The Perks of NBA Ownership

What's crack-a-lacking J-Bors? Sorry for the late post today, but I really couldn't think of any worthwhile topic. The "Seattle was cheated vs. Pittsburgh played better" dispute is totally played out at this point, there's nothing exciting about pre-season baseball, and writing about the Spurs and the Pistons winning (and winning and winning…) is about as fun as discussing the mating habits of West Indian Water Buffalo. I felt like a kid in a cut rate candy store. "Sorry, we're all out of gummy cola bottles, we don't have any more sour apples, and that little squirrelly kid just bought the last jawbreaker. But we have plenty of black licorice and Swedish fish.” Woop-de-doo. Just when I thought all hope was lost, I browsed to ESPN.com to view the latest headlines and there it was: “Cuban responds to Jackson, says he owns him”. Nothing like everyone’s favorite billionaire calling out the greatest basketball coach of all time. Now THAT is a discussion worthy sports story.

Apparently, after last weeks Mavericks, Lakers game, Phil Jackson complained about Mark Cuban intimidating the referees. “I know there's a lot of pressure on the refs when they come here, because Mark has them review the tapes and send them into the league, and these guys are nervous Nellies when they come in to referee in this building. But they have to do a better job than they're doing. That's not acceptable.” In one of the most riotous replies of the fledgling year, Cuban responded to Jackson’s comments with an entry in his web log entitled “I own Phil Jackson”. Cuban says that “For whatever reason, I have gotten to Phil so completely and thoroughly that every time he comes to Dallas he has to offer unsolicited comments about me to the media. I wonder if he dreams about me the nights he spends here in Dallas.” He goes on to refer to Phil Jackson as his “bucket boy”.

As I was reading this comic diatribe, I couldn’t help but think, how does this guy own an NBA franchise? This is the exact kind of thing that I would do if I owned an NBA franchise. Pump the music up loud, whip the crowd into a frenzy, heckle the opposing team, and basically run around my personal arena like a wild man treating a multi-million dollar organization like my personal play toy. Isn’t there some sort of entrance exam you have to pass in order to qualify to become the owner of a professional sports franchise? Or even some sort of agreement along the lines of “I won’t run my franchise like a 57 year old frat boy.” Don’t’ get me wrong, I think it’s awesome, I just can’t believe it’s real. I can’t imagine that the NBA would let me and three of my buddies pool a couple hundred million together and buy a team. Can’t you just see how that meeting would go? The four of us sitting around with stupid grins on our faces, all thinking “this can’t be real”, on the edge of our seats, not paying attention to the discussion about the current state of the organization or the minute details of the 400 million dollar contract we were about to sign. Then we finally sign the contract to buy the team, start jumping around like a bunch of idiots, yell for the limo driver to send up the strippers, and all of a sudden it turns into a beer commercial as we throw down the biggest keg party in the history of an NBA front office? Lord have mercy…

Well, however he managed to get a hold of his franchise, my hat is off to Mark Cuban: He’s a retired billionaire who owns a highly successful NBA franchise. Furthermore, his only work consists of watching the Mavericks play basketball, researching ways to gain a competitive advantage over other teams, and occasionally, talking trash to NBA Hall of Fame coaches in the media. His outlandish and hysterical actions and unabashed pursuit of entertainment have earned him the first spot in the J-Borhood Hall of Fame. You can find his weekly musings at www.blogmaverick.com, located in the links of this blog. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get back to work on making that first billion so I can get that NBA team of my own…