Marketing most foul

Sporting News, The, August 18, 2003 by Dave Kindred

Mark Cuban, the billionaire fool who owns the Dallas Mavericks, has paid maybe $1 million in fines levied by David Stern, the NBA commissioner. The flares were the result of Cuban's behavior at games across two or three seasons. He once ran onto a court as if to take part in a fight. Mostly, Cuban screamed at game officials and later criticized them in terms suggesting incompetence and vindictiveness.

Strange, then, that Cuban's latest foolishness has not caused Stern to reach for the financial whip. If it's not in the league's best interests for owners to rip the zebras, isn't it worse when an owner says a charge of sexual assault against the league's brightest star is good for business?

Repeatedly, Cuban has said just that: "I would expect the first Lakers game to draw the biggest ratings for a regular-season game in a long, long time. Nobody wants to see these things happen, but the reality of our world today is that this will help the business of the NBA, not hurt it."

Asked in various venues to explain his reasoning, Cuban has said that he simply understands 21st century Americans.

"The 'I'm horrified' and 'What happened to the good old days?' perspective has long died as a perspective among the general public," Cuban said.

What's dead, if anything, is the idea billionaires say smart things and only smart things. For here is Mark Cuban proving that billionaires are as susceptible to brain-lock as the rest of us.

He's just plain wrong.

Kobe Bryant's arrest on sexual assault charges is not good for business.

It's not entertainment to be packaged, marketed and sold. And the young woman's accusation of sexual assault was not done to provide chitchat for talk shows.

The arrest is plain bad for Bryant, bad for the young woman, bad for the NBA. Just bad. So don't come here with any contemptible spin about a man's possible life imprisonment being good for business.

Anyone who would spin that way is a fool so great that he cannot realize the length and breadth of his foolishness. Philosopher Elbert Hubbard opined, "Every man is a damn fool for at least five minutes every day; wisdom consists of not exceeding the limits' Mark Cuban went on in his fool's oration for the greater part of a week.

He wrote e-mails to sportswriters. He made appearances on TV and radio shows. One easily imagined him as a carnival barker, a whiskey-nosed shill standing in the sawdust outside a midway tent shouting, "Come one, come all, here before your very eyes, for your viewing pleasure, we have a man's pain, a woman's pain, their families' pain. Step right up, all you voyeurs and vultures, the show begins in five minutes, good tickets still available. And don't forget the cotton candy on your way in."

I, for one, refuse to believe that even at this late date in the development of mankind that the "general public" would rush inside the shill's tent. Be it the 19th, 20th or 23rd century, I believe the "general public" would find such a circus act contemptible.

Yes, yes, indeed, there is a market for the shill's product. Phineas T. Barnum grew wealthy on circus customers who may or may not have known his operating mantra: "There's a sucker born every minute." There are people eager to see the train wrecks of humanity; otherwise, Jerry Springer would have to get a real job.

Cuban's arguments have a foundation in the theory that all publicity is good publicity. Still, it's insulting, almost beyond words, that the accusation of a heinous crime would be portrayed as publicity promising positive results. What, the league is marketing to rapists now? It wants violence against women to be associated with its image? Will those suckers born every minute buy tickets to see Bryant's body now enveloped by shadows, a shadow of his shame, a shadow of a young woman's pain?

In his most circumspect lawyer's language, Stern issued a statement on Cuban's blather: "Any suggestion that there will be some economic or promotional benefit to the NBA arising from the charge pending against Kobe Bryant is both misinformed and unseemly. That idea does not reflect the NBA, NBA owners generally or others associated with our sport."

When not being circumspect for public consumption, "misinformed" and "unseemly" are likely not the first words Stern would have uttered on hearing of Cuban's business analysis. More likely, Stern said, "@#$!" followed closely by "!*$@#$%^&!"

On the other hand, Washington Post columnist/ESPN shouting head Michael Wilbon has called Cuban's arguments eloquent and then argued, "Controversy sells, and sometimes it sells big." His examples: "After being in a murder trial, Ray Lewis is more popular than ever.... Mike Tyson's biggest paydays came after his 1992 rape conviction.... Latrell Sprewell choked his coach (and he is) bigger now--a star, a celeb."

Freaks sell. Yes, they do. But not even the circus can sell all freaks all the time. We might ask O.J. Simpson, for instance, if after his murder trial he felt more popular than ever.

DAVE KINDRED

dkindred@sportingnews.com