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seriously…..

Dwight Howard has got to be one of the most explosive athletes I have ever seen. As a kid, I used to always miss the All-Star Saturday Night because we never had cable. I’d sit and watch the 10 o’clock news hoping for highlights from the Slam Dunk Contest.

Well no longer. I watched this year’s Slam Dunk Contest itching to see something good, and it ended up being the best show I’ve seen for a long, long time. VC in 2000 was unbelievable, but to see someone of DHoward’s size do the things he does is off-the-charts.

Here’s some behind the scenes footage that is just as incredible.

This is longer and shows more than the first. I didn’t realize DHoward is that long. I mean I know he’s tall, listed at 6′11″, but he just gets up so quick and it doesn’t ever look like he’s as long as he is to me. Take a look at when he’s hanging on the rym, his feet are 6″ or so from the ground with his feet extended. That’s insane, as is the last dunk on the video. It’s just silly stupid that someone can do what he does.

dear nba,

it’s been nice know you this year.

love,

andy.

it’s official. i won’t be watching any more basketball until the fall. no more nba for me. i’ll definitely watch some of the

2006 fiba world championship in japan, but probably on mute. all they’ll be talking about is dwayne wade. i’ve found myself in a position of finding the sports media loathsome, particularly the disney affiliates, abc, espn and the rest. there are a few exceptions here and there, but for the most part, i just can’t handle listening to pregame hype, followed by in-game blathering, followed by a postgame blah-fest. i really think there needs to be a way to listen to the audio in the arena, and not the announcers. i also think i need to start turning off the television and doing other things.

for the basketball world championships, the usa has a great roster of players, but if this tournament turns out to be a dwayne wade worship-fest, i’m out. he’s a great player but his stats in game 5 speak for themselves. check it:

11-28 from the floor, 21-25 from the line!!! just how many fouls are the refs going to bail him out??!!!

0-2 from 3, 4 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals, only 1 foul!!!

and 43 points in 50 minutes played.

that sounds like a pretty good stat line right? well here’s the thing, wade isn’t helping others to get involved and make a sunstantitive contribution. all he does is drive and jump in the air and if there’s nothing there he throws a horrible pass out towards the 3-point line, causing a teamate to chase it down. or he gets a moronic defender to crash into him and as a result the brainless referee’s blow there whistles and put him on the line. i think the nba referee’s believe that the free throw line is their currency, or their praise. i think they decide to put whomever the please on the line, because when they call a foul, they are in the spotlight, as well as the free-thrower. it really has become a sickening sight. the game has been a mockery of this season. if it weren’t for kobe’s magnificent accomplishments and steve nash’s amazing regular season, this year would’ve been one of the worst on record. everyone has talked about how these playoffs have been so exciting, i don’t discount that there has been a high level of excitemnet, but when that level is brought on primarily in my opinion, due to referee error and stupidity, its a farce, a waste, and a complete sham. i feel like i’ve been robbed after watching these games. i feel like i need a shower. i’m serious here, these officials have caused me to cease watching my favorite sport in the world on television.

i’ve got to add here, i am a referee. it is my primary source of income. i spend my time doing what these guys are getting paid hundred’s of thousands of dollars to do. i feel that of any sports fans, i have the right to complain because i know exactly what it is they are continually missing, i’m not just going off because my team is on the losing end. and for the record, i’m complaining when “my” team wins also, because the referees are really that bad.

on to happier topics….

oh its the mavericks, the old mavericks, back in full effect.

for two and a half games, i could not have been more impressed with the mavericks as a team. they were direct and aggressive. they played with the poise of a championship team. now this last game and a half, they’re back to playing like last year’s playoff’s mavericks. tentative, passive, looking around like they don’t know what they need to do. pretty dissappointing really.

during the first half of game 3 i realized that i really don’t like the heat as a team. they’re a bunch of individuals. they’re old and selfish and theyy are completely uninspiring. i don’t think that professional basketball players realize that they can inspire and lift their fans they way that footballers in europe realize thay can, in fact often their aim is to do just that. there’s a togetherness in football that is alluring beyond anything that american sports can offer. the heat don’t play good basketball. they play in a “let me get mine” kind of way.

- dwayne wade is an absolutely rediculous athlete. he has done things on the court, and continues to do things that amaze me. what is nearly as amazing is how these teams seem to stand around when he starts to drive to the basket. for all his abilities, making his teamates better is not one of them. his teamates seem to stand and watch when he goes to the basket because they know he’s probably not giving it up.

- shaq’s career is nearly over. he’s lost that edge he’s had for so long. as a fan i’ve grown accustomed to him having that dominance and its extremely sporatic now. how can one of the most dominant players in the history of the world, only score 5 points in 28 minutes going 2-5 from the floor and 1-7 from the line? he can’t keep going much longer like this. he did this in the finals mind you. it doesn’t ever get bigger than this. this is why he plays, for rings, and you show up and give that effort. i don’t believe his heart’s in it any longer

- jason williams has caused me to really want to no longer watch the nba finals. his game is ugly, cheap, boring, and a waste of 15-25 minutes a night. he has no purpose, no direction and absolutely NO ability to lead a team from the point position. yet for some reason, the “genius” pat riley starts him every game and continues to give him minutes. during game 3 i kept thinking, where is gary payton? payton’s knickname is ‘the glove’, given to him becuase of his unbelievable defensive ability. he’s also notorious for his mouth, jawing at the opposition or anyone who will listen or who won’t listen. he’s tenacious. payton is a leader on the floor. he’s definitely lost a step, and his game is nowhere, and i mean nowhere close to where it was even 3 years ago, but he’s still a good player, infinitely more useful than williams. williams is known as ‘white chocolate’ and is know for throwing alley-oops more than for being a good basketball player. watching him play, makes me like basketball less. he’s really a waste on the floor. it really boggles the mind that you can play like he does and get paid millions of dollars.

- james posey, antoine walker, and udonis “has-been” haslem are undependable. what you get from them each night is a crap shoot at best. with walker, you know you’re going to get at least 4 or 5 missed 3’s a night. posey might be aggressive, then again he might stand around, and haslem might get you 10 boards, but he might also have several defensive lapses and let the opposing 4 dominate him or have the opposing 3 continually blow past him.
i’m not saying i want the heat to win, because i’m focusing on their team, and not the mavericks. strategically, i feel there are adjustments that riley could make to have the games be a little more interesting and as a want-to-be coach, i see these adjustments that make more sense than the moves that “the genius” according to magic, shaq, wade, charles and countless others, is making. i also wouldn’t want to watch williams play, at all.

i really don’t like the heat’s team.

the mavs have to resume playing like they did in game 1 and game 2 and the first two thirds of game 3. but for a missed dirk free throw, this series might be over right now. crazy how one game, one quarter really can change the outlook of a series entirely.

i just can’t understand why you (the mavericks) don’t want it more. where’s the killer mentality? when you have a team down by 13 and you’re shutting out the lights on their season, their year, their hopes, their playoff lives, and you’re soon to assure your place in nba history, where’s the mentality to go rip the heart out of the team and finishing it by stomping on there last chance to do anything with your total team effort and offensive precision and defensive aggressiveness? (in the heat’s case, if they don’t do anything this year, that might be it for them. riley’s too old as are the rest of them and he’s not up with the “new” as a coach.) where’s the concentration? where’s the love? if you want a ring and a championship and all the money, fame, respect and recognition that comes along with it, where’s the intensity to get it done? how can you not finish a team that you have on the ropes with a swollen-shut eye, and a damaged leg and damaged shoulder. why do you let them up off the ropes?

i cannot for the life of me understand it. i have over the last few years observed the desire to become a coach grow in my heart, and one of the main things i want to coach and teach is having an unbeatable will. having a unbeatable desire. you might have more talent, more height or more money and better facilities than me, but you will not ever want it more or give more effort than me. i RARELY see this mentality in sports. kobe shows signs of it, but some nights he’s not into it, ie. game 7 of the lakers v suns series, where you at kobe? lebron doesn’t have it. shaq’s lost interest, there are players who show signs on given nights, kidd, carter, wade, amare, ray allen, but nobody and i mean nobody had it like mike.

bird had it, i wouldn’t ever want to play against bird or mike. there’s a story about bird during all-star weekend one year, he was in the 3-point shoot-out. before the contest he walked into the locker room and announced to his competitors, “which one of you m-fers is going to come in second?” he then prceeded to go out and absolutely light up the competition. i don’t mean just winning, he went out and hit like 80 or 90% or his 3’s. scored something like 23 in the final round. 25 is hitting all 20 shots with 5 money balls.

why don’t more people play with that kind of passion? i’m not suggesting that everyone start verbally assaulting their opponents and playing the the old ‘bad boys’ from detroit in the late 80’s, but why aren’t more people playing with that fire that gets you out of your seat. more and more and more it seems, i’m left feeling like this.

The Finals

even covering his eyes won’t stop him.

game 6 started off as horrible as i think is possible. i actually left the house and went to the grocery store and to get a cup of coffee. i was infuriated. how could a team, 1 win away from playing for a world championship ring and all that entails, come out so unbelievably flat? how could the referee’s call the game in the manner that they called the first half? this is game 6 of the western conference finals for goodness sake. how could jason terry make 3 MAJOR mental errors and pick up those two immediate personal fouls, then sit for 10 plus minutes only to come back on the court and pick up another immediate personal?!!!!

how is this possible?

in the end, the mavs played like a championship caliber team, they played the last 3/8’s of the game like the team i know they can be, like a team of basketball players should play. they were smart, they were aggressive, they took excellent shots, they worked for offensive rebounds and the word swarming came to my mind when they were on the defensive end. when a team is swarming defensively, that is for me perfection. what i mean by swarming is that they are running everywhere, no walking, they have the appearance that they are being sucked to the ball or the man. they are tight up on everyone and they are anticipating where the man or ball are going next. great defenders have an impatience about them. they are pressing because they seem to be impatient to get back to the other end, but there is a commitment there, that they are going to stop their man. the mavs were being aggressive, and aggressiveness defensively confuses and distracts an offense because offensive players expect on some level, the defensive to be reactive and thusly somewhat passive. thusly allowing the offensive player to dictate the terms of the battle to some degree. an aggressive, swarming defense negates the offensive advantage that the offensive player knows where they want to go and causes the first move an offensive player makes, to be an adjustment of sorts instead of where they want to go. it really was exciting to watch. what’s funny was that i was railing my wife in the car about how basketball on television isn’t fun anymore. the rule changes along with the referee’s apparent inability to adjust themselves to the new rules and call consistent games, has taken the fun out of watching my favorite sport. the refs in the second half, let the teams play and called good fouls but stayed out of the way most of the time. the true mark of a top drawer official is that you don’t see, think about or remember them being out there. i forgot about the officials in the second half because for once this playoffs, they got out of the way and let the teams, the players, and the game be the show.

in the end, nash just didn’t have enough in his legs and didn’t have enough help. i feel like this picture represents the series, the mavs just had too much for the suns to deal with over such a long series.

marion even said postgame that they ran out of gas. he said he felt it and looked at his teammates and could see it in them, they were just tired. looks like marion is left to ponder what could have been with stoudemire healthy, which would have been scary.

two things that struck me after the game ended were dirk and nash’s embrace. their friendship is refreshing to me.

the way dirk looked after the game was fantastic. he didn’t celebrate and look elated and jump around and dance, he just went and shook hands chest bumped/hugged the suns. the fact that there wasn’t celebration said to me that winning the western conference finals is not the goal, winning the finals is. that may be the biggest change in the mavs i’ve seen yet.