Skyhook Sunday: Farewell to the 20 second timeout

This week, the NBA announced some rule changes with the attempt to improve game flow. The most notable are the changes to timeout length. Each team will be given seven timeouts per game with each timeout lasting 75 seconds. That means that the 20 second timeout is no more.

As silly as this sounds, I am really sad to hear that the 20 second timeout has been removed. It's been a part of my life forever and to have it gone, I feel like a piece of me has died along with it. I know that sounds over the top, but in a way it's really true. There was always an extra feeling of drama when a 20 second timeout was called down the stretch of a close game. It was just a part of the background of the NBA that I've grown to love. To have it gone will feel very weird.

By reducing the number of timeouts from 18 to 14, the NBA is ensuring that there will be fewer interruptions to games, something that will be nice. All the same, I feel kind of sad knowing that when I someday become a father, my children will never get the chance to see a 20 second timeout. It will be a thing of the past. Just like how my children will never know about the Vancouver Grizzlies, the Seattle Super Sonics (fingers crossed that they'll return), etc. There's some things you wish could last forever and unfortunately they don't.

Hopefully, these new changes will make the league better and make in-game experiences better for fans. If they do, then I'm all for it. The NBA does a great job of looking for ways to improve their product and they are never afraid to try new things.

All the same, I will never forget the 20 second timeout. It's always been there from the very beginning, adding just the right amount of drama and tension. In the words of Salute Your Shorts, "20 second timeout, we hold you in our hearts and when we think about you, I hope we never part."

For a full description of what these rule changes are, click here.

In case you haven't seen Salute Your Shorts or would like to take a stroll down memory lane, click here to watch its intro. 



To connect with NBA Lord on Twitter, click here. 

To connect with NBA Lord on Facebook, click here. 

To connect with NBA Lord on Google Plus, click here. 

Wednesday Windmill: George Karl is the most overrated coach in NBA history

                                            (Credit: Keith Allison. Click here for source) 

     When people talk about the best coaches in the NBA, George Karl is a guy who frequently comes up in discussion. He is viewed as a miracle worker of sorts; a guy who turns lemons into lemonade and helps struggling teams find success without having to blow everything up. When there's a team looking for a new head coach, George Karl is often thrown into the mix if he isn't already coaching some other forlorn cast of misfits. From 2005-2013, he coached the Denver Nuggets and currently is coaching the Sacramento Kings, who hired him because they believed he would give them the direction they needed.

     While George Karl has been an NBA Coach of the Year (2013) and coached a team to the NBA Finals (1995-96 Seattle Super Sonics), he has by and large not done anything more than just hang around for a really long time. He has a regular season record of 1173-821 (58.8%) but has struggled in the playoffs with a record of 80-105 (43.2%).

     While his trip to the NBA Finals with the Seattle Super Sonics in 1996 was a great achievement, his inability to guide the 63-19 Sonics past the 42-40 Denver Nuggets in the first round of the 1994 NBA playoffs was flat out embarrassing. It was the first time an 8 seed had upset a 1 seed in the NBA playoffs since the NBA adopted the 16-team format in 1984. How he didn't guide that Sonics team to the NBA Finals is something that I'll never understand and the fact that he only managed to come out of the Western Conference once with a Gary Payton/Shawn Kemp duo is rather pathetic.

     When given one of the most talented duos in NBA history, George Karl underachieved big time and that is something that not enough people talk about. Maybe it's because George Karl is a nice person and nobody wants to talk ill of him. While I'm sure he's a swell guy off the court, his coaching hasn't been anything to write home about if you really look at it under the microscope. He has just one trip to the NBA Finals and literally nothing else to write home about.

     He stunk it up with the Cavaliers and Warriors in the 1980s, underachieved with the Sonics in the 1990s, had one good season with the Bucks in 2000-01 in which they reached the Eastern Conference Finals, and did some solid work with the Denver Nuggets, helping them reach the Western Conference Finals before losing to the Los Angeles Lakers in 2009.

     As far as his time with the Sacramento Kings is concerned, that has been a disaster. He has been on a crusade to derail the career of DeMarcus Cousins and take down anybody who is against him. He hasn't made the Kings any better. As a matter of fact, he's made them worse and even more chaotic than they were before he got there. He has embarrassed himself during his time in Sacramento and has made many people believe that he is no longer fit to coach in the NBA.

     But, what's perhaps most puzzling to me is the fact that it has taken this long for people to finally question George Karl. Granted, Sacramento has been a mess unlike anything that George Karl has experienced, but considering his overall resume, one would think that the Sacramento Kings would have looked elsewhere for a coach to turn their team around. One would also think that the Denver Nuggets wouldn't have held on to him for as long as they did.

     If the Oakland Raiders are committed to failure, then George Karl is committed to mediocrity. He finds ways to be mediocre or average as opposed to being great. His teams don't succeed like everybody thinks they do. In truth, they do ok at best and at worst blow up like a fat stick of dynamite.

     George Karl gets mentioned as one of the best coaches in NBA history, but if you really look at it, he shouldn't be mentioned as an all-time great. He's hung around for a long time and found a way to keep getting hired. That in and of itself is impressive, but that doesn't mean he's a great basketball coach. It just means he's great at getting hired and convincing teams he has what it takes to right the ship. He very well may be the best coach in NBA history at getting hired after getting fired, but beyond that, he's nothing more than mediocre.

The NBA needs to bring back the Seattle SuperSonics

   
It is pretty much established fact that when Clay Bennett purchased the Seattle SuperSonics in 2006, he had no interest of keeping the team in Seattle and that the city of Seattle lost their precious SuperSonics by way of robbery.  Bennett purchased the team for the sole purpose of relocating the team to his home city of Oklahoma City and there was nothing that the city of Seattle could do to stop him.

     Bennett could hide behind the fact that Key Arena in Seattle was one of the smallest arenas in the league and that the SuperSonics at the time had poor attendance, but the reality is that he just wanted to bring his hometown an NBA franchise. He didn't care how he did it and who he hurt in the process. As long as he was able to succeed at moving the Sonics to Oklahoma City, he was happy.

   

     The only good that came out of the departure of the Seattle SuperSonics was the fact that the team name was changed to "Oklahoma City Thunder", which would allow a possible return of the "SuperSonics" nickname to Seattle. Given the fact that there are other arenas across the country ready to house NBA franchises and that Seattle sports fans are foaming at the mouth for the return of the Sonics, the NBA has to do what is right and bring back the Seattle SuperSonics within the next five years. 

     Rather than uprooting another team and angering more fans, the NBA needs to instead expand to 32 teams, placing one team in Seattle and another team somewhere else that is also deserving of an NBA franchise. The only real argument against expansion is that it dilutes the talent pool and creates two more terrible teams. I find this argument to not be all that convincing. The reality is that such an expansion would be a great thing for the NBA. 

     First of all, such an expansion would put fans across the league at ease and it would put an end to talks of relocation. Los Angeles has two teams; New York has two teams; Chicago has a team; Boston has a team; Texas has three teams; and the greater Bay Area has two teams with the Warriors and the Kings.  By bringing back the Seattle SuperSonics, the NBA would have a team in every major market in the United States of America, which would be a great thing for the league. Fans would stop freaking out if their team goes for sale and greedy billionaires in Seattle would stop trying to poach a team from another market. 

     Secondly, it would give the NBA an opportunity to realign the conferences. The two most likely cities to also get a team are Kansas City and Louisville, both of which have new arenas capable of housing an NBA team. Louisville geographically is an Eastern Conference city and Kansas City geographically is a Western Conference city, but either way, the addition of a 32nd team would allow the NBA to put either the Memphis Grizzlies or New Orleans Pelicans in the Eastern Conference if they wanted to make the conferences more fair and balanced. 

     In addition, the NBA could also realign the divisions within the conferences to make things more geographically coherent. The Northwest Division is a mess geographically thanks to the the Sonics moving to Oklahoma City and by expanding to 32 teams, the NBA would certainly be able to realign the divisions and make everything more orderly for the sake of travel and competitive balance.  

     Lastly, as sort of an appeal to nostalgia, who wouldn't want the Seattle SuperSonics back in the NBA? Gary Payton and Shawn Kemp did so much to put the Seattle SuperSonics on the map that it's sad there is nothing left to remind us of their legacy. The return of the SuperSonics would bring back fond memories and restore a tradition and history that never should have left us. 

     What I'm saying is that the NBA needs the Seattle SuperSonics. There is a hole created by their absence and it won't be filled until they return. I say "until" because the Seattle SuperSonics aren't dead. They are just waiting to be brought home. 

---Ben Parker: follow me on twitter @nba_lord