by Brett Melnick ’12

As the NBA season is right around the corner, teams are working hard to acquire players they feel will make strong contributions to their organizations. A handful of player transactions occur over the course of a season, and very few are overturned for any reason besides the failing of a fitness test. Recently however, NBA Commissioner, David Stern overturned a transaction that would have benefited all teams involved. This transaction would have sent Chris Paul, arguably the best point guard in the league, from the New Orleans Hornets to the Los Angeles Lakers. On the subject, Stern’s spokesperson claimed the trade was overruled for “basketball reasons”, but we all know that’s not the real reason. Stern overturned this trade in an attempt to stop the Lakers from forming a super-talented team, which would take away from the competitive balance of the league. This would only worsen the NBA’s problem of major-market teams having all the money to pay good players, preventing small-market teams from contending for a championship. As fans and player are now reacting to this action by David Stern, one can only wonder if this league is really playing for “basketball reasons”, or for the money itself.