The NBA Blew Its Chance to Stand Up for the WNBA

As the WNBA Finals Game 6 tipped off Thursday, the loudest noise nationwide was that of breakfast smoothies being mixed in San Francisco in advance of the 9:30 a.m. start.

And that’s troubling.

There’s a lot of blame to be spread around when the Golden State Valkyries are forced to play a potential championship-winning game at an hour when they’d normally be walking their dogs.

When the Atlanta Dream are treated like Sherman in Hood's hometown.

And when the suddenly trendy WNBA has an opportunity to attract the largest television audience in women's basketball history, only to be told, in essence: We can make exceptions for men, but not for women.

Sure, several powerful basketball people got together and worked out a compromise. The WNBA would get their coveted arena and their preferred date, but they'd have to tip off before the sun came up on Santa Monica Boulevard.

Oh, and that agreement came with an ugly asterisk:

The Valkyries were told not to think about celebrating should they happen to win, oh, the first championship in franchise history. Both teams needed to vacate center stage in State Farm Arena so it could be prepared for the all-important Cavaliers-Hawks game – aka the Jock Landale-Riley Minix showdown – a few hours later.

Seriously, the final chapter in one of the most entertainingly unpredictable seasons ever scripted in WNBA history not only would be served as a lunch appetiser, but any champagne cork-popping would be exported to an adjacent practice court.

If, that is, the local club volleyball team would agree to take a 10-minute water break.

Sad, but true. (OK, not the volleyball part.)

That raised the collective temperature of a whole lot of sports fans. Many targeted the utterly unlikeable Cathy Engelbert, but those darts missed the board.

There's a reason why arenas won't give reservation holds to sports teams who say: Our playoffs run five weeks. Not sure if we'll even make it or when/where those games will be played. But please reserve all those dates for us. Oh, and we'll need a 24-hour cancel policy.

Uh, no.

Even the NBA Finals once lost a tug-o-war not only with the Ice Follies at the Oakland Coliseum Arena, but then had to schedule around a karate tournament at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. Elvin Hayes can still smell the ... never mind.

Imagine the short conversation between Engelbert and the State Farm Arena venue manager sometime back in August:

Engelbert: We’d like you to block off every date between Sam Adams’ birthday and Halloween for possible Dream home playoff games.

Venue Manager: Don’t try to impress me with your Lehigh education. Hit the pike. I’ve got Live Nation on the other line trying to schedule Taylor Swift. They’re offering a $10 million down payment for each date they’re requesting. You willing to do that?

Crickets.

It would have been much easier for the mighty NBA machine to resolve the issue. They, after all, have conveniently scheduled most teams for an in-season vacation from Dec. 4-10 – no more than two games – so that the nation’s attention can be focused on the NBA Cup semifinals and finals.

The Cavaliers-Hawks game could easily have been rescheduled for whatever night that week Ms. Swift wanted to take a break.

Why didn’t the NBA do this? I’ll tell you why …

Because of LeBron James.

And Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Steve Kerr, Erik Spoelstra and ...

You know, the NBA’s earth-movers. The guys who get headlines even when talking about figure skating and news cycles at the White House.

Imagine if one of them had gone viral with …

I’m ashamed of my league. I can't believe we're standing here and allowing this to happen. We can’t inconvenience two teams for one night in order for our sisters, the greatest women’s basketball players in the world, to hold their championship? Are you kidding me? I’m embarrassed for our league’s leadership and for every player who won’t stand up for our partners. This is a bad day for the WNBA, and a sad day for the NBA.

Where’s Gregg Popovich when we need him? He’d have said it, and San Antonio doesn’t even have a WNBA team.

I’m no player agent, but I know this:

If I were, I could have made my client the most popular basketball player in the world (for at least one day until others jumped onboard) by being the first to grab a microphone and call out the NBA on this great injustice.

Where’s the outrage? The call to arms to prevent a tremendous disservice? The players had the power to effect this change.

More and more, we’re seeing NBA players and coaches support the WNBA. That’s great. It's nice to see Chris Paul and Dwight Howard at Finals games.

Maybe they’ll jump into the fight the next time WNBA players want more money or better benefits or more comfortable travel, but that’s a big leap.

This scheduling thing wasn’t.

Engelbert, Adam Silver, NBA players and coaches, even Rich Paul. You all blew it on this one. Some more than others.

Now, where’s my Bloody Mary?