More hate

[Note: I composed the substance of this post while laying in bed this morning with a pillow over my face, but didn’t have a chance to write it down until now. I find it interesting that, in the intervening time, Curt came to essentially the same conclusion about Dwyane Wade, even if he did misspell his name]

On the plus side (upside, perhaps, in honor of everybody’s favorite spineless color man?), at least the NBA’s officials for Game 6 maintained consistency in calling fouls against the Mavericks for swiping at the ball in Dwyane Wade’s hands and completely missing everything, for standing there when Wade threw his body into someone and flipped the ball over his head, and for getting in the way of Wade’s forearm. On the down side…well, isn’t the downside pretty obvious? (And that doesn’t even get into the fact that both games 5 and 6 essentially ended on phantom foul calls; whatever happened to letting the players decide the game?)

The really sad thing about this whole debacle is that it’s made me start hating Dwyane Wade, one of the most likable players in the league. Intellectually I know that he’d be stupid not to flop, drive recklessly and throw his body into the defender if he’s going to get calls, but the less abstract layers of my brain see that and think about how much I’d want to punch the guy if he ever tried that stuff in a pickup game in which I was involved.

Of course, a good deal of the blame for my wanting to see Wade fail falls at the feet of Heat coach/GM Pat Riley for surrounding him with the likes of the smugly mercenary Antoine Walker and the utterly despicable Alonzo Mourning. Incidentally, when did the league decide that ‘Zo was free to throw his body indiscriminately into shooters so long as he makes a clean block up top? Has this always been the case? Despite the fact that there are at least four players on the Heat I like (Wade, Haslem, Shaq and Posey), I could never find it in myself to root for a team that prominently features Walker, Mourning and, of course, Riley himself, the man who almost singlehandedly destroyed professional basketball for an entire decade.

But, tempting as it is to blame Riley, the presence of he, Walker and Mourning only made me want to see Wade’s team lose; it took truly gutless officiating to make me hate Wade the individual. Which is pretty impressive, given that the whole scenario had me empathizing with Dirk Nowitzki, who isn’t exactly unaccomplished when it comes to flopping.

7 Responses to “More hate”

  1. Curt Says:

    Incidentally, does anyone else find it notable that during the U.S.-Italy World Cup match, a game cursed with equally horrendous officiating, the American announcers were lambasting the ref with justified but still nakedly partisan fervor, whereas during the NBA finals we heard nary a peep from any of them, except when it came time to righteously intone against Mark Cuban for his outbursts against the officials? But I guess in that case they don’t have the nationalism card to play, and Disney (which owns ABC and ESPN) has a much smaller financial investment in FIFA than they do in the NBA. I just find this interesting.

  2. Curt Says:

    p.s. Almost compensating for that bummer sports story was the story on ESPN with the brilliant headline: Guillen calls columnist Mariotti homosexual slur.

  3. shonk Says:

    My favorite part of that story:

    When reached before Wednesday night’s St. Louis-Chicago game, Mariotti said that the story is the gay groups who have been insulted, and not him.

    How, exactly, are gay people insulted by Mariotti being called a fag? The only way that’s insulting is if it’s mortifying to even contemplate the notion that Mariotti might share their predilection for man-ass.

    Oh, wait, I see I’ve just answered my own question.

  4. Andy Stedman Says:

    Well, I prefer Curt’s did spelling of “likeable”. Your version made me read “lickable” in my head, which perhaps ties in with the gay stuff somehow.

    Why on earth are both correct?

  5. El Charno Says:

    Thought I’d provide some insight on the Marrioti / Guillen thing. Marrioti is barely a journalist or even a columnist, he’s just a shit flinger. He basically is on constant attack against any Chicago player, manager, owner, hell even the fans. He’s been doing that the entire time he’s been in this city. He hated Mike Ditka, and now he bitches that Bears coaches are not like Ditka. When the White Sox (the team he picked for a fourth place finish) won the world series, he wrote a totally wounded, insecure article about how he was “actually glad that they had proved him wrong”. His main specialty is name calling. He doesn’t publish the “uncomfortable truths” or anything, just insults people even when there is no reason to do so. Basically, this is the guy that libel laws were invented for. Now, I’m not saying he should shut up or be quiet. He should simply expect the reaction that he gets. I like how the guy who called Frank Thomas (“The Big Hurt”) the “Big Skirt” is acting pious over a sexual insult.

    There’s my discoordinated rant about Marrioti!

  6. shonk Says:

    Dude, I’ve seen “Around The Horn”. I know who Mariotti is and what he does.

    Oh, and if you haven’t seen it yet, check out Jay the Joke.

  7. Heat Shirts Says:

    I’m not gonna lie. It would make my next 5 years if LeBron stays ringless, but you guys are getting awfully close.

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