"Karim, on the other hand, as a person was and is an amazing guy."

"Amazing?" I don't know about that. If you had written "angry" or "sullen" or "arrogant," I would have agreed with that. There's a reason why he's never been a head coach in the NBA, though he's desperately wanted to be one. It's because when he was a player he treated people like they were beneath him (figuratively, not just physically) and they remember that.
And there's no excuse for him having a lower rebounding average than Lafayette Lever something like five years in a row. Abdul-Jabbar went from being the most complete player in the league to a side show circus freak with a trick shot. Late in his career, he didn't play defense beyond standing in the middle of the lane and being an obstruction, he didn't rebound, and he didn't run the floor. If Lakers' fast break broke down, he would jog down the court to the post and hit his skyhook (with the officials conveniently ignoring him using his left arm to prevent the defender from playing, well, defense).
But I'd be interested to know what constutites a description of Abdul-Jabbar as "amazing." Has he done any charity work? Has he saved someone from drowning? Performed the Heimlich Maneuver on a choking victim? Adopted an ugly mutt from the pound? Please enlighten me. I'd be interested to know how he's amazed people.

I'm not a huge Kareem fan. 1) He played for those Laker teams that beat the snot out of Portland. The same reason I dislike James Worthy and Magic Johnson. Unlike those guys however, Kareem left Milwaukee the second he found out Oscar Robinson was retiring because he didn't think he could win without him. This was a pretty crappy "Thank you" to a city and region that had adored him for ... 8 years?

Max wrote:

How many others sold the urinals?

At the very least, the Reds, the Brewers and the Tigers.

http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2002/10/02/loc_urinals_among.html
http://www.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/stories/2001/01/22/story8.html
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2007/09/18/urinals_have_sports_history_too/

And outside of MLB, you can add the Cowboys and Dolphins to that list

http://fifthdown.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/08/when-did-urinals-become-sports-memorabilia/
http://blogs.trb.com/sports/custom/business/blog/2008/01/orange_bowl_items_up_for_sale.html

But even if the Cardinals were the only ones, so what?  Other than the fact that it sounds disgusting, how is selling a urinal different from selling a brick or a piece of sod or an old sign?  I sure as hell wouldn't want one, but if someone out there does, why not sell it?

Max wrote:

As I hope I made clear, I don't have one issue with DeWitt. It began with the arguments for taxpayers funds, but it grew into the perception that the whole thing was disingenuous: We needed the stadium to raise revenue to facilitate a higher payroll that would keep the team competitive and allow them to resign Pujols.  Well, except for the quirk of September and October of '06, how much of that has actually happened?

At the risk of sounding like a Dewitt apologist, the "higher payroll" idea was tied not only to the new stadium, but to the public funding.  Since they didn't get the public funding, you can't really say they broke their promise.  And re-signing Pujols was never part of the pitch which began in 2002.

Max wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

As far as the condition of Busch II, it was asthetically as nice as they could make it, but the underneath was really in poor shape. You couldn't touch the walls in the old video room because they were coated with dried, sticky soda, beer and whatever else had seeped in. If you wanted to take a shower you had to let the water run for a couple of minutes to let the brown (rusty) water clear out of the pipes, and there were cockroaches in the clubhouse that were bigger than a cigar.  As much as people want to believe that stadium didn't need to be replaced, they just didn't appreciate how poor of condition it was really in.

That's easy to say now that Busch II has been killed and the body disposed of.  Maybe it is true, and I assume that it is, but then they should have made a better case of selling that to the public, with tours and videos documenting it all, and bids on repairs showing that they were less efficacious than a knock down and rebuild.  Maybe that happened and I missed all of it.  I was a long way away with other things on my mind at the time.

Everything I mentioned was based on personal observation, not things that were told to me.  The best way to describe it is to think of the old homes along Lindell or in the Central West End.  They are unbelievable works of architecture and very asthetically pleasing, but the outward appearance hides 100 year old pipes, excessive maintenance costs and construction that in many cases prevents or hinders modern amenities that didn't exist at the time of construction.

Trust me, there isn't anyone who attends a game in July/August who misses the old stadium.

Last edited by forsberg_us (3/01/2011 5:29 pm)

The Austin Toros I think.

Clemons' girlfriend, Jessica Bunge, used to hang out at a nightclub near my area. I've heard people say some really horrible things about her, and that was before all that stuff came out about Clemons.

forsberg_us wrote:

Max wrote:

How many others sold the urinals?

At the very least, the Reds, the Brewers and the Tigers.

http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2002/10/02/loc_urinals_among.html
http://www.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/stories/2001/01/22/story8.html
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2007/09/18/urinals_have_sports_history_too/

And outside of MLB, you can add the Cowboys and Dolphins to that list

http://fifthdown.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/08/when-did-urinals-become-sports-memorabilia/
http://blogs.trb.com/sports/custom/business/blog/2008/01/orange_bowl_items_up_for_sale.html

But even if the Cardinals were the only ones, so what?  Other than the fact that it sounds disgusting, how is selling a urinal different from selling a brick or a piece of sod or an old sign?  I sure as hell wouldn't want one, but if someone out there does, why not sell it?

Max wrote:

As I hope I made clear, I don't have one issue with DeWitt. It began with the arguments for taxpayers funds, but it grew into the perception that the whole thing was disingenuous: We needed the stadium to raise revenue to facilitate a higher payroll that would keep the team competitive and allow them to resign Pujols.  Well, except for the quirk of September and October of '06, how much of that has actually happened?

At the risk of sounding like a Dewitt apologist, the "higher payroll" idea was tied not only to the new stadium, but to the public funding.  Since they didn't get the public funding, you can't really say they broke their promise.  And re-signing Pujols was never part of the pitch which began in 2002.

Max wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

As far as the condition of Busch II, it was asthetically as nice as they could make it, but the underneath was really in poor shape. You couldn't touch the walls in the old video room because they were coated with dried, sticky soda, beer and whatever else had seeped in. If you wanted to take a shower you had to let the water run for a couple of minutes to let the brown (rusty) water clear out of the pipes, and there were cockroaches in the clubhouse that were bigger than a cigar.  As much as people want to believe that stadium didn't need to be replaced, they just didn't appreciate how poor of condition it was really in.

That's easy to say now that Busch II has been killed and the body disposed of.  Maybe it is true, and I assume that it is, but then they should have made a better case of selling that to the public, with tours and videos documenting it all, and bids on repairs showing that they were less efficacious than a knock down and rebuild.  Maybe that happened and I missed all of it.  I was a long way away with other things on my mind at the time.

Everything I mentioned was based on personal observation, not things that were told to me.  The best way to describe it is to think of the old homes along Lindell or in the Central West End.  They are unbelievable works of architecture and very asthetically pleasing, but the outward appearance hides 100 year old pipes, excessive maintenance costs and construction that in many cases prevents or hinders modern amenities that didn't exist at the time of construction.

Trust me, there isn't anyone who attends a game in July/August who misses the old stadium.

I got all that, and stated that I assumed it was accurate.  But realize the hoot and holler than would be raised if anyone tried to knock down any of those homes along Lindell, in CWE, or in Parkview with the justification that the plumbing was old, or that the basement had roaches.  My point was that for PR purposes DeWitt should have documented the need in a transparent and credible way if he was asking for public funds to replace Busch II.

Last edited by Max (3/01/2011 8:02 pm)

The new stadium is much better then the old.  it was crap.

artie_fufkin wrote:

Please enlighten me. I'd be interested to know how he's amazed people.

He was an awesome co-pilot.

I applaud your cynicsm and encourage you to turn it on the JFK assassination, Enron, and Goldman-Sachs-gate.  It could be that Karim hired a PR firm to tell him what to say and do, but I think an alternative explanation is that it took him until that 2006 interview to reach the conclusion that it was his own character that stood in the way of his dreams.  The path to self-awareness is a long and winding one, and I applaud a 50 to 60-something multimillionaire who has already received nearly all the accolades that society has to offer, and who still searches inside himself for the impediments to his further advancement. 

And FWIW, the idea that Wooden would respect, or even like, a player with a flawed personality who helped win games is about 180 degrees the opposite of everything that Wooden was about.  He shares a great anecdote about Bill Walton, who helped him to the record 88 game winning streak, and in it is clear that Wooden would have cut Walton without a second thought merely for growing a beard.

Last edited by Max (3/02/2011 11:42 am)

artie_fufkin wrote:

"I applaud your cynicsm and encourage you to turn it on the JFK assassination, Enron, and Goldman-Sachs-gate."

No need. I've got my hands full with the Raiders.

"He shares a great anecdote about Bill Walton, who helped him to the record 88 game winning streak, and in it is clear that Wooden would have cut Walton without a second thought merely for growing a beard."

I've heard two versions of the "benching Bill Walton" yarn. The first has to do with him not getting a haircut, and the second is about him being involved in a protest on campus.

They are both more or less correct, but you should listen to Wooden explain it.  Walton was politically active, but he also wanted to grow his hair out and grow a beard.  It was the beard, I believe, that specifically violated Wooden's policy.  Also interesting is to hear Wooden's continued growth, admitting that he had judged Vietnam war protestors too harshly, and out of ignorance.

Your answers up to this point did not make it clear to me.

The version I heard on the DVD I mentioned was that Walton came to him in his office and explained how his convictions required him to do A, B, and C, (protests, long hair, beard) and Wooden responded how he respected a man with convictions and that "we sure will miss you around here."