Passion and Ignorance

Ignorance in the NBA is never lacking. My recent disgust with the Warriors (I live in the Bay Area, so I am much more exposed to their media) is their recent love affair with the volatile Stephen Jackson, a person who has neither the ability nor the intelligence to control his temper.

In Friday’s sporting green in the Chronicle, as a preview for their game that night against the Washington Wizards, Jackson’s teammates were coming to his defense for the way he ‘asserted’ himself at a previous game. “I’ve been with Jack long enough to know when he’s going to explode, and he was fine. It’s just that everybody stood up and made it look worse than it was…..nobody has to go hold his hand and bring him to the bench, none of that. Let him go through what he’s going through, and he’ll come over there and sit down,” says Al Harrington, a teammate of his while he was in Indiana. I am not sure if Harrington was with Jackson when Jackson went into the stands to fight the fans in Detroit, but in either case, it doesn’t seem responsible to allow ‘Jack’ to stand up and argue with anyone in a public forum after the infamous brawl that he was a large part of .

Baron Davis credited Jackson for his remarkable enthusiasm for the game, “He’s a guy who’s going to get technicals. That’s just his passion for the game. I’d much rather have everybody on our team like that, than somebody who never shows…emotion and doesn’t play with a passion or love for the game.”

Passion? Technicals cost a team points and the possession of the ball. The very nature of a technical is a designed punishment onto to a team due to the excessive nature of a player and/or coach. What the hell is Davis talking about? Can someone please help me understand this twisted logic of the NBA?

As for Jackson’s passionate play Friday night against the Wizards, he played a total of 7 minutes of the game before he got thrown out by the officials. According to the Chronicle on Saturday, “Jackson immediately took out his mouth guard and threw it to the ground as the Warriors tried to steer him away (probably led by Harrington) from the officials. Warriors apologist Center Andris Beidrins said, quite seriously, “ I think it was a misunderstanding.”


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