Tmoney03 Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 May have been posted, but here goes: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36674-2003May9.html excellent article Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelvin Bryant Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 It's always about race to Wilbon... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skins26 Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 I'm sorry but when GM's get fired they are usually pretty clear why they got fired. Cause they made bad personel moves, thats what it was, cant Jordan figure that out, the fact that he made bad moves. Stack for Hamilton?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TennesseeCarl Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 There've been times when I enjoy Wilbon, but that's among the stupidest articles he's written. You can find a lot of fault with Abe Pollin, but I'd doubt anyone can seriously paint him as a racist. He's been loyal (to a great fault) as heck to Wes Unseld. Gave Bernie Bickerstaff more of a chance than I would. I'm not buyin' the racist stuff. As for giving MJ an explanation...please. What explanation would Wilbon accept? None. Pollin never liked MJ on a personal level and wasn't giving him the team. That's a $350 million asset (and that's conservative) - why should he turn the team over to Jordan? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yomar Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 I don't care what Wilbon has to say. He was the head cheerleader when the Bullets traded Webber for Richmond, as far as I'm concerned he has no right to criticize. The fact that he is even bringing race into the conversation only confirms everything I already know about him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NavyDave Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 The fact is that Jordan would ve never been involved with the Bullets if he wasnt wooed here with the promise of ownership. Poor Teddy Email. Unless he convinces Abe's food taster to take the day off he is gonna be stuck for another decade with only the Crapitals Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CMonster Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 Wilbon is right to lay it on Pollin, but pulling the race card is pretty ridiculous, since he turned it back over to Wes Unseld. Wes is black, and Pollin called him "like a son". The point is, Unseld has been the worst GM in the history of the league, and Jordan gets canned for QUESTIONABLE moves, since the jury is still out on all of his major calls (Kwame, Jared Jeffries, Juan Dixon, Brendan Haywood) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yomar Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 Jordan got screwed. Kwame is a child. Pollin is a blithering idiot. Wilbon sucks nuts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tarhog Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 I'm not defending Pollin...anyone who seems content to head a franchise that sucks year after year after year has got some issues. But I'm not surprised Jordan got shown the door. Few owners/GMs are going to put up with someone in the front office who wants to be bigger than the team itself. As great a player as Jordan is/was, his cardinal sin is craving that limelight above all else. I understand how much that drives Jordan, and I'm not even saying its 'reprehensible' or anything close to it. But its a trait 'the man' running the show will never admire off the court, and I think its what cost MJ his job. I don't buy into the notion that it was poor personnel decisions (they've been making those for the better part of a decade), and it sure as heck wasn't racially-motivated. He'd just become a thorn in Pollin's side, and I believe they were sick of seeing Jordan, Jordan, Jordan every day of their lives headlining the WP Sports section. Had Jordan stayed in the front office and off the basketball court, keeping a relatively low profile I'm betting he might well still have his job. Too bad it had to end so acrimoniously, but not all that surprising. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckydevil Posted May 10, 2003 Share Posted May 10, 2003 I like and I am a fan of Wilbon. However he can really piss me off. He brings the race card out a lot. The truth is Jordan was fired, because Jordan was never his guy and they didnt win when he was here( Jordan was Ted's guy). I am so angry at Abe Pollin right now, Im just counting the days until Ted takes over, however to play the race card with Pollin is simply absurd. By the was Wilbon there are alot of black fans who did not want Jordan back as a gm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tmoney03 Posted May 10, 2003 Author Share Posted May 10, 2003 I like Wilbon, but he can be a bit over the top sometimes. What I liked about the article, though, is not the fact that he brought out the black card or pretended he was speaking about the black community, its the fact that he spoke against Pollin's unexcusable excuse of Jordan I don't care what anyone says -- getting rid of Jordan curses the Bullets for the next 100 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phat Hog Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 I’ll echo the “I like Wilbon” sentiment. But sometimes he reminds me of Jessie Jackson – “Everything I disagree with is a race issue… keeping the black man down”:puke: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimboDaMan Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Oh Lordy, this is Wilbon at his rock bottom worst. Its not just about race, its about race AND CHICAGO. God help us, this is only the 'Bone's second article on the subject, my money says he's got 2-3 more in him easy. The striking thing to me is Wilbon's statement that Pollin is not a racist, that he's done a tremendous amount of good for the African community, that he as a sportswriter has better access and knowledge than the man on the street and thus knows that Pollin's generosity has been, in Wilbon's words, "staggering". And then, rather than make any effort to lay the facts out for people to judge, he sides completely with the uninformed man in the street, using them as an excuse to vent his anger. The putz. Pollin's a shmoe, and I never agree with Sally Jenkins, but she's got a point. If Michael Jordan's such a Washington Wizard, how funny is it he still keeps Illinois plates on his cars? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RTerps2002 Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Charles Oakley BYron Russell Resigning Laettner trading for Stackhouse and no development from the younger players??? Humm and why did he get fired again? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CMonster Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Charles Oakley BYron Russell Resigning Laettner trading for Stackhouse and no development from the younger players??? Humm and why did he get fired again? That WOULD be a valid take if he didn't replace him with the man who traded Webber, Sheed, and Ben Wallace for absolutely nothing. It's a double standard and proves that Pollin didn't fire Jordan for his track record as an executive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tenaciousd Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 I debated whether to respond to this, but I have to let it out. Michael Wilbon is a virulent racist of the worst kind. He writes and spews his poison on a daily basis under the guise that he, being black, is in touch with the underlying strife that permeates sports. A first class hypocrite in a forum that has very little to do with anything tangible race-wise in the real world. Wilbon always talks about being a man of the street. How he grew up seeing the stars of the Chicago hoods. Horse$hit. Wilbon grew up in a middle class neighborhood in the Chicago area, went to Northwestern, and has worked in print all his life. What has he seen of the hood and strife more than the average person that buys a ticket to a Wizards game? "You can't understand the firestorm without understanding the dynamic of race, even though race didn't play a part in the decision." Figure that out. Seriously. Wilbon attempts to be the Jonny Cochran of print, but its a transparent joke. He attempts to be hardcore with his shaved head and pudgy goatee, but his tirades of 60s holdover rants against "The Man" are tired. No one even knows what he's talking about. "Jordan deserved better than what he got on Wednesday and so did we." Does that "we" mean me and you Wilbon? Doubt it. He is a racist of the worst kind. Watch him on PTI. Everytime a debate comes down to Who is the best QB? it is inevitably a MOBILE QB. Everyone knows what he's talking about. But he won't say it. Take Wilbon for what he is. A racist loudmouth. With revisionist glasses. Yep, he never talks about how he wrote it was a good move to dump Webber for Mitch Richmond...much like he doesn't bring up his columns from two seasons ago when the Bears won 13 games and he wrote whole pieces about how he "is a Bears fan through and through and grew up on them." Shocker he doesn't write those columns when they get bounced in their first playoff game, or proceed to win 5 games the next season. But thats Wilbon. Too cool for school to wear the Swami hat on PTI. To perfect to admit he has ever been wrong. Too racist to see that the "firestorms" are all in his head. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hogie Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Word up! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckydevil Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 "A first class hypocrite in a forum that has very little to do with anything tangible race-wise in the real world. Wilbon always talks about being a man of the street. How he grew up seeing the stars of the Chicago hoods. Horse$hit. Wilbon grew up in a middle class neighborhood in the Chicago area, went to Northwestern, and has worked in print all his life. What has he seen of the hood and strife more than the average person that buys a ticket to a Wizards game?" I have never recalled him make this claim. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brandies Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 If I were to speak your kind of language, I would say that man's only moral commandment is: Thou shalt think. But a 'moral commandment' is a contradiction in terms. The moral is the chosen, not the forced; the understood, not the obeyed. The moral is the rational, and reason accepts no commandments. --Ayn Rand "The second item in the liberal creed, after self-righteousness, is unaccountability. Liberals have invented whole college majors--psychology, sociology, women's studies--to prove that nothing is anybody's fault. No one is fond of taking responsibility for his actions, but consider how much you'd have to hate free will to come up with a political platform that advocates killing unborn babies but not convicted murderers. A callous pragmatist might favor abortion and capital punishment. A devout Christian would sanction neither. But it takes years of therapy to arrive at the liberal view." -- P.J. O'Rourke "The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it." --H. L.Mencken As a liberal most of my life, I have to say, I totally agree! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luckydevil Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Sisko Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Overall it was a pretty weak article. However, I think his point was that by Pollin's lack of tact in the manner in which he fired Jordan, he left himself open to being accused of racism by folks who don't know him as well as Wilbon and/or the local D.C. community does. As much as I dislike Pollin and the amateurish way he has chosen to run his team over the years the LAST thing I think I could accuse him of is racism. However, I do understand how many who aren't aware of his record could come to that knee jerk conclusion. The public hears about "The Big Meeting" that will take place where Pollin, Leonsis (Teddy e-mail...that's a good one ND:laugh: but I digress) and Jordan will either hash out their differences or decide to part ways. Instead of this, what actually happens is Pollin simply tells MJ "Thanks, but you're fired. What are you waiting for ? Get to steppin". No reasons, no give and take, no nothing. Just "Get the he11 out". The inherent disrespect in this type of behavior is clear. I think it was a blatant slap in MJ's face on Pollin's part to say "You may be the king of the NBA, but I'm the king of the Wizards organization". However, some black folks might see it as some white guy disrespecting MJ because he's black. Regardless of the reasoning behind why Pollin fired MJ the way he did, it was still in very poor taste. Even so, it's a pretty big stretch to make that a whole newspaper article though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hail2skins Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 I like Wilbon but the guy does wear his race on his sleeve. A few years ago when he was on WTEM's "Sports Reporters" Andy Pollin mentioned the British sports book Ladbroke's had a line on whether Tiger would win the Grand Slam that particular year and Wilbon just went off on how the expectations were being set too high and that Tiger was being set up to fail "because he's black." WTF? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gamebreaker Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Originally posted by CMonster That WOULD be a valid take if he didn't replace him with the man who traded Webber, Sheed, and Ben Wallace for absolutely nothing. It's a double standard and proves that Pollin didn't fire Jordan for his track record as an executive. Unseld is leaving for a long time after the draft, he is not Jordan's replacement. Just the man who is going to stand in, until Pollin finds a replacement. Most people don't know how bad Unseld's knees really are. He can't get around with a cane, and he's planning on getting knee replacement surgery in BOTH knees. If he does return, it will take a really long time for him to recover or to get used to walking again. Not to mention the problem never goes away for a knee replacement patient, it just gets slightly better. He may never come back at all, that is why Pollin said he's looking for a new President of Basketball Operations immediately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gridironmike Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 Wilbon constantly erodes any credibility I used to give him. Yes, I am a white male. Who cares? I get tired of the black, black, black thing that is constantly coming out of his mouth (or pen). He does this on PTI too. I don't buy into this racially represive society flap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fansince62 Posted May 11, 2003 Share Posted May 11, 2003 I don't like Wilbon and he is an idiot....his argument is unbelievaably one sided....essentially, he is arguiing that yet another African American was exploited to create wealth by the master then dispensed with.......never any recognition that African American athletes also benefit immensely...in Jordan's case hugely....from the system........even better, he often appears to be arguiing that because he is African American he better represents the views of the African American community: that is, by virtue of his race he has better insights; the truthfulness of what he has to say somehow has greater standing. doesn't this strike anyone as racist in itself? even though he himself is an upper middle class plutocrat who no doubt lives in a comfortable neighborhood and takes advantage of the perks his job and TV status offers......... he should worry less about rich men like Jordan and a lot more about what is going on in the inner cities. make it your crusade you pompous, fat-*ssed windbag. do something tangible and beneficial for the folks who really need it......I am so weary of these pontifcating *ssholes who never get to the core problems..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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