Sideline crowd needs to thin out in the NBA

Notice the gap between the baseline and the cameramen

These videos are named ‘phantom’ because these photographers deceased after getting hit, and became phantoms who now haunt the NBA arenas. Phantom of the arena.

One of these cameramen was photographing JJ Barea’s Miss Universe wife instead of JJ Barea himself. And he took umbrage at it:

Okay, I kind of veered off the serious tone I was going for. Here’s a gruesome video to put you back in the mood I intend you to be in:

Imagine waking up, kissing your family goodbye, and not knowing if you are going to return back in one piece. You walk out of the door with trepidation, reminiscing on all the fond moments you had. You nod at the security guard at the arena, and wonder if you ought to hire one yourself. Your job is essentially to become a sitting duck and take pictures of 200 pound train wrecks rushing at you at ungodly speeds.

Imagine waking up, kissing your family goodbye and not knowing if you are going to walk back home or hobble back on crutches. You walk out of the door with a lingering fear in the back of your mind. On one hand, you are supposed to be fearless on the court, and on the other hand, fearless recklessness can cost you your ankle. Your job is to play basketball, where the court is flanked by a line of sedentary men equipped with sharp appliances. They aren’t on the sidelines where the players don’t too often go crashing. They are placed at the baselines, where the players often charge full speed to make a shot. And whilst charging, they pray that their ankle doesn’t get twisted by stepping on some wayward photographer, while the photographer prays not to be crushed under a giant hurtling at them at top speed. Its kind of like a train wreck, only, both player and cameraman are equally at risk of damage.

Of the gruesome video above, the player who sprained his ankle off the photographer, Jason Richardson, said “‘They really don’t belong down there – you see what happens. It creates all kinds of problems for players. There’s got to be a better way.”

If I had a dime for everyone, player and photographer, who were injured through collision, I’d be sitting on a tidy pile of dimes. I wouldn’t be a rich man, there haven’t been enough of those accidents for that, but the number is significantly alarming.

Now I may have painted too sinister a picture with Hitchcockian overtones by exaggerating on the mindsets of the players and photographers towards each other. Its not quite as much of a doomsday scenario. But everything shouldn’t have to be a life or death scenario for people to take action towards it. Ideally, the players and fans would rather have the photographer move a good many steps back. The only reason they sit so close is because proximity is associated with higher quality pictures. And that just bums me out. To me, by far the worst video replays come from the baseline video cameras. I’ll grant it they come up with good pictures. But when your subject consists of NBA athletes in full motion, regardless of the angle, you will probably do a good job of it.

Lets face it, with the technology available to us today, it’s not really a stretch to figure out a way to take pictures without having actual people sitting down there with huge cameras. Check out the pictures taken from the backboard. Automatic cameras do that. Why not have the same for baselines? I realize that its a necessary evil, but how necessary is it really? Is it worth the risk it puts forward?

“Haters on the sideline, hopin’ I sprain an ankle.’’ Actual lines rapped by Stephen Jackson. And when you tempt the fates like that, ah well, you’re asking for it.

The waitress there was serving the mayor, Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York himself. He claims that the waitress didn’t fall with Jackson, mayor himself pushed him on her by mistake. “He came close and I just pushed him a little bit.”

“It’s maddening. It’s an accident waiting to happen. After what happened, I have no doubt the league has contacted teams to make sure everybody shores up their discipline in that area. It’s obvious people shouldn’t be ordering beers or Cokes or hot dogs when the game is going on.”- said Gregg Popovic, coach of the Spurs. Its not just the cameramen, the entire court ought to have more buffer space between the people who surround it. Back in the good old days, the players reacted with their basic instinct against it-

Its not really fair to stand up Dennis Rodman as an example of how the average NBA player would react. Dennis was nothing if not instinctive. and his reaction shows what we would feel if we suffered a ankle injury needlessly. The cameramen are well paid to withstand the possibility of Shaq coming and crashing into them, and the players are paid well to bear injuries. Maybe they both wouldn’t mind being paid a little less to increase the buffer. Or maybe if they didn’t mind, it would have been brought up in the lockout negotiations. As that hasn’t happened, we can assume that no one is really willing to take a concrete stand on this. Maybe a couple more incidents and it will be something which people will take issue with.