I DON'T CARE WHAT DAVID STERN SAYS, I BELIEVE TIM DONAGHY

by WCT, The Ship of Fools

The Tim Donaghy vs. David Stern, he-said-he-said war of words has become quite compelling. Donaghy has stated that NBA officials went out of their way to make dubious calls while officiating playoff games, and Stern has said that his claims are baseless and has attempted to discredit him as felon. Stern basically tried to sweep the entire situation under the rug by framing the messenger, but he ignored the message. And the more you imagine the message itself, the more the things Donaghy was saying sound plausible.

First of all, lets get one thing straight: a lot of people were saying that Donaghy was alleging that NBA officials fixed playoff series. That is not at all what he was saying. Take the 2002 Western Conference Finals for example. Donaghy was saying that officials acted in a way that they thought was in the best interests of their employers (The NBA) and made calls in a 6th game to favor the Lakers and make it more likely that the series would be extended to 7 games. He is not saying that they had any affect on what happened in game 7 (to do so would effectively be "fixing the series"). It would seem pretty reasonable that some officials might make a few calls (in such a close game I doubt it took many calls to make the difference) to help create a compelling series for a then-struggling league, doesn't it?

Also, consider the game itself. In the immediate aftermath of that game, it was pretty much universally considered to have contained at least a handful of curious calls. This was not a case of people coming up with evidence to support a claim after the fact, that was people's opinion back then, before anyone had ever heard of Tim Donaghy or this scandal. Now, does that make it more plausible that if Donaghy were to lie, he would be more likely to lie about this, highly controversial game? Perhaps, but then we get into how likely it is that Donaghy would be compelled to lie.

Obviously, Donaghy is already found himself in what lawyers refer to as "deep shit." He has been caught gambling, and attempting to dig himself out from that gambling by affecting the outcomes games to benefit other gamblers. That's what landed him in this legal mess to begin with. All of these recent allegations have been given to federal authorities. If it were to ever be found out that anything that he has said to the Feds was a lie, he could basically kiss any chance of ever seeing the light of day good-bye. As a result, lying, more specifically being caught lying, to federal authorities would take the problems that he is already in, and multiply them. Why would he risk that? What is he gaining by telling these stories? Maybe he looks a little better. Maybe it looks as if he wasn't the only one who was involved in this, and his sentencing is at the lighter end of the range. But what if he lies and is caught? He adds lying to federal investigators to his list of charges (also perjury? Obstruction of justice? I'm not a lawyer). He stands to lose a lot more by lying and getting caught than he stands to gain by lying and not getting caught. I don't know him that well, but I doubt he is that ballsy.

David Stern on the other hand, has everything in the world to gain by discrediting Donaghy, and it is impossible that he can be caught in a lie. If anything that Donaghy is saying is proven to be true in the future, the NBA can simply fire those officials, and claim ignorance to their activities, similar to the way the Oklahoma football program handled the Rhett Bomar situation.

There is a legitimate chance that everything Tim Donaghy has claimed is true, and the NBA and David Stern had no knowledge of it. David Stern knows this. That is why he can brazenly deny everything without worrying about the repercussions of eventually being proven wrong. Donaghy, on the other hand, literally has his freedom on the line every time he makes a statement to the Feds. Therefore, even though he is a convicted felon, I put a lot more weight into what he says in this situation, than a commissioner trying to save the credibility of his sport.