Referees Union Criticizes the Response to Van Gundy

Whether Jeff Van Gundy is retained as Houston’s coach is up to the Rockets, but the league needs to do a better job of defending its game officials from criticism by coaches, the spokesman for the National Basketball Referees Assn. said Tuesday in New York.

Lamell McMorris, the lead negotiator for the group, said the NBA’s response to Van Gundy’s comments about league officials targeting Rocket center Yao Ming was unacceptable. However, McMorris did not call for Van Gundy’s job, as he did in a statement Monday night.

“The real issue is the culture that I feel has been created where referees are the easy scapegoat,” McMorris said. “Where it is easy to allege, easy to accuse and easy to attack the referees. Even easy and acceptable to question the integrity of the referees publicly.”

The league fined Van Gundy $100,000 -- the most assessed against a coach -- after the coach said that an official who was not working the playoffs told him that Yao was being targeted following complaints by Dallas Maverick owner Mark Cuban. On Monday, Van Gundy clarified his comments, saying when he referred to an NBA official, he was not talking about a game official and was intentionally vague when people inferred he meant a referee.

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Cleveland Cavalier forward LeBron James has dropped agent Aaron Goodwin, who negotiated about $135 million in endorsement deals for the 20-year-old in the last two years.

Goodwin issued a statement wishing James well.

James is expected to turn over some of his management duties to close friend Maverick Carter, a former teammate at Akron’s St. Vincent-St. Mary High School who is employed by Nike. Randy Mihms, who serves as James’ personal assistant and road manager, and Rich Paul, another James confidant, are expected to take on more active roles in his representation.

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As expected, Mike D’Antoni was named the NBA’s coach of the year after leading the Phoenix Suns to a league-best 62-20 record, a 33-game turnaround from last season.

D’Antoni received 41 first-place votes and 326 points overall from a panel of sportswriters and broadcasters from the United States and Canada.

Indiana’s Rick Carlisle was second with 26 first-place votes and 241 points, and Seattle’s Nate McMillan was third with 234 points and 30 first-place ballots.

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Dallas Maverick forward Dirk Nowitzki bickered with Erick Dampier after Monday’s 25-point Game 1 loss to Phoenix in their Western Conference semifinal series, calling the center “a step slow on everything.”

“He never got involved in the game,” said Nowitzki of Dampier, who was outscored, 40-0, by Sun counterpart Amare Stoudemire. “He has always been in foul trouble. The first series was the same thing. He gets a quick two fouls in the first two or three minutes, and we can’t be aggressive anymore. Then he gets the third foul and has to sit.

“The bottom line is we’ve got to get something out of our center position. We really haven’t gotten anything out of it.”

Dampier responded by saying, “We didn’t play the way we are capable of playing, so for him to say something like that is totally stupid.”