Apparently, the reason that Ron Harper was traded was that he was caught socializing with suspected drug traffickers:
No one from Cavs wanted to trade Ron Harper ... except the man whose opinion mattered most
Athletic and talented shooting guard was viewed as Cavs' answer to Michael Jordan, but then came The Tradewww.si.com
When he found out, Gordon Gund, the Cavs' owner, said that they needed to trade him right away, even though no drug charges were filed against Harper.
They ended up trading him to the Clippers for Danny Ferry, and the rest is history. Cleveland was unable to get by the Bulls without him.
However, what if cooler heads prevailed? What if they waited to see if Harper was really guilty?
He had a lot of injury issues as did Mark Price and Brad Daugherty. They had some great talent and wish they could have gotten a title. But I dont think keeping Harper would have gotten them over the hump. In fact, their best chance was arguably the season that Jordan beat them with the iconic shot.
What if, instead of Keith Lee (1) (whom they drafted in OTL), the Chicago Bulls draft power forward Karl Malone (who went #13 to the Utah Jazz in OTL)?
Assuming the Bulls still manage to get Pippen in 1987, the Bulls are going to dominate most of the 1990s...
(1) The basketball player, not the wrestler of the same name...
https://www.joebucsfan.com/2021/05/...2008-brett-favre-trade-to-tampa-bay-revealed/ woah for the buccaneers almost got Favre.
Recently, JaguarGator on You Tube posted this video about the 1967 NFL re-alignment:
In the comments, I said that the divisions should have been more geographical, like this:
Eastern Conference
Atlantic Division: Atlanta, N.Y. Giants, Washington, Philadelphia
Industry Division: Baltimore, Cleveland, Dallas, Pittsburgh
Western Conference
Central Division: Chicago, Detroit, Green Bay, Minnesota
Gateway Division: L.A. Rams, New Orleans, St. Louis, San Francisco
I called the second division in the East the Industry division because you have rust belt cities Cleveland and Pittsburgh in there, and Dallas has always been a business first town. Also, the Gateway division comes from St. Louis, obviously.
They were rotating teams at the time. If I had to guess, I would say it was to get the Saints and Falcons to see all the other NFL teams as soon as possible. Kind of like what they did with the 1976-77 schedule.
Players would have been interesting - the Thorpe Division could have had the Browns, Steelers, etc. (St. Louis being in there would have been nice as a shoutout to the Plains Indians.) Others could have been the Grange... nah, there's a Bear again.
Colors could have been used, too - Yellow (or Gold if they didn't want the coward association), Red, and Blue for the primary colors, and then add Green in.
I suggested a while back when there were still rumors of the Jags moving to St. Louis that the NFC could go back to the 66-69 division names (Capitol, Century, Central, Coastal) and that the AFC could adopt something similar: the East would become the Metropolitan since NY and Boston play there, the North would be the Millennium as a play on the Century (Pittsburgh and Cleveland played in the old Century, and the Ravens are the Eve to the Browns’ Adam), the South would be the Midwest since it would have teams in Indianapolis and St. Louis along with Tennessee and Houston, and the West would be the Mountain.As a Packer fan, I cringed at the thought of using founder names, because I immediately realized one of the 4 would have been the Halas Division. Yeah, given the rivalries I don't think they could have used the NHL's later idea of naming divisions after people.
Of course, then again, saying we won the Halas Division might give Packer fans some joy.
Players would have been interesting - the Thorpe Division could have had the Browns, Steelers, etc. (St. Louis being in there would have been nice as a shoutout to the Plains Indians.) Others could have been the Grange... nah, there's a Bear again.
Colors could have been used, too - Yellow (or Gold if they didn't want the coward association), Red, and Blue for the primary colors, and then add Green in.
Okay, we've kind of run out of what-ifs, so let's try something a little different, based on the Javier Baez crazy rundown - how could we get an all-time great in any of the major sports to have such a brain fart that he's remembered as still an all-time great but also as someone along the lines of Fred Merkle of Merkle's Boner or Jim Marshall of the wrong-way run. I'm not talkign just a strategic blunder (like Baby Ruth being caught stealing for the last out of the 1926 World Series) but a "My LIttle Leaguer said that was dumb" blunder. (Although if you can turn one into Bull Buckner for the '86 Red Sox that would also be interesting.)
That should not be Lilith?and the Ravens are the Eve to the Browns’ Adam
There would have been most likely an Anti-Trust suite against the Power 5 that would have resulted in either a big payday for the Group of 5(winning plaintiffs in Anti-Trust suites gets treble damages awards) or the whole colligate sports system would have imploded as schools from the non élite conferences would had to drop the level of competition in football because they can't get enough money from television contracts to pay for the scholarships for players.This might be contentious for understandable/justified reasons but what if the Group of 5 Conferences (American Athletic Conference, Conference USA, Mid-American Conference, Mountain West Conference, and Sun Belt Conference) never received a guaranteed NY6 bid at the beginning of the College Football Playoff Era in 2014? How would that change things for College football (particularly FBS)?
Or they take a page from european soccer and basketball and all the big colleges leave the NCAA and form a college football super league.There would have been most likely an Anti-Trust suite against the Power 5 that would have resulted in either a big payday for the Group of 5(winning plaintiffs in Anti-Trust suites gets treble damages awards) or the whole colligate sports system would have imploded as schools from the non élite conferences would had to drop the level of competition in football because they can't get enough money from television contracts to pay for the scholarships for players.
So what would happen to the G5 in that case? Do they all drop down to FCS?Or they take a page from european soccer and basketball and all the big colleges leave the NCAA and form a college football super league.
Probably a mix of both, along with a complete restructuring of how the big boys even operate. Right now those schools are hampered by all kinds of expenses and Title IX considerations, but what if they went full-hog and the biggest programs separated themselves from their schools entirely? As in, the biggest Power 5 schools’ football teams become private companies a la an unofficial NFL minor league, operated similarly to how the leagues are run these days? I’m not sure where the line would have to be drawn for legal purposes (like if, say, the team based out of Columbus, Ohio can still call itself the Ohio State Buckeyes and use the same logos and claim the same team history.) But it seems like a logical conclusion, especially with the rulings about names and likenesses of players.There would have been most likely an Anti-Trust suite against the Power 5 that would have resulted in either a big payday for the Group of 5(winning plaintiffs in Anti-Trust suites gets treble damages awards) or the whole colligate sports system would have imploded as schools from the non élite conferences would had to drop the level of competition in football because they can't get enough money from television contracts to pay for the scholarships for players.