Indiana Groans
The Pacers find trouble once again…
Sunday afternoon at the Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, while the Titans and the Colts were squaring off just down the road, the Indiana Pacers hosted their annual Fan Jam, one of those events designed to allow fans to watch their team in an informal practice session and hopefully build some sort of rapport between the players and the community.
Problem was, not even 100 hours earlier, several Pacers (Stephen Jackson, Jamaal Tinsley, Marquis Daniels and Snap Hunter) were involved in an incident at 3:00 a.m. involving a strip club, guns, cars and a fist fight. This would be a problem no matter where it happened, but it was worsened by the fact that after last season, Pacers president Larry Bird met the media and pledged to take control of the franchise Ron Artest had pushed to the brink. People I’ve talked with in Indy have told me that there was a serious disconnect between basketball fans in Indiana and the Pacers. This may have been because of the Artest incident(s), or it might have been because the Pacers haven’t been winning as much.
Either way, it’s indicitive of a larger trend around the NBA, where fans (particularly casual fans) and teams haven’t been vibing. Is it because the players are largely black and the fans the NBA courts are white? Is it because nobody can relate to guys making upwards of $5 million a year? Whatever the cause, the effect is real.
Even if Jackson shooting off was justified, as police say it was, the larger problem is that the Pacers players are continuing to perpetrate an image that they’re above the law, out for justice, hard to kill or any other Steven Seagal movie title. The Indy Star compiled a helpful list of all the gun incidents involving pro athletes from the last decade. (Although they left out Lonny Baxter — guess he didn’t qualify as a pro athlete.) And Bob Kravitz has been hammering them and Larry Bird (here and here) in the Star.
But so far the Pacers haven’t officially responded or made any statements to the fans about how they’re going to handle things, which makes it seem as if they hope it will all be swept under the rug.
And how’d the Fan Jam go? Well, an estimated 10,000 fans showed up, and they were by-and-large supportive. James White got to play with the starters — which led to a great backhanded compliment from Al Harrington: “You can tell he’s been in college five years” — and by all accounts he acquitted himself rather well.
Jackson didn’t participate in the Fan Jam, but the Pacers players rallied around Whoo! Jackson, most of them spending Friday night at his house, which is probably a safer environment than a strip club.
Then again…
8 Responses to “Indiana Groans”
Oct.9 at 12:39 pm
Brian says:
I don’t think race has anything to do with the separation between fan and player. Look at where the non-vibation is happening - Indy, Portland, Kobe (back in 04), Sprewell, Barry Bonds, etc. If guys act like idiots and say idiotic things, people don’t like it - doesn’t matter what color they are. I don’t see any problems in Dallas, PHX, Cleveland, Miami San Antonio, or most other places.
Oct.9 at 1:02 pm
paps says:
What I think what is wrong with the NBA -The games is slow. -The players dont know how to run plays. -The last 5 minutes of a game takes an hour to complete. -Watching free thows sucks. -Too many time outs in a game -Too much one on one. -Player are so out of it with the fundamentals that Nash wins MVP twice cause he knows how to play. -Players are out of touch with reality -Too many touch fouls -Too much favoritism
Oct.9 at 1:07 pm
namik says:
Well actually Brian, the disconnect happens when the team/player messes up AND the team is not winning. The year the Kobe thing happened, the Lakers were still a hot ticket because of the Fab Four thing. In 05 when Shaq was gone and the Lakers started to lose is when everyone went against them. I remember in 04 Kobe was the fav to win Finals MVP here on Slamonline.
And I think Lang was talking the NBA in general, not particular teams.
I think he is right, if you look at soccer in europe, almost all games are sellouts which is amazing. In the NBA, only the top 4-6 teams have that kind of following. On a different note, Lang you gotta tell me where to get a Beckham Real Madrid away(black) full-sleeve jersey! I really cant find it anywhere. Please man!!!
Oct.9 at 1:36 pm
Derms says:
You forgot to mention Marked For Death, Exit Wounds, and Under Seige. Three of Segal’s best.
Oct.9 at 1:38 pm
Lang Whitaker says:
Don’t know about the Becks jersey, Namik. Have you checked Eurosport? The thing about the sellouts in soccer and American football related to basketball is apples and oranges, though. Football teams play 8 home games, 2 preseason games and maybe 1 or 2 postseasons games. Soccer teams play league games at home 3 or 4 times a month. NBA teams can play as many as 8 or so home games each month. That’s a lot of games to sell tickets to, and a lot of money to ask your fans to give out.
Oct.9 at 2:01 pm
Dblizzy says:
I think the disconnect has to do with the accessability of veiwing the game. Like you said Lang, we are talking about casual fans and most casual fans don’t have the money to be season ticket holders. Then you have nba league pass, espn, abc, nba tv and your local networks showing games all the time. Why spend all that money to see a game and buy expensive concession stand food, when you can see the game on TV and take a nap when its a blow out and wake-up in time to catch the miraculous comeback. Or how about I just DVR the game and watch it later? I think the fact that its so expensive, coupled with the fact you can still see the game at home, makes it harder for people to support. It’s not always about winning and losing. The Nets were going to back to back finals and couldn’t sellout the Swamp cuz, well, who the hell wants to go to the Swamp and the knicks have sucked since big Pat left and they sell out all the time, but MSG is more of a party atmosphere than a place where diehard fans go. i guess what I’m trying to say is that there are too many damn factors that lead to poor attendance.
Oct.9 at 3:11 pm
namik says:
Yeah I checked there Lang. They dont have the full-sleeves one..thanks though.
And I was talking more about how involved soccer fans are as compared to basketball fans. Even the bad teams have die hard fans who always back them up. The good teams have some fans who follow their teams all over the place, even to different countries(!!!).
You look at somewhere like portland, and the fan base has basically left the team in 3 years. It’s cool to expect a good product but to abandon the team dosent say much about the fans, even with the mishaps recently. I think the difference in interest can also be blamed on the media where every mistake an athlete makes is blown up into massive proportions propogating the stereotypes that people have about them, esp. the black athletes.
Oct.10 at 5:55 am
Darksaber says:
Aww, c’mon Mr. Whitaker. Lonny Baxter shooting off his gun just around the corner from the oval office has it’s own legendary status. Doesn’t belong on any simple “list” of athlete / guns incidents. That there got secret service allll over it.