While the Rockets GM and ex-head coach were busy fitting Tracy McGrady with a new label, a more general controversy erupted at the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. New Warriors owner Joe Lacob, in a move to destroy any credibility he had for saving the team from Chris Cohan, derided sports bloggers for not being real fans. The reason? Because they don't buy season tickets.
He responded ... "They are not real fans, because they don't have season tickets."
What most Warriors fans took from that statement -- at least interpreting many of the comments on Twitter afterwards -- was that only season-ticket holders are real fans.
Little problem here Joe: insulting anyone passionate enough to write about your team for chump change isn't the best career move. Particularly when that team has put together a grand total of two winning seasons in the last 17 years.
More to the point: do you realize how completely out of touch you sound on this subject? America is being hit by a ton of budget crunches right now, from the federal level all the way down to the low and middle class folks. Buying nosebleed Rockets season tickets would be a crippler for me, and I consider myself pretty fortunate to have the job that I have. Oh, and the Rockets have some of the most affordable tickets in the NBA.
Oh, but it's okay, you've apologized! Wait, no you didn't, you "clarified."
"I totally embrace the on-line community," Lacob said in an e-mail. "Why would I respond to all of their e-mails and have webcasts and take calls on radio shows if I didn't care?"
...
Said Lacob: "That is in no way to say that if they were not season-ticket holder that I do not care. I certainly do."
There's a difference between caring and caring, Joe. You're talking about parts of a job that you may not have to do, but it's considered common courtesy to do. If you cared about fans, you'd try to reach into their minds and see what you could do to fix this, not group them into season ticket holders, mini-plan holders, and non-entities. You're a business man, you've bought the Warriors because they are a good business. That's fine. Don't waste your time "clarifying" things. You just come off as a phony. As someone who lacks the passion to really care about sports. What do they call those people? Oh, right. Fans.
Three cheers for Les Alexander. That's about all I've got to say about that.