Nowitzki suspension? My bad
I was wrong, wasn't I?
After Dirk Nowitzki's flagrant foul on Andrei Kirilenko last week, I told you I would be very surprised if the NBA reviewed the play and handed down a suspension.
I thought Nowitzki committed a hard foul, obviously. But I didn't think it was blatantly dirty or unsportsmanlike.
I thought Nowitzki reached back and tried to foul to stop a layup, except he caught Kirilenko at an awkward moment. Andrei crashed to floor and suffered a sprained hip but, again, I've seen worse fouls go unpunished by the league.
Unfortunately for Nowitzki and the Mavericks, he was suspended for a game, which turned out to be a home-court loss to Houston. The suspension also cost Nowitzki $148,000 in salary.
I believe the NBA suspended Nowitzki when it learned that Kirilenko's injury would prevent him from playing in the Jazz's next game against Minnesota. Otherwise, some might argue, it could become open season on star players of contending teams. Knock them down and all it costs you is a couple of free throws? That's not a bad trade-off.
Kirilenko is scheduled to practice Monday morning and accompany the Jazz on their four-game trip to Milwaukee, Chicago, Boston and New Jersey.
It is not known if Kirilenko will play in any of the games, but Utah could certainly use him, especially against the Celtics. He missed the first Boston game of the season with biceps strain and the Jazz had no one come close to controlling Paul Pierce, who torched them down the stretch.
Because of his size, Kirilenko is a tough matchup for Pierce. He also has the ability to come from the weakside and help against the Celtics' Kevin Garnett.
If Kirilenko can play by the time Utah reaches Boston, the Jazz's chances in what looks like the toughest game of the trip will skyrocket.
-- Steve Luhm
After Dirk Nowitzki's flagrant foul on Andrei Kirilenko last week, I told you I would be very surprised if the NBA reviewed the play and handed down a suspension.
I thought Nowitzki committed a hard foul, obviously. But I didn't think it was blatantly dirty or unsportsmanlike.
I thought Nowitzki reached back and tried to foul to stop a layup, except he caught Kirilenko at an awkward moment. Andrei crashed to floor and suffered a sprained hip but, again, I've seen worse fouls go unpunished by the league.
Unfortunately for Nowitzki and the Mavericks, he was suspended for a game, which turned out to be a home-court loss to Houston. The suspension also cost Nowitzki $148,000 in salary.
I believe the NBA suspended Nowitzki when it learned that Kirilenko's injury would prevent him from playing in the Jazz's next game against Minnesota. Otherwise, some might argue, it could become open season on star players of contending teams. Knock them down and all it costs you is a couple of free throws? That's not a bad trade-off.
Kirilenko is scheduled to practice Monday morning and accompany the Jazz on their four-game trip to Milwaukee, Chicago, Boston and New Jersey.
It is not known if Kirilenko will play in any of the games, but Utah could certainly use him, especially against the Celtics. He missed the first Boston game of the season with biceps strain and the Jazz had no one come close to controlling Paul Pierce, who torched them down the stretch.
Because of his size, Kirilenko is a tough matchup for Pierce. He also has the ability to come from the weakside and help against the Celtics' Kevin Garnett.
If Kirilenko can play by the time Utah reaches Boston, the Jazz's chances in what looks like the toughest game of the trip will skyrocket.
-- Steve Luhm
9:49 AM
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2 Comments:
Steve:
I have to disagree. The Jerk throw down of AK and the K-Mart foul of Brewer should have both been flagrant 2 fouls with automatic ejections. You could have either one of those fouls resulting in a season ending injury. I can just see a "TJ Ford" back injury rehab resulting from something like this.
You need to go back an look at the replay again. This is the reason the flagrant foul rule was put in place, to prevent this kind of nonsense. From a medical standpoint, the potential damage is to great to allow this to go unpunished.
So, K-Mart skirts by unscathed and Jerk gets a one game suspension. Pretty good trade off for the damage they caused!
Jazzaholic.
I started a debate between some friends by saying that maybe the fouler should miss as many games as the foulee. Obviously it can't be a straight up 1:1 ratio, and there'd have to be some fine print, but is this viable? Dirk would be out about as long as AK.
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