@Timmethy2.0

he is going to be paying in California. I'd think that anyone being paid $154 million a year to play a sport can afford to pay his taxes and lucky to have that opportunity to do so. Very few people get the chance to make the obscene amounts of money they get paid.

Phil Mikkleson used to be one of my favorite golfers until he moved from California because of his taxes. You should just appreciate that you get to make that amount of money in the first place, but maybe that's just my opinion.

I wasn't at all upset when Tiger fell from grace. His unsportsmanlike behavior on the course effected the game when newer players thought that throwing ones club after a bad shot was acceptable. It's not.

Just to give the Warriors a little competition.

@Pricknick
on the San Francisco waterfront thereby exchanging their diverse Oakland, local working class fan base for a fan base of male techies in their twenties who have no clue about anything that has made SF unique.

how long before they demand a new court as the oracle arena is the oldest venue in the nba.
Bend over taxpayers.
How I hate professional sports.

@doh1304

and yet they would put together a great team year after year before players would leave for more money.

I used to take BART for $5 and then buy a $5 ticket to sit in the bleachers behind right field. Those were the years that they made the playoffs, but what was exciting was seeing the bigger teams like the Yankees and others. I was at the SF ballpark when Tony Gwinn had his last at bat before he retired. And if I couldn't afford to buy a ticket I could watch the game from the back. This is Cruz who dropped a fly ball during the World Series in the 9th inning. His mistake set up the winning run for the other team who went on to win the series!

Something (I'm going to get the exact numbers wrong) like 58 of the last 72 NBA championships have been won by 5 teams, usually in blocks, the most famous being the Celtics (9 in 10 years) the Bulls (5 in a row - except for MJ's baseball vacation)and the Warriors. The only decade that didn't feature a "dynasty" was the 70s, and the game almost died, only being "saved by Magic and Bird". His premise was that people liked to complain about dynasties, but that complaining was only part of their enjoyment. People prefer seemingly invincible winners/heros/villains. (se also the Yankees, the Braves, the Cowboys, the Patriots, the 70s Steelers, the Big Red Machine, the Swinging A's)
I would like to add that those dynasty teams have to have at least some legitimate opposition to be good for the game, but I'm really not that sure of that.

@Big Al adding Cousins doesn't necessarily mean they'll get better. Remember when Karl Malone and Gary Payton joined Shaq and Kobe on the Lakers. Bust, after the Kobe and Shaq had won 3 titles together. There's only one ball and Cousins is a high usage player, not to mention volatile. Hard to see how one ball is going to suffice.

runaway neoliberal capitalism. I don't think people are really looking at what's happening. I hear the progressive left complain about bank and corporate CEO salaries, but all but a very few pale in comparison to what the top NBA, NFL, and MLB players are making now. As I've said before, Michael Jordan is a billionaire and he did it because of basketball and the endorsements. Lebron James, Durant, Curry, Irving, the list is long now of future billionaire NBA players. Pretty much ALL top players coming into the league now are charted for billionaire status. It is an accepted and sought after goal for every new star entering the league.

As an aside, I was invited as a free agent to Golden State in 1979, made the summer league team and almost made the team. I ended up getting hurt and having to drop out of the summer league, then went over to Europe and played five years. Back then they didn't have the D league and for most it was a one and done thing if you didn't make it initially.

So I'm quite familiar with basketball, have loved the game since I was a kid and I was good enough to be a professional. But the money involved now is absolutely ridiculous. The thing that separates sports from say, the movie industry and top actors who also "make" obscene amounts of money is the pro sports highlight their salaries as part of the overall package.

That's why I'm Big Al, I'm tall, not fat.

Boycotting pro sports should absolutely be at the top of the list in the class war. The advantage is we'd be targeting people who for the most part were not silver spooners with a large minority segment that could be used to highlight the extreme wealth inequality that directly contributes to the poverty and lack of opportunities of minority population, especially the black population.

@Big Al I have a hard time making the few people who manage to get into the 1% from the bottom ranks of society my preferred targets, especially since I know that they don't actually have the power in this equation. However much money they make, it's piss in a pot compared to what the owners have, and it's the owners who control what happens. Apparently in the case of Golden State, it's some Randian Silicon Valley sonofabitch.

That said, yes, of course, we should all boycott sports, not because LeBron James is a multimillionaire, but because it's an increasingly fake competition which increasingly amounts to a bunch of rich fat cats playing with themselves for TV dollars.

runaway neoliberal capitalism. I don't think people are really looking at what's happening. I hear the progressive left complain about bank and corporate CEO salaries, but all but a very few pale in comparison to what the top NBA, NFL, and MLB players are making now. As I've said before, Michael Jordan is a billionaire and he did it because of basketball and the endorsements. Lebron James, Durant, Curry, Irving, the list is long now of future billionaire NBA players. Pretty much ALL top players coming into the league now are charted for billionaire status. It is an accepted and sought after goal for every new star entering the league.

As an aside, I was invited as a free agent to Golden State in 1979, made the summer league team and almost made the team. I ended up getting hurt and having to drop out of the summer league, then went over to Europe and played five years. Back then they didn't have the D league and for most it was a one and done thing if you didn't make it initially.

So I'm quite familiar with basketball, have loved the game since I was a kid and I was good enough to be a professional. But the money involved now is absolutely ridiculous. The thing that separates sports from say, the movie industry and top actors who also "make" obscene amounts of money is the pro sports highlight their salaries as part of the overall package.

That's why I'm Big Al, I'm tall, not fat.

Boycotting pro sports should absolutely be at the top of the list in the class war. The advantage is we'd be targeting people who for the most part were not silver spooners with a large minority segment that could be used to highlight the extreme wealth inequality that directly contributes to the poverty and lack of opportunities of minority population, especially the black population.