting killed in the press along with the NBA's image. If they can just explain the thought processes maybe people will understand more. Ref's will also instinctively be more motivated to get calls right if they know they have to explain themselves after. It's just so black and white.


8. Provide Better Stats

If Derek Fisher Leads
The League In Charges For The
10'th Time And There's No
Stats, Does Anyone Care?

The work for many unpublished stats is already done and sitting in the NBA's databases. All they need to do is release it. Not even release, they just need to display it. Use it.

Take drawn charges. We see them in the play by play, but you have to go to hoopdata.com for a list of leaders. There's a plethora of other stats that are MIA. Quarterly stats? Open shot percentage? Shot contests? Hockey assists? All these things invariably matter but the NBA just doesn't seem bothered to acknowledge, record and publish the information.

When they do, it's going to look quite stupid in years to come, much like not having the shot blocking numbers from Bill Russell or Wilt's career looks today.

It's not from a lack of interest. It's not from a lack of resources to do these tasks. If some behaviour on a basketball court helps teams win and can be quantified, we should have stats on it. Derek Fisher gets almost 0 love from a statistical ranking because he does things that don't go in box scores. He's maybe the best player in the league over the past 10 years at something very important but is just seen as a role player.


9. Add A 4 Point Line

Why not? If you hit a shot from behind half court or even 35 feet it should be worth more simply because it's exponentially harder. It's more spectacular. As I see it, anything that helps a desperate team get back in it when they are on the ropes should be a go. Could you imagine how intense a 5 point play would be to swing a game?

When I went to ABA games in Halifax they had a great rule. Force a TO in the back court and a light went on. If you made the basket on the ensuing possession you got an extra point. Leads were not as safe and players D'ed up to win because even if they were down 10 points, they knew they were in it. Desperation creates drama.

10. Make The Court Bigger

They Dropped The Cages, Why Keep The Floor?

I'm a little surprised this has never been experimented with before. The court is not designed with a specific purpose. It's an arbitrary 50 feet wide. Even if there was a method to this it's long since become irrelevant. Players have become incredibly bigger, stronger and faster. The space may have been good for people with peach baskets, maybe it even suited the guys in the 50's, but for much too long the game has been cramped into either end of the court.

When the NBA adopted the 3 point line in 1980 rather then sensibly widen the court since players would now be spaced out more they shortened the line on the sides. The result: players have 3 feet on either side of the court to work in. Why? Is this better? The elite athletes of the NBA can cover this distance in 2-3 steps. They never really get a chance to get going in any half-court set slowing down the action and making it easier for weaker athletes to defend. Not even to mention, this style of play is largely responsible for so many injuries that hamper the marketability of the game.

Widening the court will give players more room to operate and open things up for the most athletic/talented players. It creates an all around more exciting experience. Instead of getting trapped in the corner we'll see split double teams and widened passing/attacking lanes for better ball movement and so many more vicious assaults on the rim.

Of course. this is not the movies, and I'll never be commish of the NBA, but it does not stop me from playing the what if game. I still often wonder why the NBA is so reluctant to experiment with even minute changes to improve things for all. David Stern loves to talk about the tradition of the game, but in reality I think he's just a pretty unimaginative guy who's more about the NBA's books then the game itself. The only change he's gone after, The New Ball, blew up in his face because it was actually just a marketing gimmick they'd put no thought into.

Bad Movie, Good Idea

It's likely to never happen, but I've never understood why teams, owners and the league office are so bloody content when they are sitting on such a base of talent. Why not shake things up a little and make some harmless changes? Why not have a commish for a day contest? Haven't they ever seen Little Big League?

10 Reasons Why March Madness Destroys The NBA

Nothing Defines March Like A Bracket

I've heard all the reasons why NCAA hoops is inferior. The players suck. They are kids. The games are low scoring. It's a joke compared to the NBA. Everyone who's good is gone in a year or two. All very valid and I know these points all too well: I made them myself for years.


That is, till I finally filled out a bracket and sat down to watch "The MADNESS!" in all it's glory. Instead of just seeing the championship game or the final four, I learned that the beauty of March is in the first two rounds. I learned watching crappy teams beat the better ones is unmatched. Here are 10 realities you nay sayers should consider about March. ( In my house "March" implies the Madness, simply because there is nothing else in the month that truly matters. That's right, take it Easter!)

1. There are 'plenty' of good players in college. Great players even. Every year lots of them make it to the NBA as a result. In a good draft there can be 20 dudes who come in an contribute right away in all capacities on NBA teams. This year alone Blake Griffin and John Wall came in and ripped franchise player status from whoever was there before them as rookies.

This man = Amazing Player!

2. Being a good basketball player and making the NBA are not the same thing. Many amazing college guys are loaded with talent but merely lack the size or athletic ability to compete at the NBA. Pro hoops are dominated so much by those two things. Just because a 6 foot shooting guard is too small to defend 2's in the NBA doesn't mean he's a bad scorer/player.

I can guarantee this: Gerry McNamara is an AMAZING basketball player. He's 6'2" in shoes and no, not as good as Nash or athletic like Iverson, but he's amazing none the less. I watched him carry Melo for huge stretches on their way to an NCAA title. Fantastic. As was Stephen Curry. He's yet to accomplish anything in his NBA career that compares to the ass kicking he gave the entire NCAA in 2008.

3. Teams in the NCAA are not stacked like the NBA. Powerhouse teams will have a guy, maybe two, who will be an elite NBA player. They're better then everyone. But what's so amazing to see is when the 'sucky kids' use heart to overcome the super teams. If heart can't beat talent there's really no point to sports at all. Nothing exemplifies this more then March.

4. These guys who 'suck' are actually more like you and me. Watching someone who has no hopes of a pro career hit massive shot after massive shot to beat someone who is headed for stardom is infinitely more entertaining then watching a stacked juggernaut plow through an NBA season. Tony Skinn is one of my favourite players of all time. He might end up selling insurance.

George Mason Didn't Wear White Once
On Their Way To The Final Four. If You
Watch March, you Know Why This Is Amazing.

I watched him live the story he will be telling his grand children till the day he dies. It's like how Boston fans rooted for Brian Scalanbrine because he was the closest to them and they related. Except instead of rooting for him to finally be put into garbage time or actually hit a shot in a game, I was rooting for him to win a national title as a starter. Have I ever been emotionally invested in a team more then George Mason? Probably not. They were like me beating guys like them.

5. Players in college are not paid money, and the vast majority of them never expect to be paid big money. Hoop is everything to them. Half the NBA lumbers around all season talking about how 'it's a business' and frankly look bored most of the time. Everyone admits that the NBA season is much too long and would be better if it had half the games... you know, just like the NCAA season. Watching teams play their hearts out for nothing but the sport itself will always be better then watching ego driven dudes living in luxury play for their contracts.

6. Fans at college games are drunk.

Lets let Gus Johnson Tell You Why

Really drunk. And they're into it like Charlie Sheen is into Bree Olsen and another line of coke. I just watched a game where I swear the fans didn't stop jumping up and down for an entire half and were cheering at insane decibels entire game. March is like watching Dallas @ GSW in the 2007 playoffs for an entire month. I love the NBA, but I can hardly remember a game or crowd that matched that intensity.

7. Stars are stars, but they're not given star treatment in any similar way shape or form as they are in the NBA. There's still bad calls but there is so much less "well, that was close so we'll give it to the star" situations. I just watched Grant Hill foul out because Kobe gave him an elbow while going by him and looked at the ref. Not in college. It makes for a cleaner and more pure game that's not controlled by the refs, but by the players.

8. Teams play D. Those low scoring games? This is due to kids playing the way their coaches want them to. If an NBA coach told his players they'd be employing heavy pressing and pressure every minute of every game, what happens? He would lose his team of super stars in a month. They're stars and in a nut shell lazy. One of the reasons Rick Pitino failed in the NBA was because he didn't anticipate how players would know the right way to play, but wouldn't care enough to do it. I love hoop, and watching Kevin Love's UCLA teams break the backs of offensive juggernauts to me was just as entertaining as watching Memphis get to the title game with Derrick Rose.

Gus Johnson Is The Embodiment Of March

9. Better talent is not always a good thing. If a team is up 5 or 6 points with a minute left, that game is as good as over in the NBA. They will close them out, hit all their free throws, and it's done. Get on the plane. Next game. In the madness it happens, and happen often. There's always a shot.

With talent spread out it's just harder to put your boot on the throat of the other team. Someone could choke their free throws or turn the ball over to let them back in it. You get more close games and furious come backs. Every year so many massively epic games are won on buzzer beater shots and plays.In the NBA it's just not the same. In the last 10 seconds of a march game it's not uncommon for the lead to change 3 times and then the game be won at the buzzer with everyone freaking out like maniacs. It's hard for me to even picture NBA guys jumping up and down like that.

10. Simply, the Madness. When you watch March, you don't watch one game at a time. It's about the format. In the first weekend there are 40 or 50 games played alone. They're all overlapping each other. When that's combined with point 9 above following all the drama just gets insane.

You start jumping back and foruth between 4 games at once that all have leads of a basket or two at most cuz there are 8 games going on. There's no point in watching something that's not close. Then the finishes start to roll in and you watch one finish after another. It's nothing in March to watch 4 games finish in the span of 20 or 30 minutes, see 2 buzzer beaters, one buzzer beater attempt that fails, and another game go to OT in the final seconds by some underdog team no one ever gave a chance. After the first good game you say "wow, how can that be topped?" and then you see it get topped 4 or 5 times later that night. It's incredible.

Bonus point 11. Gambling. Filling out a bracket and rooting for all the teams you picked to upset the teams they shouldn't be beating just takes everything to another level. When the above happens and a team hits crazy shots to win you money and more importantly the traction to talk smack to your friend you just took money from, life is good.

Stephen Curry Was INCREDIBLE In College

Bonus point 12. I started watching March seriously in the 90's after years of thinking it sucked and was over rated. I got into the fab five thing and loved Grant Hill at Duke but I didn't 'really' start watching the whole thing till later. The first year I filled out a bracket was when Wade went deep in the toruny at Marquette and blew my mind with his play.

Every year for I dunno, 6 years?, I said "there's no way it can be better then last year" and every year I was convinced that's exactly what happened. The only time I didn't feel that way was the year after George Mason made the final four from the 13 seed. Understandable because that was one of the best runs in hoops history. Then the year after that Curry took over and it started again. There's just few things I've ever been into that delivers more then the Madness.

And that's what March is really all about. It's what the Louvre is to art, or what Jazz is to music. Just basketball in it's purest form. There is really no way to be a real basketball fan and not love March. It's what separates fans of basketball stars from fans of the game. If you are a real fan and disagree, don't worry, you'll eventually fall in love with it like the rest of us.

Lets sum this all up in a single sentence. March: the only way sex could be better then March Madness is if you were having sex while watching March Madness. QED.

Post Script: Just one more note. March Madness has Gus Johnson. I would watch him calling paint dry. "And here we go, rise and fire from the sun. Latex is drying hardening it's colourful compound." Gus once made me look up excitedly by calling the ball boys wiping sweat off the floor. I laughed at myself then. Just watch Gus Johnson describe the first game he called in the tourny.

His First Game Ever, And More Amazing Gus Johnson