Phoenix has been the center of the majority of NBA news over the last four days. The city hosted the annual NBA All-Star Weekend, but the news didn’t end there.
Despite the enthusiastically positive buzz surrounding the dunk contest and the all-star game — especially the novel idea of Kobe Bryant and Shaq being co-MVPs — those two events have been overshadowed by news surrounding the Phoenix Suns.
Two much more intriguing stories came out of Phoenix on Monday, involving Suns head coach Terry Porter and guard Jason Richardson.
Porter became the eighth head coach to be fired in the 2008-09 season and the first with a winning record to get the axe this year when general manager Steve Kerr announced the team’s decision Monday.
Although the Suns are 28-23, Porter’s firing came as no surprise to many after his team lost five of eight and fell to one game out of the playoffs heading into the weekend’s festivities.
Porter was in the first year of a three-year, $6 million deal, replacing head coach Mike D’Antoni who left Phoenix to take the same position in New York.
The irony of the firing is Porter’s dedication to defense, something prized by Kerr. While D’Antoni coached the Suns, Kerr emphasized the team’s need to play better defense, something that led to the head coach’s departure.
“I hired Terry because I believed he would be able to provide the balance our team needed in order to perform at a very high level,” Kerr said Monday. “Unfortunately the transition from last season to this one proved to be very difficult, and we have not played to our potential.”
With a coach that emphasizes defense and a team that is struggling, Kerr has fired Porter and replaced him with assistant coach Alvin Gentry. The naming of Gentry as head coach has led to speculation that Kerr will allow the team to return to something more like its previous run and shoot style under D’Antoni.
It appears that Kerr ideally would prefer a Pistons-like team in Phoenix but failed to realize that the players on his roster are not really suited for such a style. They are, in fact, better suited to play D’Antoni’s run and shoot style, as Kerr now appears aware after the firing.
Even more perplexing than Kerr’s case of buyer’s remorse is the development surrounding the recently acquired Jason Richardson.
Following a dinner Sunday night with his 3-year-old son, the Suns guard was arrested and charged with reckless driving, excessive speeding and failure to use a child seat.
Allegedly, a Scottsdale officer initially clocked Richardson driving 67 mph in a 40-mph zone. As a result, the officer decided to follow Richardson.
It was then that the officer reports clocking the former Michigan State standout traveling 90 mph in a 35 mph zone.
Fifty-five mph over the speed limit in a residential zone?
With an unrestrained 3-year-old son in the back seat?
It’s beyond me to fathom what could possess the 28-year-old Richardson to travel at such speeds with his son in the car.
Not only is he putting his son’s life as well as his own in danger by driving recklessly, Richardson is setting an absurdly poor example for his son.
How do you expect Richardson’s wife to explain to a 3-year-old why his father is being cuffed and placed in the back of a police car?
If you are his wife, how can you trust him to care for your son after this incident?
And it’s not as if this were Richardson’s first mistake either.
An officer stopped Richardson in December — the same month he was traded to Phoenix — in the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community under suspicion of driving under the influence of alcohol. The officer accused Richardson of having a blood-alcohol level above 0.08 percent and of the failure to drive in one lane.
Richardson’s response to that incident?
It was “one stupid mistake.”
Well, make that two stupid mistakes, Jason.
Jordan is a junior majoring in journalism and political science. Think Jason Richardson was justified in driving 90 miles per hour without using a car seat for his son? Jordan can be contacted at [email protected].
