Stern denies funny business in Draft Lottery

CHICAGO, IL — After the Chicago Bulls’ unlikely acquisition of the first overall pick in Tuesday night’s NBA Draft Lottery, conspiracy theories have been shouted from the rooftops in Miami, Memphis, Minnesota and the homes of all the other teams the Bulls leapfrogged for the ultimate draft prize – a choice between Michael Beasley and Derrick Rose in the NBA’s June 26 draft.

In particular, conspiracy theorists point to the fact that Rose hails from Chicago and the Bulls are in dire need of a go-to ball-handler and point guard. Then again, the team also needs a powerful player on the interior – a bill that Beasley fits to a T. In other words, after a disastrous 2007-08 season, the Bulls are suddenly poised for a bounce-back year.

But NBA commissioner David Stern adamantly denies any inappropriate backroom dealings. SSNN caught up with Stern after he arrived in Chicago to do a walkthrough of a brownstone that he “acquired in a recent business transaction.”

“Frankly, I’m sick of all the cockamamie theories out there – all the hot air being blown around suggesting I’m fixing this, or refs are fixing that,” a frustrated Stern said. “Sure, I happen to have a nice new property down the block from Jerry [Reinsdorf]’s; sure, I purchased season tickets for the Bulls on Monday afternoon. Can’t a guy just move to a new city and support its sports franchises without everyone crying foul? I got White Sox tickets too – I’m just about civic pride, you know? Chicago is my kind of town.”

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Jerry Reinsdorf serves as the face of ownership for both the Bulls and White Sox franchises. In addition to the brownstone in Reinsdorf’s neighborhood and his two sets of season tickets, Stern reportedly now owns a piece of Comcast Sports Net Chicago, the local cable sports station owned in part by several of the city’s sports organizations.

“Yes, David and I know each other – we’ve run into one another at a number of social events, and at synagogue on a handful of occasions,” Reinsdorf told SSNN, when questioned about the relationship. “Believe it or not, there’s a relatively close-knit community of wealthy, older Jewish men from New York, and we both travel in it. That doesn’t mean either of us is doing inappropriate favors for the other.

“We just both happened to get very, very lucky – myself with the Bulls winning the lottery, and David with a property that I just have to say is absolutely beautiful. Oh, and also the season tickets to the Sox and Bulls, which are really fantastic seats. From what I’ve heard, I mean.”

Though there would seem to be a wealth of evidence available for someone attempting to prove misconduct on the part of Stern and Reinsdorf, in fact there is very little useful information linking the two directly. According to several officials from other lottery teams, it is quite likely that no formal investigation will be launched.

“There’s a review process, but it basically has to be started by Stern, and almost everything we have against him and Reinsdorf is circumstancial,” said one NBA GM who spoke on condition of anonymity. “At the same time, let’s be honest – we all know the lottery is fixed. It was fixed when Ewing went to the Knicks, fixed when Duncan went to San Antonio, and it’s damn sure fixed now that Derrick Rose is going to end up in Chicago.

“You’re not really buying the old ‘all Jews know each other’ excuse, are you? I mean, that’s the same argument he used after Lawrence Frank mysteriously scored the Nets coaching job and then got photographed babysitting Stern’s kids.”