The NBA Draft: The Association Conspiracies

PORTLAND,  Oregon-  Many like to grade the draft, and over the last few days many people have rated, critiqued and analyzed the biggest winners and losers of the draft. But unless you are grading a draft from 2010 or earlier, of players who have had a chance to prove themselves, you are making clueless speculation like an NBA palm reader. Not one of the rookies from the 2012 draft class has taken a single dribble (or a single step, then a dribble, then three more steps as is one of the custom forms of dribbling in the Association) in an NBA game or even a meaningless summer league game. Yet several draft picks have already been tapped as the greatest steal of the draft or the biggest bust of the draft. To be clear, clueless speculation is a fun part of sports and the 100% reason why many “analysts” have television jobs. Instead of trying to blindly peer into the future by rating this draft of players with unknown “upside” and “potential,” and since I can’t hop in with Doc and take a ride to see how well they are playing in 2015, I wanted to discuss something incredibly credible with rock-solid legitamcy: NBA Draft Conspiracies. Now let us turn back the clock to 1984…

In a parallel NBA universe, the Blazers drafted MJ, went on to have the greatest bald trio in sports history with Jordan, Clyde Drexler, and Terry Porter

     Why would the Portland Trailblazers take Sam Bowie, the moniker given to the large sturdy over-sized file cabinet the Blazers selected,  ahead of Michael Jordan? There were actually several reasons for this, most of which are largely unknown to the public, and all of them point to conspiracy. We can start with the basic cover-up excuses.  Portland already had a proven balding young superstar at shooting guard in Clyde Drexler, and Trailblazer team personnel were not comfortable drafting Jordan due to several factors including 1) he seemed like a bit of a ball hog when he was 15, 2) though he was thought to have tremendous upside,  he did not have the experience or maturity of someone who played twenty-seven years of college ball 3) that whole always sticking his tongue thing made players on the Blazers’ roster uncomfortable, especially after several players at pre-draft workouts complained of being inadvertently licked by Jordan’s tongue several hundred times during various drills.

 “I triple-dog dare you to find someone who spent a longer amount of time than I did on doing such a poor photoshop job”-me

      While those are all extremely valid and truthful points, the real reason for letting MJ fall to the Bulls in the draft was a secret agreement between that old swindler David Stern, and the Portland and Chicago franchises. The Blazers and the Association allowed Jordan to go to the Bulls in exchange that the Blazers be compensated in the following ways: 1) receive all of Michael Jordan’s hair follicles for life, 2) receive a portion of Jordan’s gatorade-nike drinkable shoe product profits 3) a portion of Michael Jordan’s frequent gambling earnings 4) following the release of the Bulls vs. Blazers video game, Portland would receive majority profits, and MJ would also go on hiatus from being featured in any video games for a stretch of several years in the 90’s 5) that no one from the Trailblazers roster ever have his powers drained by the Monstars during the filming of Jordan’s biographical documentary, 6) That Jordan successfully pull off the hitler mustache look in a future Hanes undershirt commercial.    As a result of the secret mega-agreement, the Blazers ownership and Stern became very very rich riding the tidal wave of Jordan’s success. As for how well this turned out for the larger Portland franchise,  Jordan meet all of the aforementioned conditions of the deal, and additionally, the file cabinet drafted by Portland never had a gambling addiction, and therefore unlike Jordan, never had to rehab from its gambling addiction for two years under the guise of a pathetic minor league baseball career.

1 of 2, to be continued…. New York edition coming soon