Let it be known throughout the land that I condemn evil in all its forms, and that goes for everything from jaywalking to hanging out with Blackwater call center employees. With that in mind, I find it totally bizarre that Chris Bosh might be done in Toronto over some child support drama. The Toronto Star sums up said transgressions -- alleged transgressions -- thusly: "[D]ocuments in an ongoing child-support case cited in this newspaper accused Bosh of leaving his ex-girlfriend destitute while she was seven months into a difficult pregnancy with the couple's consensually conceived daughter "
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↵Okay, pretty raw. And yeah, if it's true, then "Bosh's days as being known as one of the NBA's good guys are over, at least for a good while." We're talking something in between Dwight Howard's impregnation of an unwed cheerleader, which ended his Christian Crusader thing once and for all, and the darkness that Kobe unleashed in Eagle, Colorado. So Bosh, an extremely talented basketball player and generally bright dude who is the third-place prize in the 2010 stakes, has some image rehabbing to do. Right? Athletes screw up like this sometimes, and while we condemn them, it's not a career-killer. ↵
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↵Unless you play for Bryan Colangelo. Again, The Star: ↵
↵⇥Don't think that doesn't matter to Colangelo. And don't think it won't be another key factor in Colangelo's decision-making process in a coming off-season when the struggling franchise will face difficult questions about its direction. ↵⇥↵I don't doubt that character might matter to Colangelo, just as it's always been key to the Spurs organization (like when Stephen Jackson clinched their ring; was that nature or nurture?). But there's no way that, if Colangelo places too much emphasis on this mini-scandal, it's not perceived as a smokescreen for Bosh's decision to leave. Why did we lose CB4? We didn't want him. This young star may play elsewhere, but we have our pride. Really convincing, right? ↵
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↵⇥If the allegations in the court filings prove to be true -- and that's a massive if because nothing has been proven in court -- it's difficult to imagine Colangelo proceeding with Bosh on the roster past this season. And even if Bosh's side of the story is compelling and believable, which anyone who cares about this team can only hope it will be, maybe the damage is done. ↵
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↵And here's the other thing that makes me cringe: Why is it that sleazy guys can get away with things, while good guys fall faster and harder than anyone else? That's what made the Kobe story such a bombshell -- he'd been presented as this squeaky-clean, sponsor magnet, poised and well-spoken, and then everyone panicked when he proved to be kind of nuts and scary. So with Bosh, what if one of the league's most affable, relaxed personalities turns out to be awful with family issues? Naturally, the two opposites collide and the world ends. ↵
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↵That we can't accept that good guys might have some negative impulses says more about us than it does the players. What's preferable, relatively harmless jerks who do semi-jerky things on a regular basis? People are complex.↵
This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.