Gary Seymour, sports@wolfrivermedia.com
As the lights were turned out at Oracle Arena and the NBA season was put to bed, the Golden State Warriors completed one of the strongest postseason performances of all time. With a solid nucleus of young stars, it’s a team we’ll be hearing from a lot in the coming years.
In knocking off the Cleveland Cavaliers 4-1 in the Finals, Golden State became just the third team ever to cruise through the postseason with just one defeat. The Warriors juggernaut team won 15 straight in the playoffs before losing Game 4 of the Finals.
They joined select company; the Los Angeles Lakers of 2001 also finished 16-1 in the playoffs, and the 1983 Philadelphia 76ers went 12-1 en route to the title.
The ’01 Lakers’ perfect postseason was spoiled by the ‘76ers, who won the first game of the Finals in overtime before getting rolled over in the next four.
In the ’83 playoffs, the 76ers led the Eastern Conference finals three games to none over the Milwaukee Bucks before losing its only game of the postseason.
Golden State’s only defeat also came after leading 3-0, which not only breathed momentary life into the Cavaliers, but also evoked hue and cry from Conspiracy Corner. Certain skeptical fans believe that to some extent the outcomes of various playoff games are rigged. In this case, suspicions arose after the 22 first-quarter free throw attempts that helped the Cavs put up a record 49 points and build a lead they kept the rest of the way.
The “rigging” conjectures are rooted in the age-old notion of following the money. Tickets, merchandising and parking brought in about $11 million per game in the Finals, 25 percent of which went to the league. Connecting those dots isn’t a brain-teaser – the longer the series lasts, the more the turnstiles spin.
The NBA Finals can be as exciting as they are expensive to attend. If you have season tickets, it’s also a great time to turn a profit. A Golden State season ticket holder resold his two courtside seats for $133,000.
A Warriors sweep of Cleveland would have denied them and the league another home game and the accompanying revenue, and when the Cavaliers shot all those free throws in the first 12 minutes of their blowout win, there began the chorus that the fix was in.
The players themselves aren’t suspected of any sort of flimflam. Already financially set for life, their entire lives and dreams have been building to those moments in the spotlight. With a nod and a wink from the league office, only the referees — who make more than 30 grand per game in the Finals — could alter the course of an outcome.
According to former NBA referee Tim Donaghy, the league instructs the refs in pre-game meetings on how to officiate and which specific infractions to look for. He said that it didn’t take much reading between the lines to understand which direction the league wanted the game go, which players to protect and ultimately which team they wanted to win.
He knows a thing or two about scams. Donaghy spent 15 months in federal prison for betting on games in which it was determined that his calls affected the point spread.
He isn’t the only one to have peddled the notion of systemic foul play. Ayesha Curry, the wife of Golden State’s all-pro guard Steph Curry, got into the act last year, sending out a tweet after a Game 6 loss to Cleveland that the contest was “absolutely rigged, for money, or ratings.”
She later backed off that accusation and apologized. Win or lose, dubious whistles or no, her husband made more than $12 million that season. No point in poking a stick at the golden goose. In the world of business and entertainment, that’s the ultimate bad play.