Joakim Noah Gay Slur: Why His Fine Should Be Harsher Than Kobe Bryant
Joakim Noah of the Chicago Bulls finds himself in some hot water this morning, after cameras caught the Bulls' big man firing a gay slur at a Miami Heat fan on Sunday night.
Noah picked up his second foul with 6:26 remaining in the second quarter of Game 3. He returned to the bench, clearly frustrated with the call, and with himself.
The forward could be clearly seen on camera having an angry dialogue with a fan, and the former Florida Gator dropped several expletives before calling the fan the gay slur.
Joakim isn't the first NBA star to find himself caught using inappropriate language on the bench this season. Lakers mega-star Kobe Bryant was seen calling a referee the same slur that Noah used back in early April, and David Stern fined him $100,000.
Now, Noah is sure to face some sort of financial blow from his own gaffe, but there's also a good chance his punishment will be worse.
In fact, here are five reasons why Noah should be fined more than Kobe was.
5. The League's Precedent
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On April 12, Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant used the same homophobic slur used by Noah, and directed it at referee Bennie Adams.
Because of what Kobe said (and the backlash that followed it), commissioner David Stern levied a $100,000 fine against Bryant.
Kobe was meant to be an example, but here we are, less than two months removed from Kobe's slur, and now Noah is making the exact same mistake. The precedent has been set, so Noah deserves to have the same fine levied against him, right?
Except that we're just six weeks removed from the precedent being set. Kobe's incident is still fairly fresh in our minds, and now, Noah has managed to break with David Stern's example.
For being dumb enough to make the same mistake less than two months after Kobe, Stern has to levy a stiffer fine against Noah. It doesn't have to be significantly larger, but enough to make a difference.
If he doesn't, Stern is being unfair to Kobe and to the league, and undermines the precedent he's set.
4. It Happened in the Playoffs
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There's one significant difference between when Kobe's outburst took place and when Noah lashed out: Joakim managed to do it in the playoffs.
Kobe's gaffe was a public relations nightmare, to be sure, but he did it in a regular season game. Even though it was televised on TNT, Kobe's game was being watched by fewer Americans than the Bulls-Heat clash on Sunday night.
With a larger audience, there's a higher chance of Noah offending a significant chunk of the population. Because the audience is larger, and more people saw him do it, David Stern is going to have a bit more pressure on him to make sure Noah has the book thrown at him.
The NBA wants these playoffs to go without a hitch. Noah's mouth represents a fairly sizable potential hitch in the league's plans, and they need to make sure everyone knows not to use that language in front of a national television audience.
3. He Should Know Better at This Point
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The league's precedent aside, Noah should have known better than to use that slur at this point. He knows cameras are always following players to the bench after a foul, he knows how the public reacts to language like that, and he knows he shouldn't use it.
Did he learn nothing from Kobe? Did he not see how strongly and angrily people reacted to Bryant's slur?
He should have known not to say that word, but he did it anyway. I understand he was frustrated and didn't think before he spoke, but at this point, given everything the league has done in recent weeks speaking out against the use of slurs like that, he really should have known better.
2 He Used Multiple Expletives
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When Kobe dropped the homophobic slur on Bennie Adams, all the cameras saw him saying was the slur that got him in trouble.
But with Noah, that was the last word out of his mouth. He preceded the word with a few other choice phrases and words, very few of which can be used in polite company.
By delivering an expletive-laced tirade, Noah managed to one-up Kobe's gaffe. The league should fine Noah more simply because he used more swear words than Kobe did, all of which were caught on camera by TNT.
1. He Said It to a Fan
5 of 5This is the biggest difference between Kobe's gaffe and Joakim Noah's. Kobe vented his frustration at the person who had given him the technical foul, a logical, if still unacceptable course of action.
But not only was Joakim's rage not directed at someone on court, he turned on a fan. The NBA loves its paying customers (as all sports do) and they tend not to like it when a player does something in a hostile or threatening manner towards them, as Noah did.
By lashing out at a paying customer (and given the seats the fan was probably in, a customer who paid serious cash to sit where they were), Noah is sure to cross the league's bad side. The last thing David Stern wants to do is have fans upset because a player shouted obscenities in their direction, or called them something inappropriate.
I realize fans say terrible things, and it's somewhat unfair to expect players to sit and take the constant abuse without firing back. But Noah's response was unacceptable, and by directing those words at a fan, he's opened himself up to a sure-fire big fine.
In the end, that will be the biggest reason Noah deserves a bigger fine. He lashed out at a fan, and in the end, David Stern is sure to give him a harsher penalty for that than he did for Kobe's response to Adams.
