FanHouse Tim Donaghy

I was glad to see my FanHouse colleague Brett Edwards pick up the discussion string concerning the disturbing attendance data uncovered by Peter Nussbaum last week at Supersonics Soul. What was disappointing, however, was his failure to grapple with the data presented and how he instead pointed the finger back at hockey fans like me and our "hilarious" insecurities.

Let me make one thing clear: I take no joy in the attendance woes of the NBA, or any other league for that matter. And if hockey fans like me are "insecure," it's for a very simple reason: the relentless drumbeat in the mainstream media and on sports blogs that the NHL is irrelevant.

What am I talking about? Well, our friend Enrico Campetelli gave us a nice reminder last week over at The 700 Level, where he posted an interview he did with long-time Flyers beat writer Tim Pannacio. It was Pannacio who left the Philadelphia Inquirer after last season when he demurred after his editor attempted to re-assign him to cover the Eagles. The reason: the editor, an ex-ESPN hand who was responsible for PTI and Around the Horn had declared hockey "an irrelevant sport," this in a town where the Flyers are outdrawing the 76ers despite the fact that the Flyers lost six straight games to start the season.

NBA Essentials ranks our six favorite stories of the day.

1. IndyStar.com: Shaquille O'Neal, so happy to be back home in New Jersey that he's ... stealing candy bars?

2. South Florida Sun-Sentinel: Shawn Marion, feeling like a caged animal.

3. SI.com: Good Interview with Scott Foster, the other (innocent!) referee whose name kept coming up in the Tim Donaghy scandal.

4. Toronto Star: Do not mention the "stupidity" of the Chris Bosh 2010 free agency to Raps' coach Sam Mitchell.

5. Deseret News: Carlos Boozer "hasn't decided" if he'll opt out this summer. What? You don't believe Boozer when he's talking about his contract?

6. AlanaG.com: A hilarious tale of a trip to the voting booth, which has been taken a little too seriously by at least one other site. (Oh, and it's NBA-related because of the video of Acie Law voting, I guess.)

Today's release of the Pedowitz Report -- which, among other things, backed up the league's assertion that Tim Donaghy was the only one doing what he was doing -- prompted David Stern to take questions from the media via conference call. Here were some of the hightlights:

- The question was asked that if the report found that referees were not manipulating the outcomes of games, how were they able to win between 60 and 70% of their wagers? Stern answered simply, "I don't know," then questioned the reporter on that statistic. He added that he hadn't seen those numbers and that he didn't know if that was accurate. But he guessed that if you start by guessing and you're at 50-50, any additional piece of inside information would be likely to increase your odds of guessing correctly.

- Speaking of inside information, that was the reason the commissioner gave for implementing the game-day release of the names of which officials would be working which games. He said that the more information that's available publicly, the less of a gambler's advantage there is, because there would be almost no inside information anymore. Stern stated that the "gambler's edge would be blunted" by the release of more public information.

Never has a guy playing a "friendly" Nassau got himself in so much trouble.

Tim Donaghy, a man that will most likely be nominated into the Suns Hall of Fame after jail, got infected with his gambling bug from, of all places, the golf course.

"(Stephen) Block, a longtime New York-based gambling treatment counselor who interviewed Donaghy in January, traced his problem to 1994, when he started betting up to $500 a hole and playing card games at various golf clubs in his home state of Pennsylvania."

I have some buddies that would bet on anything from who hits the most trees in a round to which portion of the cart girl's shirt will be stained and even they don't toss $500 around the links.

Who is this guy, Charles Barkley?

"His gambling history demonstrates the need to gamble to fulfill the underlying need for 'action,"' Block said. "He continued to gamble despite the consequences and the fear of disclosure of his activities."

With Donaghy just being sentenced to 15 months in prison, I guarantee the need for "action" will indefinitely be fulfilled. "Hey Timmy, wanna bet on which guard I paid off to conveniently disappear for the next eight minutes?"

He better hope they send him to a jail near San Antonio, it might be the only place he's safe.

Never has a guy playing a "friendly" Nassau got himself in so much trouble.

Tim Donaghy, a man that will most likely be nominated into the Suns Hall of Fame after jail, got infected with his gambling bug from, of all places, the golf course.

"(Stephen) Block, a longtime New York-based gambling treatment counselor who interviewed Donaghy in January, traced his problem to 1994, when he started betting up to $500 a hole and playing card games at various golf clubs in his home state of Pennsylvania."

I have some buddies that would bet on anything from who hits the most trees in a round to which portion of the cart girl's shirt will be stained and even they don't toss $500 around the links.

Who is this guy, Charles Barkley?

"His gambling history demonstrates the need to gamble to fulfill the underlying need for 'action,"' Block said. "He continued to gamble despite the consequences and the fear of disclosure of his activities."

With Donaghy just being sentenced to 15 months in prison, I guarantee the need for "action" will indefinitely be fulfilled. "Hey Timmy, wanna bet on which guard I paid off to conveniently disappear for the next eight minutes?"

He better hope they send him to a jail near San Antonio, it might be the only place he's safe.

Looks like Tim Donaghy is catching some sort of break after all, as the fedarales announced today that they believe Donaghy should not have to pay back the $1.4 million the NBA claims he owes the league. That figure was calculated based on his salary from 2003 to 2006 for 'honest services' (read: not fixing games) plus the costs of investigating the alleged improprieties.

In a letter filed Tuesday in Brooklyn federal court, assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Goldberg said the government believes Donaghy shouldn't have to pay more than $500,000 in salary and benefits to the league. That amount represents the value of Donaghy's "honest services" for the years 2003 to part of 2006, money the NBA isn't entitled to recoup under federal law, Goldberg said.

The only amount of salary the NBA can get back as restitution would be for part of 2006 to 2007, the period during which Donaghy admitted being part of gambling conspiracy to which he plead guilty last year, Goldberg said.

See, this is a tough legal line to actually figure out. Donaghy has only admitted to cheating during those two years, so yeah, I suppose those are the only improperly compensated time frames.

Even with Tim Donaghy doing his very best to put a damper on things, more people than ever were tuning in to watch this year's Finals. The ratings for the event were the highest the league has seen in eight years, the largest since Kobe and Shaq's first title-clincher back in 2000 over the Pacers.

The Celtics' Game 6 blowout drew a 10.7 rating, compared to a 14.7 in 2000 for the Lakers-Pacers Game 6. Overall the series pulled in 9.3% of U.S. households, a 51% increase from the Spurs' sweep of the Cavaliers last season, which, by the way, was the lowest rated NBA Finals ever at just 6.2.

So conspiracy theories be damned, it appears that regardless of what people might think about the league controlling things, they still watched. The fact that the network got to play up the history of the Lakers-Celtics rivalry certainly didn't hurt the ratings. But I wonder if David Stern had addressed all the "fixing" nonsense with some clear cut solutions for holding the NBA's officials more accountable, if even more people wouldn't have tuned in.

We've had plenty of reason to have some fun with Doug Christie over the years, and why not? The fact that he and his wife have no ordinary love is pretty hilarious, as is the way Doug used to gesture at her roughly 212 times per game during his playing days. Now that there have been some discussions about Christie's 2002 Kings team in relation to the whole Tim Donaghy thing, Doug wastes no time in attempting to get back in the spotlight.

Christie first comments (on his blog of course) about the injustices of that 2002 playoff series, but quickly rolls that into how he believes not winning a championship -- along with his close marital relationship -- have caused him to be "blackballed" from the league.

What really makes me mad in the turn of events since then is the fact that these events have turned into what I consider a black balling of myself in the NBA!! ...

A champion is treated in a whole different light. They are valued in the locker room and commercially on a whole different level. For years, my wife and I have been ridiculed and talked about like we are weird, all because we did not fit the "mold" of what the culture breeds in the NBA. It got to the point that these stories would precede us to the point that teams thought that I (i.e. we) would be a problem. That is bogus!!!!

It's a long, rambling post, which is more about Christie's personal struggles to get back into the league than it is about the conspiracy with the fixing of games. But since he does mention his disappointment with the situation, it's worth noting that he doesn't come out and say it wasn't true like say, the owners of the Kings did. It's just bad for the league to have former players giving any credence at all to a convicted criminal's statements, when there is zero evidence right now to back those desperate words up.

Darren Rovell has a fine point today about the NBA's on court promos last night. Those being the promos that were letting everyone know Game Six of the Finals would be this Tuesday. No big deal, right? Because that's when they are scheduled. Unfortunately, had the Celtics won, Game Six wouldn't have been played. Oh yeah, and David Stern would have been in a nightmare.

So was the rotating sign by the floor at last night's Lakers-Celtics game out of line?

For those of you who missed it, it said "Game Six Tuesday."

I looked at it maybe 30 times each time it passed. And I never saw an asterisk, and I never saw any sort of small disclaimer - like an "If necessary" in very small font. Perhaps I missed it, but if I missed it others did.

And Rovell is right -- in a world where Tim Donaghy does not exist, no one thinks twice about this. But because the conspiracy talk in the NBA is rampant, this will be (and currently is!) being contorted into some sort of act by a David Stern dictated NBA that knew the Lakers were going to win last night.

Because, you know, it's not enough that Kobe had his back up against the wall. Obviously it is in the NBA's best interests for this series to go seven games, but there is still no conspiracy going on right now. However, an asterisk, even as tacky as it might look on a commercial, would probably behoove everyone.

A survey released exclusively to Advertising Age yesterday reveals that -- shocker -- the NBA has a serious image problem. According to the poll, out of 907 participants, 37% responded that they believe it is "somewhat or very likely" that the NBA alters the outcomes of its games. That number goes up to 41% when the question is answered by "casual" or "avid" fans. Oh, and how about that Lakers-Celtics Finals match-up? 26% believe the league had a hand in making sure it ended up that way.

To be fair, 907 people isn't exactly the largest sample size in the world, and when you combine the low number of participants with the fact that 46% of the respondents weren't even aware of the Tim Donaghy scandal, you can see how easy it will be for the league to dismiss the results. But they shouldn't.

Whether this particular poll is an accurate reading or not, the fact remains that there are plenty of people out there who believe the NBA is involved with fixing games, either by mandate from the league office or by crooked officials. Diehard fans will continue to follow the league regardless of these allegations, especially until some evidence appears that's a little more than a criminal trying to lighten his jail sentence. But to casual fans, and people who are 50-50 about watching the NBA in the first place, the league is fixed. And until the NBA provides much more transparency and accountability where its officials are concerned, that's the image that the general public is going to continue to see.