MIAMI. As Dorrell Wright threw the ball high into the air above the court at American Airlines Arena here following the Miami Heat’s 98-96 win over the Indiana Pacers Saturday, his teammates released an audible sigh of relief.
Wright: “Whew–glad that’s over with.”
“I hope we never have to go through something like that again,” said Dwyane Wade, referring to the team’s fifteen-game losing streak, a franchise record.
Dwyane Wade: Hobbled by a silent “y” in his first name.
“Don’t be so sure,” said Shaquille O’Neal, the team’s towering center who has been slowed by an inflammation in his hip. “I think we’re in for changes of catastrophic proportions.”
O’Neal: Low-post force, rapper extraordinaire, actor, and now environmental activist.
O’Neal is referring to global warming, which is expected to raise sea levels, contibute to aggravated psoriasis in housepets, and submerge sand-filled ashtrays in hotel lobbies throughout the Miami area.
“I don’t like to make excuses,” O’Neal said, “but me and my teammates have the hottest logo in the NBA, and it’s getting harder to compete with teams from Northern latitudes like the Timberwolves and the Trailblazers.”
Peter Jacobs, a reporter for NBA Today, pointed out that the gradual increase in the earth’s temperatures seems not to have affected the Phoenix Suns, whose nickname is derived directly from the luminous celestial body at the center of the solar system, and who are in first place in their division. “They’re in the Western Conference,” O’Neal reminded him, “where certain guys think they’re so cool,” a veiled reference to his former teammate Kobe Bryant of the Lakers.
Cool!
Global warming is ranked as the number one threat to human civilization among college graduates, ahead of long lines in coffee shops and mismatched socks. Among respondents with high school degrees, global warming slips to fifth place behind “Location of truck keys” and “Whose house we gonna watch the Super Bowl at?” among other concerns.
“No way–you didn’t call ‘Glass’!”
O’Neal, who has played on four NBA championship teams, has become increasingly restless watching his team flounder while he is confined to a starring role on the ABC TV show “Shaq’s Family Challenge”, a weight-loss reality show. He turned his attention to environmental concerns after winning former vice president Al Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize in a game of H-O-R-S-E.
We do so many defensive drills in practice that we do them in our sleep. Man, I come home putting the press on my woman, denying her the ball. It's sad, man.
Boston Celtic Kevin Garnett, The Boston Herald
It was 7:28, and I had my game face on. I put the last glass in the dishwasher, dried my hands with a terry-cloth towel, and headed for the den.
Kevin Garnett
As I walked in, I saw my wife Sarah "Sally" Christopher, a two-time Volunteer of the Year for the Uphams School PTO, fiddling with a dried flower arrangement on the armoire. Just like her, I thought, acting blase right up to the moment of tipoff.
"Are you going to be in here or the living room?" she asked as she turned around. Like I'd tell her where I was going to set up. "Can't say," I said as I picked up the local paper and nonchalantly flipped through the high school sports section. The second hand on the Pottery Barn Scottish Terrier clock on the wall ticked up towards twelve. We looked each other in the eyes, bent at the knees and extended our arms for balance. Bring it on.
That is just so precious!
As the clock struck 7:30, we lunged for the remote and, after a brief scramble, I emerged with possession. "Celtics vs. Kings," I said as I pointed and clicked at the big-screen TV. "You're going to have to go watch 'The Queen' someplace else."
"That's okay, I'd rather spend time with you," she said calmly as she picked up a Martha Stewart Living from the wicker magazine basket at her feet and took a seat on the couch. I wasn't fooled--I know a zone defense when I see it.
The Celtics took a 25-17 lead as the first quarter ended, and I decided it was time for dessert. "I'm going to go get some ice cream," I said as I got up from my chair. "You want anything?"
"No, I'm fine for now, thanks," she said, not even looking up from a photoessay on homegrown herbs. She had learned the game in the hardscrabble Presbyterian living rooms of her youth, in a gritty suburban neighborhood where you didn't get to watch H.R. Pufnstuf unless you were quick to the dial, and willing to throw an elbow at your big sister if you had to.
H.R. Pufnstuf: He's your friend when things get rough.
I scooped myself a bowl of Haagen-Dazs strawberry frozen yogurt--I needed to be ready to run if she decided to switch to an uptempo game in the second quarter. I turned and walked back to the den and saw--Sally with the remote in her hand, clicking for the Lifetime Channel!
Lifetime Disease-of-the-Week Movie: "I just hope you live 'til the next commercial, sweetie."
"Hey, what gives!" I said with a pouty look that I learned by watching Miami Heat coach Pat Riley.
"Gimme the remote, dammit!"
"You snooze, you lose," she said as she watched a mother lovingly stroke her daughter's forehead.
I flopped down in my chair as if I'd just been pulled from a game for a missed slam dunk. "What's the Disease-of-the-Week?" I asked, knowing that someone would get sick and die before I'd see another transition basket.
"They don't know yet," Sally replied. "They think it might be Osgood-Schlatter's Disease."
Osgood-Schlatter's Disease
"What a crackpot diagnosis that is!" I said with a snort. "Everybody knows Osgood-Schlatter's primarily affects adolescent boys . . ."
"Primarily," she said without taking her eyes from the screen.
I decided to slow things down and work the shot clock. It is virtually impossible for a woman to watch the Lifetime Channel for more than ten minutes without breaking into tears. Sure enough, just as they wheeled the girl into the operating room for emergency surgery, Sally began to sniffle.
"I'm going to go get a tissue," she said as a touching commercial for instant cinnamon-flavored cappucino (yuk) came on.
"You getting a cold?" I asked solicitously, if sarcastically.
"Keep up the trash-talk and you can sleep on the couch," she said.
As soon as she was out of the room I set up on the block in front of the cable box and switched back to the game--45-44 Kings, halftime. The Boston Celtics dance team--who go by the name 'The Boston Celtics Dance Team'--took their places on the historic parquet floor of the TD Banknorth Garden to shake some obligatory male-fan-base-pleasing booty.
Red Auerbach is spinning in his grave.
"Oh for the love of God!" Sally exclaimed when she returned as she saw the rock-hard abs that are standard equipment on the underemployed aerobics instructors who succeed in the fiercely-competitive world of NBA fleshpot entertainment.
"I thought you liked dance," I said with an innocent look on my face. "Sure, they're not the Boston Ballet, but then who is?"
Co-Defensive Players of the Game
Sally plopped down on the couch as Rocco and Oakie, our two cats, came into the room, looking for a warm lap to sit in for the rest of the night. I don't like to brag, but they do favor me--maybe because I'm such a sensitive guy.
Sure enough, they both hopped up in my chair and settled down after doing that circling thing that cats do to find the best spot. Rocco took the high lap up by my waist where he could get his chin scratched, while Oakie took the low post on my ankles, which were resting on a footstool.
"They sure love you, don't they," my wife purred with a chocolate-eating grin after our little tableau vivant was set.
"What's not to like?" I asked rhetorically.
"Oh, I don't know," she said with a thoughtful look on her face. "Maybe the way you hog this!"
As she spoke she stole the remote from my hand. I was stuck--I couldn't fight my way through the double-team. "Illegal defense!" I yelled.
Deviated septum: Before, and after.
"You're not going to get that call in a close one," she replied coldly. "The refs aren't going to win the game for you."
Sally switched back to Lifetime, where the ailing daughter was seen walking out of the hospital and throwing away her crutches. "Mom!" she cried. "I'm fine--it was just a deviated septum!"
"Oh, honey, that's wonderful!" the mother exclaimed. "Now we can go shopping for scented candles and potpourri again."
"Okay, it's over," I said. "Can we switch back to the game now?"
"Let's see what's on the House and Garden Channel."
Con Chapman is a Boston-area writer. He is the author of "The Year of the Gerbil: How the Yankees Won (and the Red Sox Lost) the Greatest Pennant Race Ever," a history of the 1978 AL East pennant race, and a number of plays, including "Number One Hockey Mom," "Please, Pope," and "What Mickey Belle Isle Told You," a trilogy about hockey (JAC Publishing). His work is available on Amazon Shorts (at 49 cents a dowload), and he writes on sports for Flak Magazine.
