Despite complaints, new ball is here to stay

[Pistons < Spurs]

Stern: Despite complaints, new ball is here to stay


NEW YORK -- David Stern expected complaints, and he got plenty of them.

His response: The new ball is staying.

The NBA commissioner said Monday the league is sticking with its new ball and is convinced it's a better product despite concerns from a number of players.

That was a much stronger answer than he gave recently when he was in Europe for a series of exhibition games between NBA and international teams. Stern said then he would continue to monitor the situation and test the ball some more. That seemed to leave open the possibility the new ball would be bounced.

"We've been testing it and retesting it," Stern said. "And I think that some of the dramatics around it were a little overstated in terms of the downside and not enough recognition of the upside."

The upside to Stern is that all the new balls, made of a microfiber composite, feel exactly alike. No two leather balls were the same. Stern said it was customary for referees to go through a rack of balls to select the best one before each game.

Still, some players preferred it that way. Some have said the new ball is too sticky when it's dry; others claim it's too slippery when wet.

Shaquille O'Neal and Steve Nash are among those wary. O'Neal has said the new ball "feels like one of those cheap balls that you buy at the toy store -- indoor-outdoor balls."

"Within certain parameters of the way you want a ball to perform again and again and again, it is performing extraordinarily well," Stern said. "It doesn't mean it feels the same; it may not even bounce exactly the same. It may do all the things that everyone says it may or may not do, but it's a very good ball and the tests continue to demonstrate that it's an improvement."

Stern was speaking at the NBA Store, where the league announced a partnership with the personal computer company Lenovo. But once that was done, it was back to what has been perhaps the biggest headache the commissioner has faced this preseason.

NBA officials have stressed that most players grew up playing with the microfiber composite, but they may have underestimated the preference players have for leather. That's even after Stern said Spalding wanted to make the change more than a year ago.

"We said no," Stern said. "We want to go back and do more tests and confirm to us that this move will be pain free -- which, of course, it hasn't been."

Stern said he has handled the new ball and doesn't agree with the complaints that it bounces differently from the old one.

"It may behave somewhat differently in some circumstance or another ... but I will say that whichever ball you take out of the box, it's going to behave in that way consistently," he said. "Every leather ball behaves differently."

"That's the trade-off we're making," he added. "And we think it's going to make a great improvement."

Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=2636270

[Johnny_Blaze_47]

Here's the full Insider column.



Monday, October 23, 2006
Busting Stern's ball

No matter what the players say, the new NBA ball is here to stay.

I coaxed that piece of news out of commissioner David Stern early this morning at the NBA Store in Manhattan, where I fueled up on an all-coffee, no-food breakfast to get in juuust the right frame of mind for a fiesty back and forth with The All-Powerful.

Being a big believer in the rule of life that "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," I'm opposed to the league's move from a leather ball to a microfiber composite ball. I shot the new ball earlier this month at the Berto Center in suburban Chicago, and my first impression was that it seemed too squishy. I was unable to palm the old ball, but I was able to make like Connie Hawkins with one of the new balls they had at the store, grabbing it with five widespread fingers and swinging it around without losing my grip.

Players have complained that the ball gets too slippery when wet, and a couple have told me that the new design, with the seams no longer meeting, has at times produced a knuckleball effect. At a Celtics-Knicks game last week in New York, I saw Jamal Crawford shoot a high, high-arching 3-pointer that hit the back rim and simply died, dropping through the net without the slightest of bounces. Never saw the old ball do that.

Condemnation of the new ball from the players has been nearly universal, which caused Stern earlier this month to acknowledge that the NBA was taking another look at its decision to change what's pretty much it's only piece of equipment.

As Dave D'Alessandro of the Newark Star-Ledger put it: What in the name of New Coke are these people thinking?

But while Stern even admitted Monday that the new ball "behaves" differently, he has made his decision to stick with the new model permanent. I had all sorts of devil's advocate questions ready for Stern, so I grilled him on it like I was a combination of Mike Wallace and Lindsey Hunter as he grew as defensive as Bruce Bowen. By the end of the exchange, Stern was pointing his finger at me. (Good thing I don't work for him. The last guy he pointed at like that is flipping burgers for a living now). Here's the transcript:

Another reporter: Are you surprised by the reaction about changing the ball?

Stern: Actually, I'm not. I had done a little homework and went back and looked at the adidas change of the soccer ball, or football as we Europeans call it. The Americans call it soccer. And same thing: 'It's too high, it's too low, it'll never work, etcetera.' And it is a change, and it is a little different, and we expected it. But we've gone back and tested and continued to analyze the results, but preliminarily this is the most standardized ball in respect to uniformity of high result that we've ever had. There's not going to be any need to go select one of 20 balls and feel that it's worn right. We'll stay with the same ball, this is a uniformity that very much is important to us. And within certain parameters of the way you want a ball to perform again and again and again ... it is performing extraordinarily well. It doesn't mean it feels the same, it may not even bounce exactly the same, it may do all the things that everyone says it may or may not do, but it's a very good ball and the tests continue to demonstrate that it's an improvement in standardization. And it ever has to be changed in the middle of play, you just take another out of the box and it's identical. Identical!

AR: You don't think it was maybe part of the charm of the game that every ball was a little different?

Stern: I can't imagine why that, over time, would be charming. We tell the officials we'd like them to call the same game, and we'd like to play each game with the same ball. I don't think that charm ... maybe it was charming in the old Boston Garden when the Celtics knew where if you hit a certain part of the parquet the ball wouldn't come up, but I'm not sure their opposition thought it was charming.

AR: Why did you guys decide to change?

Stern: This I something we've been looking at for years as the world morphs to a consistency-based ball with respect to a synthetic that can come as close as possible to replicating leather without having an inconsistency among the balls. We literally had a ritual where our referees would go in to feel the ball, then another, then another, recognizing that's they're all different. Our partner Spalding said they'd very much like to bring us along with the rest of the world, we've been doing it with the WNBA, with the development league, with the All-Star game last year. And they really wanted to do it a year ago, but we said no, we wanted to do more tests and confirm to us that this move will be pain-free, which of course it hasn't been. But that's okay. This is the NBA.

Insider: Are you 100 percent going forward to it? Because you seemed to hedge on it when you were in Europe.

Stern: I was out there, and I was hearing reports, and it's about the game. But since then we've been going back, testing it and re-testing it, and I think some of the dramatics around it were a little overstated in terms of downside and not enough recognition of the good side. I watched eight games, and I was thinking about announcing after the Clippers lost to CSKA Moscow and the Sixers lost to FC Barcelona that it must have been the ball, but I didn't think it would play well because it wasn't true.

Insider: But you acknowledge the ball bounces differently and performs differently?

Stern: Uh, no, I'm not prepared to acknowledge that. Obviously it feels a little differently, it may behave somewhat differently in some circumstances or another that I can't tell you about, because I don't know precisely, but I will say that whichever ball you take out of the box, it's going to behave in that way consistently.

Insider: But if it bounces off the glass differently for Tim Duncan than the old ball used to, or if it slides off Steve Nash's fingers differently than the old ball used to &

Stern: Every ball does that now. Every leather ball behaves differently.

Insider: Steve Nash was playing fine with the old ball.

Stern: Every leather ball behaves differently.

Insider: OK, but the new ball behaves differently than the leather ball.

Stern: But the same as every new ball, and that's the tradeoff we're making. And we think it's going to be a great improvement.

Insider: The axiom is 'If it ain;t broke, don't fix it'. You seem to be violating it.

Stern: No. Our axiom is if you can make it better, you always should. If we followed that (other) axiom we'd still have 24 people working in the NBA in a league that grosses 200 million a year, and now we've got a $3 billion global enterprise where our player salaries are $5 million rather than $250,000. That was based on the premise: even if it's going OK, break it so that you can make it better.

Insider: Have you used it? The ball. Shot with it?

Stern: Sure. You want to go one on one? Get one of the balls out here.

Insider: Have you really shot with it? And did you notice a difference?

Stern: No. Well, yes, I can grip it better.

Insider: Can you palm it?

Stern: I can actually come close. I palmed it at the press conference. I was holding it, and it actually was a little stickier at the time. Maybe it wasn't fully inflated because I can't palm a ball, but I was having some fun with it.

Insider: Have you polled the players about their reactions to the new ball?

Stern: We have a pretty good idea of what the reaction would be whenever you do something different. We don't do polling. That's not leadership.

Insider: Have the statistics from the preseason told you anything?

Stern: Ask how do you feel this morning, and the answer is 'Just a minute I'll take my temperature and I tell you how I feel.' No. You feel a certain way. So let's get one with life here. You've been hanging around this league too long, Sheridan, I don't know. Take this man away.

And so ended the debate over the new ball, at least my debate with The Commish. I glanced over at Lenny Wilkens, who gave me a warm nod. He's about as old school as they come, and it seemed he was appreciative that at least someone was refusing to be a 'yes man' for Stern on this issue.

But what The Commish says is what goes in the NBA, and it looks like the leather ball is gone for good.

[td4mvp21]

Screw Stern. I can't stand him. Who the hell is in charge of this guy being commisioner?? His little handchecking rules, division set ups, referee system, no complaint rule, and this new ball that NO ONE LIKSE are all BS. Get rid of him.

[leemajors]

Screw Stern. I can't stand him. Who the hell is in charge of this guy being commisioner?? His little handchecking rules, division set ups, referee system, no complaint rule, and this new ball that NO ONE LIKSE are all BS. Get rid of him.

yeah he's done nothing for the NBA and basketball. i can't believe he still has a job.

[jacobdrj]

Good. This is one subject I am glad the Commish has put his foot down on.

The argument against this ball is more absurd than the argument against the dress code. This is a non-issue, and will be forgotten in less than a few years.

[mavsfan1000]

Good. This is one subject I am glad the Commish has put his foot down on.

The argument against this ball is more absurd than the argument against the dress code. This is a non-issue, and will be forgotten in less than a few years.
You would be complaining to if it effected your shot. Leather>rubber any day of the week. This will fuck up the whole nba product.

[jacobdrj]

First of all, they are pro basketball players, I think they can adjust.

Second rubber basketballs>>>>>>>>>leather basketballs.

[kris]

"Stern: We have a pretty good idea of what the reaction would be whenever you do something different. We don't do polling. That's not leadership."

That's dictatorship.

I can't stand David Stern. I know it won't happen, but I keep hoping the leagues stars form a new league free from authoritarian rule.

[Streakyshooter08]

I would love to test the ball myself. In the preseason games I saw, I did not notice a lot of TO because of a "slippery" ball or bad shooting/ missed layups because of the ball. Some players seem to shoot even better with it. I think it is just a matter of getting used to it.

[td4mvp21]

That's dictatorship.


Bingo. When you have an iffy product, DO A POLL. Ask your superstars because they are the ones that define the league. You don't just do whatever the hell you want and have no questions asked. That is a dictatorship.

[Kermit]

Bingo. When you have an iffy product, DO A POLL. Ask your superstars because they are the ones that define the league. You don't just do whatever the hell you want and have no questions asked. That is a dictatorship.

holy shit! i almost crapped myself. a dictatorship? does the nba look like fucking north korea to you? remind me how much the average nba player makes again? pull your huge head out of your bigger ass. stern doesn't owe the players anything when it comes to making decisions for the league. i'd say that he has a pretty strong track record. it's a ball for fucks sake. they'll get over it and go back to counting their benjamins.

[MadDog73]

Bingo. When you have an iffy product, DO A POLL. Ask your superstars because they are the ones that define the league. You don't just do whatever the hell you want and have no questions asked. That is a dictatorship.

Right, because the majority is always right. :rolleyes

Stern's logic is sound: You want a consistent product. With each new ball being the same, once players adjust, I think most will learn to like it.

What would you rather have, different inconsistent leather balls each night, or a consistent ball that you know is going to do the same thing as your home ball?

[Trainwreck2100]

He said there was nbothing wrong with the seeding and the playoff seedings gave us a great product this year. :rolleyes

[Mixability]

i say just bring back the basketballs that had the laces in them.

[Kermit]

we weren't bitching about the seeding when we were winning championships in 2003 and 2005.

[Pistons < Spurs]

i say just bring back the basketballs that had the laces in them.

http://www.kshs.org/people/graphics/naismith_james.jpg

[jacobdrj]

For the record, there is a difference between a 'rubber ball' and a composite one. I have used composites, and they are inferior... to rubber... Rubber, vulcanized tire rubber to be exact, basketballs are still king. Can't beat their grip.