Arizona's Finest
Your My Favorite Mistake
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Q. Tell me if you can guess which CNNSI writer has a schiztophrinic personality.....
The Belkin File
When does a concerned owner become meddlesome?
Dreams are a very subjective part of the human psyche. Athletes dream of turning professional, of cashing a paycheck for playing a sport they would probably play for free in local rec leagues. Those blessed with a superior intellect often dream of the fortune that comes with success in the corporate world. And if you're a Massachusetts Kennedy, well, you basically dream of taking over the world.
When Steve Belkin purchased a majority interest in the Atlanta Hawks 18 months ago, it was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream that began in a Boston boardroom almost 22 years earlier.
Unfortunately for him, that dream quickly turned into a prolonged nightmare.
The hostile takeover by eight members of the Atlanta Spirit LLC (a nine-man contingent, including Belkin, that bought the Hawks, Atlanta Thrashers and Philips Arena) came to a conclusion last week with one clear resolution: Belkin -- along with his 30 percent stake in the company and position on the NBA Board of Governors -- was out. The resolution is clear, but in the end, to whom do we assess the blame?
Belkin is not your typical NBA owner and in his 18 months on the job he gave commissioner David Stern enough headaches to last a lifetime. But he is not dispassionate. He is not a Donald Sterling-esque owner who defines success by whether the ink on the financial reports are red or black. Belkin is cut out of the Mark Cuban mold, an avid hoops fan who has spent parts of three decades trying to acquire an NBA franchise. In 1983 Belkin, who built his fortune on the back of Trans National Tours, had an agreement in place to buy the Boston Celtics for $15 million, only to withdraw from the bidding a few weeks later when reports began to surface that one of his vice-presidents at Trans National, Henry Lewis, had been convicted of bookmaking in 1977. In 2001 Belkin made another run at the Celtics, who were eventually sold to venture capitalist Wyc Grousbeck for an NBA record $360 million. The following year Belkin came up short again, this time finishing runner-up to Robert Johnson in the bidding to own the new expansion Charlotte Bobcats.
It's easy to look at Belkin as a meddling owner, but where do you draw the line on an owner's right to "interfere" with his team? A source close to the team told SI.com that Belkin in no way felt Joe Johnson was worth the five-year, $70 million offer sheet Atlanta signed him to. However, Belkin signed off on the contract terms because he felt Johnson's addition -- even at a bloated salary --would improve the team. It was only after GM Billy Knight negotiated a sign-and-trade with Phoenix involving two Atlanta first round draft picks that Belkin began to balk
Should an owner undermine his own personnel? Probably not, but Knight wasn't one of Belkin's people. In the last two ownership bids, Belkin had Larry Bird standing by ready to run basketball operations for Belkin's new franchise. With Bird in Indiana, Belkin was left with Knight, who came over from Memphis before the 2003 season. What can be inferred from this situation is that Belkin did not have much faith in Knight as a decision maker; you can be sure if Bird had come to him with the same deal this would be a very different story.
Belkin was right to question the merits of this trade. Johnson is a nice complementary player, but is he a building block for a young franchise loaded with players who play his position? Johnson the point guard? We saw how well that worked out for Larry Hughes in Philadelphia.
At the end of the day, Belkin decided the only move left was to cut his losses. As first reported this week in Sports Illustrated, a source close to the team said Belkin initially agreed to allow the trade to pass and would have retained his position on the NBA Board of Governors. When it became clear the two sides could not maintain a working relationship, Belkin offered to buy his co-owners' 70 percent stake in the team; they countered with an offer to buy him out. With all his options exhausted, Belkin agreed to the buyout at a cost that will be determined by an independent appraiser before the end of the year.
The most disappointing aspect of this situation is how it went from internal strife to a public spit ball fight. Problems should have been broached, addressed, and dealt with before even a word of dissent became public. This could have been over before it began. Maybe future owners, with this kind of history staring them in the face, will remember that.
But hold on….a week earlier he wrote this article, disparaging our beloved Phoenix Suns…….
Script changes
Offseason moves rewrite Suns' plan of attack
Posted: Friday August 19, 2005 12:20PM; Updated: Friday August 19, 2005 12:42PM
The Phoenix Suns were fun to watch last year, weren't they?
Through 62 regular-season wins and two playoff rounds the Suns were a high-octane machine, posting the best scoring average in the NBA in 10 years and playing with a free-flowing style and flair not seen since the days of the Showtime Lakers.
At the end of the day -- and the Western Conference finals -- Phoenix's fun-and-gun style could not measure up to the disciplined play of San Antonio's Spurs, who put the hammer down on Phoenix in five games on their way to an eventual NBA championship.
So when this summer began, Phoenix GM Bryan Colangelo had two options: he could maintain the status quo and let his Suns take their chances in the West again next season with a revved up offense with no real defensive presence to speak of; or he could revamp his roster, break up a contending team that filled the seats (Suns attendance averaged 17,639 last season.) in favor of a more traditional lineup that paralleled the physical nature of the Western Conference.
Much like his team did last season, Colangelo didn't sit still.
With the trade of long-distance threat Quentin Richardson to New York and the pending departure of Joe Johnson to Atlanta, Phoenix will go into the 2005-06 campaign with a roster markedly different from the one that scored 110 points a game last season. Kurt Thomas, a rugged rebounder and adequate mid-range shooter who arrived in return for Richardson immediately becomes the Suns starting center, initiating a domino effect that bumps Amare Stoudemire to the power forward slot and Shawn Marion to small forward. Brian Grant, an amnesty casualty of the Lakers who signed this week, steps in as Thomas' backup. Grant may have had his worst season as a professional last year with the Lakers, but he's still a career 7.6 per game rebounder who is unafraid of mixing it up underneath.
Johnson's defection won't be so easy to fill at shooting guard. Michael Finley, an amnesty cut by the Mavericks, is Phoenix's first choice to replace Johnson, but league sources believe Finley is headed for an Eastern Conference team; despite the allure of returning to Phoenix (where Finley played from '95-97), the Suns can only offer the 6-foot-7 guard the veteran minimum of $500,000.
Phoenix's fallback is Raja Bell, a free agent from Utah who agreed to a 5-year, $24 million deal to move to the desert. Bell is not the perimeter threat Richardson is and isn't as versatile as Johnson, but he does bring the Suns a different quality: defense. Bell has a reputation as a hard-nosed defender, so much so that upon hearing of Bell's signing, Spurs swingman Manu Ginobili reportedly called his agent to gripe about Phoenix's acquiring one of his least favorite defenders.
In casting aside two-fifths of the starting lineup, everyone from Suns fans to coach Mike D'Antoni must be wondering if the club can continue to play the style to which they had become accustomed?
I don't see it. While the additions of Thomas and Grant undoubtedly will toughen up the Suns' interior, it also removes two of the bullets from the Suns' offensive chamber. Last year Phoenix had five guys who each could outrun their counterpart down the other end of the court. Grant, whose chronic knee problems plagued him in L.A., and Thomas would have trouble outrunning D'Antoni. Likewise Stoudemire and Marion, who easily outpaced fives and fours respectively, will find their once wide-open lanes becoming considerably clustered by more athletic forwards.
True, Steve Nash will still be running the show, but even the reigning MVP will encounter some problems. Despite losing in six games to the Suns in the conference semifinals Dallas took much of the teeth out of Phoenix's attack by employing a strategy that others are likely to mimic this fall -- allow Nash the ball -- and make him keep it. Nash rang up 121 points in the last three games against the Mavericks, and even though Phoenix won two of those games, the margins of victory were decidedly closer than in the series' first three contests.
And when Nash does manage to find an open teammate next season, an assist will be far from assured. Richardson made a league-high 226 3-pointers last year while Johnson was the NBA's runner up in accuracy, shooting 47.8 percent from beyond the arc. Bell, who averaged a career high 12.3 points last season with Utah, is a career 37.7 percent from long range.
This fall will be a trying time for the Suns. In addition to incorporating a confluence of different styles, Phoenix will be saddled with the additional burden of enticing Stoudemire to re-sign after this season. Should Phoenix falter or should Stoudemire be thrust back into the center position (a spot he loathes and cites as a factor in his happiness), he could sign Phoenix's one-year qualifying offer after '06, knowing that the Lakers, with their bevy of expiring contracts coming off the books in '07, will be waiting in the wings. It's a burden, to be sure, one the Suns may not be able to bear.
Is it me or is this guy seriously confused about the NBA...........?
So if Joe is so unable to be replaced for the benefit of the Suns, how can he also just be a complimentary player when arriving in Atlanta?
Also any writer who mentions Amare and the Lakers in the same sentence, and that sentence doesn't start "Amare Stoudmaire dominated the Lakers last night, filling the stat box with numbers of.........." should be publicly shot in the center court at AWA IMO.........
A. Chris Mannix BTW
The Belkin File
When does a concerned owner become meddlesome?
Dreams are a very subjective part of the human psyche. Athletes dream of turning professional, of cashing a paycheck for playing a sport they would probably play for free in local rec leagues. Those blessed with a superior intellect often dream of the fortune that comes with success in the corporate world. And if you're a Massachusetts Kennedy, well, you basically dream of taking over the world.
When Steve Belkin purchased a majority interest in the Atlanta Hawks 18 months ago, it was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream that began in a Boston boardroom almost 22 years earlier.
Unfortunately for him, that dream quickly turned into a prolonged nightmare.
The hostile takeover by eight members of the Atlanta Spirit LLC (a nine-man contingent, including Belkin, that bought the Hawks, Atlanta Thrashers and Philips Arena) came to a conclusion last week with one clear resolution: Belkin -- along with his 30 percent stake in the company and position on the NBA Board of Governors -- was out. The resolution is clear, but in the end, to whom do we assess the blame?
Belkin is not your typical NBA owner and in his 18 months on the job he gave commissioner David Stern enough headaches to last a lifetime. But he is not dispassionate. He is not a Donald Sterling-esque owner who defines success by whether the ink on the financial reports are red or black. Belkin is cut out of the Mark Cuban mold, an avid hoops fan who has spent parts of three decades trying to acquire an NBA franchise. In 1983 Belkin, who built his fortune on the back of Trans National Tours, had an agreement in place to buy the Boston Celtics for $15 million, only to withdraw from the bidding a few weeks later when reports began to surface that one of his vice-presidents at Trans National, Henry Lewis, had been convicted of bookmaking in 1977. In 2001 Belkin made another run at the Celtics, who were eventually sold to venture capitalist Wyc Grousbeck for an NBA record $360 million. The following year Belkin came up short again, this time finishing runner-up to Robert Johnson in the bidding to own the new expansion Charlotte Bobcats.
It's easy to look at Belkin as a meddling owner, but where do you draw the line on an owner's right to "interfere" with his team? A source close to the team told SI.com that Belkin in no way felt Joe Johnson was worth the five-year, $70 million offer sheet Atlanta signed him to. However, Belkin signed off on the contract terms because he felt Johnson's addition -- even at a bloated salary --would improve the team. It was only after GM Billy Knight negotiated a sign-and-trade with Phoenix involving two Atlanta first round draft picks that Belkin began to balk
Should an owner undermine his own personnel? Probably not, but Knight wasn't one of Belkin's people. In the last two ownership bids, Belkin had Larry Bird standing by ready to run basketball operations for Belkin's new franchise. With Bird in Indiana, Belkin was left with Knight, who came over from Memphis before the 2003 season. What can be inferred from this situation is that Belkin did not have much faith in Knight as a decision maker; you can be sure if Bird had come to him with the same deal this would be a very different story.
Belkin was right to question the merits of this trade. Johnson is a nice complementary player, but is he a building block for a young franchise loaded with players who play his position? Johnson the point guard? We saw how well that worked out for Larry Hughes in Philadelphia.
At the end of the day, Belkin decided the only move left was to cut his losses. As first reported this week in Sports Illustrated, a source close to the team said Belkin initially agreed to allow the trade to pass and would have retained his position on the NBA Board of Governors. When it became clear the two sides could not maintain a working relationship, Belkin offered to buy his co-owners' 70 percent stake in the team; they countered with an offer to buy him out. With all his options exhausted, Belkin agreed to the buyout at a cost that will be determined by an independent appraiser before the end of the year.
The most disappointing aspect of this situation is how it went from internal strife to a public spit ball fight. Problems should have been broached, addressed, and dealt with before even a word of dissent became public. This could have been over before it began. Maybe future owners, with this kind of history staring them in the face, will remember that.
But hold on….a week earlier he wrote this article, disparaging our beloved Phoenix Suns…….
Script changes
Offseason moves rewrite Suns' plan of attack
Posted: Friday August 19, 2005 12:20PM; Updated: Friday August 19, 2005 12:42PM
The Phoenix Suns were fun to watch last year, weren't they?
Through 62 regular-season wins and two playoff rounds the Suns were a high-octane machine, posting the best scoring average in the NBA in 10 years and playing with a free-flowing style and flair not seen since the days of the Showtime Lakers.
At the end of the day -- and the Western Conference finals -- Phoenix's fun-and-gun style could not measure up to the disciplined play of San Antonio's Spurs, who put the hammer down on Phoenix in five games on their way to an eventual NBA championship.
So when this summer began, Phoenix GM Bryan Colangelo had two options: he could maintain the status quo and let his Suns take their chances in the West again next season with a revved up offense with no real defensive presence to speak of; or he could revamp his roster, break up a contending team that filled the seats (Suns attendance averaged 17,639 last season.) in favor of a more traditional lineup that paralleled the physical nature of the Western Conference.
Much like his team did last season, Colangelo didn't sit still.
With the trade of long-distance threat Quentin Richardson to New York and the pending departure of Joe Johnson to Atlanta, Phoenix will go into the 2005-06 campaign with a roster markedly different from the one that scored 110 points a game last season. Kurt Thomas, a rugged rebounder and adequate mid-range shooter who arrived in return for Richardson immediately becomes the Suns starting center, initiating a domino effect that bumps Amare Stoudemire to the power forward slot and Shawn Marion to small forward. Brian Grant, an amnesty casualty of the Lakers who signed this week, steps in as Thomas' backup. Grant may have had his worst season as a professional last year with the Lakers, but he's still a career 7.6 per game rebounder who is unafraid of mixing it up underneath.
Johnson's defection won't be so easy to fill at shooting guard. Michael Finley, an amnesty cut by the Mavericks, is Phoenix's first choice to replace Johnson, but league sources believe Finley is headed for an Eastern Conference team; despite the allure of returning to Phoenix (where Finley played from '95-97), the Suns can only offer the 6-foot-7 guard the veteran minimum of $500,000.
Phoenix's fallback is Raja Bell, a free agent from Utah who agreed to a 5-year, $24 million deal to move to the desert. Bell is not the perimeter threat Richardson is and isn't as versatile as Johnson, but he does bring the Suns a different quality: defense. Bell has a reputation as a hard-nosed defender, so much so that upon hearing of Bell's signing, Spurs swingman Manu Ginobili reportedly called his agent to gripe about Phoenix's acquiring one of his least favorite defenders.
In casting aside two-fifths of the starting lineup, everyone from Suns fans to coach Mike D'Antoni must be wondering if the club can continue to play the style to which they had become accustomed?
I don't see it. While the additions of Thomas and Grant undoubtedly will toughen up the Suns' interior, it also removes two of the bullets from the Suns' offensive chamber. Last year Phoenix had five guys who each could outrun their counterpart down the other end of the court. Grant, whose chronic knee problems plagued him in L.A., and Thomas would have trouble outrunning D'Antoni. Likewise Stoudemire and Marion, who easily outpaced fives and fours respectively, will find their once wide-open lanes becoming considerably clustered by more athletic forwards.
True, Steve Nash will still be running the show, but even the reigning MVP will encounter some problems. Despite losing in six games to the Suns in the conference semifinals Dallas took much of the teeth out of Phoenix's attack by employing a strategy that others are likely to mimic this fall -- allow Nash the ball -- and make him keep it. Nash rang up 121 points in the last three games against the Mavericks, and even though Phoenix won two of those games, the margins of victory were decidedly closer than in the series' first three contests.
And when Nash does manage to find an open teammate next season, an assist will be far from assured. Richardson made a league-high 226 3-pointers last year while Johnson was the NBA's runner up in accuracy, shooting 47.8 percent from beyond the arc. Bell, who averaged a career high 12.3 points last season with Utah, is a career 37.7 percent from long range.
This fall will be a trying time for the Suns. In addition to incorporating a confluence of different styles, Phoenix will be saddled with the additional burden of enticing Stoudemire to re-sign after this season. Should Phoenix falter or should Stoudemire be thrust back into the center position (a spot he loathes and cites as a factor in his happiness), he could sign Phoenix's one-year qualifying offer after '06, knowing that the Lakers, with their bevy of expiring contracts coming off the books in '07, will be waiting in the wings. It's a burden, to be sure, one the Suns may not be able to bear.
Is it me or is this guy seriously confused about the NBA...........?
So if Joe is so unable to be replaced for the benefit of the Suns, how can he also just be a complimentary player when arriving in Atlanta?
Also any writer who mentions Amare and the Lakers in the same sentence, and that sentence doesn't start "Amare Stoudmaire dominated the Lakers last night, filling the stat box with numbers of.........." should be publicly shot in the center court at AWA IMO.........
A. Chris Mannix BTW
