Taking My Mind Off Of Other Sports: Ten Teams To Enjoy This NBA Season.

I'll write the Chipper piece later.  Let me get some distance, chronological, emotional and otherwise, from Friday night's sad and ugly final punctuation mark on his career.  I'm depressed about the loss, pissed about that infield fly call, and embarrassed as hell by the fans.  Or rather, the portion of the fans who briefly lost their collective minds at Turner Field and started behaving like a bunch of depraved assholes.  We take a lot of guff, Atlanta fans do, for supposedly not being as passionate about our teams as other cities.  If that was a display of "passion", well f*** it, then.  I'd rather deal with a lifetime of insults from the neanderthals in Philly, New York, and Boston than be associated with the kind of hive-mind psychosis that leads to throwing batteries at players or games being literally called on account of riot.  (Cleveland Indians, 1974.  Look it up.)  I spent the entirety of that 20-minute bottle-chucking lapse of sanity standing in the stadium concourse with my best friend; both of us Atlanta sports diehards since birth.  In between long stretches of appalled silence, the one thing we kept repeating by way of conversation was some variant of: "I can't effing believe this is happening.  Atlanta fans never do this kind of stuff.  What the holy hell is going on?"  We were as outraged by that (egregious, awful, horrible) travesty of a call as anybody, but sweet jeebus, people, there is a line between normal anger and outright stupidity, and a chunk of the crowd crossed over the damn thing like it didn't exist or they didn't care or both.  Southern hospitality, my ass.

Sadly, that was only the start of of one long, slumping weekend for Georgia sports teams.  The Yellow Jackets put up a fight but were ultimately outplayed in all phases by a feisty Clemson squad in a loss that cost Tech's D-Coordinator Al Groh his job.  The Dawgs ... I don't want to talk about what happened in Columbia.  That wasn't a football game, it was a slow parade of visceral humiliation.  Or, to put it less poetically and far more accurately: Carolina kicked Georgia's asses up and down the field for four quarters.  End of story.

Two things salvaged the weekend: A phenomenal show by Grace Potter at The Tabernacle Saturday night (seriously, go see her live if you get a chance!!!), and the Falcons playing a sloppy first three quarters but ultimately pulling it together for a win over Washington to remain undefeated. 

Oh, and one other thing.  That bright burst of light flashing across the sky like a beacon of hope or the Bat Signal or some other damned explosion of heart and grace and purpose.  That's right, folks: Basketball!!!  Preseason is underway, and things tip off in earnest the day before Halloween.  For an outstanding season preview from the reigning HEAVY-WEIGHT CHAMMPPPEEEN OF THE WOOOOOOOORLLDDDDDD!!!! of basketball writers, skip on over to Grantland and soak up Zach Lowe's breakdown of all 30 teams.  I was contemplating a full-on NBA 2012-2013 preview, but frankly, Lowe dropped the mic and walked off stage with that piece (as if we expected anything less) and there's just no need for an inferior reproduction from me.  Instead, here's a list (in no particualr order) of the 10 teams I'm most excited about watching this year:

1. Miami.  For reasons that should be obvious.  A. Watching LeBron is always worthwhile.  B.  Will Wade stay on the court this season, or is his career going to be truncated by injuries?  C.  How will they function now that they've scaled Championship Mountain?  Can they maintain the drive towards sustained excellence of MJ's Bulls and Kobe's Lakers, or will the satisfaction of what they've achieved dull the gut-check propulsion necessary to repeat not one, not two, not three, not four...?
We'll see.

2.  OKC.  Did you spend a decent portion of the off-season wondering how the NBA Finals would have turned out if Eric Maynor had been healthy?   Me too.  Are you intrigued to see what kind of impact new draftee Percy Jones III has on an already exciting team?  Me too.  Are you ready to watch Russ to explosive, enigmatic Russ things?  To see if the Durantula continues to develop his game while assaulting another scoring title?  Me too!!!  Do you wonder if The Beard might, maybe, be less than the awesome force we all think he is?  Me too.  Gosh, we have a lot in common. 

3.  The Lakers.  Yeah, yeah, I hate them, you hate them, we all hate them.  And yes, I wrote a whole piece about how their acquisition of Dwight Howard made me much, much less inclined to watch them.  You know what?  Screw it.  They're running out four future Hall of Famers, including arguably the most devastating offensive backcourt of the past 15 years.  There frontcourt is downright terrifying.  Not even Mike Brown can screw this up.  As long as Father Time doesn't wrap his icy fingers around Nash's back or Kobe's knees, their floor is an almost certain trip the Western Conference Finals, with a ceiling that extends all the way to hoisting the Larry O'Brien Trophy.   

4.  Indiana.  The Pacers put the fear of God into Miami in last year's playoffs before LeBron went into full transcendental virtuoso mode, and they smartly retained the core responsible for that.  There's just something charming about this Indy squad.  They're a fun group of guys with complimentary styles of play and, when the key cogs are all in high gear simultaneously, capable of giving any team in the league a good battle. 

5.  My very own Atlanta Hawks.  If you think that's a shameless homer pick, hang on a second.  I'll put Horford and Smoove up against any starting frontcourt in the land, Devin Harris may be the best backup PG in the NBA (which is always a nice luxury) and, alternately, pairing him (at the two) with Jeff Teague will play havoc on opposing defenses.  We have a truckload of perimeter snipers (I see you, Lou Williams and Kyle Korver), Zaza, Anthony Tolliver (great acquisition), and everybody's favorite bench big Ivan Johnson should be sound rotation contributers.  Oh, and we're going to use this small, speedy assortment of cats to run like hell.  We're Nuggets East at this point.  Title contenders?  Not a chance, but I'm calling this team early (continuing the Denver analogy) for League Pass Darlings of the season.

6.  The Clippers.  Blake Griffin has moved from Must Watch Highlight-Making Slamma Jamma to OK, what else ya got? in near record time.  He can catch oops all day, but his shooting stroke and defense need serious refinement, and it's unclear whether he's willing to put the work in to become a more complete player.  (And he's on the short list for guys whose wallets get dinged the hardest by the NBA's new flopping policy.)  Which direction he chooses will have an immeasurable impact on L.A. not just because he's the ostensible franchise cornerstone, but because it will have a direct effect on how compelled CP3 might feel to stick around.  Also: Grant Hill!  I like Grant Hill. 

7.  The (hang on, I still have to get used to typing this ...) Brooklyn Nets.  The new Jay-Z designed uniforms, the dawning of an era, the potential clash of the Russian mob with the long-established Italian and Irish crime syndicates in New York ... uh ... Brook Lopez, I guess?  OK, there's not a lot of tangible reasons to watch this team, but it's a new team, the first professional sports franchise in Brooklyn since forever, and they have the potential, depending on how the Knicks' season unfolds, to usurp a decent enough portion of the Madison Square Garden crowd's affections to start a legitimate rivalry.  Let's all enjoy the ride. 

8.  Denver.  Even though I hope the Hawks usurp their League Pass Must-Watch crown, how can you not love this team?  Manimal and JaVale fo'eva!!!  'Nuff said.

9.  The Timberwolves.  Obviously, this mostly applies once Rubio returns, but there are a bevy of fine reasons why you should be tuning in from jump.  Kevin Love being Kevin Love.  AK-47 and Derrick Williams.  Free from the Darko Curse!!!  (Oh, Boston, I'm so sorry.)  And the biggest and best incentive of all: the potential redemption of Brandon Roy.  We all remember Roy going off in epic fashion against Dallas in the playoffs two seasons ago, and how we were so glad he could muster one more stellar effort before staggering of into the sunset on his ravaged knees.  If he can mount any sort of comeback, and especially if Rubio can come back at something close to 100% by February, this becomes the most lovable team in basketball.  Here's hoping that happens.

10.  New Orleans.  Fear the brow.  Fear The Brow.  FEAR THE BROW!!!!!!  Ahem, sorry.  But, you know, fear the brow. 

An Utterly Random NBA Playoffs Top 10 List

I don't know about you, but I feel like the 2012 NBA Playoffs are lacking more than a little elan.  At first I thought I was just acting spoiled, a petulance stemming from the embarrassment of riches lavished upon us by last year's heady Round 1.  Nope.  On reflection it turns out that, Grizzlies/Clippers aside, this year's opening series have been woefully devoid of intrigue or fun or even any particularly good basketball.  The overall malaise that has accompanied this past week has put me in mind of nothing quite so much as physics.

This is not to address the parabolic trajectory described by Ray Allen's jumper or to mean that the playoffs feel cold, clinical, and scientific this year.  (Though both could be discussed, I suppose.)  What I'm talking about is the thing every kid learns in middle school science class, usually illustrated by holding a tennis ball on top of a desk and then dropping it: the difference between potential and kinetic energy.

On a macro level, it's the perfect descriptor of every series besides the aforementioned Clips/Griz matchup.  All that beautiful potential that, for various and sundry reasons, has failed to be converted into anything compelling and dynamic.  The tennis ball is stuck, frustratingly, maddeningly stuck, on top of the desk.

On a micro level, the potential/kinetic energy difference applies to any number of critical story arcs and players.  To belabor the analogy for just a bit longer, take Derrick Rose.  Eight days ago, he was NBA's foremost personification of kinetic energy.  Now, one detonated ACL later, he's unable to harness any of that energy.  He's neutralized, stranded in a potential state.  Now apply that to the litany of other injuries we've seen so far.  You see where I'm going with this, right?  I don't want to have to exhume the dead horse to beat it again.  Point is: The playoffs have mostly been godawful dull so far, so I've taken solace by immersing myself in the little things that make basketball fun to watch even when the games are terribly inconsequential or just plain terrible.  Here, to help me (and you) with the Bland Playoff Blues is a no-particular-order-and-definitely-extemporaneous Top 10 list of brightly flashing instants, minor personages, and other arcana that have made round one marginally more bearable.

1. Jrue Holiday's smile.   I don't know if you've noticed, but whenever anything good happens for Philly or he does something cool, Jrue's grill goes incandescent.  At 21, he's an NBA young'un anyway, but when he lights up with that huge, gleeful grin, he looks about twelve.  Or like a twelve-year-old looks when he gets a new bike for Christmas or possibly a pony, anyway.  When he drained his second trey in a minute during the 4th quarter today, he turned an unleashed that Cheshire-Cat goodness on Elton Brand, and it was the most sincerely happy thing I've maybe ever seen.  Jrue Holiday is awesome.

2. J.R. Smith's "this is how you punk your opponent's entire front line with a monster jam" clinic.  All due respect to Blake Griffin, but this was the dunk of the year.  Posterizing dudes is cool an whatnot, but when there's no one there to actually posterize because you just blew by two defenders and faked a third out of his kicks with the most insane double-clutch ever, that is artistry, my friends.

3. Paul Pierce's insane night/Tebowing at midcourt.  He did this to my beloved Hawks, which sucked, but I can't even be all that mad at The Truth.  This was one of those games where the phrase "you can't stop him, you can only hope to contain him" doesn't even apply because ... well, because the Hawks hadn't a prayer of containing Pierce.  He was categorically uncontainable, which is probably why he felt saucy enough to emphasize that point with a good, old-fashioned Tebowing.  Annoying, sure, but when you toss up a 36-14-4 on a night your team absolutely needs you to bring that kind of production in order to win, you may invoke, utilize, and/or revive any dopey meme you wish.  Well played, Paul Pierce.  Well played.

4. The genius on the Indiana Pacers' training staff who decided to affix a "please do not hit" warning label to the fire extinguisher in the hallway leading to their locker room.  That was some absolutely inspired comedy, right there.  What did you learn, Amar'e? 

5. I've been watching Knicks/Heat as I'm typing this.  'Melo just dropped 41 points, 6 boards, 4 dimes, and a steal on Miami to force a game five.  It was magnificent.

6.  Zach Harper.  You're scratching your head right now trying to figure out if he's some obscure Nugget's bench player or Jazz assistant coach, aren't you?  Well: Zach is a tremendous basketball blogger and, more importantly for the purposes of this entry, he also runs the Daily Dime Live chats for ESPN.   DDL is, for lack of a better word, a sort of extended family.  For those of us with a marrow-deep affinity for NBA basketball, it's a virtually-based communion.  It's hoops nerds generally having a wonderful time watching games, cracking jokes, and sharing the sort of memes that only come to exist when a bunch of enthusiastic loonies get together in the name of fun and snark.  Zach is the grand poobah, moderator, setter of humorous emotional tenor, gently scolding parent, and general facilitator of this awesomeness.  Holla at me DDL, I'll be there later.  Doing laps, of course.  KLOE!!!

7.  Ivan Johnson.  I don't think I should have to explain that.

8.  Clippers/Grizzlies: Game One.  The most overtly ridiculous rally in playoff history involved Reggie Evans briefly morphing into Scottie Pippen, Nick Young plumbing the utmost depths of his Swaggy P-ness, and Chris Paul being the most perfectly amplified version of himself.  That fourth quarter was twelve minutes of undiluted, unrelenting glory (unless you're a Griz fan).  Just a gem of a game.  Thanks for that one, playoffs.

9.  JaVale McGee!!!  Sure, he spent a hefty portion of the season as the NBA's unofficial poster boy for ineptitude, but he's playing remarkably effective and coherent basketball in Denver.  Love it when the endearingly vexing quirky kids make good.

10.  I saw someone wearing one of these the other day.  However you feel about the Thunder, (and I love watching them play hoops.  Fear the beard!) you have to admit this thing is awesome.  I want one.

Happy playoffs.  Here's to a better Round 2.

NBA Poetry Corner.

I have to be honest, I was expecting at least a modicum of normalcy to show up this weekend.  I assumed that the old axiom about everything slowing down in the playoffs would apply in a compound fashion this year, because the games would actually be scheduled at a reasonable, measured pace.  You know, as opposed to that space-time-continuum-mangling we just endured; 66 games where 50 should have been played.  The NBA and those who follow it were going to recalibrate to a tempo where we could absorb everything without getting whiplash.  Or so I thought.

Turns out the reverberations of the manically compressed 2011-2012 regular season are still clanking and jangling around the league, echoing in shudder-y and unpredictable ways off of the postseason's actions and characters.  Sticking with that conceit, I thought I'd take a swing at categorizing the salient points of the playoffs' opening weekend using an organizing principle of the four stanzas in Edgar Allen Poe's "The Bells."  (Seriously, just bear with me, this will make sense in a moment.)

I

Hear the sledges with the bells -
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.  

The Magic going "Ewing Theory" all over Indy.  Jameer and J-Rich had 17 apiece, Big Baby kicked in 16 (seriously?!?!  Glen Davis?!?!!?) and Orlando staved off a deeper and more talented Pacers squad.  This was a statement game.  The statement was probably "it will take slightly longer than you thought to eliminate us without Dwight", but still.  You can't count on Indy failing to get buckets in the final four minutes of every game, but the Magic served notice that they're not going gentle into that good night.  Bonus points : Chris Duhon's Travellin' Call Shuffle Dance, which might be the most inspired bit of NBA choreography since John Wall's "Dougie" intro.    

Andrew Bynum's insane 10-point, 13-board, 10-FREAKING-BLOCK Trip-Dub.  Setting his irritating petulance (and my general hatred of the Lakers) aside for a moment, it was gratifying as a basketball fan to finally see him healthy and playing up to his potential in a big moment.  Lakers fans must have been ecstatic watching a team that looked lost and discombobulated for much of the season play with such cohesion and verve.  All five starters for L.A. scored in double figures, and despite heroic efforts from Galo, The Manimal, and a feisty Nuggets bench, The Lake Show appear completely in command and primed for a deep playoff run.

II

Hear the mellow wedding bells -
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight! -
From the molten - golden notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle - dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future! - how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells! 
 
Oh good gravy, we got two absolute barn-burning gems out of our late games this weekend!  I mean, where do you even start?  (OK, chronologically sounds good.)  Mavs-Thunder was as taut and intense a fireworks display as we could have hoped and then some.  For OKC, Durant and Ibaka combined for 47 points and 9 monstrous blocks, Russ stuffed the stat sheet with 28, 4 boards, 5 dimes, and 3 steals, and The Beard showed no lingering affects from his unpleasant run-in with Metta World Peace's elbow by tossing up a similarly awesome 19, 6, 3, 1.  Dallas' players were no less ridiculous in there performances.  Dirk's 25 was pretty much expected, but The Matrix chipped in 17 and 8 boards, J-Kidd had a great 8-6-5 and absolutely pilfered the Thunder to the tune of 7 steals.  JET Terry shot a patently absurd 80% and hit 4 of 5 treys en route to 20 points, and even Vince Carter's ancient bones were good for a 13-7.  And it goes without saying that KD's absurd game-winner with 1.5 on the clock made this an instant classic.  This series is going to be phenomenal.

Now, about last night: "Don't call it a comeback!" ... no, wait ... yeah.  Yeah, call it a comeback.  WTF, people?  W.  T.  F.?  erasing a 24-point deficit in the fourth quarter on the road?!?!  With a team that young and inexperienced?  It would take a miracle.  Like having Chris Paul on your team, and having him furiously explain to Vinny Del Negro that this one wasn't over, then deliver by dropping 7 dimes in the 4th Q and orchestrating one of the greatest comebacks we've ever seen.  Nick Young went incandescent and drained three 3s in about a minute of clock.  Veteran Reggie Evans was a tenacious firebrand with 7 points and 13 boards, , earning CP3's "game ball."  Memphis checked out in the second half, but still, this was a thoroughly insane effort by a Clippers team that had every reason to be distraught over an awful game (up until that 4th quarter) and Caron Butler's broken hand.  Notable for the Griz: Marc Gasol is a high-post artist.  Scoring, passing, whatever, dude is a straight baller.  Z-Bo is not the force of nature he was last year, but with Conley, Gay, and Mayo playing out of their collective skulls, Memphis is plenty formidable.  

III

Hear the loud alarum bells -
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now - now to sit, or never,
By the side of the pale - faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear, it fully knows,
By the twanging,
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling,
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells -
Of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
In the clamor and the clanging of the bells! 

Allow me to summarize the collective thoughts of Knicks and Bulls fans: F&#$^!!!!!!!!!!

D-Rose is gone.  For, like, the foreseeable future.  ACL bad.  You could feel it even before he hit the ground.  He's always been the most skilled mid-air contortionist in the league, but there was something eerie and unnatural about the way he planted on what turned out to be his final play of the season.  Given their exemplary sans-Rose performance this season, the Bulls probably can still get by Philly, but the road to facing the Heat in the ECF now appears much more treacherous for Chicago.  (And, I might add, wide open for the rest of the conference.)  It's a shame that this had to happen, especially with so much promising hoops obliterated in an instant.  That said, Rose has been injury-plagued all year, and this was the fault of 66 devilishly compressed games, not Coach Thibs.  

The poor Knicks.  They've dealt with so many identity crises and transitions this year, and they finally looked like they could come into the playoffs with a little swagger behind them.  Instead, they lost emerging defensive stalwart Iman Shumpert (ACL bad, again) and got absolutely crushed by the Heat.  LeBron.  Effing.  James.  That was a majestic performance (that he disgraced with two utterly reprehensible flops.  Sorry, those were just awful).  It also meant nothing.  He turned in several similarly jaw-dropping efforts last year before ghosting in the finals.  We'll wait and see if he can sustain this level of play. 

IV

Hear the tolling of the bells -
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people - ah, the people -
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who, tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone -
They are neither man nor woman -
They are neither brute nor human -
They are Ghouls: -
And their king it is who tolls: -
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A paean from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the paean of the bells!
And he dances, and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the paean of the bells: -
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells: -
To the sobbing of the bells: -
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells -
To the tolling of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells, -
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.

What can you say about Spurs-Jazz?  That was a thoroughly unsurprising result, San Antonio's well-rested veterans took apart the Jazz behind yet another killer Tony Parker night (28-8-4) and Timmy D's semi-vintage 17, 11 boards, 5 dimes, and 2 steals.  It really was a ponderous affair, the outcome was never really in doubt, and, well, we're pretty much done here.  Now on to an equally uncompelling (yet infinitely more significant) game ...

Hawks.  Celtics.  No Ray Allen + Rondo's ejection + average night from The Truth = easy victory for Atlanta, especially with Jeff Teague playing well and J-Smoove going off for a monstrous 22-18 and eviscerating the C's interior defenders.  This was an ugly, low-scoring dirge in a series that no one particularly wanted to watch, but the Hawks dropped the hammer on an unsuspecting Celtics team, and Rondo's probable game 2 suspension for chest-bumping a ref could have the Hawks up 2-0 by the time the series gets to Boston.  Atlanta is the most maddeningly inconsistent team in the NBA, but they proved last night they can hold a lead against a good team, and their defiance all season in the wake of losing all of their interior depth was on full display.  We're being set up for either a resurgent Boston masterpiece or an unexpectedly dominant Atlanta run to the Eastern Conference Finals.  Too bad we'll likely have to endure a few more games like this one first.

Thus concludes the first (and possibly last) Arena Apothecary NBA Playoffs Poetry Recap.  In closing, a haiku:

Many games to come
Ball don't lie and in the end
Someone's gettin' Ringzzz.

Thank you.