Positive Uncertainty

Bio: Rough Justice guarantees he would pass a doping control urine test, but only because they haven't invented a drug that could give him Andrei Kirilenko's hairdo yet. Check out his other work over at his blog There Are No Fours.

Doping suffuses professional sports. Ask almost any fan, athlete or talking head how they feel about performance-enhancing drugs and you’ll get an earful of righteous judgment, but drugs are part of the sports landscape for good because they work and because the money at stake overwhelms the various reasons why players might abstain.

Dopers aren’t acting out a set of beliefs contrary to the masses; they’re acting out their desire to win the fame and money that success will bring, or simply trying to win. The margins between pro and failure, between starter and backup are often slim enough that the extra boost chemistry can provide will bridge the gap for someone who can’t quite make it. Authorities can try to stop use with penalties, but testing doesn’t eradicate illicit PED use; it creates an arms race between the chemists creating new, subtler drugs and the chemists inventing new tests to sniff out those new drugs.

The NBA has so far avoided a large dustup about drug use, with a few isolated incidents that were explained away easily enough, but in light of OJ Mayo’s suspension it’s worth taking a look at what PED use in the NBA might look like.

There is no sport immune to chemistry, but individual sports are affected differently and to different degrees by doping. At the far end of the spectrum, any sort of racing is completely vulnerable to drugs. Cycling is the sport with the biggest drug problem precisely because a bike racer engaging in oxygen-vector doping will beat a similarly talented non-doper every single time. The NFL, where speed and strength are the main currencies for position not named quarterback, showcases defensive ends faster than the defensive backs your father watched, but skill position players need to be able to read defenses and run routes as much as they need to have a good time in the 40 yard dash. Still, in a sport where brute strength is a key asset for 80% of the players on the field, steroid use will always be a huge advantage.

The breaks built into the game also provide enough rest that the stamina problems bulking up might cause don’t undermine effectiveness. Shawne Merriman’s suspension and subsequent accolades and blowback strongly suggest the sport isn’t clean, but also that the NFL views this primarily as a PR problem. No one needs the baseball doping conversation to be rehashed. Basketball, hockey and soccer have remained largely incident-free; that doesn’t mean that they aren’t being affected by PEDs, but their structure and play limit the effect drugs can have more than other sports.

Simply put, the precision of the NBA game means that doping isn't a direct path to success. Being bigger and stronger helps, but good players marry that to the finesse to finish plays or the jumpshot they've honed since childhood. If physical ability alone determined success on the court, Gerald Green would be thinking up the next cupcake dunk, not plying his trade in Russia.

The NBA is a second-order sport for PEDs, one where doping can aid ability but not generate it. As a fan of both baseball and professional cycling, I’m cynical enough about the issue to assume that some non-zero percent of NBA players are doping. Older guys trying to eke out a last season or two, injury-prone players trying to get/stay healthy, skilled but underathletic players trying to make it, second-tier guys trying to break through into stardom, there are plenty of reasons why a professional basketball player would turn to chemical assistance.

But the best players aren’t the biggest or fastest, they’re the guys who are best at getting the ball in the hoop and stopping their man from doing the same. Physical shortcomings matter, but skills that are forged by time in the gym do too, and there’s no chemical shortcut to Ray Allen’s jumpshot or Kobe Bryant’s footwork. LeBron is the best player in the NBA not just because he’s 6’8”, jacked and quick, but also because he can shoot, pass, defend and position himself at an elite level. There are only a handful of players who can succeed in professional basketball without possessing an NBA body, but there are also countless players who couldn’t succeed despite having that body.

At the end of his response to O.J. Mayo’s suspension, Henry Abbott said “Players are bigger, stronger and faster than ever. Many of the world's finest enhancers are impossible to test for…Is it really smart to stick with the theory that performance enhancing drugs are just not a problem in the NBA?” It’s true players are bigger and faster than ever, but that’s not any evidence of drug use specifically. It ignores the fact that NBA players strength train and condition in a way that was unheard of a few decades ago, and the current generation is the first to have such methods available throughout their youth careers. NBA players used to smoke!

Players are taller than ever before, but the NBA draws players from a larger genetic pool, both because the sport is global and because the US population has continued its steady climb. Medical advancements mean MRIs and new surgeries can let players continue playing after what would have been career-ending ten years ago. PEDs may well have a part in the physical talents on NBA rosters, but it’s not like the physiological changes we’ve seen can’t be explained without them.



The NBA has a testing policy for a reason. It’s not there purely as a PR ploy; if there were no reason for basketball players to use PEDs there would also be no need for testing. But if you paid much attention to how baseball players explained their steroid use you learned that most users got started by following the “here, try this” plan offered by a teammate. Professional athletes operate in a bubble and don’t by and large have sophisticated knowledge about biochemistry, so they would have to rely on others to introduce them to drugs.

I don’t doubt that some players have followed this route, but unless players are doing a fantastic job of conspiring to keep a league-wide habit secret, the users are likely individuals injecting or ingesting at home, clinging to the edge they’re giving themselves over their compatriots. Morality isn’t the only impediment to PED use; acquisition isn’t necessarily an easy task. I’m sure there are players in the NBA who would take a drug if it were put in front of them but don’t have the first clue where they would go to get it.

Not only that, but there’s no one drug that would benefit every player in the league. Part of the reason for steroid ubiquity in baseball and football and EPO ubiquity in cycling is that those PEDs help every athlete. Baseball and football are all fast-twitch actions that are over within ten seconds. Steroids make everyone faster and stronger. Everyone can benefit from hitting a ball farther, throwing it harder or running faster.

Similarly, every cyclist will be better at his job if his circulatory system does a better job of delivering oxygen to his muscles. But the different roles and skills of a basketball team make it unlikely that any drug, other than HGH, would benefit everyone. An shooter who makes his living running his defender all game and curling around screens would gain from taking a drug that aided his stamina. A post player would do well to bulk up so he could push people around. A slasher could exploit a few more inches of vertical leap. But if different players on a team would benefit from different drugs, they’d all have to find them via their own routes unless a drug culture was truly pervasive or a team was actively helping its players dope.

Players might take the risk of exposure inherent in sharing drugs with a teammate for team gain, but given the variety of body types and skill sets you find in any given locker room, NBA doping would have to be more diffuse than the doping is in any of the sports that have established problems.

O.J. Mayo claims the DHEA in his system is from a supplement he vetted poorly. That’s an eminently plausible claim. As far as I can tell, DHEA isn’t a masking agent or precursor for anything else, and it’s currently legal to sell it over the counter. It’s possible he was using it as a steroid, but unless he had very high levels of it in his system, it’s much more likely he did a terrible job reading labels at GNC. It’s possible he’s a cheater, but it’s more likely he’s a knucklehead. This isn’t Mark McGwire with Androstenedione in his locker.



If I had to guess, I would say NBA doping is a low-level phenomenon. I would be shocked if use were higher than one out of every ten players precisely because the returns for doping are more limited in the sport than in others. I would be even more shocked if no one in the NBA were using PEDs. But in today’s media environment, where baseball dopers have been excoriated in the press for their “crimes”, a basketball player who is regularly drug tested would have to be careful about what he was doing and to whom he mentioned it. The tacit approval that aided steroids in baseball does not and has never existed in the NBA.

A player who was doping would use HGH, EPO or some other drug that is undetectable in a urine sample. If OJ Mayo were a serious doper, you can be sure he wouldn’t risk exposure by having something as easily detectable as DHEA in his system. If we’re going to have a serious conversation about performance-enhancing drugs in the NBA, I’m all for it. But OJ Mayo almost certainly has nothing to do with it.

The Most You Can Do Without Speaking

I need to stop and get it together. Yesterday is a truly big one for this establishment, especially when you consider that we didn't do anything. TrueHoop tells us that Dr. Santiago Colas (of Go Yago!) at Michigan is using The Undisputed Guide as a textbook; then, the Mavs video team gives what is undoubtedly a shout-out to one of our founding members (go 58 seconds in).

Also, last night I realized that there are no new buzz players this year. That's why I feel like I'm slacking. Actually, there's one, one big one -- Blake Griffin -- and physics-like, he has stolen everyone else's light and plunder, or made their stores look puny. He is the great uniter and great divider -- what us League Pass fiends have been waiting for, maybe even more than Durant ever was. At the same time, though, he makes a mockery of all the time we spent waiting on players far less fantastical to shake up our Tuesdays. AND OUR TUESDAYS ALONE! Anyway, I'm not complaining. Griffin has made life so much more simple. You watch the big game, or you watch the Clippers. Or maybe the Warriors, if BG ain't on.

Can someone tell me the difference between End of the Year posts and Thanksgiving ones? Really, I don't get it. Am I supposed to be preachy here? I feel a lot more reflective; in late Novemeber I was mostly just mad about travel and disappointed at what wasn't working out the way I wanted it to in the NBA.

Speaking of total surprises from space, I wake up today (way, way late) to news that the Timberwolves -- already FD favorites for their stewardship of Love and Beasley -- are eyeing O.J. Mayo, have a good shot at Ricky Rubio coming over (there is now promise there, really), and ... hold it ... trading for Anthony Randolph. I think I speak for everyone when I say that, if these things come to pass, this will be the most FreeDarko team ever assembled. I couldn't even dream up one more in line with my core principles. Will stop now before I puke out tears of excitement. It's funny, though, that David Kahn may actually be more a kindred spirit than we ever thought. Those folks calling him a fool? They probably get bored with this site, too. So there. Happy New Year, Kahn. Phase One was risky, even silly, but if this is what's next, it was all worth it. You saw what talent would flourish, and are now in a position to bring in more Beasleys. Just keep letting other teams think you're doing them a favor.

Now I have to wonder if this means all-out war between Ziller and myself. Although I suspect he would forgive all, and do penance, if that above-stated team came to pass. Rationality only holds until it is outsmarted. Kahn may do just that.

I am going skiing in a mountain cabin and may die. So here is the last Works of the year, with New Year's Resolutions for players, and Eric and me. Also, the long-promisd discussion of age in the NBA. Look for me on the Awl sometime Wednesday, too. Merry Christmas to all!

Vain Gray Ovens

Real quick, and maybe better designed for the Twitter: When they first announced HORSE, I was deathly afraid this was going to turn into some racial bullshit. I mean, what gave that away harder than the "no dunks" rule, buried deep in the press release? The reason I objected to everyone's jittery Kevin Love nomination is that, like it or not, trick shots are the result of practice. That's (EDIT:) self-fulfilling gym rat shit, and it's almost unreasonable to expect anyone else in the field to pull off your ace in the hole.

Now, to draw an analogy I absolutely hate myself for, it's classical music from a score. Putting Durant, Mayo and Johnson in there, is—arghhh—improvisational. Instead of all aspiring to a set-piece one dude knows like his own hand, you'll have weird combinations of elements emerging on the spot. Okay, so maybe these three will do some preparation, but not like how the Other Horse would go down, or how they would do for the Dunk Contest (P.S. the "white" HORSE with, say, Love, Miller and Dunleavy would be the white Dunk Contest). Am I falling victim to stereotypes here myself? Maybe. Durant could very well decide he has to win this one. But given the kind of players, and personalities, these three are, you know they're not going to come with anything corny, or a shot that it's clear they've spent their whole life working on. I'm thinking lots of high-bounced, backboard use, and range. Like the Dunk Contest of consummate scorers. Now that's got a solid ring to it.

Keep those contest entries coming!

Sorry for the sloppiness in the beginning that makes it sound like I don't believe in African-American gym rats. I hope you all got my drift.

The Ziller Sessions: Edition 8

Firstly, please, look below for details on our Chicago and Seattle launch events.

I spend a lot of the day chatting with Tom Ziller about basketball. Sometimes, once of our conversations is so eventful, I decide to take it's basic structure, write a bunch of big words around it, and pretend I thought of the whole thing. This is one such post. Hence the title, and the occasional quotes from TZ.

Last night, when I decided to stop watching Facts of Life and go to bed, my thoughts immediately turned to yesterday's description of O.J. Mayo. I stand by the Joe Johnson comparison, but looking back at it, there's something a little too generic, or porous to what I wrote. It could describe anyone who "plays within the flow of the game but will step up." That could, to some degree, describe not only Mayo and Johnson, but also Kobe, Durant, and LeBron James. It's especially the addition of Bron to this list that rubs me the wrong way; the first four make it imprecise, he makes the characterization empty.

Searching for hope and direction, I was saved when my girl handed me last week's New Yorker, which had a long article on psychopaths/sociopaths (apparently one is either the PC term, or the one that makes the most clinical sense). It was then that, in reference to the above question of on-court assertiveness, I started kicking around that old cliche "killer instinct." This is, of course, a good thing. Unless you're reading an article about sociopaths, and then, the relationship between a man and his killer instinct starts to take on a more ambivalent connotation—especially if you think of "the flow of the game" and "team" as some version of polite society, and see Kobe as 1) epitome of killer instinct; 2) someone for whom it's not always a positive on the court; and 3) a person once suspected of being a low-grade sociopath.



I think the best description for what I see some of in Mayo, and defines Joe Johnson, is an especially powerful strain of cool. That takes it a step beyond "respecting the flow of the game," since there isn't that tension between their killer instinct and the flow of the game. Their insides are, for lack of a better word, flow, which is why there's no a clear disturbance when they assert themselves. Johnson doesn't struggle against circumstance, look to dominate, or even—to throw another cliche out there—"wait for the game to come to him." He's not envisioning opportunity in advance, or laying back one step, all predatory and reactive; he's right there with it, seeming just to know. There's a confidence to him, but you'd hesitate to even call it "steady." And when Johnson explodes for 20 in a quarter, it's about as naturalistic as these things get. Mayo's not quite there yet, but as Ty Keenan put it, "even when he seems to be forcing it he acts like he's supposed to."

Durant, possess no such mystical qualities. Barkley, I think, compared KD to Gervin, in terms of piling up points without anyone noticing. And it's true: Unless Durant hits five threes in a row and follows it with an especially acrobatic drive (which, with his length, he rarely resorts to), his style is impressionistic. Not understated—a 6'9" jumble of arms and legs that rises up for threes like he's floating is still an extraordinary sight. But between the lack of emphasis in his game, his build, and those limbs just seem to trail off into the rafters on every play, Durant can get pretty ethereal at times.

You can tell he's embraced this, perhaps because it suits his outward mildness, maybe since he knows he's not an intimidator. But we've all seen glimmers of unspeakable intensity from Durant, and some of his epic scoring bursts shatter all this, mistaken by some as complacency. Ziller: "Durant's eyes are always kind of frantic, like he wants to scream but bottles it up." There's a killer instinct there for sure, perhaps—remember the Jordan comparisons—one that borders on unnerving. That he gets the best of both worlds, instead of being torn about by the tension or overcome by his passion, is one of the greatest signs of his maturity. That doesn't mean, though, that he's always easy to watch, or ever feels entirely stable. More Ziller: "He makes the league uncomfortable."



In a way, Durant's closer to Kobe than he is Joe Johnson. It's not really worth going over Bryant's struggles with ego, and the ways in which his various instincts have been both incredibly productive and seriously destructive. When we talk about the mature Bryant, it's of a player who keeps himself under wraps until called upon. Certainly, he's internalized this good behavior, and Kobe does have the pure ability to play well with others without completely reforming. But that Kobe is always there, just beneath the surface, by design. Durant's at his best amidst the interplay of extremes. Kobe's an either/or headcase just waiting to steal the keys.

The missing element in all this is LeBron. This exchange says it all:

TZ: LeBron doesn't actually care. Like there isn't tension. Because he doesn't care if he's 2-for-14 or if he's scoring 55. Not that he's detached, but, well, he sort of is.
BS: I also don't think LeBron feels disappointment. He's above it all.
TZ: Exactly
BS: TRANSCENDENCE.
TZ: That's because he can never let his team down.
BS: You mean, no matter what he does, he can't let them down?
TZ: He could have his worst night ever and his team is better off in the immediate with him on the court. His worst is better than any teammate's best. That's not quantitatively correct. But spiritually, that's the case I think
BS: I think it's true. Like, when does LeBron actually hurt that team?
TZ: Never! Even Team USA, in 2004 and 2006. I don't remember him hurting the team ever.

Let me ask again: Who among us is really human? And when exactly did we decide that mattered so?



(diagram by Ziller)

We All Are Columbus Day

The book is here! In stores now, out on the display tables in some, but still we thought we'd hit you with one more batch of excerpts. This one, on NBA players as city mayors, might be of especial interest to our core audience. Visit the book site for T-Mac and Amare chapters, and check out our fresh slide show on Slate. And even then, you'll barely have scratch the surface of our tome, so go cop that!

A few other things:

-I am kind of annoyed at my friend Paul Slocum for not mentioning to me this Dream Team vs. Croatia/Jesus and Mary Chain sound assemblage he's been working on. So up our alley it makes me faint.

-Watched the first three quarters of Suns/Grizzlies last night, after which it apparently got close. But I do feel qualified to state that teams seem to tire from playing Phoenix even though they shouldn't. Ty Keenan suggest it's Amare fatigue, and it's true, Amare is really a holy terror these days (even if only for half the game). However, I think it's most muscle memory, reflect brought on by the sight of Steve Nash dribbling down the court. Mayo, he's for real like Beasley and Rose. I like that, despite his profligate scoring, he also makes smart plays, resourceful plays, almost mature-beyond-his-years plays that bespeak a certain calm and wisdom. Maybe it's just the beard, which frames his face in way that's anything but post-Bron. I just get the feeling that he's never really in a hurry, and that when he starts going off, it's because he's decided the time is right. There's something Joe Johnson-esque to it.

(I haven't watched nearly enough of him this year, though, so rip away at that. I just can't begin to explain how thrilled I am at what impact him, Rose, and Beasley have made already. In a weird way, it sort of brings down Durant's luster—partly by association with last year's disastrous, over-hyped class, partly in that they've burst upon the scene in true phenom style. Though KD did have quite a game last night, a effortlesly inflamed as ever).

BUY THE BOOK!!!!

Me and RJR Still Got Unresolved Issues

I never grew up as any kind of college basketball fan. I grew up in the suburbs of San Francisco, hardly a college town. My dad went to a tiny school in New Hampshire, and my mom went to a small school in Pennsylvania that, when she went there, did not have a men's basketball team or, for that matter, men.

Now I actually go to college, and care deeply about the fortunes of my USC Trojans, although in going from the Golden State Warriors to USC basketball, all the advantages the college game is supposed to have over the pro game-the energy in the building, the sense of kinship with the players, and the feeling that the game is not some pre-packaged industry but a genuine competition in which the players give all that they have out of a desire for glory or pure love for the sport-feel noticeably absent.













Anyways, whereas college basketball was once only an opportunity to evaluate the merits and flaws of future pro players, I now genuinely care about not only the performance of players destined for the NBA, but the play of the actual team, from the future lottery picks to role players, and how they work together as a team in order to win games.

Unfortunately for me, the emphasis on college basketball has shifted in recent years to an extended pre-draft camp, especially since the "one-and-done" rule allowed players who in years previous would have jumped straight to the pros shrouded in mystery to show their skills for a year in the national spotlight, especially when they sign with programs not seen as traditional college basketball powerhouses.

Anybody who watches college basketball now knows of what I speak; about two weeks ago, I watched Georgetown get upset by Pittsburgh, although I only knew that from the score; the broadcast itself taught me about how good of an athlete Roy Hibbert is, how good of a passer he is from the high post, how he can finish with either hand around the basket, and how (I am not making this up) he puts "perfect rotation on his free throws," which is much more important to hear during a pair of big free throws than something like how often he actually makes free throws. (An un-perfect 63.4% on the year, by the way.) I am not exaggerating when I say that when another Georgetown player hit a tough three coming off a Hibbert screen, the broadcasters chose to talk about the screen instead of the shot.














Naturally, what sent me over the edge was when my beloved USC's upset over hated rival UCLA became a five-on-five workout for Kevin Love. While DaVon Jefferson quietly took the Bruins apart, I got to hear gushing monologues about Love's rebounding, post play, outside shooting ability, choice of number (again, I am not making this up-the broadcasters pointed to Love's choice to wear Connie Hawkins' number as evidence of his respect for the game), and especially his outlet passes, which have ignited UCLA's pace of play to 254th in the country.

The best-known example of the player being more important than the game has to be last year's championship game, when the broadcast team raved about Greg Oden for 40 minutes while Florida quietly won its second consecutive national championship.

The emergence of singularly talented players taking over programs and dominating college basketball as freshmen, made directly possible by Carmelo, made possible in theory by Amare, LeBron, and Dwight Howard showing just how much game an 18-year old can have in them, and made real by Durant and Oden, is odd for college basketball, because it has always been a platform where the program is paramount to the individual-like the old saying goes, the only man who could hold Michael Jordan to under 20 points a game was Dean Smith.
























For one year or more, top prospects must now show the strengths and limitations of their game, where in the short-lived era of the draft dominance of high school players, we had convinced ourselves that the draft's best players should not have limitations.

Take Derrick Rose. When he was a high-school senior who almost no casual fan had ever seen play a full game, all we knew about Rose was that he had a Baron Davis-like point guard build, and was capable of shocking dunks and bowel-emptying crossovers set to new-wave Europop; that, combined with reports that he was a "true" point guard with surpassing court vision, allowed us to see Rose as a one-man point guard revolution, combining Jason Kidd's size and passing ability with Devin Harris' speed and young Steve Francis' finishing ability.

However, he came to John Calipari's big-time Memphis program, and instead of being allowed to handle the ball on every play or run the pick-and-roll, he's been relegated to being one in a bevy of slashers in Memphis' equal-opportunity speed attack, finishing on fast breaks, making passes when needed, and playing quality defense, doing his job for an undefeated team, and in doing so has become less compelling in the eyes of the draft than Michael Beasley, doing it all for the significantly worse Kansas State Wildcats.

Whereas before college players were seen in varying degrees of good, and teams looked at which one would be most effective in helping their team, with the crown jewel of a draft being a player like Duncan or Iverson or K-Mart, players who had proven themselves to be effective for their teams through countless battles, the phenomena of LeBron James and the rest of the high schoolers and the prophetic choice of Dwight Howard's freakish potential over Emeka Okafor's established game have turned high school superstars with the spotlight of the "one-and-done" year shining on them into team saviors who will all be franchise players.

When those players hint at the possibilities of their game without needing to show the whole thing, like Oden or Marvin Williams, they are free to remain superstars in our imagination and we rejoice. When they dominate with the spotlight on them, like Michael Beasley this year or Kevin Durant last year, the filter of our dreams for them when they were shrouded in mystery and talent makes us see them being radically different from those that supposedly dominated the college game through savvy and skill like Adam Morrison, Shane Battier, or Jameer Nelson, but rather as having possessed so much natural talent that the college game itself bent to their indominable will.

















Going back to the UCLA game/Kevin Love-fest 2008, the broadcasters briefly stopped fawning over a Love outlet pass that almost started a fast break to issue my boy O.J. Mayo the ultimate put-down of the "one-and-done" era: "O.J. Mayo is a good player, but he's not a great player." While one-and-done players who appear to follow the paths we forge for them in our imaginations turn from valuable players to gods worthy of clearing out an entire franchise so that their gifts may be better accommodated, those who show a ceiling during their showcase year are punished with a lower spot in the draft and a much lower place in our imaginations.

After Florida's first championship, Joakim Noah was a tremendously athletic big man who could pass, run the floor, play defense, and rebound like a man possessed; in the imagination of the draft, he would one day become a player who would add to those skills 20 pounds of muscle, an outside shot, and post moves, and he was projected as a top-three pick. He chose to stay, and played nearly the exact same role for Florida that he had in the previous year, and the result stayed the same as well; Florida won the national championship. Instead of being rewarded for proving himself as a player who would be an extremely valuable member of any team, Noah ended up going behind not only the sure-thing foursome of Oden, Durant, Horford, and Conley, but Jeff Green, Corey Brewer, Yi Jianlian, and Brandan Wright as well, players who all seemed more attractive than Noah because they had not yet allowed the world to see that their games came with limitations.

While many of those picked ahead of him are crumbling under the weight of what their NBA teams expected of them, Joakim has quietly posted the second-highest PER of any rookie and leads the Bulls in +/- rating. Likewise, O.J. was expected to be an Arenas-like Deus ex Machina of a guard capable of scoring 40 points with a flick of his jump shot and elevating the otherwise offensively-challenged Trojans to greatness through the sheer virtue of his game; instead, he has accepted his role on a grind-it-out Tim Floyd team that is a top-5 defensive team in the country, and instead of freewheeling on drives and fast breaks patiently runs off screens looking for a jumper or bucket off a curl, gradually settling into his role as an efficient scoring option. Like Noah, O.J.'s performance in college strongly suggests that he will contribute rather than dominate, and as this fails to jibe with what he was expected to be given his status as a phenom since he was a freshman in high school, he has dropped out of most imaginations, and hence has dropped out of many top 5s.




























By definition, greatness cannot be so common as to present itself in three or four players every year, but in an era where we have become spoiled because of the influx of incredible young players in recent years, the mystery-shrouded scraps of wonder we get from fawning scouting reports and fleeting YouTube clips about the one-and-done wunderkids lead us to believe just that, and hence we trip over ourselves to anoint those who appear to fufill the destinies we have laid out for them as the next Michael Jordan, as well as condemn those who prove themselves merely human, but if NBA teams learn to temper their expectations for the men in the spotlight and see one-and-done phenoms as players capable of being a part of the answer rather than the answer itself, they may find the sublime in the simply good.

UPDATE: I'm just as devastated as the rest of you by the Shaq news. I've never believed in Stern conspiracy stories, but this does make Wade relevant again, puts a big, fat marquee name on one of the young and exciting teams that the league believes should merit more attention, and the chances of a Shaq-Kobe playoff series just went from "completely impossible" to "fairly likely." I'm fucking stoked for this-I see it as either going down like Ray Allen destroying his dad at the end of He Got Game or Darth Vader finally killing Obi-Wan Kenobi, with Kobe punctuating a 40-point game with a vicious dunk over Shaq as Shaq walks to the bench with a serene grin on his face when Boris Diaw replaces him and the Suns go on to win the series. I just don't see a lot of explanations for this-could Marion's attitude really have been worse than Scottie Pippen's, who was at open war with the Bulls organization but was ultimately able to man up and win a championship? Steve Kerr was on that team. And the idea that this was done to protect against the threat of Bynum feels like when the military resorted to activating SkyNet to control the giant computer virus in Terminator 3, which led to the immediate immolation of most of humanity. I'm with those of you hoping that the best outcome of this is that the whole thing goes down in horrible flames and a revolution springs anew from the ashes.