ShoogarBear
02-20-2005, 06:28 PM
My favorite is bolded . . .
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Good, bad and ...
All-Star Saturday moments you may have missed
Posted: Sunday February 20, 2005 2:51PM; Updated: Sunday February 20, 2005 5:37PM
All-Star Saturday provided some memorable images: Quentin Richardson nailing his last nine three balls to win the shootout, Josh Smith donning Dominique's jersey for a windmill dunk and, best of all, possibly the greatest dunk contest moment ever: the Steve Nash-to-Amare Stoudemire headball.
But you saw all that if you were watching on TV. Here are some of the things you might not have seen -- and in some cases that's a good thing. Starting with:
• Grant Hill introducing the Goo Goo Dolls: Poor Grant couldn't have looked less inclined to perform this duty. The crowd felt likewise about watching an androgynous man lip sync the lyrics to an old Supertramp song -- Give a Little Bit -- that would have been much better if it stayed in the Supertramp catalog. Couldn't they have found something a little more classy for a guy as classy as Hill?
• NBA fashion row. In an image that, as one of my press row peers pointed out, might tell you everything you need to know about the NBA these days, Allen Iverson and Shaquille O'Neal stood next to each other at one point looking like a very large pimp had brought his 16-year-old son to the game. Actually, Shaq looked more like a pimp crossed with a 30s-style gangster: resplendent in a charcoal suit, red shirt, red kerchief and shiny black leather bowler hat. When he was lit upon by the "Kiss Me" cam -- that NBA rite wherein the Diamond Vision puts a couple up and exhorts them to make out -- O'Neal turned to his wife and unveiled a Gene Simmons-esque tongue, flicking it like a lizard at her before kissing her. It was an unsettling moment.
• Other attendees: Over in the stands, David Robinson was taking photos with the contingent of fatigue-wearing military members in attendance. His smile was as big as always. Elsewhere, Kenyon Martin was wearing a hat on top of a white do rag so voluminous it looked like he tied a tablecloth around his head. To Martin's credit, he cheered early and often for all the other Nuggets -- Voshon Lenard in particular.
• The Mavs Maniaacs. I don't know if they showed this on the telecast but be very, very happy if they didn't. This is the brainchild of Mark Cuban, and as such it was born prematurely and horribly disfigured. Here's the idea: 10 middle-aged men with enormous guts gyrate and grind to dance songs, including I'm too Sexy for My Shirt, which they most definitely were not. Not that this fact stopped them from doffing theirs to reveal half-shirts, as well as the swaying, jiggling beasts that lay beneath.
• The Friday night party at Marcus Camby's house. I didn't attend this, but never fear, the crack reporters of the Denver Post brought us all the important news. Such as, for example, that the first-floor toilet backed up. I'm not kidding, that was printed in the Sunday edition. Also: it took 90 minutes for people to get their cars back. And, in news we didn't need to know, Julius Erving was "kicked back on a bed in the basement, chillin' with an equally laid-back babe next to him, taking in the scene."
• The Chris Andersen Show. I fear this might have been shown on the telecast. We love Chris. He's a first-class space cadet, the equivalent of Shaggy in the leagues' Mystery mobile or, as SI writer Ian Thomsen put it last night "the Kramer of the NBA." But his performance in the dunk contest was so comical it made one wonder, as is the case with certain American Idol performers, if he was actually just doing it for laughs. On his first dunk attempt, he apparently followed the motto of "if at first you don't succeed, and if at second you don't succeed, and if at third ..." and so on up until "if at ninth." He kept throwing that football pass and it kept coming up short on the alley-oop. Then, for reasons only he can know, his Hornets teammate J.R. Smith chose Andersen, the guy who just spent five minutes trying to throw an alley-oop, to throw him an alley-oop. In a shocking development, Andersen proceeded to mistime two more passes, this time from directly beneath the basket. Afterward, Andersen analyzed his performance succinctly, saying: "I stunk it up tonight." True. But those of us on press row would like to thank you, Chris, for making the evening far more enjoyable.
Link (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2005/writers/chris_ballard/02/20/all.star.sat/index.html)
-----------------------------------------------
Good, bad and ...
All-Star Saturday moments you may have missed
Posted: Sunday February 20, 2005 2:51PM; Updated: Sunday February 20, 2005 5:37PM
All-Star Saturday provided some memorable images: Quentin Richardson nailing his last nine three balls to win the shootout, Josh Smith donning Dominique's jersey for a windmill dunk and, best of all, possibly the greatest dunk contest moment ever: the Steve Nash-to-Amare Stoudemire headball.
But you saw all that if you were watching on TV. Here are some of the things you might not have seen -- and in some cases that's a good thing. Starting with:
• Grant Hill introducing the Goo Goo Dolls: Poor Grant couldn't have looked less inclined to perform this duty. The crowd felt likewise about watching an androgynous man lip sync the lyrics to an old Supertramp song -- Give a Little Bit -- that would have been much better if it stayed in the Supertramp catalog. Couldn't they have found something a little more classy for a guy as classy as Hill?
• NBA fashion row. In an image that, as one of my press row peers pointed out, might tell you everything you need to know about the NBA these days, Allen Iverson and Shaquille O'Neal stood next to each other at one point looking like a very large pimp had brought his 16-year-old son to the game. Actually, Shaq looked more like a pimp crossed with a 30s-style gangster: resplendent in a charcoal suit, red shirt, red kerchief and shiny black leather bowler hat. When he was lit upon by the "Kiss Me" cam -- that NBA rite wherein the Diamond Vision puts a couple up and exhorts them to make out -- O'Neal turned to his wife and unveiled a Gene Simmons-esque tongue, flicking it like a lizard at her before kissing her. It was an unsettling moment.
• Other attendees: Over in the stands, David Robinson was taking photos with the contingent of fatigue-wearing military members in attendance. His smile was as big as always. Elsewhere, Kenyon Martin was wearing a hat on top of a white do rag so voluminous it looked like he tied a tablecloth around his head. To Martin's credit, he cheered early and often for all the other Nuggets -- Voshon Lenard in particular.
• The Mavs Maniaacs. I don't know if they showed this on the telecast but be very, very happy if they didn't. This is the brainchild of Mark Cuban, and as such it was born prematurely and horribly disfigured. Here's the idea: 10 middle-aged men with enormous guts gyrate and grind to dance songs, including I'm too Sexy for My Shirt, which they most definitely were not. Not that this fact stopped them from doffing theirs to reveal half-shirts, as well as the swaying, jiggling beasts that lay beneath.
• The Friday night party at Marcus Camby's house. I didn't attend this, but never fear, the crack reporters of the Denver Post brought us all the important news. Such as, for example, that the first-floor toilet backed up. I'm not kidding, that was printed in the Sunday edition. Also: it took 90 minutes for people to get their cars back. And, in news we didn't need to know, Julius Erving was "kicked back on a bed in the basement, chillin' with an equally laid-back babe next to him, taking in the scene."
• The Chris Andersen Show. I fear this might have been shown on the telecast. We love Chris. He's a first-class space cadet, the equivalent of Shaggy in the leagues' Mystery mobile or, as SI writer Ian Thomsen put it last night "the Kramer of the NBA." But his performance in the dunk contest was so comical it made one wonder, as is the case with certain American Idol performers, if he was actually just doing it for laughs. On his first dunk attempt, he apparently followed the motto of "if at first you don't succeed, and if at second you don't succeed, and if at third ..." and so on up until "if at ninth." He kept throwing that football pass and it kept coming up short on the alley-oop. Then, for reasons only he can know, his Hornets teammate J.R. Smith chose Andersen, the guy who just spent five minutes trying to throw an alley-oop, to throw him an alley-oop. In a shocking development, Andersen proceeded to mistime two more passes, this time from directly beneath the basket. Afterward, Andersen analyzed his performance succinctly, saying: "I stunk it up tonight." True. But those of us on press row would like to thank you, Chris, for making the evening far more enjoyable.
Link (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2005/writers/chris_ballard/02/20/all.star.sat/index.html)