If there is one owner in the association who it seems is not afraid of Kim Jong-Stern, it is Heat owner Micky Arison. During the lockout Stern fined Arison $500,000 for comments made on twitter where he insinuated that other owners were the reason the process was taking so long to iron out.
Now today, in a meeting with Heat beat writers, Arison admitted that even though he was strongly pushing for the deal, he voted against it because he felt it was punitive to the Heat.
It is important to note that the deal had already passed by the time it got to him so his vote was more of an F.U. to David Stern and more importantly Dan Gilbert. If the Heat truly are the nWo, Arison is “Billionaire” Ted Turner.
When the original story about the fine came out it was revealed that several owners had pushed for the stiff fine. Knowing what we know about Stern and Gilbert with the CP3 drama, you have to imagine a comic sans email was sent to the league office.
Arison is a good follow on twitter @MickyArisonand has actually responded to me on several occasions. Really bucks the “ol’ boys network” way of doing things.
Speaking of Twitter, information for this story gathered from several guys who are must follows if you love the Heat drama. @EthanJSkolnick of the Palm Beach Post, @ByTimReynolds of the Associated Press and @WindhorstESPN of The Heat Index on ESPN.com and Joseph Goodman of the Miami Herald @MiamiHeraldHeat.