The Allen Conspiracy

The Celtics won game 7, so it's pretty much splitting hairs to complain or talk about the horror that was Tony Allen's performance at the end of regulation in game 6. It was a triple overtime game, one that Bulls fans will probably think of the way it, the way Red Sox fans will remember the ALCS game 5 comeback last fall. It's a fun memory, but ultimately you were disappointed to lose the series. The problem with this game is that it wasn't on the up and up. Why you ask?
TONY ALLEN SHAVED POINTS!
That's right I said it, and I don't mean the innocent way Tony shaved points in Blue Chip where "We won the damn game. Who cares about the spread, it's just for the damn gamblers ain't it?" The only problem is that the real life Tony, in this case Allen, shaved 6 points, up by 6 with a little more than a minute to go. I think you have to be good to shave points, you have to be able to control the game to effectively shave points. In Blue Chips, Tony was a freshmen but he was still the best player on the team. He could control the game and control how many points he was shaving and allowing the other team to get close, but not too close, just enough for the other team to cover the spread. Tony Allen doesn't get enough minutes to effectively shave points. There are two guys on this team that could shave points and those two are Rajon Rondo and Paul Pierce and neither of them did.
While the Celtics were in Chicago for games 3 and 4, there were reported death threats made against Tony Allen's life. It has happened before also while the C's were in Chicago, from which Allen is a native. Most times guys get cheered when they return home or have to get 50 tickets for family and friends, not Tony Allen, he gets threats against his life? Please? When does this ever happen, there is somewhat of a precident with this and in Chicago nonetheless. Two summers ago Antoine Walker got robbed when he returned to his Chicago home. Either there is something weird going on in Chicago, or Al Capone is fixing Bulls games, in which case we might need to reevaluate the Michael Jordan era. (More on this in a moment.)
The Celtics had battled back from a double digit deficit in the 4th quarter and then taken the lead down the stretch. The Celtics were getting an all-time scoring effort out of Ray Allen, Big Baby (Glen Davis doesn't even exist anymore really, he's just Big Baby, I see him legally changing his name in the near future) was scoring consistently down the stretch. Then why on earth would Doc Rivers take Big Baby out for one of the most crucial minute and half stretches of the season? Unless.......DOC WAS IN ON IT AS WELL.
I can completely see a conversation between Doc and Tony before the game that went something like this:
Tony: "Doc, you gotta help me. I'm involved with some really bad people. You gotta put me into the game, they own me."
Doc: "Who owns you?"
Tony: "Mikey. I've gotta shave points tonight or else I'm going to be dropped off the Sears Tower."
Doc: "Mikey huh, okay I'll see what I can do."

I swear it had to have happened like this and how do they both know who Mikey is? Doc Rivers, is also from Chicago! That's right, the two people that could lose that game for the Celtics, are both from Chicago. If Doc doesn't put in Tony Allen, the Celtics win game 6 in regulation and Tony Allen might be dead. Instead he puts him in to save his Chicago brethren and boom, the Celtics lose the game and have to win a do or die game 7.

I even have a theory about who Mikey might be. That's right, you guessed it, Michael Jordan. Before you dismiss this completely, name the two greatest athletes in the modern era who have a reputation for gambling? Pete Rose and Michael Jordan. The Pete Rose story has been well documented, Michael Jordan however is known to play high stakes poker all night in Vegas and play $1000 a hole with his buddy Charles Barkley. Bill Simmons has a conspiracy theory that I find very interesting in which he believes that when Michael Jordan retired in 1993 and decided to play baseball he was actually suspended by David Stern for gambling. Not to mention that the biggest gambling controversy in the last 20 years happened just last year and it involved the NBA, does Tim Donaghy ring a bell? He was owned by gamblers and fixed games, playoff games. Is it such a stretch that perhaps there are other referees and/or players that might brush up against organized crime? If Michael Vick can make millions of dollars and do something as stupid and gruesome as arrange dog fighting, anything is possible. But what does Tim Donaghy have to do with this game? Tim Donaghy graduated from Cardinal O'Hara High School in Springfield, Pennslyvania. Who also graduated from O'Hara High? That's right, Ed Malloy and Joey Crawford, who were 2 of the 3 officials for game 6 of the Celtics-Bulls series. So now the tentacles of the Chicago gambling are spilling over into Havetown, Pennslyvania.
So where does this leave us, is Michael Jordan the Godfather of the NBA? Does he have anything to do with the 1985 Draft Lottery? Is Michael Jordan buying Chicago boys and was Tim Donaghy a scapegoat for a larger conspiracy? Is Tony Allen actually Tony from Blue Chips? (Allen doesn't have the jumper, but I could definetly see Tony Allen flunking TV and getting his girlfriend pregnant.)

Sterling Pingree