Cuban may get wish
The NBA has finished tallying up its top 10 playoff moments, and the list is full of the usual suspects. It’s topped by Michael Jordan’s game-winning shot in the 1998 finals, followed by efforts by the likes of Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Willis Reed.
It’s an admirable list, but maybe the people who market the league should have waited a bit longer before compiling it.
Because, as moments go, it may not get any better than watching David Stern hand the championship trophy to Mark Cuban.
If that’s not good enough for you, imagine this added bonus:
“I’m working on which Speedo I want to be wearing,” Cuban said.
The Mavericks owner was joking, of course. The NBA has a new dress code this year, and Speedos are not on the approved list.
Neither are Dairy Queen uniforms, just in case Cuban gets any ideas.
Besides, just watching Stern clench his teeth and hand the trophy over to the upstart billionaire should be theater enough.
“I just hope we can get to that point and then we can deal with it,” Cuban said the other day.
Oddsmakers like the chances of that happening. The Mavericks are a five-point favorite to win tonight’s opener, and a 7 1/2-5 pick to beat the Miami Heat and win the team’s first NBA title.
The odds of Cuban making it all that way without embarrassing himself or the league aren’t quite as good.
Will he go into the stands like he did in Phoenix? Run on the court and argue with officials like he did in San Antonio?
Stay tuned, because the sideshow may be better than the basketball.
Get used to an all Cuban, all the time finals because the folks at ABC like that kind of thing. By the time Game 7 rolls around, Cuban will have had more face time on the network than the women in “Desperate Housewives.”
See Mark yell. See Mark scream. See Mark make a fool out of himself on national television.
Then watch the Mavericks follow him all the way to an NBA championship.
Sure, he’s a nerdy billionaire whose act wears thin quickly. Turns out, though, that there’s a method behind this madness, one that has allowed Cuban to take a miserable team and turn it into an NBA finalist in just a handful of years.
He doesn’t coach, and he’s not much into making player personnel decisions. But Cuban has given his players every edge an owner can, and you better believe that every time he reaches into his pocket to pay the NBA a fine they understand that he has their back.
That happened most recently when Stern lifted $200,000 out of Cuban’s wallet for going onto the court in San Antonio to complain about the officiating, and later posting some musings on his Web site under the headline: “How To Improve NBA Playoff Officiating.”
He’s now at some $3 million and counting, if you include the like amounts he donates to charity. But when you’re worth $1.6 billion, as Forbes recently said Cuban was, that’s tip money.