Buck Harvey: The Rage Of Paul Can Go Two Ways

[duncan228]

http://www.mysanantonio.com/sports/b....f5830891.html

Buck Harvey: The rage of Paul can go two ways
Buck Harvey
San Antonio Express-News

NEW ORLEANS — The fury inside of Chris Paul should scare the Spurs tonight.

It should scare the Hornets, too.

Paul has long had a temper. Once, famously in college, the temper erupted in a cowardly and embarrassing way.

Paul hasn’t done anything like that since, suggesting he learned something. But he’s also never faced in his pro career what he faces tonight. Then, he will be asked to do more, with more pressure, against a le-tested defense known for frustrating the best.

How he handles it will decide a few things.

One is his reputation. There was a time, not long ago, when they called him a choirboy.

Paul was a self-proclaimed momma’s boy, a guy who tried to say and do the right things. He would mow the grass on weekends and squeeze in homework the rest of the time. He made the dean’s list as a communications major at Wake Forest.

When asked about following Tim Duncan and other players at Wake, Paul stayed humble, just the way he said his parents had raised him. “I’ll never be like those guys. They’re on a whole other level.”

He should have lived in Minnesota then. He was Saint Paul.

Everyone in Winston-Salem knew this Paul even before he arrived on campus. Paul was in high school when his 61-year-old grandfather was murdered, and Paul was especially close to him.

“He did so much for our family,” Paul said at the time. “Anything our family needed, he was right there.”

Unsure how he could play the next game with such sorrow, he came up with a way to honor his grandfather. He would score 61 points, or one for every year his grandfather had been alive. Paul had never scored even 40 points before.

Then, he displayed the gifts he displays now. He reached 61 on a drive, and a foul shot came with it. Facing the free throw with the prospect that his point total would extend to 62, Paul intentionally missed short, walked to the sideline and collapsed in the arms of friends.

This is the Paul who was the face of the New Orleans All-Star Game in February, as well as the one who made news last week with a make-a-wish gesture. This is also the Paul who Tony Parker likes.

But there’s something else going on inside of him, and it comes out occasionally when the Spurs get too close to him, or a call goes the other way. Then, Paul looks like a man who’s had waaay too much coffee.

Few humans have expressions as diverse as the Paul smile and the Paul scowl. The latter manifested in technical fouls in college, including two against Duke in his last year in school. But no one would have said much about any of that if not for a moment only Jason Terry would appreciate.

Then, in the last regular-season game of the 2005 ACC season, Paul threw a below-the-belt punch that floored Julius Hodge of North Carolina State. The refs didn’t see the blow, and Paul went on to beat the Wolfpack with a runner at the buzzer.

Asked about the punch afterward, Paul made it worse. He lied and said he would never do such a thing to Hodge.

But replays confirmed the act, and a one-game suspension followed. “Paul has never been as sweet as he’s been made out to be,” a Charlotte columnist wrote then. “He’s generally a good kid, and he works magic with the ball every night. But Paul has always had an edge.”

Paul apologized, later adding, “That’s the last time I’m doing that.”

Maybe it was the last time. In the elimination game against the Mavericks, Jerry Stackhouse was the one who lost his cool and was ejected. Paul was the one who ended with a triple-double.

That’s the Paul who the Spurs should fear. He can be fierce and in control. Given the new Spurs strategy, maybe Paul goes for 61 again.

But everything thus far in his pro career, including the Dallas series, has gone his way. He led the Hornets to the division le, and he finished second to Kobe Bryant for MVP, and now he’s on the Sports Illustrated cover, expected to break through at the age of 23.

What’s there to be mad about?

Tonight might give him something.

[PlayoffEx-static]

You mad, Chris Fall?

[Bob Lanier]

Central bankers are such es.