Basketball

Courtside in Las Vegas

August 10, 2013

He’s the master of smooth jump shooting. He’s a shrewd passer and disruptive long-armed defender. He’s the player who hits shots when it matters. He’s Mr. Clutch, Jerry West, man in the NBA logo. He’s also the legend whose 1960s Los Angeles Lakers lose several times in the finals to the Boston Celtics of supernatural…

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Las Vegas Hell Motel

July 20, 2013

Fritz and Ida go to bed early, arise refreshed, eat good breakfast, and then grit teeth before driving east to enter Mojave Desert where dry death and hot existence always depress, but they can’t afford flight to Las Vegas for NBA summer league. Thankfully, they’ve reserved good motel, for three nights at fifty bucks per,…

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Pray for Heat

May 29, 2013

Sunbathers and other celebrities believe Miami Heat certain to beat Indiana Pacers in series tied at two. I say lunch pail Pacers have five of eight best players, hobbled Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh aren’t second and third after LeBron James, and big Pacers Roy Hibbert, David West, and Paul George outrebounded all Heat in…

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Internal James

December 13, 2011

in crunch throw king james ball don’t really want but gotta dribble hard in place rather not drive now maybe i’ll shoot from timbuktu or you do something

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The NCAA Confesses

September 21, 2011

What’s in that syringe? Untie me. You’ll go to jail. This won’t work. I’m not talking. I hope I won’t. I know I shouldn’t say as a kid I was a white wimp and still am and therefore perfect to work for the NCAA. I loathe my athletic superiors and all the media and fan…

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Twilight Next Door

August 31, 2011

Soon after moving into current home Joe walked out front to trim bushes and met next door neighbors, lady and gentleman both about eighty. She introduced herself and said, “This is George.” Joe said hello and enjoyed lady’s vivacity and charm but thought what rude bastard husband was, bearing silly semi-smile and not looking at…

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Letter to my Cable Company

December 14, 2010

Dear Cable Company, Please excuse me for annually asking you to send a technician to upgrade my service from a “limited-basic” menu of twenty-one channels to the still-merely-“basic” package of seventy-five, and then a few months later recalling your cable guy, always a different one, to climb the telephone pole in my back yard and…

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Shooting Baskets in Dreams

December 10, 2010

Generation after Hal moved from two small dingy rooms connected to old house in battery-stealing part of town, he thought dreams had disappeared so was saddened to see himself there shooting baskets. Old friend sat behind and watched errant shots. Damn ceiling’s too low to shoot right. Friend should’ve agreed but only stared as Hal…

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Clippers Carve Kings during Thanksgiving Feast

November 30, 2010

On Thanksgiving night I made my first visit to Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles since New Year’s Day when the defending-champion Lakers hosted an aroused and hot-shooting group of young Sacramento Kings who would’ve prevailed if Kobe Bryant, with customary flair, hadn’t swished a three-point jumper a millisecond before the final horn. The capacity…

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Basketball in Downtown Los Angeles

January 29, 2010

Trust yourself. You’ve been to the Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles many times, so you know you’re walking the right way, south on Figueroa Street a couple of blocks to the arena. Okay, then. Where is it? It’s got to be there. They haven’t moved a building holding almost twenty thousand people, have they?…

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Highlights from the 2008 Olympics

August 28, 2008

I see many noble commentators have downplayed if not altogether ignored Olympic sports in order to rebuke China for a range of civil rights concerns and thereby imply the nation today is as ill as in the era of Mao, who shred at least as much flesh as Hitler and Stalin.  China has in fact…

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Pistons Pound Lakers into New Era

June 20, 2004

Don’t dare claim you knew the Detroit Pistons were going to kick the stuffing out of the Los Angeles Lakers, not unless you’ve got it in writing and notarized by at least three solemn souls.  You couldn’t have known a seven to one underdog was going to pound Hollywood’s favorite team, and pride of NBA…

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