OK, that's my quibble with Bettman. My real problem is with my peers in the media. I think we're too quick to go for the death penalty when it comes to verbal screw-ups. We can never see the gray areas and just want hard and fast rules.
Avery may be just as dumb as Rocker, but Avery is not John Rocker, yet. Avery isn't even Fuzzy Zoeller, who mean-spiritedly tried to diminish Tiger Woods' first Masters title with a fried-chicken joke.
For now, Avery is a garden-variety simpleton. Some might argue he's Charles Barkley without the timing, occasional substance, and fawning friends in the media. And I'm one of those fawning media members, even though Sir Charles has made some mistakes along the way (I never liked the Shirtless Charles in Chains Sports Illustrated cover, but I loved his take on LeBron and New York. It's always a mixed bag with Chuck).
My point is we're trying too hard to paint Avery as a despicable human being. ESPN ran a graphic, referencing the fact that Avery called another player "fatso" and described an announcer as "terrible."
How is that any different from what Barkley does during TNT's pre-and post-game shows? Barkley is the best studio analyst in the business.
We have to cut people a little slack, even people we don't like. Avery gets to be offensively flawed up to a point. He's yet to cross the line however. We shouldn't push him over it.
You can e-mail Jason Whitlock at ballstate0@aol.com.
This article originally published on FOXSports.com.
Read more of Jason's columns here.
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