There’s a lot of NBA conspiracy theories fans like to feed into like the 1985 NBA Draft being rigged for the New York Knicks to land the No. 1 pick to draft Patrick Ewing or the officiating in the 2002 Western Conference Finals heavily favoring the Los Angeles Lakers against a Sacramento Kings team on the verge of beating the dynastic Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal Lakers.
There’s also one that isn’t as talked about as much but generates passionate views when brought up — the 2006 NBA Finals being rigged in favor of the Miami Heat. The Heat beat the Dallas Mavericks in six games, led by a young Dwyane Wade whose star was on the rise. It was Wade’s first of three rings over his career, but if you listen to Mavericks minority owner Mark Cuban, he and the Heat should’ve never gotten that title in the first place.
Cuban has long been incredibly outspoken and passionate in thinking that there was some bias in the 2006 NBA Finals, and mentioned it again recently during an appearance on the DLLS Mavs podcast. When Marc Stein said the ’06 Finals were “stolen” from the Mavericks by the league, Cuban rattled off the names of two officials who worked the series.
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“Yes, Bennett Salvatore in particular, Jack Nies right behind him.” Cuban said. “I’ll take that to my grave that the [2006 NBA Finals] were stolen from us.”
Wade’s play was at the center of why some think there was some favoritism during that series, particularly with him taking 25 free throws in Game 5 and 21 in Game 6. He clapped back at Cuban’s remarks.
“Mark stop saying that,” Wade said on his own podcast. “Mark, we beat y’all. Did we get some foul calls? Everybody gets foul calls. We can all go back and point — I can go back and point at 2011 in one of them series where Dirk had 48 [points], he had 24 free throws in one of those games. Does that mean that the referees wanted them to win? I don’t know, but it wasn’t rigged. We still had to play the game. You had a young guy who was becoming a star in the NBA. Did I get a few whistles? Yes, but was I the only one attacking the basket every play? Probably so. I’m gonna get some calls, too. You’re not about to tarnish the work that I put in as a young guy, to do something that not a lot of young guys have done in this game. To say it was rigged, Mark stop that. Y’all got us, we got y’all.”
To be fair, Cuban hasn’t outright said that the 2006 Finals were “rigged,” but said in 2024 that “all the 50-50 calls” favored Miami. He certainly thinks there was some funny business in how the game was officiated.
Obviously there’s nothing to prove Cuban’s claims, but even without evidence suggesting the fix was in, it doesn’t sound like he’ll change his stance on that matter. Fortunately, Cuban and the Mavericks got revenge on Wade and the Heat in 2011 when Dallas beat Miami in the NBA Finals to capture the franchise’s only championship.
