Adam Silver Needs To Use His Brain And Not Suspend DeAndre Ayton For Game 2
You may remember this sequence from the start of last night's fourth quarter. First, I'm glad LeBron survived. What a warrior. But while most may be looking at the classic NBA "hoolllddddd mmmeeeeeee baaaaaackkk" scrum at the bottom of the screen, we should not ignore what happened at the very top of that video. This right here
Oh no. Not again. Just when Suns fans had maybe started to recover from the last time this happened. We all remember what happened in 2007 right? The David Stern straight up cost the Suns a probable title because they suspended Amare Stoudamire and Boris Diaw stepping onto the court after this Robert Horry hip check
They missed Games 5 of that series. Pretty important if you ask me. The Spurs won Game 5 88-85 to go up 3-2, which they eventually won in 6. That was easily the Suns best chance at winning a title in recent history, which is why I would still be holding that grudge as a Suns fan.
Which brings us back to yesterday. Once again this is probably the best chance the Suns have to win a title in over a decade. Once again playing the crown of the league, this time the Lakers. We have a little altercation and DeAndre Ayton took one step over the line. Lakers fans, in rather pathetic fashion, went right to Twitter and demanded Ayton be suspended. Jesus Christ guys, have some pride. Take your loss as a 7 seed like an adult. If Ayton sucked last night, would this be an issue? Nope. But he ate Anthony Davis for lunch so naturally Lakers Twitter was crying about it. You kept seeing things like "this is exactly what THT did and we got suspended!" Ummm....no it wasn't.
Dude basically ran onto the middle of the court. DeAndre Ayton took one step and was immediately held back. I'm not saying suspending THT was right either, but these situations are not the same. Anyone with a brain can understand that.
Which is why I am going to need Adam Silver to use common sense here. I know the Lakers lost and I know LeBron is probably putting the pressure on Silver and the league to help him, but I say this for all Suns fans, don't cave. Don't essentially ruin what should be an awesome series because DeAndre Ayton put one foot over a line. Use your brains. You were already willing to bend the rules and not suspend LeBron for breaking protocols, so let's do the same thing here. I know the league more often than not caves to whatever LeBron wants, but don't screw over Chris Paul like this like you did with Steve Nash. Another all time great PG who had his best chance at a ring ripped away all because of some bullshit. This is the league's chance to somewhat make up for that disaster from 2007.
Seriously though, just search "DeAndre Ayton suspended" on Twitter and look how bad Lakers fans are crying about this. Don't reward them. Make them actually earn this series, and that means finding a way to solve the Ayton problem on their own. Not Adam Silver doing their dirty work for them.