RE: CUBAN-NELSON CATFIGHT

WSJ subscribers can find the article here. As Eric says, delicious. For those without a subscription, here’s a taste. The lead:

When basketball coach Don Nelson of the Golden State Warriors team threw a party two weeks ago for some friends associated with his former club, the Dallas Mavericks, he greeted an old protégé with a hug and a compliment.

“You’re doing a much better job than I did at keeping him away from you,” Mr. Nelson told Mavericks Coach Avery Johnson, according to guests at Mr. Nelson’s Oakland, Calif., home. Mr. Johnson smiled.

And this:

But just as the Nelson-Cuban revival was peaking — in the NBA’s 2003 Western Conference finals — it started to fall apart. With the Mavericks facing elimination by the San Antonio Spurs, the coach and owner exploded at each other over Mr. Nelson’s refusal to fulfill his boss’s wish to play an injured Mr. Nowitzki, according to Mavericks officials close to the team’s owner.

Mr. Nowitzki had suffered sprained ligaments in his left knee in the third game of the best-of-seven series, but, with the Mavericks trailing three games to one, was cleared by team doctors to play again. Mr. Cuban confronted Mr. Nelson in the coach’s office and demanded the star forward return to the court, Mavericks officials say.

Mr. Nelson refused, insisting that playing the young German with the ligament injury would jeopardize his career. The coach also confided in friends that he had promised Mr. Nowitzki’s parents, when the Mavericks signed the young man at age 19, that he would look after the seven-footer in Texas like a son.

“You’re just looking for excuses to lose,” fumed Mr. Cuban, according to two people who heard the blowup. Mr. Nelson threw the Mavs’ owner out of his office, these people say.

Finally, have a look at the traditional WSJ illustration of Cubes. Is his face really that lopsided? I’d never noticed that before.

Update: I’m told this link works even for non-subscribers.