Bottom line is that Ariza knew he was going to take Rudy down. Whether or not you want to say it's plausible that he went for the ball, however he altered that shot, Rudy was going down. I believe that, especially if you watch the video in slow motion, there is something to be said about the fact that Ariza never looks up at the ball, only the back of Rudy's head. I don't think he had anything on his mind but hard foul, but I'll never know. I don't think Ariza is neccessarily a dirty player, but he let his emotions get involved and made an very dirty play. I don't think anyone can honestly argue that he wasn't trying to foul Rudy hard.
Bingo. Nobody who is legitimately trying to make a defensive play on the ball takes a wild swipe across the top of an opponent's head. He was definitely trying to make a hard foul out of frustration (he had turned the ball over twice in recent Laker possessions, his team was down by 30, etc.). There are much smarter ways to try to prevent an open-court dunk in that situation. Plus, I still hold that anyone who truly goes in without intent would at least show a nugget of remorse after the result of the foul rather than puffing your chest out like some idiot thug. -Pop
You should have seen the (I think it's called) Lakerground? forum. The initial reaction was jubilation followed by making fun of Rudy for faking followed by the best quote... "I kinda wish that had been Brandon now". Then they got all happy because they actually got it down to within 16 (thought they had the come back in the bag) and at the end blamed the refs for the loss because they wouldn't let them play on. None of them figured out the refs were calling everything on both sides because they wanted to keep the game from getting out of control. It was really classy.
Nobody likes the posters at Lakersground. They even hate themselves. It's like the sports version of 4chan, minus the child porn. Well...I think minus the child porn. Never checked their off-topic forums.
Yet, the NBA suspended Miller, because his foul was an even bigger cheap shot because it was away from the ball. Funny how opinions change based solely on a poster being a blatant homer.
I signed up to post at Lakersground once. Ended up not posting anything and the very next day I got an email saying they banned me because I have a Portland IP address.
