New Los Angeles Lakers recruit Jared Dudley recently shared his thoughts on one of the most gripping topics that has clouded the league of late. According to the 34-year-old veteran, tampering is indeed very rampant in the NBA today, and that he himself has been a firsthand witness to the same:
“I just think that tampering is at an all-time high during the season,” Dudley claimed, via Ethan Strauss of The Athletic. “I seen that even when guys are playing. It’s hard to even be focused. You hear in December, Kyrie talking to Spencer (Dinwiddie), you got KD, what he’s thinking about. Kawhi (Leonard), it even came out the other day, Paul George talking about even wanting to play with him since when he was in San Antonio and George was in Indiana. These guys, they talk, they don’t mind calling. So what you got to do is start playing the game. USA Basketball is huge for networking and you got to have a start.”
When asked if he has any proposition on how the league can better monitor violations of this policy, Dudley admitted that it would be extremely difficult to ensure that tampering is completely rooted out:
“It’s impossible to police,” he said. “How can you tell a player that he can’t text someone from the coaching staff, something like that? I would just say that they got to do something different with the free-agency process. I would say that’s got to change a little bit. So I don’t know the way that he can change it, but Adam Silver is a smart guy. Everyone loves him. Everyone respects him. So I think that he can kind of find a way to maybe help it out.”
Dudley makes a very valid point here, and in truth, it is indeed hard to put the blame on the league for their inability to strictly enforce their policy on tampering, given the unlimited means players or teams can reach out to each other.
The NBA is investigating the seemingly rampant tampering during this free-agent period, but even if there are punishments and rule changes in the future, it will still be impossible to fully police.
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