Commish answers critics; notes from Wolves-Celtics

David Stern responded to a recent New York Times headline that he felt was taken out of context. AP

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LONDON -- The NBA Europe Live 2007 tour is all about diplomacy and marketing, far less about real news or bothersome offseason headlines (in this case, quite literally).

But commissioner David Stern couldn't keep the conversation Wednesday entirely on the growth and nurturing of a sellable, expandable Euro version of his NBA product, and a few times he didn't seem to even want to.

Meeting with reporters before the Boston Celtics-Minnesota Timberwolves game at The O2 Arena in North Greenwich, Stern said the league will not fire any referees in the wake of interviews to investigate possible conduct violations similar to the Tim Donaghy gambling scandal.

He also was critical of the New York Times for a headline that ran in a weekend edition stating that Stern will not punish the New York Knicks, coach Isiah Thomas or Madison Square Garden ownership for their actions in the Anucha Browne Sanders sexual harassment civil suit that ended with an $11.6 million judgment for Sanders.

Regarding the referees and concerns about the game's integrity that flared up when Donaghy pleaded guilty to charges related to betting on games that he worked, Stern said he had hoped to discuss the matter first with the NBA Board of Governors when it meets in New York later this month. But with only three weeks left until the start of the regular season, and little offered lately to support the "transparency'' the commissioner promised when the scandal broke in July, Stern shared some of the league's initial findings after meeting with all 60 referees.

"I told the officials in the meeting, we won't be terminating any officials for violation of league rules,'' Stern said. "There may be some violations but they are not hanging crimes.''

The league will conduct more thorough background checks, he said, along with other unspecified security measures. But Stern dismissed the notion of posting referee evaluations on a league Web site, a suggestion made by numerous media outlets to keep the review process as open as possible.

"I won't be doing that,'' he said. "I think what we will be doing is we have got to be quicker in admitting when mistakes have been made by officials rather than waiting for the public to come to us.

"I've got a bunch of hard-working, law-abiding referees and because one of their number has confessed to being a felon [Stern emphasized the word] by betting on his own games and by giving information to draw into question the integrity of the other officials ... would be like me saying Jayson Blair [fabricating newspaper stories], 'how can I trust you?' I deal with officials as human beings.''

That was only Stern's first shot at the New York Times, Blair's former employers. Rather than taking no action against the Knicks, Thomas or MSG -- the league traditionally has levied penalties against players or coaches convicted of criminal offenses, but not civil cases -- Stern said he planned to discuss that matter, too, with the league owners in two weeks.

"Unfortunately, once again the New York Times headline writer said something that didn't appear in the text of my remarks, and the remarks themselves were badly mangled,'' he said. "Fortunately, I have my own transcript; one has to do that with the New York Times. What I said then was it was still under consideration.''

Among other topics, Stern termed the situation in Seattle, with Sonics ownership pursuing a relocation to Oklahoma City pending public financing of a new arena, as "all bad.'' He praised the O2 Arena, operated by the AEG company that runs Staples Center in Los Angeles, as the type of facility that could revive talk of a European branch of the NBA. And Stern reiterated that the leather ball, brought back in January after player complaints about a newer synthetic ball, would be in use for all of 2007-08.

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