Suspending Amare Stoudamire

OK, I’ve been talking about sports a lot recently, but I’m a big sports fan and I just can’t help it. And I had promised myself to not post about sports for awhile, but I’m getting sucked in by the Suns-Spurs incident at the end of Game four and the potential for suspensions. Here’s the video:



At about 3:30 on that video, Amare Stoudemire steps on the court which immediately implicates Rule 12, Section VII

c. During an altercation, all players not participating in the game must remain in the immediate vicinity of their bench. Violators will be suspended, without pay, for a minimum of one game and fined up to $35,000. The suspensions will commence prior to the start of their next game. (rest of rule omitted)

Note that this rule is strict liability: violators “will be” suspended. Not “may be”. Let’s break this down to the elements:

- During an altercation
- A player
- Who is not participating in the game
- Must remain in the “immediate vicinity” of the bench

Which has led to all sorts of speculation that Amare Stoudamire is going to get suspended for Game 5 along with Boris Diaw, which would practically hand the game and the series to the Spurs. It seems the league can make out the prima facie case against Stoudamire. The Suns have moved into action right away to try and prevent the suspensions. So far, here are their arguments and potential arguments:

1. Stoudamire was just checking in the game
2. There was no “altercation” so the rule does not apply
3. Stoudamire never left the “immediate vicinity of their bench”
4. Applying this rule in this circumstance violates the intent of the rule
5. The NBA has refused to apply this rule before, so it is not a strict liability rule
6. The league has already refused to suspend Bowen for dirty play, so they should be just as lenient with the Suns and not issue suspensions
7. Duncan charged the court earlier in the game, so he should be suspended as well.

Let’s go through these arguments:

STOUDAMIRE WAS JUST CHECKING IN THE GAME
This seems to attack element three. Hey, Stoudamire was “participating in the game”! He had already checked in at the scorer’s table, there was a whistle, and he was now going onto the court as he is entitled to do under the rules of substitution. Actually, he isn’t as the rules state in Rule 12, Section III

b. A substitute shall not enter onto the court until he is beckoned by an official.

Stoudamire was not beckoned by an official. Besides, no one honestly believes Stoudamire was enthusiastically checking into the game. It’s an unbelievable argument that I like in its sheer brazen audacity. It’s not even a good lie, but it’s the one they had within two minutes. Credit their PR staff for putting something together on the fly. Those guys deserve a raise.

THERE WAS NO ALTERCATION
This has been the Suns official argument in the day after. Watch the foul again. There’s some pushing and shoving, but there is never anything anyone could construe as a fight. And the rulebook leaves “altercation” undefined. Rule 12, Section VII is in the FINES section, not the FIGHTING section, which is Section VI. Here’s the fighting rule:

a. Technical fouls shall be assessed players, coaches or trainers for fighting. No free throws will be attempted. The participants will be ejected immediately.

No player was ejected for fighting as mandated by the rules. Horry was ejected for a flagrant foul and Bell got smacked with a technical foul for unsportsmanlike conduct. The officials, by the punishments doled out, admit there was no “fight”. However, the bench rule does not pertain to “fights,” it pertains to “altercations”. I think it is reasonable to assume a fight is worse than altercation. I think the league wins this argument as well, unless the Suns can successfully argue an “altercation” is the same as a “fight”. And if they are the same thing, why does the rulebook use different terminology and place the bench-leaving rule in a different section than the FIGHTING section? It’s not an untenable argument, I just don’t believe it is a winner.

THE IMMEDIATE VICINITY OF THE BENCH
Stoudamire never gets more than a step from the sideline. He was then immediately restrained by his coaches who got him to sit back down. The rule is not that a player must remain on the bench, but in the “immediate vicinity”. Just like “altercation,” “immediate vicinity” is undefined, but I think the Suns could make a very good argument that a player who never gets more than a step onto the court and always has a coach between him and the players on the court is still with the “immediate vicinity” of the bench.

This attacks the final element of the prima facie case and is the last of Stoudamire’s “I didn’t do it” arguments. I think this one is the only one that really has a snowball’s chance in hell, but previous application of the rule shows Stern to believe simply taking one step on the court as leaving the immediate vicinity of the bench. This isn’t a decided issue, but it weighs against the Suns.

THE INTENT OF THE RULE
This is the overarching argument. The NBA created this rule in order to prevent escalation of on-court fights. How do we know this? They told us. Now, the courts don’t like legislative history, but Stern made the rule and he’s deciding this case not some court. He surely knew his own intent in creating the rule.

Did Stoudamire escalate the fight? Certainly not. There was no fight, as the league concedes. Actually, let’s give credit to the refs who broke things up remarkably quick and kept things from getting out of hand. But, once again, this is a strict liability rule. You do the crime, you do the time. The intent of the rule shouldn’t matter. If Stoudamire violated the rule, he will be suspended under the clear text of the rule.

IT’S NOT STRICT LIABILITY
Here’s an interesting argument. The NBA has refused to impute strict liability for players leaving the bench to stop a fight before. The situation was radically different, it was players leaving the bench to stop a fight in the tunnel, but the point is still valid: the NBA has conceded through the application of this rule it is not a strict liability rule.

From the article:

A strict interpretation of NBA rules would have resulted in at least a one-game suspension for anyone leaving the bench to join an altercation.

"Our rule regarding an automatic suspension for players leaving the bench was not intended to apply in a highly unusual situation like this one, where an altercation occurs in an access tunnel or hallway,'' NBA vice president Stu Jackson said. "In this circumstance, our judgment was that the players who left the bench were attempting to break up the fight and did not escalate the altercation."

By the way, note the intent of the rule argument popping up again.

If it is not strict liability, then Stern has discretion in applying it here. And frankly, it would be ridiculous to suspend Stoudamire for escalating a fight that didn’t happen when he never even got near the players on the court.

Sure, this argument runs against the plain language of the rulebook, but once you’ve done it once, why not do it again?

PREVIOUS LENIENCY TO THE SPURS IN THIS SERIES
The NBA refused to suspend Bowen for intentionally kicking Steve Nash in the nuts. Read that sentence again. The Suns now argue that since the league office has already decided to not let its disciplinary arm decide this series, it shouldn’t jump in now, particularly for the far lesser offense of a player leaving the bench.

David Stern can’t suddenly become a hardliner after showing remarkable leniency to the opposing team, can he? How is that fair?

Hey, Suns fans. Sometimes life isn’t fair.

RIGIDLY APPLY THE RULES AND SUSPEND DUNCAN
This is the nuclear option, and it is pure brilliance. If the Suns lose on all of their previous arguments, which looks to be about fifty-fifty, they can then turn around and say:

“Fine. You want strict liability? A rule is a rule is a rule, right? Well, that means you have to suspend Duncan and Bowen, too.”

If the league decides to apply the letter of the law to the Stoudamire incident, then they would almost be forced to do the same regarding a little noticed play earlier in the game which has since been pointed out by Steve Kerr on Yahoo! Sports:

In a play that went entirely unnoticed until well after the game was over, both Duncan and Bowen actually left San Antonio's bench early in the second quarter after Francisco Elson and James Jones were entangled. Replays clearly show Duncan walking several steps onto the court as Elson and Jones appeared to be ready to get into it. Bowen then followed Duncan onto the floor, grabbed him and led him back to the bench. If the league does indeed follow the letter of the law, both Spurs players would also be suspended for Game 5.

And Duncan and Bowen made it further onto the court than Diaw or Stoudamire. The Spurs might have a better "altercation" argument, but they have a much worse "immediate vicinity" argument. Intent doesn't matter, right?

Can you imagine a Game 5 without Stoudamire, Diaw, Duncan, and Bowen? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, right? This would be a nightmare for the league, and it is probably the biggest bullet in the Suns’ argumentative gun. There’s no way Stern wants to suspend so many big stars for what appears to be extremely minor violations. Look for the league office to let everyone off with a warning, probably using some sort of logic from the Suns’ “we didn’t do it” defenses, when it is really a cover for avoiding suspending everybody. The Suns have a nice hammer here, but they are giving the NBA plenty of outs. Use the “immediate vicinity” argument even if you don’t believe it, because the league has to be afraid of the implications of “a rule is a rule is a rule”.

As for Horry, he should be suspended for throwing a cross-check. It’s not an automatic suspension, but that was a pretty damn flagrant foul, and leaves him subject to suspension. And the league cannot encourage the tactic of sending in bench players to commit hard fouls on superstar players in the hope they will draw some retaliatory suspension when they react to a pretty blatant cheap shot. Which, by the way, is exactly what the rules do. Stoudamire has strict liability for a fight he didn’t even participate in, while Horry can be suspended only at the Commissioner’s discretion for starting the whole thing with a needlessly hard foul.

Which, if you stop to think about it, is just another big shot to put on Horry’s resume. If he manages to get Stoudamire suspended because Horry committed a blatant dirty foul, that would be pretty genius.