Mishkin gives insider insight on state of NBA

By Chris Burke and Andrew Krause

On Thurs., Feb. 20, National Basketball Association Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer Jeffrey Mishkin visited Trumbull College for a Master's Tea. Mishkin, who attended Albany and received his law degree from Cornell, has worked for the NBA for over four years as the head of a legal department that covers matters from licensing agreements to salary cap disputes.

The Herald sat down with Mishkin to discuss the present state of the NBA, from the suspension of Dennis Rodman, to the league's current scoring droughts.

Yale Herald: Many would argue that the hottest thing in the NBA is the Chicago Bulls' Dennis Rodman. How does the NBA feel about the effects of Rodman's antics on league image?

Jeffrey Mishkin: What Dennis does off the court he is free to do off the court. I'm sure what he does has some impact on making people interested in watching him play basketball. I think it's equally likely that because he's such a great basketball player, that allows him to do some of these other things that gain him attention. The NBA does not wish him to change his game at all. As long as he conducts himself properly on the basketball court, we are very happy.

YH: Rodman's lengthy suspension for kicking a cameraman has garnered tremendous media attention. Legally, why are the NBA's suspensions more easily enforced than those handed down by other professional sports, particularly Major League Baseball?

JM: Under our collective bargaining agreement, the commissioner has the sole authority for imposing discipline with respect to anything that happens on the court. There is no arbitrator to hear [the case] and the commissioner does not suspend his discipline while the case is being appealed. In baseball, the tradition has been that the suspension made by the league president is immediately deferred until there is an appeal. They just have a different approach to it.

YH: This season the NBA has expanded its international role by including regular season games in Japan. Given this global trend, what do you foresee as the future international role of the league?

JM: The plans are to continue with the Japanese games, and there are current and future plans for a lot of exhibition games in Europe and Mexico. We also have a tournament called the McDonald's Open, which is now truly a world club championship. Most international competitions involve national teams put together by the basketball federations of each country. The McDonald's championship involves existing clubs who have won their respective national championships coming together to play and to effect a world champion. This year the McDonald's Open is in Paris, and for the first time, the NBA will send its championship team to the tournament.

YH: Players such as the Philadelphia 76ers' Allen Iverson have recently come under fire for their perceived attitude problems and disrespect for the game. Does the NBA worry that this negative publicity will hurt the league in the long run?

JM: Every generation is different from the generation before it. But that's almost like natural law. There was a lot of discussion of this issue at the All-Star Weekend. Some of the older players were complaining about how the younger players don't respect the game. As for the NBA, we know it's an issue and being written about. But at the same time, for every Allen Iverson, there is a Grant Hill.

YH: Is the NBA at all concerned with the rash of low scoring games this season, and are there any plans to make rule changes to facilitate higher scoring games?

JM: All season, the demise of the NBA has been written about because the scores are now more like 88-86 instead of 102-101. We don't think that the absolute score is what matters. I don't think that a close game that ends with scores in the 80s is any less exciting than one that ends in the 100s.

Some coaches are deliberately slowing the game down. Defense has really been stressed, and some coaches have turned it into a real art form. I was just at a meeting with the teams' general managers talking about if there was something that we could do to, if not to increase the absolute score, at least not to have the game be as slow.

I don't think anything as radical as reducing the 24 second clock to 20 seconds will happen, but smaller changes may be made. There is a rule now that says you must bring the ball across midcourt in ten seconds. The general managers think reducing the time to eight seconds might be a good idea. They think if you get it over faster, the momentum of having brought it up in eight seconds will continue the speed of the play near the basket.

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