Leather Ball Back!

Its taken a while coming, but the NBA has decided to revert to the old leather ball -- the one that has been used in past seasons. For reasons that were not explained, the NBA brought in a new composite ball this season. The new ball has been reviled for having unpredictable bounce and acting weird overall. Sorry, that was the best way to put it. Sometimes it doesn't bounce hard off the rim, flops into the basket, makes paper cuts on players' palms and is either too slippery or too sticky.

Steve Nash, LeBron James, Shaquille O'Neal and Jason Kidd are some of the bigger stars who've expresses their displeasure with the ball. The player's union decided to take legal action against the league last week , on two counts -- the new 'zero tolerance' policy and the composite ball.

Stern had to say this, about reverting to the old ball.
“Our players' response to this particular composite ball has been consistently negative and we are acting accordingly. Although testing performed by Spalding and the NBA demonstrated that the new composite basketball was more consistent than leather, and statistically there has been an improvement in shooting, scoring, and ball-related turnovers, the most important statistic is the view of our players.”

Boy, the man flat out can't admit he was wrong !

I really wonder why they've decided to switch to the old ball now, in the middle of the season. After all, the players have now got used to the new one's random behavior. Even the three point shooting has been getting better and from what I recall, the league shooting average is a few percentage points above last year's. Oh well, the players adjusted to the composite ball within a month, so they should be comfortable with the leather ball by Jan end. I hope.

I guess Stern did not want the 2007 Finals to be decided by some weird bounces. What would the refs do then?

Dictator Stern at it again

Looks like David Stern is running out of ways to mess with the NBA. In his latest move to assert his authority, Sternbot apparently wants to remove all NBA videos from the internet. Huh? This is exactly what happens when you give a pint-sized lawyer the chance to control a league of monster athletes. Presently, only hoopsworld is carrying this story, so I don't know how true this is. But hey, you can never have enough reasons to hate Stern. [full story at hoopsworld]

I will post on how to download videos from youtube, google vid etc. in a few hours, so you can download what you want before Stern's minions go to work. In any case, Stern can do diddly squat to services like bittorrent. And there's always the porn versions of youtube! Who would think of looking there? Imagine Stern's underlings dutifully scouring through porntubes looking for NBA highlights!

Around the League - Thursday

Hawks' Marvin breaks hand [AJC]
"Second-year Hawks forward Marvin Williams broke the third metacarpal on his left hand in practice Thursday and will be out of for six to eight weeks."

Did someone just yell "Hooray 2007 draft !"?

LeBron high-fives Roethlisberger during game [cleveland.com]
"Among those rooting for the MVP-to-be was Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, who sat in the front row at midcourt. Roethlisberger watched his good friend sail in for one driving dunk in the first quarter. And when James slipped along the baseline for a second slam 27 seconds later, Big Ben couldn't help but grin and hold out a hand for James to slap as he raced down the court."

Stern wants players to leave guns at home [ESPN]
"It's a pretty, I think, widely accepted statistic that if you carry a gun, your chances of being shot by one increase dramatically"

Phil Jackson almost ready for opener, Bryant likely to miss [FOX Sports]

LA becoming Clippers town [FOX Sports]
"It was great if we could get a win for us and our fans," Brand recalled. How about now? "We expect to get a win against anybody in the league," he said.

NBA news, 24/7 on Sirius [nba.com]
"The NBA and SIRIUS Satellite Radio, announced today a new exclusive programming lineup on NBA Radio on SIRIUS, channel 127, the first 24/7, year-round radio channel devoted to the NBA."

Friend of Jamaal Tinsley faces charges in strip-club fight [USA Today]
"A court commissioner entered a not-guilty plea to misdemeanor charges of battery, disorderly conduct and possession of marijuana on behalf of Raymel Mattocks, 29, of Brooklyn, N.Y., a friend of point guard Jamaal Tinsley, who was also at Club Rio early on October 6."


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