Whining

On my latest SPOTD e-mail I talked a lot about game 5 of the NBA Finals. As a Miami partisan I was pleased with the result, and felt that the blame for Dallas' loss rested with Dallas, whose failures prior to the final 2 plays were the real contributors to their loss. Greg Cote of the Miami Herald echoes my feelings with today's column. He goes into some detail regarding the reaction of the Mavericks, and I particularly like his conclusion:

Yes, let the Mavericks not accept blame for their third straight Finals loss or entertain the absurd idea Miami might be a worthy opponent.
No.
Let's instead put a telescope on the grassy knoll and imagine Stern there -- is he grinning? -- exacting some sort of vendetta against Cuban over the fact he is the most outspoken critic of NBA officiating. A conspiracy! Yes. That's it. Stern's Revenge!
''It's just ridiculous,'' Cuban summarized before climbing onto his team's bus.
He meant the officiating late in Sunday's game.
He might better have meant his team's response to the loss in the absence of any sort of grace.

It is that final sentiment that I wanted to talk about, the lack of grace. In our society we tend to celebrate mavericks (no pun intended) like Mark Cuban. He made his money, he is doing it his way, he doesn't take any garbage from anyone. With those celebrated qualities has also come a disgusting classlessness. Cuban has no class and he lacks the most basic kind of discretion that might allow him to actually work with the league instead of against it.

He does a disservice to his team and sets a bad example- one where denying responsibility for your own failures is an acceptable reaction. I don't think it is acceptable, and I predict that Dallas will pay for it, tonight even.