Hide Ya Face

If you've not yet done so, please read Shoals's nearly perfect articulation of Ron Artest. As I think about the piece, I like it even more for having been posted during the nation's birthday weekend. Seems like a subtle, even if unintended, ribbing for all of Ron's self-righteous detractors. He enjoys freedom and opportunity in this land, too.

Also, please check the latest recommendations posted in the Amazon widget along the right side of this page. Clicking through means good things for FD, for the products endorsed, for Amazon, and for your karma. Just clicking through before buying something else is helpful. The karma bit's been verified by science, by the way.

If ever there were a summer made for Rasheed Wallace, this is the one. The draft yielded few sure vessels of transformation, and free agency has mostly offered existing contenders new resources for strengthening their positions. (Unless folks are expecting exuberant Turkish people to help push Toronto to the top of the Eastern Conference.) Should it actually arrive, enabled by The 2010 Free Agent Class and a coming draft haul expected to greatly exceed that from last month, the much-discussed New League Order remains at least a year away. For the time being, teams with stars, systems, and identities all firmly established are jostling to find the element that will deliver a championship. Rasheed Wallace is playing with house money as these squads gamble.



We already know that history is likely to speak ill of Roscoe. It will harp upon his volatility. It will almost jeer as it calls him an underachiever. And it surely will subsume his contribution to Detroit's recent championship, bundling it with "however" and "if only" while emphasizing the technicals and the meltdowns. Rasheed will go out as grousing, mercurial, unreliable. His enormous talents will only damn him, as the critics, whose voices appear to ring loudest, cite his gifts as evidence of the disappointment he's authored. We need not even wait for validation; already, the historic Portland collapse from 2000 is an iconic moment for all the wrong reasons. A family man, a concerned member of his communities, a thoughtful fellow--makes no difference. Rasheed is nonetheless cast as the embodiment of failure, a source of the Jail Blazer malignancy and a paradigm of the problematic NBA player.

Rasheed's story would be different had he won more, or, in the alternative, had he been a lesser talent. Fair or not, he has been crushed by falling bricks from the crumbling foundation laid by expectation. The popular story of Roscoe never cares to take up trifling details such as his natural deference, or his preference for serving as an equal and not a star. Our sports culture so thoroughly disdains "wasting" talent that Rasheed Wallace's career is almost wholly anathema. People see his gorgeous jump shot, his facility near the basket, his technical proficiency and deride him as disinterested, insincere, or straight up idiotic. They observe that he's among the most gifted on-ball post defenders in memory, or they recognize his basketball intelligence, and they seethe that he's not nearly effective enough. For years, Wallace was supposed to mature into a leading man on par with players who share his physical prowess. Players like Timothy D and Kevin. Yet, he didn't, and the convention that reviles Wallace never allowed for a reconciliation of Roscoe's game and the ways we watch basketball. So Rasheed has enjoyed most-hated-on status.

Were sports dialogue less rigid, were attitudes more malleable, Rasheed may have had a chance. Rather than damning Wallace for what he isn't, we might have instead appreciated the intrinsic value of a diverse and refined skill set. Roscoe is fun to watch. Further, Roscoe hints at new possibilities, perhaps more than any other big man. Kevin Garnett, for instance, is many things, but a reliable post scorer and a three-point threat are not among them. Dirk Nowitzki, too, is many things, but an athletic and crafty defender has yet to appear on anyone's scouting report. Somehow, Rasheed doesn't get credit for what he is, nor, more rhapsodically, for what he's shown someone else might be. Seeing him score from the outside before drop-stepping and fading his way to more points on the next possession fairly invites the question of why he doesn't score more often, or more reliably. That said, more creative sports thinking could perhaps allow this inquiry to exist alongside greater admiration for Roscoe's game. Only, that's not how the world works. The emphasis, instead, is on how far he remains relative to where he is supposed to be.

Rasheed bears some blame, of course. His flare-ups have been counterproductive, and shameful moments like Game 6 against Cleveland three seasons ago strike at whatever sympathy his personality, history, and style encourage. Be moody. Reject that talent carries with it a mandate to aspire for greatness. But don't flout obligations, or punk out in such explosive, consuming fashion. Boorishness leads to anger. In that way, Roscoe has invited some scorn.



Miscreant or misunderstood, fairly criticized or unfairly villified, Sheed is most certainly not a superstar. He would likely be first to say so. He is, instead, a highly skilled complementary player, albeit one whose natural gifts are vast but not focused in the way that separates Kobe from Pietrus. As noted, this is the summer of Wallace's dreams.

On Wednesday, Roscoe officially signs up with the Celtics. The idea is that a healthy Kevin and the improved frontcourt depth which Rasheed creates will elevate the Celtics above the Cavs and the Magic, to say nothing of the Lakers. Rasheed will arrive to find a team with a leader (or three), a pecking order, a coach who juggles personalities, and a system. He is being added as Rasheed Wallace, Missing Link, not Rasheed Wallace, Primary Element. When he arrived in Detroit, despite assuming a role in the starting lineup and immediately becoming a prominent figure, he enjoyed similar luxuries. The Pistons had two guards who ran the offense and the team. The Pistons had a defensive anchor whose effort forbade anyone else from taking plays off. And--without rendering judgment about his disposition or playing the right way--the Pistons had LB, in all his lugubrious glory. (OK, so I judged his personality a little.)

In the D, Sheed wasn't asked to be "the leader" and wasn't asked to be "the guy" in a basketball sense. He was asked to assimilate--something he does well, as he's quite bright--and find ways to use his enormous ability in complementary fashion. Without compromising who he is, Wallace helped the Pistons win one title and come within a bad fourth quarter of repeating the next year. Perhaps it wasn't coincidental that the Pistons fell off as the coach left, the defensive anchor left, the point guard started to wear down, and more was quickly demanded from Rasheed. Judge Wallace as you will, but teams commonly cannot succeed when its players are asked to do things beyond their capabilities and comfort zones. That doesn't excuse untimely technicals, but it does, as usual, answer the more thoughtless dismissals that Wallace simply didn't fulfill his potential. For a time, he did. When those expectations grew outsized, he couldn't meet them and the team withered.



Awarding the 2010 championship to Boston on July 6th would be a little silly. Let's not do that. But let's acknowledge that Boston may be adding the most gifted role player of all time. And there is no intended shame in that distinction: as just noted, Roscoe knows the role he wants and has proven that he can acquit himself well when properly cast. In Boston, he will be afforded the opportunity to again demonstrate what he does, and how he best does it. A championship is not likely to undo all of the harm his reputation and legacy have incurred, but he might be able to affix some lasting repairs.

The question of temperament can't be avoided, so we should dwell upon that for a moment. Rasheed erupts sometimes. It will inevitably happen in Boston. (Can't wait to see how Boston treats such a flamboyant, on-court-angry black man if things don't go as planned.) But, is there anyone who credibly can argue that Sheed's temper will be a problem? When he has to walk back to a huddle which features a man who matched Kobe's playoff intensity while in street clothes, and probably while seated on his couch last month? Kevin Garnett will not suffer fools, distractions, or undermining tantrums. If anything, the rest of the league should be terrified. Combining Rasheed's indignation and KG's fury might resemble what would happen if the sun made a nuclear weapon and detonated it inside of a 100 supernovas. The entire Warriors backcourt could be blown off the court by the force of the energy. Also, if you can buy stock in something like "'motherfucker' being uttered in Boston," now might be a good time.



We are at a moment when the thrust of NBA activity centers around filling in at the margins and finding that last required piece. Sheed's been here, waiting for us to acknowledge this need. Everyone should let him do it.

Playing With House Pancakes

You want to know why I didn't flinch when Shaqobronix, or whatever it's called, came to pass? Why I was lukewarm on the Celtics, and to this day think my premonition was right? It's because this is what a real meeting of the minds should feel like.

Let's stop momentarily and honor Trevor Ariza, who will have a bright career elsewhere, starting with Houston, where he will either make okay to like Shane Battier, displace him the way we thought James White might do Bowen, or both. I know how important he was to that championship run. But that's in the past. They got the ring; these things are filled with singularities, contingencies, and rarely start-to-finish mandates. He was part of one crazy summer, and now instead, Ron Artest will be a Laker.

What makes Artest such a magical beast is that he's exactly the opposite of a championship. That place in history was a flux that ends in certainty. Artest is forever bold statements and stands, all adding up to bouquet of question marks. He can do nothing to surprise is, partly due to our numbness, but also because of how damn earnest he is about everything. It's a testament to Ron Ron that he can fall back on the force of his spoken and implicit convictions, no matter how ever-shifting and contradictory they may be. Artest will always have, for lack of a better word, his realness. Not his authenticity—he's not the only athlete from the projects who's seen shit—but the ability to make us watch not out of horror or honor, but from a place of love.

Like it or not, there is something admirable about Artest. Otherwise, he'd be a garden-variety sociopath. He's no longer a symbol of instability or risk, but of the enduring quality that could redeem such a blood-blender of a career: the fact that, at the time, he sure did mean it.



You might also say he's the opposite of Kobe Bryant, who by the least charitable reading, is the form of conviction without any of its substance. That would of course be totally wrong and unfair (though I expect to hear it echoed in the comments section), and yet it gets at something of Kobe's, well, dullness. Artest is complicated in the literal sense, of things fucking each other up and getting in each other's way. Kobe's complicated like a watch or schematic, and it's only us on the outside who don't see the internal logic. Ron Artest is inconvenienced by logic, Kobe redeemed by it. That's partly why you never hear "why doesn't Ron Artest win a championship?" It just doesn't seem right to bring him into the world of criteria. He has one of those careers that, when it's over, we'll all know whether it left a mark or not.

That's why it's so perfectly glib, and hilarious, that he's being attached to a team looking for a second championship. I caught some criticism for suggesting that, even if the Shaq-jection was successful, LeBron would only have one ring. I know that city and franchise can't like that, and noted as much, but James needs to be thinking dynasty. It's in his nature, the scope of what he does in the sport. Kobe, on the other hand, needed that single Shaq-less ring. Right, there's the three-peat, and the dynasty he got to help author. This last one, though, was all about the technicality. Ironic as all get-out, then, that this kind of thinking barely enters Artest's mind, or those who would judge him. Sometimes you wonder if he even thinks in terms of seasons, or even final scores. Each nanosecond is a war.

Ron Artest doesn't need a ring. Kobe doesn't anymore, either. There's zero pathos or desperation to this, not even with Lamar Odom presumably back on board (more on that in a second). I'm not saying the Lakers won't have desire, just that there won't be pressure beyond the pressure to play basketball. LA is great at disappearing; I think that having no weight on their shoulders will make for less, not more, of that. Artest, paradoxical as this may sound, will also only heighten this new outlook.

To close out this journey to the heavens and back again, the reason I am bouncing off the walls tonight is because of the Artest/Odom reunion. I know people have a problem with Knicks exceptionalism, and maybe even New York exceptionalism. But fuck it: I am sick of Mark Jackson having a monopoly on the New York Basketball brand. How long has it been since we heard any other announcer describe a player as NY, except in passing? Do not so quickly forget what our Attorney General said at his Senate confirmation hearings! Not bullshit street ball, these two; they're the stuff lore is made of. Artest is all grit and aggression, Odom beauty and otherworldliness. Sometimes I don't know who between them has more anguish in their game; they probably share a sack. However, as much as it will sicken some to hear this, seeing the two of them on one team is, in a sense, a triumph for whatever it is that city means to the sport.

It may be Los Angeles hanging a banner in a year, but if you want to talk style and stories, you couldn't make a team more New York if you wanted to. Just from these two.

Taking One For the Team: On Converting Your S.O. Into A Sports Fan

With the draft dead and summer league weeks away, it's time to ponder other matter. Hence, we turn to Jim Ruland for some sports/relationship advice. Jim is the author of Big Lonesome, a collection of short stories, none of which are about Chris Kaman.

Now you’ve done it. You’ve gone against your best instincts and worst intentions. You’ve risked ridicule from your friends and put your free time (to say nothing of your finances) in serious jeopardy. You have fallen irrefutably, irredeemably in love.

They said be careful. They said look before you leap. But did you listen? No. You threw caution to the wind and pitched yourself over the cliff. You’re like someone with an incurable disease: there’s no hope for you.

Now you find yourself at the crossroads, ready to take the next step and reveal yourself for what you truly are.

A fan.

(You probably thought I was going to say “alternative lifestyle enthusiast” didn’t you? If you did, that means you’re probably a Dallas Cowboys fan, which is more or less the same thing.)

This is a serious dilemma. Potential mates will look past a lot of flaws if the positives outweigh the negatives--lack of education, staggering credit card debt, your asshole friends--but once you’re outed as a sports junkie, it’s only a matter of time before it becomes obvious that you are the asshole friend.

You know those relationship red flags they’re always talking about in a certain type of magazine that usually has Oprah on the cover? It’s not a metaphor. The red flag is your team colors. But there’s no need to surrender. You can win your squeeze over by following these simple steps:

INTRODUCING YOUR SIGNIFICANT OTHER TO YOUR TEAM

The logical first step is to bring your S.O. to a game, right?

Wrong. First of all, most professional games are long, dull and boring. Being a fan, you do not comprehend this. “Boring? There’s nothing boring about the Lakers/Colts/Red Sox!” To demonstrate how wrong you are, read this review of a performance of “The Nutcracker” by the City Ballet of San Diego. Couldn’t hack it, could you? Now try to imagine being there. For most non-hoops/football/baseball fans, attending a sporting event is like this. Times twenty.

The key to a successful first step in sports fandom immersion is controlling the environment. I don’t recommend watching the game at home for a number of reasons: 1) Old habits die hard. If the game’s tied going into the fourth quarter are you going to remember that she’s even there? 2) You have to clean and/or your parents will embarrass you. 3) You don’t want her to see your LeBron James puppet theater.



But where do you take her? A lot depends on the sport. Here’s a short list ranked from the easiest to most difficult on the conversion scale:

1. Hockey: Really. Everyone loves violence. Most people won’t admit it, but it’s true. Plus, if you’re a hockey fan, chances are you live in a shithole and she’s as starved for quality entertainment as you are. If you’re a transplanted NHL fan, all bets are off. I have a friend in San Diego who is a hardcore hockey nut and on most weekend nights he can be found trolling the Gaslamp Quarter for vacationing Canadians. Sad, very sad.

2. Basketball: It’s fast, it flows, it’s graceful, and it’s acrobatic. It’s also screamingly obvious. Either the ball goes in the bucket or it doesn’t. It’s also exceptionally difficult. We all know people who are convinced they could play pro ball if only their knee hadn’t blown out. Not so with basketball. (Are you 6’9”? Do you have freakishly large hands? Do you have the legs of a gazelle and the heart of an assassin? Then STFU.) The athletes do things on the court that we can only dream about and they do it on the regular and, perhaps most importantly, we can see their facial expressions while they do it. I’m going to suggest it’s poetry in motion or anything like that, but it’s at least the equivalent of a muscular species of doggerel.

3. Football: Let me say this once and get it out the way: football is the most complex game in the history of mankind. What else requires a 53-man roster, a dozen coaches, a few dozen assistants and a small army of equipment people to make the enterprise possible? (Warfare, maybe.) And football is burdened with more Byzantine rules than any one person can be expected to absorb in a single afternoon season. But when an offense or defense executes its game plan it’s astonishing to watch. And if it’s done when the clock is ticking down and everything is on the line, there are few things more dramatic than a come-from-behind victory. Also the fact that the games occur just once a week also works in your favor. It’s a tough sell, but it’s helped along by all the food and fanfare that is considered part of the pageantry.

4. Horse Racing: Don’t believe me? Have you ever seen an actual horse? I’m kind of sort of kidding here but the point that needs to be made is that just about anything is more enjoyable than televised baseball and I say this as a baseball fan. An afternoon spent watching a game of baseball at home is a form of early-onset oldness. You know what goes well with televised baseball? Newspapers and naps. Next thing you know you’ll be drinking prune juice and watching Matlock.

5. Baseball: But only if you’ve had your hip replaced.

THE FIRST SPORTS DATE

I recommend an upscale sports bar. The key is to make it as normal a date as possible with sports as an added bonus. A place that is an official team bar is good because it proves that your preoccupation is shared by others.

A word to the wise: make sure it’s not the place where you normally watch the game as Murphy’s Law dictates that the rival sports fan you almost got into it with or drunken cougar you nearly took home three seasons ago will resurface and put your plans in peril. If you’ve been bounced from all the local watering holes, plan a picnic and listen to the game on the radio. Remember, it’s not like going to the movies where you put all interaction on hold. At the sports bar you have to talk and stuff.

It goes without saying that you will be recording the game and watching it later with the phone turned off and all of your rituals in effect (i.e. burning sage, donning unis, heating up the nacho cheese).

INTRODUCING YOUR S.O. TO YOUR “FRIENDS”

Breaking in a new lover is like breaking in a baseball glove: you have to be rough. You’ve followed my advice and taken the first step and been generous (but not too generous) with the lubricating oil, now it’s time to stick a ball in your lover’s mouth and stuff him or her under the mattress—too far, maybe? The point is you’re going to have to expose your new fling/life partner/mail-order sex slave to a little harsh treatment so when things really get serious they’re battle-tested and ready. I’m talking about introducing them to your friends. Three words: proceed with caution.



There are two kinds of friends: the people we like and the people with whom we watch sports. The two aren’t synonymous. I’m not going to spend the day on a boat fishing with some asshole I can’t stand, but I’ll spend an equivalent amount of time watching the game with him, regardless of how many warrants, divorces and/or DUIs the guy has. Friends come and go but a fan is a fan.

The best scenario for introducing your S.O. to your friends is at a game-watching party held at someone’s house who is extremely successful. This sends the message that successful people are Philadelphia Eagles fans, too. (Just kidding. There’s no such thing as a successful Philadelphia Eagles fan..) There should be a mix of people, male and female, married and single, just like a beer commercial. This may take some effort, some careful planning, possibly even the hiring of actors and bribing of affluent acquaintances. And it must be done in such a way that your S.O. feels like they’re in a beer commercial without actually being aware of it.

TAKING YOUR S.O. TO THE BIG GAME

You’ve taken in some games together, got the “friends” introduction out of the way—now it’s time for the next step: going to a game. Some tips:

1. Don’t cheap out. Get good seats. A fan might be happy to be in the same city as their favorite sports team, but a casual, semi-interested observer needs to be able to actually see the game in order to experience it. Go figure.

2. Be prepared but don’t over-prepare. Going to a game is a colossal pain in the ass. Fans frequently overlook this. Remember the ballet example. Would you tailgate to a ballet? Sit in the parking lot for an hour afterwards because the traffic is grid-locked? Risk being groped in long bathroom lines filled with drunks? (Don’t answer that.) There’s nothing you can do about these things but a little preparation goes a long way. Some things you should never be without during a first date to a game: sunscreen, aspirin, blanket, handy wipes, first aid kit, snacks, full tank of gas, and a shitload of cash.

3. No face paint. For reals. And for god’s sake, don’t forget your medication.

MISCELLANEOUS TIPS FOR SEALING THE DEAL

BE A FRONTRUNNER: Everyone loves a winner. What better way to demonstrate your dominance over the rest of the species than by aligning yourself with newly anointed champions? So go right ahead and dress up in matching Lakers gear. On second thought, maybe you shouldn’t.

BAIT & SWITCH: If you know you can’t control yourself during the NBA playoffs, feign interest in another sport that you don’t really care about as a way to get your S.O. used to the idea that you’re a sports fan, while still providing the attention and consideration that will prove impossible during the Western Conference Finals . This doesn’t make it easier, but it shortens the learning curve.



BE CASUAL: I was at a hardcore New York sports fan’s house the other day and his collection of jerseys, bats, balls, and other memorabilia was the most impressive I’ve ever seen. What made it so cool is that he had the stuff lying around. You could get close to it, pick it up, get intimate with history. He’s clearly obsessed, but because he wasn’t super intense about his stuff he came off like a normal person. It’s like he was saying, This is a big deal to me, but I don’t expect you to feel the same. Don’t try this at home if you have pets. You’re going to look pretty silly with your arm up your dog’s ass after Fido scarfs down that Ricky Henderson batting glove.

THE ULTIMATE, FAIL-SAFE WAY TO CONVERT YOUR S.O. INTO A SPORTS FAN: If none of the steps above work, do what I did: marry someone who went to high school with a player on your favorite sports team

French Furniture

Sportsfans,

I feel so old media, the way every time I pick up my pointer finger to start typing, it’s already been covered, re-covered, and thoroughly digested. Nonetheless, allow me to ponder some recent events.

Richard Jefferson.

Amazing deal for the Spurs. AND they got DeJuan Blair (whose name my brother and I were calling every time Stern stepped to the podium for picks 19 through 30). Now, this comment may bring Brickowski out of retirement, but I have to wonder how much of the Spurs’ “genius” is simply taking advantage of other teams’ stupidity. Like,

1) You don’t NOT take a chance on DeJuan Blair’s knees if you’re a non-lottery team in a pretty weak draft.

2) If you are John Hammond, don't you at least have to throw in Charlie Bell's contract or get a draft pick or SOMETHING to let your fans know you are asleep at the wheel? I'm so f'ing sick of the 'alluring 2010 offseason 'I could vomit up fishbones. Beyond the top three 2010 FAs on this list (Bosh, LBJ, Wade--the former of which are not going anywhere anyway), is there ANY body that you would want your team to throw Rashard Lewis money at? Most of these guys have are gonna be old or have a history of injuries. And any now-monetarily satiated star who is slightly appealing (e.g. Dirk) isn't going to be looking to play in Milwaukee or Minnesota...they're gonna be looking to go somewhere to get a ring.

In sum, the Spurs are now better than the Nuggets and a hair worse than the Lakers, who are right now the best team in the West.

Blake Griffin

Not much to say here, just wanted to make the prediction that he will be better than Durant and Beasley. Probably Carmelo too. Seems to be the first forward since LeBron to come into the league with a legit NBA frame. I'm sure B-Diddy will break out his good legs for this season. Am excited.

Ricky Rubio

First off, as a Wolves fan, I'm angry. This is personal-not-business. The draft has left me with a clawed-at scalp, and a head full of worries, one of which is that Ty Lawson will haunt us for years to come. On Rubio, I want to give sincere thanks to Canis Hoopus for writing this so I don't have to. Everyone take a second to go read it. No, seriously, take a look at it...Now that that's over with, let's talk about another angle on how this story is being covered/manufactured/facilitated. You know it's bad when you have to rely on Jay Mariotti to land the few big punches and point to what is the critical issue here. It's race. In his essential FCKYOU to the dream of so many inner city kids and farm boy hayseeds, Ricky Rubio is being coddled, practically ENCOURAGED by ESPN to seek a trade, to make demands, to act like he has played one goddam nanosecond of American ball.

Mariotti brings up Eli Manning and John Elway. Good start, but they (a) had college resumes to back up their trade demands, and (b) ended up talking the talk. What about Jamarcus Russell, Cedric Benson...how about Steve Francis? You think they got this sort of treatment when they made their childish demands? Hell no. And they were already proven commodities in the US!

I mean, Rubio skipped out on the Wolves first press conference. Can you imagine if TO skipped out on the Bills voluntary workouts! That would have been news! Oh wait, it was! What Rubio is doing with his passive/aggressive trade angling and failure to commit to the Wolves is as bad as Kobe/Shaq/Marbury/Cassell/etc. trade demands...except it's WORSE. He is an unproven commodity and he is shitting on the American Dream.

Thanks ESPN/athletes for keeping mid-market teams hostage!

Shaquille O’Neal

...which brings me to Shaq, or instead LeBron. Talk about keeping mid-market teams hostage, and that is LeBron's daily operation. Instead of committing to Cleveland once and for all, he forces Danny Ferry's shaky hand to getting the Big Situation Room, who at this point is simply a coach-killing token that allows Ferry to say, "Look Bron! Look how much we want to keep you around! We got a top 50 player for you!" Getting Shaq is about as good as any other Danny Ferry move: admirable on paper, questionable during playoff time, always the scapegoat after the Cavs are ousted.

I am also pissed (on behalf of Cavs fans) for how much this is a gut reaction to losing out to Dwight Howard in particular (with Shaq, oddly, poised to be playing the role of Dwight-Howard-stopper). Did they forget that the reason they lost was because Turkoglu and Lewis got ridiculously hot, and Mo Williams forgot to show up every other game?

A logical response would be to attain more shooters because in this day and age, LeBron effectively IS Shaq. Nah, eff that. He is a better Shaq than Shaq. He occupies space in the lane and can attract double teams (which Shaq no longer can), and is a better passer than Shaq. How about Ferry gives Milwaukee a call and see if Hammond wants to complete that rebuilding project by dumping Michael Redd?

Too much blood has been spilled on this topic already, but I had to say my piece.

Kevin Love

Now I'm as much of a hater on Twitter's media coverage as there. I hate the Time cover, the slacktivism behind thinking we're doing anything on Twitter to aid the Iran situation, the smug "look at our bourgeoise generation talking about talking about talking about" angle to every trend piece on the topic of Twitter, but I have to be real: K-Love’s Twitter is changing my life, or at least the way I follow sports. I swore I would never “follow” a celebrity, but when he aired the McHale news, I gave it a shot. And now... well, given my Wolves’ allegiance, I mean this is like watching Twin Peaks and being able to get a phone call from Dale Cooper every now and then to see what he’s thinking. Incredible stuff.

Toss Off Those Glittery Outlaws

So that's how I found myself in the position of reputationally damaging one of my favorite players.

On Saturday, when the sun should've been setting and I should've been buying chicken broth, I ended up having an impassioned phone conversation with Chris Littmann over those Jennings/Budden tapes. I hadn't taped them off the original camera feed, or put them on message boards, hip-hip with a trace of Knicks, in the first place. But we were in a position to, as the kids say, blow up his spot in a major way. The question was, how to do so without coming over as prudish, judgmental asses who don't actually like getting to hear players really, truly be themselves.

I think we—well, actually, Chris—did a good job softening, or ambiguifying, the blow. But the fact remains: The Baseline, formerly known as the mainstream media outlet most devoted to Jennings cheerleading (and Rubio-hating), was now spearheading the movement to get out some quotes that, in the hands of the stupid, would further tarnish Jennings's already tricky image. In the past, I'd resisted putting up incriminating Twits, Here, though, I thought of throwing these videos up on FD before the whole prospect of going platinum with them came up. For anyone with half a brain, or half a clue as to how NBA players—especially an outspoken nut like Jennings—would talk in a "safe" situation, these are gold.

Are there people too foolish, or walled-in, to not catch the obviously whiff of absurdity and playfulness in everything Jennings says here? Of course. Should I spend my whole journalistic life dancing around these assholes with kid feet? I don't want to. To me, Jennings follows naturally from Beasley or Arenas, both of whom are distant descendents of Muhammad Ali. They talk. We listen. They do or don't back it up. But we listen because we know they might.

The reason we ultimately went big-time with the story was the abrupt cover-up/misunderstanding/Twitter shutdown surrounding it. As Chris said in his post, we like seeing this side of players. But it's not clear the players themselves have really thought this "people want to see the real me" thing through all that well. Most importantly, are they supposed to be showing us the edgy outskirts of their public persona, or the first shores of who they really are? That is, are Twitter, or presumably ephemeral, semi-private (if you don't know. . . ) camera feeds, meant for the hardcore fans who just want more, more, more content, and will tolerate some rough edges—or those so in tune with the player that they actually "get" them?



It's clear that ballers understand the marketing potential of Twitter, and recognize the authenticity factor contained therein. But again, are they supposed to just do them, and let the interested public see a little, or learn a whole new set of rules for how to reveal layers of their persona that are off-limits in press conferences without having to stage a Cultural Translation 101 seminar on the internet? Check out the Wade Twits in the Baseline post. Hard to see these utterances as anything other than Wade ignoring the public, or figuring anyone watching his Twitter exists in some sort of idealized fan vacuum. Either way, the question of audience, and public presentation, has gone out the window. That must be liberating—not just to get to say whatever, but to know there's an audience for it. But exactly waht "say anything" means remains to be seen.

As we can see from the deletion of Jennings's Twitter, it's not like agents know exactly how to deal with this newfound questions of real/too real. By its very nature, athlete social media should push the envelope a little. Remember Arenas's blog, anyone? However, that was far more mediated, vetted, and no matter how renegage it seemed at the time, a so-called "underground" version of the Arenas emerging in the press. What Jennings or Wade is saying here is irreconcilable with their mainstream personas. It forces us to acknowledge who these players might really be—a "real" that's only terrifying if you're incapable of reading "fuck the Knicks" as anything other than an off-hand joke.

So consider this a challenge not to players, but to fans, the media, and agencies. These guys want to put themselves out there. Clearly, it's seen as an opportunity for them to be themselves, in a way that the strictures of modern marketing doesn't allow for. How to reconcile this behavior with the vanilla image that moves real money? Where's the ledge? Amidst all the juvenile finger-wagging that will spring up around these Jennings comments, I want to know what's next: What happens to those of us who want to hear raw and uncut Brandon?



LIke I said after these broke, if only Jennings had cleaned up his language a little bit, this could've been viral gold and an absolute marketing coup if the plan is to sell his Hollywood persona as something for the next generation. As it is, we're plunged right back into some of the most tired culture wars, or even clash of basketball civilizations. When that clucking clears away, though, it's up to young players and their management to figure out the new rules for unfiltered interaction with their public. At least that way, maybe the rest of the world can learn the difference between Jennings acting out and the rookie PG really sowing the seeds of discontent.

Post-script worth noting: It appears (from what we're hearing) that Brandon himself pulled the Twitter page. Maybe it was reactionary, preparing for the worst from all other parties involved. But certainly, this indicates that even this most "naive" of social media doyens realizes he needs to regroup and figure out what balance to strike.

(Working slowly toward a Suns post. Maybe we'll wait to see if it actually goes down.)

You Take All You Can

Last night was totally discombobulating and snuck up on me, weird-wise, like various things that kill you. After it was all over, I tore out my teeth trying to decide if I liked the possible Amare-to-GSW trade, and realized in the process that my very being was at stake. So that's a longer post that will get written over the weekend.

In the meantime, here's 1,000 words on the Jennings/Rubio screenplay as of right now.

We Live in Crazy Times

Draft coverage starts in 35 minutes, and I gotta head home, so I don't miss any essential Jay Bilas moments. Shoals will be Covering It Live over at the Baseline, and I'll be getting all a-Twitter (ha! bet no one's ever used that one before!).

If you're looking for something to do between picks, you could do worse than downloading this polka track from legendary free jazz saxophonist Frank Wright.

Also, don't forget to listen to the latest podcast, which will soon be rendered meaningless, if it wasn't already.