As we've worked our way through Brandon Knight's rookie season, the more hopeful among us have pointed to his promise, his much-ballyhooed intelligence and work ethic, and his youth and inexperience as reason to hope that he will show steady progress over the next few years and perhaps emerge at 25 at or near all-star level.

But do one-and-done players regularly exhibit this sort of growth? I found a way to create waaaayyyy too much time for what I had to spare and compiled stats for the 24 one-and-dones who entered the NBA from 2006 - 2009. Trying to upload a goddamned thing on Google Docs from Burma can (and, in this case, did) take hours, so y'all better appreciate the effort, however irrelevant and flawed it may be.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PWip7s19kTJlrA0XQVK7lef2rRW05sQD2lrTqeJFt9g/edit?pli=1

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It's a thrill for all of us to see nationwide discussion of the possibility that Bill Snyder could be the "Greatest College Football Coach of All-Time". Typically, some of us opine "yes!", others "Maybe...", others, "Man, he's unprecedented, but I don't know if that means 'the greatest'" and others, "Who knows?" There's merit to all responses in this continuum. But I feel like I can bring us to unanimity one one, related, question. A half-decade or so ago, Pete Fiutak rated coaches on the "Greatest Program Turnaround Ever". I read the headline and settled in for another fun read about Bill Snyder, Bill Snyder, and BILL SNYDER. I was appalled. Bill showed. But above Snyder's Miracle in Manhattan, he placed Barry Alvarez at Wisconsin and Bobby Bowden (yes, Bobby Fucking Bowden) at FSU. He pointed out that both programs had been dormant and both reached the level of national powers under these two great (and they were great) coaches. His bottom line seemed to be that Wisky under Alvarez was, on the whole and on average, better than Snyder's Wildcats. And Bowden, of course, had that insane streak of Top Five finishes. Frothing at the mouth (I also had rabies at that time...), I ran to my College Football Encyclopedia to compare records. (We'll limit the programs' histories to 1947 and forward, seeing as that's when the FSU program began.)

The details of the Malfeasance in Manhattan has been injected into the DNA of everyone reading this. But to summarize:

1947 - 1988 Winning Seasons: Four (with two more .500 campaigns 1947 - 1988 WinLESS Seasons:Seven 1947 - 1988 Best Season: 7 - 3 (1954) 1947 - 1988 Bowls:One Years Since Last Winning Season, Pre-Snyder: 6 Years Since Last WinLESS Season, Pre-Snyder: Um, 1 (Also winless two years before Snyder's arrival) Wins in the Five Seasons Pre-Snyder: Six 1947 - 1988 Record and Winning Percentage: 107-325-7 (.252)

As for Barry Alvarez's job in Wisconsin...Well, it wasn't a good program. And now it is a very good program. And Barry Alvarez is unquestionably a Hall of Fame coach. Did he match the turnaround wonder that our guy created in Manhattan? Let's see 1947 - 1988 Winning Seasons: 18 1947 - 1988 WinLESS Seasons: 1 1947 - 1988 Best Season: 1962 (8-2 with one of three Big 10 Championships) 1947 - 1988 Bowls: 6 (But note that the Big 10 until the 70's allowed only one team to go bowling--this number would have been doubled if Wisky had not been in the Big 10) Years Since Last Winning Season, Pre-Alvarez: 6 Years Since Last WinLESS Season, Pre-Alvarez: 22 Wins in the Five Seasons Pre-Alvarez: 14 1947 - 1989 Record and Winning Percentage: 195-225-18 (.466)

Bobby Bowden as the most successful coach in college football history? Hey, I'd listen to the argument. That string of Top Five finishes was remarkable. He changed the game. But was the FSU turnaround on par with what Bill Snyder made out of what he inherited in Manhattan?

1947 - 1988 Winning Seasons: 15 1947 - 1988 WinLESS Seasons:2 1947 - 1988 Best Season: 4 Seasons stand out from 1950 to 1964; These FSU teams were a combined 33-3-1 1947 - 1988 Bowls: 8 Years Since Last Winning Season, Pre-Bowden: 4 Years Since Last WinLESS Season, Pre-Bowden: 3 Wins in the Five Seasons Pre-Bowden: 19 1947 - 1975 Record and Winning Percentage: 160-130-13 (.553)

I either wrote to Fiutak in outrage or meant to and never got around to it. More recently, I've searched for the article online, as it still sticks in my craw, but am unable to track it down. I've enjoyed Fiutak's writing and trust his judgment. But he was so utterly and OBJECTIVELY wrong in this appraisal. Alvarez took a mediocre program that had been more down than usual over the past decade and made it a national power. Bowden took a good program--in a region of the country on the verge of becoming football dominant--that had had winning records in SEVEN OF ITS PAST TEN SEASONS!!! and made it great. Bill Snyder took absolutely, completely, totally, unequivocally the most miserable program in the history of the sport, a program that had zero history, zero tradition, no "natural" pool of talent to draw on, and that was coming off one of the worst five year stretches in college football history and he built a national championship contender. Please, someone help me find Fiutak's original article. And then we'll send this to him and DEMAND a public retraction.

Bill Snyder: Engineer of the Greatest Program Turnaround in College Football History.

Ed. note: Awesome food for thought for the weekend from DBB'er MrHappyMushroom -- MW

A number of years back, I began to actually offend friends of mine by stating that the greatest regret in my life was Michael Bishop's fifty-ninth minute fumble against Texas A & M, which cost my K-State Wildcats a birth in the National Championship game.  I've mourned deaths and lost relationships and other matters of greater gravity, but I refuse to regret them.  Death and loss are apart of our world.  If the wife hadn't left me in '96, I wouldn't be where I am now, for better or worse, (almost certainly better, I'm happy to report).  Laurie's suicide in September of '89 shook me to the core and it was a true tragedy.  But, as John Cale noted, "Life and death are just things you do when you're born". (Or maybe it's "when you're bored".  But I've always preferred the former, as it seems less postured and more truly universal.)

But sports?  There seems to be so little connection to the rest of the world.  Michael--my favorite athlete ever to the degree that when I got to slap hands with him in Waco, Texas four weeks to the day earlier, I literally squealed like a school girl a third my age--needed not stretch his arm out for that meaningless extra yard.  The Wildcats could have completed the most stunning achievement in the history of college sports (from the worst ever -- by a wide, wide margin -- college program to a national championship) and life could have gone on as for me as before with no threats to the rules of mortality, but with a transcendent spring added to my step.

In short, sports--except for those participating--ain't real.  They are an artificial competition layered on top of a life where real and meaningful competition doesn't even exist.  No matter how wealthy you are, you can always have more.  You may love the spouse, but could always love him/her a bit more. You may be supremely proud of your child, but you always worry and the headlights of an approaching drunk driver could at any point signal the end of that joy.

But in sports, you can win.  There's no ambiguity.  So, why on earth do we devote countless hours of our limited years on earth screaming, rejoicing, crying, praying, smashing (my dorm room radiator did not survive Lee Smith's extra-innings gopher ball to Steve Fucking Garvey in the '84 NLCS), hyperventilating, yelling, and overall basing the state of our emotional well-beings to the actions of a group of (mostly) young men who are (often) unfathomably wealthy, and with whom (nearly always) we have no actual personal connection in any way, shape, or form?

Because they offer us victory, transcendence, and unmitigated triumph. And only they are capable of providing us with this illusion.

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Oh, yes. They are. Quite bad over the course of the season.

Still, I wondered. There have been a few epic second half meltdowns this year--Toronto, Chicago, et. al.--so it seemed obvious that the team was much better in the first half than the second this year. But sometimes such vivid examples tend to skewer one's view of reality.

Stuck in Bangkok Airport for a few hours with nothing I needed to do and zero ambition to make productive use of my time, I went through each game and compared the Pistons' first half performances and their second half performances (through 53 games). The results:

First an interesting tidbit--in 53 games have not had a single half out of a hundred and six in which each team scored the same number of points. I find that odd. Is that odd?

Second, the Pistons are a better--much better--first half team. By no means have they been great in the first half, but they do have a "winning first half record". Thus far, the Pistons have gone to the break ahead 29 times and behind 24 times. And in those 53 first halves, they have outscored their opponents by a whopping 25 points. Ten times this year, the Pistons have gone into the locker room up by double digits. (They won seven of those games.)

Thirdly, first half leads don't necessarily translate into victories. The Pistons are a mere 15-14 when they lead after two quarters. But man, leading at the half at least does not translate into a semi-automatic loss. The Pistons are a nigh-hopeless 5-19 when down at intermission. That's got to be substantially worse than average.

Fourthly, the Pistons have been a pretty awful second half team, just as our instincts have suggested. Thus far, they have "won" only 20 of their second halves, while losing the other 33. But it's not merely a matter of falling short. As our ugly memories of the collapses against the Raptors and Bulls suggest, the Piston's have had some dreadful, dreadful turns coming back after the break. Only five times have the Pistons outscored the opponent by double digits in the second. Opponents have outscored the Pistons by ten or more NINETEEN times this season. On these ignoble occasions, the Pistons are 1-18 for the season, (the only win coming back in early November in overtime against the Clippers). For the season, the Pistons have been outscored by 252 points in the second half, or close to five points a game.

Fifthly, when the Pistons happen to win the second half, they have a contender's record, going 14-6 in those games. But, of course, there are two problems with this optimistic assessment; 1) This has only happened about 35% of the time this year; and 2) a "losing" second half is even more deadly than a first half loss. The Pistons are 5-28 this year when being outscored after the break.

Sixthly, I looked at how often the Pistons played a "complete" game, (either completely awesome or completely awful), and what their record has been in the Tale of Two Halves games. The great news--the Pistons are undefeated (10-0) in games in which they've won both halves! The terrible news--they are 0-14 in the games in which they've lost both halves. The note quite as bad news, but still pretty bad news--if the Pistons don't dominate both halves, they are likely to go home a pack of sad (red) pandas; they are 9-20 when winning only one half.

Finally, things have been a bit rosier since the team's recent (8-7) "surge". The Pistons have "only" been outscored by double digits four times in the second half, and five times overall. (And aside from the fourth quarter stomping against the Knicks a few weeks ago, all of these poor halves have closed with ten or eleven point deficits. Thus, 14 of the Pistons' worst halves of the year occurred in the first 38 games. I guess that's something.)

On the return trip to Burma, I will bring a book.

I'm off my meds and my mind is beginning to wander into dark, dark places.  Just so ya know--last time I ceased being medicated, I did a few months as pre-incarceration Jeffrey Dahmer's "life coach".  So read the following analysis at your own risk.

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I'm not fully sure how I missed this remarkable scene.  I wonder who the other two were.

The University of Kansas' Freshman Quarterback Jordan Webb pees out of his chin as he walks toward the sideline.  KU Head Coach Turner Kill looks on in astonishment.  According to team sources, this is only the third time this has happened to a Jayhawk quarterback in a home conference game since the inception of the Big 12 in 1996.

There has been on onslaught of conjecture and debate as to the reason behind the NU debacle last week.  A hidden camera and microphone, however, captured a scene on the sideline that goes a long way to an explanation, and the following still photo and transcript was just released.

After a five day wait, here is the real cause of Thursday's meltdown...

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I don't pretend to be an expert and from where I live, I can't even watch the games.  But it seems so apparent to me that the Wildcats have ridden Carson Coffman as far as they can. We got to a 4-1 start with him, and he gets some credit for being good enough when it mattered against UCLA and UCF.

But with him at the helm, the offense is as good as it's going to get. It's clear that if decent defense key on DT, they can stop him.  There's nothing we've seen (in my case heard or read) about Coffman that suggests he can lead this team to a good season. Teams can win quite a few games with a QB who can't be counted on to throw for a hundred yards, but not when that team will often have to throw 20-25 times to get so few yards.

At least with Lamur, you have an athletic option who might be able to find different ways to make the offense move without a downfield passing game.  Good Paul Johnson teams could be quite dangerous. Sammy is said to have a stronger arm and has the ability, perhaps, to make something out of nothing on a semi-regular basis.

If Bill sticks with Carson, this is a 6-7 win maximum team, and that's not really a very lofty goal.  In the days before the proliferation of events like the Depends Adult Diaper Bowl, that was nothing to crow about.  I dislike the idea of settling for this as a best case scenario.  Hell, make the Cats into a wishbone option type of team, or at least give it a shot.  This sort of offense might at least catch a few teams by surprise and just might click enough to beat a few more teams.  But with Carson behind center, this offense will be predictable and incredibly defendable. They should beat NTU and likely another weak team or two.

This upcoming game with KU is no gimme.  North Dakota State aside, the Cats aren't inherently better than the Jayhawks, especially in Lawrence.  The safe bet, I guess, is to hope that the KU secondary is porous enough to leave a few receivers wide open and that Carson can hit a couple of them.  But that's no certainty and at least an athletic QB would give the Hawks something else to think about.  And at this point, it seems not rash to risk the extra turnover or two, if it means a realistic shot at some big plays.

Carson may well be the better passer.  But the K-State passing game is a non-entity.  A running QB with a handful of other good athletes to work with seems the way to go.

The rumors are circulating that Arthur is petitioning the NCAA for a hardship waiver that would allow him to take the field THIS year.  (Bryce's situation with Tennessee likely makes this option mute for him.)  One seemingly knowledgeable source states that he looks to have a solid case and that, although the NCAA hierarchy's judgment can't ever be predictable, he seems to have a real chance of getting on the field, perhaps as early as next week against ISU.  He has apparently been taking snaps with the first team.

Any word on this?  Realistic?  And as potentially a big impact on a thin LB crew as I think it could be?

Okay, I'll start by acknowledging that I've been a somewhat irrational detractor of Rasheed Wallace's.  Yeah, he was a great, great player in "04 and "05.  But then there were the playoff meltdowns and Miami and Cleveland and the apparent total indifference to being completely humiliated by KG and Perkins in "08.  And then clearly not playing hard in "09.  And when I add to this years of unfulfilled potential in Portland--that was a colossal meltdown against the Lakers and it wouldn't have happened to a team led by B. Wallace--I can't help but think of him as at least equally cancerous as he has been beneficial to teams.  In a nutshell, it strikes me that if you put Rasheed Wallace in a perfect situation for him--where he plays exactly the role he wants, where he's not put under too much pressure, where he's surrounded by people who put in overtime massaging is ego, and where the team is built for success--he is a difference maker.  Take away any one of those factors (and god forbid, TWO of them) and he is as likely as not to be a net (pun) negative.

That's my bias.  And I know this--that it's my bias--for a fact, because it is, after all, my bias.  Now here comes my theory, based on ignorance.  (And remember that a theory is not a statement of fact, but a supposition that is asking to be tested by evidence.)

I live overseas and did not see a moment of the Celtics-Lakers series.  (I'm also far more of a Pistons' fan than an NBA fan, so even if I'd been Stateside, I'd probably only have caught a couple of fourth quarters and Game Seven.)  But I did follow 'Sheed's season through the internet and the picture painted was vivid and consistent--he showed up in Boston out of shape and didn't work particularly hard.  He tossed up an astounding number of threes and made an astonishingly low number of them. (Roughly 28%; add that to averaging roughly 6 rebounds per 36 minutes and his Morganaesque breasts and it's pretty hard to argue that Wallace put forth much effort.)

But the party line throughout the year was that if and when 'Sheed really wanted to light the fire, he could turn himself and the team around.( I seem to recall Van Gundy (or another national commentator) saying in MARCH that the Celtics were "waiting for 'Sheed to play himself into shape.")

As we all know, the Celtics rallied.  They charged through the Eastern Conference and had the Lakers on the ropes. The loss of Perkins for Game Seven was potentially devastating, but the Celtics led through three quarters.  Looking at the boxscore, 'Sheed had a decent game--11 points and 8 boards in 36 minutes.  But here's where my theory is begging for testing---

Did Rasheed Wallace's season long lack of conditioning cost the Celtics a championship?  For those who watched the Lakers' fourth quarter comeback--was 'Sheed notably winded?  Did he fail to grab a couple of key rebounds,or  not move as quickly on a rotation as a professional athlete earning $6 million a year would be expected to do?  Understood--he did not expect to start or to play 36 minutes.  But a true pro should have spent his entire year focused on being ready to do so if needed.  There's little question that he did not work to be ready.  But I'm wondering to what degree he actually  failed to be ready.  And if he did fail to be prepared in the most important game of the season, is it beyond the realm of possibility that Rasheed's year long laziness and selfish cost the Celts two or three buckets in the fourth? And with that an NBA Championship?

One stat stood out to me in the box score:  a hobbled Andrew Bynum collected four offensive rebounds in nineteen minutes.  Gasol gathered another nine, and the Lakers twenty-three in total.  'Sheed pulled in two in thirty-six minutes.  That's a HUGE gap and hard not to see it as the single biggest key to the game.  KG had an awful game on the boards, but however much many may dislike his personality, there's no basis to assume that he didn't play his hardest and that he didn't work from the very end of the previous season to have himself in the best possible shape for a hypothetical Game Seven.  No one would argue this on 'Sheed's behalf.

After this too-lengthy intro, here is the Mushroom Theory of 'Sheedatatic Lethargy:  Rasheed Wallace's selfish indifference to his professional obligations resulted in a significantly less than maximum performance in the most important game of the team's season and, thus, cost the Celtics a championship.  And as an added corollary:  This is a microcosm of 'Sheed's career and he--and his teamates and fans--finally paid the ultimate price for the way he has always, in unadulterated self-interest, conducted his career.

Discuss...

Just a quick update to my lengthy post of a couple months ago.  This one has been greatly streamlined.

A. "I Hate These Punk Assed Bitches and Wish Awful, Awful Tragedy Upon Them, and Their Families, and Anyone Who Not Only Roots for Them, But Who Desires Anything Short of Prolonged Painful Death for All of Them"

The Miami Heat

B. "I'm Fine with Them Winning, Since They Aren't a Team of Superstars Bought by Pat Riley and Including LeBron James Who May Be the Most Arrogant Piece of Shit to Ever Put on a Professional Uniform"

The Boston Celtics, The Toronto Raptors, The New York Knicks, The New Jersey Nets, The Philadelphia 76ers, The Cleveland Cavaliers, The Chicago Bulls, The Milwaukee Bucks, The Indianapolis Pacers, The Orlando Magic, The Atlanta Hawks, The Charlotte Bobcats, The Washington Wizards, The Houston Rockets, The San Antonio Spurs, The Dallas Mavericks, The Memphis Grizzlies, The New Orleans Hornets, The Denver Nuggets, The Utah Jazz, The Portland Trailblazers, The Oklahoma City Thunder, The Minnesota Timberwolves, The Los Angeles Lakers, The Phoenix Suns, The Los Angeles Clippers, The Golden State Warriors, The Sacramento Kings

C. "Yeah, Obviously, I Want them to Win. But, You Know...the Way I'm Feeling at this Moment, I'd Almost Be Satisfied with Having My Favorite Team Never Again Enjoying a Winning Season if This Somehow Also Meant that the Punk Assed Bitch Miami Heat Suffered Unimaginable Horrors in this LIfe and the Next."

The Detroit Pistons

"Da-da-da-da-daaaa..."

Fandom is such a weird concept. As I've alluded to before in a post, it's an indictment of the rationality of the human psyche that any of us could possible give a good goddamn as to what happens in any sporting event beyond the level of one's own kid playing little league. Who are these folks that we cheer for? How is it that a Michael Bishop fumble with a minute to go in the 1998 Big 12 Championship game that cost my Kansas State Wildcats a shot at the national title still--still--periodically haunst my dreams over a decade later? How could I not really regret a divorce and a friend's suicide in quite the way that I do the ground ball rolling through Leon Durham's legs that doomed the "84 Cubs?

Basically, it makes no sense. What is the source of our loyalty? The "team" is in the city in which we live? Works for some of us, but I haven't lived near Detroit since 1988 and am now about 9,000 miles away. (And it's not like more than a handful of the local friends have ever had any contact with any of the players aside from getting an autograph or gawking during a chance encounter at a restaurant.) The ownership? Frankly, I see little reason to cheer ecstatically for the success of a multi-billionaire. (Did anyone without investments or a tied-in pension fund find themselves sobbing over the failure of Ken Lay's Enron venture?) The players? Yeah, kinda. But not really. We loved Big Ben until 2005, but most of us were at least privately happy to see him fail as a Bull and a Cav. (Oh, but overjoyed at his Benaissance...) I doubt if this site has more than a handful of posters who have not screamed for the team to dump Rip and/or Tay.

Yes, none of this is rational.  Yet, many of us devote as nearly much passion to our preferred sports team as we do to our work, our families, to anything else in our lives.

 In an effort to justify it, we play the "decent guy" card. Virtually every Piston's fan takes it for granted that, man-for-man, our guys are just plain better folk than the guys in the other uniforms. Chauncey and McDyess were consummate professionals and even better human beings. LeBron and KG are, to appropriate the most commonly used moniker in these parts, "douches". And hell--perhaps Chauncey and Dyess are better people. But I'll wager that none of us really cares about that, even if we might believe it to be true.

During the couple of glory years, not a single one of us would have ever, EVER even whispered a disparaging word about 'Sheed. Meanwhile in Portland and other parts of the NBA, he was regularly denounced as being selfish, immature, destructive, and an overall creep. "Misunderstood...underappreciated..the consummate team mate..." was our standard response. (After three years of truly douchebag behavior in Detroit and another of being a self-serving turd in Boston, most defenses of him at DBB are decidedly more muted.) And I enjoyed the AI bashing as much as anyone. Truly, this is a miserable human being and one who has been a destructive influence wherever he's gone. But say, just say, that he'd somehow been the tonic the Pistons needed. (Yeah, he was overrated to begin with and over-the-hill by last year, so this is purely a hypothetical exercise). Say he had provided a spark and transformed the Pistons in a way that led to an improbable run back to the Finals, (as Joe Dumars somehow hoped he might). Not a one of us would have anything but praise for Iverson, professionally or personally.

(CollegeFootballNews.com's Pete Fiutak put it best: "In the harsh reality of the NFL, your favorite team has at least three guys worthy of consideration for People Magazine’s Most Miserable Human Being Alive, but it doesn’t matter if they’re really good at playing football. You take the high character try-hards, I’ll take the Hitler Youth with the elite skills, and you’ll be reading a My Kid Beat Up Your Honor Student bumper sticker as you look up at the truck that made you a speed bump").

No, our guys aren't better people or more worthy than theirs. And if they seem to be, we are either blinded by our desires to love them, or the have better PR skills and/or handlers. (The world raves about Kevin Durrant's humble decency. He may be all that. Or for all we know, the guy sexually assault's puppies, but either he or his handlers know the right things to say and how to keep the evil under wraps. But even if this ugly and unlikely scenario happened to be true, we'd all love to have him as a Piston, and we'd be honored to have him housesit the baby schnauzers we just bought our daughters...)

All of this came to the surface of my mind, as I turned my attention to who to root for in this Piston-free playoffs. As is true with many of us, Denver and San Antonio topped my list, mostly because Chauncey, Spellcheck, and Dyess are a cut of humanity that made Jesus look like a lazy, self-indulgent jerk, and Duncan either is or his handlers make him seem to be a pretty damned good guy. But mostly...mostly, it's all about hate.

 I didn't want the Thunder to win; I wanted the bastard Lakers (and their uber-bastard Kobe) to lose. I don't like Pat Riley, Miami, or Dwayne Wade; but god, I hate the Celtics--especially KG, Pierce, and 'Sheed more. Do any of us have any love for the Bulls as a franchise or for such a poorly functioning team that seems destined to underachieve and sneak into the 8th seed for the next decade to come? But do we hate the Pure Evil that is LeBron James far more? You bet your sweet memories of 2004 we do. (And to state the obvious--if any one of these players were to start playing in a godawful suburb about an hour from Detroit--where I lived during the Carter-Reagan years--we would love, love, love each of every one of these reviled douches, and greet every criticism of them with a mixture of incredulity and hostility.)

So, it's all about hate, baby. And the incidental portion of (equally irrational) affection I have for Dyess and Chauncey notwithstanding, 90% of my interest in this year's (and any year's playoffs) is about wishing for the demise of those I've decided I'd most hate to see happy. Thus, I began this post-season with the following wishes:

The Wistful Dreams of a "Tragic" Plan Crash Teams

The Lakers--Kobe (whether he really raped a woman or not), Hollywood celebs, and Ron Artest (who is basically a more selfish version of 'Sheed, but who doesn't--yet--have a title to bolster his self-satisfied ego)

The Celtics--I find it hard to dislike Ray Allen (http://www.theonion.com/articles/pro-athlete-lauded-for-being-decent-human-being,1477/) and Massachusetts is one of the most reliable Blue States around (oh, one's own political views and the foolish belief that this should have any bearing at all on who you cheer for is certainly a valid component of this circus of irrational attachment) are mitigators. But KG, Paul "The Whiny Thug" Pierce, and now Rasheed "Morgana" Wallace? Despicable.

The Cavs--You know, I've tended to be sympathetic with Cleveland. I mean, hell, their river caught on fire a few years back. (http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=1642) And I like Dennis Kucinich. And it's been a hard-luck sports town with loyal fans. But LeBron, LeBron, LeBron. May the search for the black box begin...

The "Okay, a Plane Crash is a Bit Harsh...Probably the Ball Boys and the Traveling Secretary Aren't Necessarily Evil" Teams

The Magic--Oh, these guys come close. I mean, they are owned by AmWay, as savagely a right-wing, evangelical Christian dominated quasi-cult type of a corporation as you're likely to find. (Again, a reminder that my irrational hatreds based on matters irrelevant to sports are based on my value system. If you spent the 80's bemoaning Reagan's softness on communism, spend your free time outing Pat Robertson's secret pro-gay agenda, and are convinced that Dick Cheney is a closet Muslim, this may be your team). But add to this the (to me--reread the disclaimer of the last sentence) fundamentalist Christianity of Dwight Howard, the grotesque amount of money thrown at Rashad Lewis, and the it's-all-about-me ball hogdom of Vince Carter, and you've got a contender for maximal vitriolic spewing.

The Heat--Pat Riley. City of Miami. Growing sense that D Wade may be a bit of a sleezeball. And the way that the entire team is essentially useless outside of Wade. And I'm still pissed that the Pistons let this team beat them a few years back.

 The Bobcats--Okay, these guys will escape this second most odious category next year, should they return to the playoffs. In fact, they're not necessarily all that far away from being likable. (Despite his $13 million a year to be a bad player, is it really worth wishing ill to Larry Hughes, seeing as he was acquired for salary cap reasons?) If anything, this is a team of no-names that had a nice run this year. But Larry Brown...Larry Fucking Brown.

I am continually amazed that he is not one of the more reviled forces in the League. For one thing, I've never fully bought into his reputation as a great amount greats coach. Yes, he's knowledgeable and generally makes franchises better. But he also cuts and runs so often and then leaves the said franchises in free-fall. For all his genius, he's won a single title (in a year in which he was admittedly great) and made it to two other finals. But that's not "great". That's not Popovich or Phil Jackson, or even Chuck Daly.

What brings him from the category of merely overrated and into the realm of contemptible is not just his lack of "loyalty". (Generally, I see loyalty as one of the great myths of the sporting world; we bemoaned Big Ben's lack of loyalty in "05, but have been collectively working on voodoo spells to dump Rip and Tay.) But Larry Brown transcends mere disloyalty with his utterly selfish lack of professionalism. He wanted to leave the Pistons for the Cavs after the "05 season? All power to him. But to basically announce this during the playoffs? I'm one of the many that believed that this distraction cost the Pistons that championship. And now he pulls the same thing with the Bobcats, and the team hobbles out with a lifeless four game sweep? What a selfish, arrogant prick. Smacks to me of the husband who financially provides for his husband, is generous at Christmas, and is widely recognized as a pillar of his community, but who conducts serial affairs, and then cuts off contact with the teenage child who develops a drug problem and starts to struggle in school. I have a personal dislike of Larry Brown that exceeds that of anyone else in this extended rant. But the general likability of the team makes them a grudging inclusion in this second deepest level of hell.

The "Ya know, I'd Almost Like these Guys if it Weren't for..." Teams

The Jazz--It's nothing short of incredibly how Jerry Sloan has kept this small market team at such a near-elite level for so long. We all like Mehmet. Deron Williams is a remarkable, remarkable player, (who may or may not spend his off season torturing Haitian refugees, but that is unknown and/or irrelevant to the world of sports). Millsap is the sort of blue-collar success story we all love. (He's pretty much what we'd hoped to have had in Maxiell.) But then there's AK-47 and his $16 million a year to do very limited things; and you really hate to see a team rewarded for that sort of stupidity. And then there's Boozer, who strikes many of us as the ultimate self-fixated wiener. His double-dealing with Cleveland a few years ago was pretty sleezy, and no player making $13 million per year (FYI, that's about $25 per minute spent playing, practicing, sleeping, watching TV, drinking, or staring lovingly at photographs at himself) and then constantly bitching about how unhappy and unappreciated he his ranks very high in my book...I just don't want to see this guy succeed.

A final bit about the Jazz that sticks in my craw is that social/religious/political status quo in Utah. My bias hinted at above is that I'm deeply a-religious and tend to dislike and distrust overt displays of religiosity, particularly when it strikes me as particularly dogmatic. The missionary work of the LDS creeps me out and I still have a hard time getting over that fact that until 1978, folks of African descent were denied priesthood because of their color. Mind you, this has NOTHING to do with basketball. But given the prevalence of deeply religiously and politically conservative people in the Jazz's fan base, I'll root against them.

(And yes, I'm aware that this is somewhat bigoted. Anti-religiosity was built into the core of my personality and it remains. My gut-level belief is that it's all nonsense, that there is no afterlife or supernatural, and that the tendency for people to devote so much passion and energy to something so unverifiable and quite possibly non-existent leads to more bad than good. But as the years have made me wiser and more mellow, I've also come to realize that I know no more than the Reverend Jerry Falwell did, and that the world is filled with utterly decent and very thoughtful people who are deeply religious. And though a preponderance of my closest friends share my attitudes toward religion, I have many people close to me who are very religious and I respect their different take on the matter. And hell, I lived in Pakistan for two years--where religious sentiment is omnipresent--and still count many very devout Muslims as dear friends. My point in defending myself from possibly legit criticism is that I don't--or try very hard not to--judge individuals by their religious inclinations. But here I'm focusing on basketball fandom and good reason and consistency, as I've tried here to make the point, are irrelevant.)

The Mavericks--I guess I've gotten used to Mark Cuban's "I'm a brash-billionaire-so-everyone-pay-attention-to-meeeeee" routine and I've come to really admire Dirk's consistent brilliance and accountability over the years. I could almost have been a six week fan. But then there's Jason Kidd. Wife-beater. Bullshit. Doesn't matter that she may be an awful person herself. Hitting people sucks, and especially when the beater is a 210 pound powerful athlete and the victim is his wife and mom of his kids. Here's a guy I want to see retire without a career-capping ring.

(Mind you, if Kidd ends up in a Piston's uni next year and somehow leads them to the most inexplicable championship in all of sports' history, expect a follow up essay about "occasional indiscretions" and how "everybody deserves a second chance"...)

The Suns--another essentially likable team. It's hard not to love what Steve Nash brings to the court, (and he was a public opponent of the stupid Iraqi invasion, which wins him points in my home of Lefty Land.) This is a team that has managed to play an unorthodox style of basketball and continue to win and entertain through a succession of coaches. There's just something about Amare Stoudamire's constant media whines and the sense that if his ego isn't placated, he won't play particularly hard. Trade him for Jonas Jerebko and Rodney Stuckey and this could be a team I'd be proud to root for (if necessary) next April.

The Thunder--oh, I love the team. Durrant is a wonder (and maybe doesn't actually sexually assault puppies, which, again, even if he does, would be a minor issue if he were a Piston). But I Iived in Seattle for a bit, and the Sonics were my unofficial second team. Now, if Clay Bennett were a special guest on the plane that flew the Cavs, Celts, or Lakers to their next game, these guys might top my list of non-Piston faves. But I don't want to see that bastard hoist a champagne-soaked trophy over his head. He's a bad, bad man...

The "Meh...Okay. Fine. I'll Deal with It..." Teams

The Bulls--yeah, they got the rivalry with us. Yeah, they stole "Big Ben". And yeah, they seem to chronically underachieve and it's hard to find much moxie (last year's seven-gamer with the Celts aside) in this lot. But Chicago is a great city with some great fans. And there's no one on the roster who particularly vexes me.

The Hawks--I never much cared for what little I knew (basically nothing) about Jamal Crawford, and Josh Smith always seems on the verge of giving definitive evidence of being a first-rate A-hole. But this team was put together in a neat way with lots of deceptively good complimentary players. Love, love, love to see them shock the AmWay Magic.

The Bucks--With another season like this, these guys could jump into exalted "I Don't Really Hate Them at All" category. I just don't know them well enough to endorse them as such yet.

The "I Really Don't Hate Them at All..." Teams

The Blazers--First of all, I like Portland. I like the city, I like it's people, I love the small market love for the team. (I even love the weather.) Though they were the Doucheblazers a few years back, (gee, could 'Sheed have played a role in that?), this is a great roster of seemingly stand-up guys. (Insert the already oft-repeated caveat that these guys may all be pure evil beneath the surface...) The management has drafted smart, (despite the tough luck with Oden, who strikes me as a truly sympathetic character), and there's no one on the roster who strikes me as a grossly overpaid knucklehead. Yes, the dream has ended for this year, but barring an Iverson signing in the off-season or a Piston's revival, this could be the team I cheer for next year.

The Nuggets--It starts with Chauncy, of course. And, in a way, ends with Chauncey. He's one of the few pro athletes for whom I almost feel genuine personal affection. He always seemed so honest in front of a microphone, and he handled his dumping by the Pistons with such class. As we look back at "04, it was a team effort, of course. But Chauncey was the indispensable one (with Big Ben as the other candidate, though the team continued to be a top contender after Ben left). Rip was a great scorer. Tay was an x-factor.'Sheed--much as I dislike the guy now--was the acquisition that put them over the top. But watching what happened the moment they let Chauncey go (plus, what his addition meant to the Nuggets), it's clear that he's the guy to whom we owe that six year run. I've also read interviews in which he's not only political aware, but also shares my inclinations. He's the pro athlete I'd most like to randomly meet some day. J.R. Reid, of course, is sort of a jerk-off. And great as he is, I always sense that a big part of Carmelo Anthony's super-star status comes from his unreal NCAA tournament years back. (Perhaps it's always someone else's fault, but last year aside, his teams have always underachieved a bit.) But with Chauncey in tow (and Spellcheck making us a combination of proud, infuriated, and downright confused, I would have been happy to see the Nuggets win it all and am sorry that they went down to a good Jazz team.

(As an added note, I've decided that one of the most admirable trait of Chauncey was his refusal to publicly fault others, even when it was probably more than justifiable to do so. I don't recall him ever dissing Flip, even through body language. And in retrospect, how incredibly frustrating must it have been to have watched 'Sheed display the emotional maturity of a middle schooler and get himself tossed from that final game against the Cavs? Or to look at as 'Sheed realized after a couple of games against the Celtics that he was half the player of KG and also being outplayed by Kendrick Perkins, and thus seeming to spend the final four games throwing up threes and showing the emotion of a lobotomy patient. I used to wonder why Chauncey was so fixated on the "You know, when he plays hard, 'Sheed can be one of the very best players in the world" line, as to me it seemed to be more of a damning commentary than a tribute. But now, I can't help but wonder if Chauncey knew that publicly stating the obvious--that 'Sheed can't handle any situation in which he's not successful without really being accountable--would achieve nothing, so he might as well try another tactic to motivate the guy.)

The Spurs--can it be that I like the Spurs the best of the lot? After what happened in "05? After having already won three titles? Being from Texas, even? Yeah, the Spurs got my nod and are one of the three remaining teams (one more to be eliminated tonight) whose victory wouldn't leave me feeling cranky.

It's Dyess, of course.that is my main source of loyalty. Again, I know it may be all spin. He may be--next to Dave Chappelle's Clayton Bigsby character--the 2nd ever African-American Klansman. He might enjoy traveling to the developing world so that he can kick starving children in the stomach (only to complain that he bruises his toes on their spines. Maybe. But god, you get the impression that he's a stand up guy. And watching him play his ass off while Iverson quit the team and 'Sheed had his contract renegotiated so that he didn't have to ever get within twenty feet of either basket, I came to admire him so greatly, and felt especially badly about him for the near miss of "05.

 But it ain't just Dyess. Do we know of a modern superstar with less of an "it's-about-me" attitude than Duncan? (Come to think of it, has San Antonio ever employed a player who has had even the vaguest reputation as a prima donna or a stats-chaser?) And what an incredible front office. Sure, they ping-pong-balled their way to Duncan, but Tony Parker came with the 28th pick and Manu (say what you will about his flopping, he plays his ass off and he does it for his team, and not just for Manu) came well into the second round. Finding George Hill (who has replaced Parker in the starting line up; and extra props to Parker for not bitching) at Indiana-Purdue? Not being dumbasses (like Dumars three times) and realizing that Dejuan Blair (16 and 13 per 36) will be great for at least a few seasons, even if his knees do give out? Geez, I almost like these guys. Admire, even. I'm glad they're alive in their quest for number four.

So, I end here with some love, or at least appreciation. But my basic point stands--I (like most of the folks on this board, based on what I read) watch this game and cast my allegiances based more on who I hate and who I slightly-less-than hate, than who I like. I like the Pistons. I like a few ex-Pistons. I can find reasons to think maybe I could like a few other players. But I want to see the rest of them go down and go down hard, and this is what motivates my continued interest in these play offs.

And none of this makes the slightest bit of rational sense.