copy of my letter to the NBA

[snoopy1@pig.net]

If anyone is interested, here's what I sent off to the NBA offices.

"I was disgusted with the lightweight "punishment" given Shaquille O'Neal 
for his commission of what amounts to a felony act in Chicago.

He was flagrantly fouled, no doubt.  Likewise, there's no doubt that he got 
up, ran over toward a man whose back was to him, walking away, and threw a 
punch that failed to connect ONLY because Miller turned his head.  O'Neal 
then unleashed a second punch that DID connect.  One of the officials says 
he removed Miller's shirt because O'Neal was throttling him with it.  TO 
top it off, Miller wasn't even the guy who jumped on him!!

I SAW the fight as it happened.  I saw it replayed from multiple 
angles.  There was no reason whatsoever to believe this was ANY kind of 
"self-defense".

You suspended another player five games when his single punch MISSED.  You 
fine Mark Cuban like you needed his money to cover the league payroll.  But 
when someone commits what in ANY other place is aggravated assault and 
battery--at LEAST--you suspend him for three games.

That's insulting, and it's flat-out wrong.  You're sending a message that 
the NBA cares more for the marquee value of the Lakers on national TV with 
Shaq in the lineup than for making it clear that this kind of behavior is 
TOTALLY inexcuseable & unacceptable.

At the LEAST, he should sit the season and forfeit his pay.  Give him 
plenty of time to take the anger management course he is obviously in 
desperate need of.

This was also a result of what has become substandard officiating 
throughout the league.  No calls are made.  Bad calls are made.  The NBA 
spends more time charging people outrageous amounts of money for making 
legitimate complaints than they do correcting a problem that has now 
resulted in a man nearly crippled or killed.

If this is the kind of message the NBA wants to send, then perhaps I will 
cancel my subscription to the NBA League Pass.  Perhaps I will then make it 
a point to publicly encourage a general boycott of NBA games, particularly 
of Laker games, in protest of the obvious special treatment O'Neal is 
receiving.  Perhaps I will put up a website and describe the situation in 
detail, including how the league likes to talk tough during negotiations, 
then turns tail and runs when the hard decisions have to be made.

The League has embarrassed itself and declared itself a coward before all.

I've been a Celtics fan since I was a kid in Boston.  I've been proud of 
that, and of the NBA all along.

Until now.  Now, I'm just  embarrassed that this "response" indicates the 
NBA acronym stands for "No Balls Anywhere".

I urge you to reconsider this false course of action and to demonstrate 
that you're not going to wait until someone gets hurt or killed before 
meting out punishments with teeth.

Please, show us that the NBA really is better than the NFL, or the NHL when 
it comes to keeping the game clean.  Otherwise, it's all just hypocrisy."