The NBA trade deadline has come and gone with many changes about the league. Your team more than likely has stayed the same or made insignificant trades. You see other teams on the East Coast plugging in this piece for that piece and so on and so forth, and you think, “Hey, why didn’t we make that deal to land Melo?” You also start to let your mind think, “all those East Coast teams are loading up on players. Why would the league allow this? The league needs parity.”
Truth is, you should quit the bitching and complaining. Your only real gripe is because your team didn’t think to load up on top talents first.
The Boston Celtics, Miami Heat, New York Knicks and, to an extent, the New Jersey Nets, have sought the help of the best available players on the market to try to bring a championship to their respective cities. So far Boston has one title in three years, while the rest of the elites are in their first year of championship battle royale.
Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce have battled and won in 2008, fought through injuries in 2009 and returned, but failed, in the 2010 NBA Finals.
Miami’s big three are struggling with top competition down the stretch, while the Knicks are finding out what to do with the newly acquired Carmelo Anthony, Chauncey Billups and Amar’e Stoudemire.
Meanwhile, my two favorite teams, the Chicago Bulls (because I’m from there) and the Los Angeles Lakers (because I was born here) have stayed the same. Not a move at all. Both were in talks with the Denver Nuggets for Anthony, but the talks were only third tier options for the Nuggets as they had higher offers from the Nets and eventual winners the Knicks.
The Lakers, who have played in three Finals series in a row after the Pau Gasol trade, don’t necessarily have a big three, and still managed to win two of the last three championships.
The Bulls on the other hand, have made the playoffs in the eighth seed on back-to-back years and were booted in the first round. But with the addition of Carlos Boozer, they are everyone’s sleeper pick to actually win the East and get to the Finals. Again, they don’t have a big three.
People try to compare Kobe Bryant, Gasol plus one (usually Andrew Bynum or Lamar Odom) and Derrick Rose, Boozer plus one (Joakim Noah) to the Heat’s All-Star trio or to Boston’s All-Star quartet and to me, that’s insanity.
Being a fan, I saw the opportunity for both of my teams to improve and trade for Melo or for the Lakers to improve at point guard and trade for Deron Williams who, shockingly, the Utah Jazz decided to trade away on deadline day. I was upset for a moment, but I collected myself and thought, who just won the last two titles? The Lakers. As they are constructed now.
Who are people predicting to win the East in a year that has the East as strong as they’ve ever been? The Bulls. With only the moves they made going into the season.
So, no reason for me to complain. But other fans I’ve been hearing from are ridiculous.
I hear complaints that the league isn’t monitoring player and opposing team interactions, teams owners are spending too much to get high-end players, and that the league is no good without parity.
Well, when your team is the team winning the title five-out-of-nine years, you don’t complain about the parity anymore. You just complain about the other four years. Get over it. Fans can never be satisfied. If you don’t like an owner for his spending habits, you don’t have to purchase their products. Simple.
When Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf and General Manager Jerry Krause didn’t re-sign head coach Phil Jackson (which led to a second Michael Jordan retirement) and dismantled a six-time championship team, I told myself, I won’t deal with anything Chicago Bulls until ownership decides to do something about Krause and this horrible team they were building. And I seriously did. You have the right to do the same, but if not, don’t complain about it later, because no one wants to hear about it.