Book of Basketball

by Simmons Bill

  Answer for Question No. 2

  Kobe. He’s the best all-around player in the league, the best scorer, the best competitor, and the one guy who terrifies everyone else. Plus, if you didn’t pick him, he would make it his mission to haunt you on the other team.

  Answer for Question No. 3

  If you replaced Kobe with a decent 2-guard (someone like Jamal Crawford) for the entire ’06

  Lakers season, they would have won between 15 and 20 games. I can say that in complete confidence. Terrible team. When Smush Parker and Kwame Brown are your third-and fourth-best players, you shouldn’t even be allowed to watch the playoffs on TV. Throw Kobe in the mix and they’re headed for 45 wins. So he’s been worth 25 victories for them. Minimum.

  Here was the voting in 2006: Nash: 924 (57–32–20–8–6); LeBron: 688 (16–41–33–23–7); Nowitzki: 544 (14–22–25–36–17); Kobe: 483 (22–11–18–22–30); Chauncey Billups: 430

  (15–13–22–18–25).

  (Translation: I give up.)

  2. Willis Reed, 1970 MVP

  With Russell retired and the Celtics floundering, the Knicks took command of the East, won a league-high 60 games, ignited Manhattan and became the media darlings of the ’70 season. Their two best players were Reed and Frazier: Reed averaged a 22–14, shot 50 percent and protected his teammates; Frazier averaged a 21–6–8, ran the offense, guarded the best opposing scorer and would have led the league in steals had they kept track. If there was ever a season for co-MVPs, this was it. Since the belief was that centers were more valuable than non-centers, Reed (498 votes, 61–55–28) squeaked by Jerry West (457 votes, 51–59–25). And nobody ever thought about it again.

  Well, check out West’s season again. He averaged a 31–5–8 for a 46-win Lakers team that lost Wilt at the 12-game mark with a torn knee (he never returned in the regular season) and had its other two top players (Baylor and Happy Hairston) miss 55 games combined. The next four best players on that team? Mel Counts, Dick Garrett, Keith Erickson and Rick Roberson. Even Charles Manson had a better supporting cast than the Logo that year. Somehow the Lakers finished second in the West, then Wilt returned for the playoffs and they rallied to make the Finals. Statistically, this was West’s finest year: he led the league in points, finished fourth in assists and shot 50

  percent from the field and 83 percent from the line. From a big-picture standpoint, West carried the Lakers all season and dragged them to within one victory of the title. From an alpha dog standpoint, if you had to pick someone who bridged the gap between Russell’s retirement and Kareem’s ascension, you’d pick West. And beyond that, he’s one of the best eight players ever, as well as the guy they selected for the freaking NBA logo, only he never captured an MVP. So why wasn’t this his year? Because the New York media were too busy losing their minds over an admittedly entertaining Knicks team. This was an eight-month circle jerk that eventually led to something like seventeen books being written about that season. 62 A Knick was getting the MVP

  and that was that. The Logo never had a chance. Just know that the trophy was pilfered from him.

  1. Karl Malone, 1997 MVP

  This wasn’t an MVP race, it was a crime scene. The previous season, Jordan averaged a 30–7–4 for a 72-win team, finished with 109 first-place votes and would have been the unanimous MVP if not for the four morons who voted for Penny Hardaway, Hakeem and Malone.63 During the ’97

  season, Jordan’s credentials “dropped” to 69 wins and a 30–6–4—in other words, he was 98

  percent as good as the previous season—only Malone stole the award with a 27–10–5 for a 64-win Jazz team. Here’s the voting from that year:

  Malone: 986 (63–48–4–0–0)

  Jordan: 957 (52–61–2–0–0)

  Look, I was there—this was inexplicable as it was happening. We’ll cover Malone’s inadequacies in a later chapter, but here’s the best analogy I can give you: For my buddy House’s bachelor party in 2008, a group of us trekked to Vegas for four days and landed at the world-renowned Olympic Garden one night. Normally in strip joints, I suggest we find a corner and surround ourselves with those big comfy chairs—I call it the “Chair Armada”—so we aren’t continually approached by below-average strippers trying to pull the “Maybe if I plop right down on his lap, he’ll feel bad for me and buy a lap dance” routine. There wasn’t a corner this time around, so we grabbed a few chairs facing the stage and it worked almost as well. Unable to dive-bomb us from behind, the strippers settled for circling repeatedly and trying to catch our eyes. This strategy could have worked if most of them didn’t look like Hedo Turkoglu. One mediocre Asian with fake cans probably circled us twenty times in two hours—never drawing an extended glance from any of us—before our buddy Monty checked her out on the twenty-first approach, gave up on finding a more appealing option, and said, “Fuck it.” And off they went. When we made fun of him the next morning, he said simply, “It was getting late.”

  What does that have to do with Karl Malone? Just like that fake-boobed Asian stripper, the Mail Fraud circled the MVP voters for ten solid years and never finished higher than third. Meanwhile, the NBA was becoming more and more diluted—expansion had ravaged the league, some younger stars (Shawn Kemp, Penny Hardaway, Larry Johnson, C-Webb, Kenny Anderson, Derrick Coleman) weren’t panning out, and Hakeem, Barkley, Robinson, Drexler and Ewing were past their primes—which meant Utah, a team that was worse in 1997 than they were in 1988 or even 1992, suddenly became a juggernaut in the West.64 There also wasn’t a dominant story in ’97. Everyone was Jordaned out. The “Shaq goes to Hollywood” and “Here comes Iverson” stories had been beaten to death. So had the “Hakeem, Drexler and Barkley are three future Hall of Famers and they’re all playing together” story. Latrell Sprewell hadn’t strangled P. J. Carlesimo yet (although he’d definitely considered it). The Grizzlies, Spurs, Celtics and Nuggets spent the last two months desperately trying to outtank each other for Tim Duncan. By mid-March, once everyone realized that the Bulls couldn’t win 73 games, we were just plain bored and awaiting the playoffs. Then, SI’s Jackie MacMullan wrote the following piece for her March 19 column:

  Headline: “The Jazz Master”

  Subhead: “Malone is playing like an MVP—not that anyone has noticed.”

  First sentence: “Jazz forward Karl Malone knows Michael Jordan will win the league MVP

  trophy again.”

  You get the idea. You can’t blame Jackie for looking for a cute angle—she spent about 800 words talking about how underappreciated Malone was over the years. (Which was true, to a degree.) That got the ball rolling, and within a couple of weeks, this became the cute story du jour. Why couldn’t the Mailman win the MVP? I hadn’t started my old website yet but remember thinking,

  “Why couldn’t he win the MVP? Because MJ is in the league! How ’bout that reason?” I just thought this was the dumbest thing ever. I couldn’t believe it. So the playoffs rolled around and fifty-three voters turned into Monty at the OG: Malone strolled by them for the umpteenth time, they shrugged, stood up and brought him into the VIP room. And that’s how Michael Jordan got robbed of the ’97 MVP. Fortunately for us, he exacted revenge in the Finals over (wait for it) Karl Malone and the Utah Jazz! In Game 1, after Malone missed two go-ahead free throws in the final 20 seconds, Jordan swished the game-winner at the buzzer, turned and did a clenched-fist pump, a move that Tiger Woods later would hijack without paying royalties. And that’s when everyone who voted for the Mailman felt really, really, really dumb. I love when this happens.

  1. Or at a Lakers game, where you can hear Kobe bitching out teammates and coaches! That reminds me of the highlight of the ’08 Finals: Matt Damon cheering the Celts in Game 5 when Phil Jackson turned and hissed, “Sit down and shut the fuck up!” Had they won, I think I would have sacrificed a pinky for Damon to snap into Will Hunting mode and pull the “Hey, Phil, you like apples? … How ’bout them apples?” routine.

  2. Another classic example: Olaj
uwon sounded like Prince Akeem in Coming to America, only if he hung out in downtown Oakland for 10 years.

  3. The half-court shot is my lifelong passion. It should only be shot one way—a three-step start, followed by a heave from under your collarbone. After spending 15 years watching fans shoot it like a free throw or whip it like a baseball, I asked the Clips to let me shoot one for an ESPN

  segment. That morning, they let me practice at the Staples Center and it took 20 minutes to adjust to the glass backboard and the rows of seats behind it (you have to shoot it 2 feet farther than you’d think). By game time, I was ready but had too much adrenaline and banked it off the front of the rim—one inch lower and I would have banked it home. Story of my life. Here’s why I’m telling you this: if you ever get picked, do the three-step heave and aim two feet farther than you think. 4. Let’s hope that’s the first and last time anyone writes that sentence. 5. My favorite Stern story: he held up the 30th pick in the ’08 draft for four full minutes to ream ESPN officials for reporting rumors about Darrell Arthur’s supposedly problematic kidneys, dropped roughly 800 f- bombs, put the fear of God into everyone and then calmly strolled out and announced Boston’s pick. The man has no peer.

  6. It’s the Hart Memorial Trophy, named after Dr. David Hart, the father of Cecil Hart (coach and GM of the 1924 Canadiens). Dr. Hart donated the trophy that year to the league, so they named it after him. I’m not making this up.

  7. You know it’s a memorable flick when fifteen years later you can remember exactly where you saw it. I saw Shawshank in Braintree and Pulp Fiction at a scummy Loews Theater in Somerville. (Whoops, cue up the porn music.) “Bow-cha-cha bow-bow-bow … thank you for coming to Loews … sit back and relax … enjoy the show!”

  8. The only way that title could have been worse was if they called it 500 Yards of Shit-Smelling Foulness or The Prison Rape Redemption.

  9. The Cleveland crew: Daniel Gibson, Damon Jones and Eric Snow, whose shooting prowess I described in 2007 by writing, “If my life were at stake and I had to pick any NBA player to miss a 20-footer that he was trying to make, or else I’d be killed, I’d pick Snow and rejoice as he bricked a set shot off the side of the rim.”

  10. This is a hypothetical example. As far as you know.

  11. Actually, with the way the NBA works now—players from different age groups bonding by coming through the ranks at the same time and, in some cases, knowing each other since AAU

  ball—it’s not far-fetched to think that there’d be more politicking now. The whole Bron-Melo-CP

  generation loves each other. Wouldn’t those guys have swung 2008 votes behind Paul? Wouldn’t the older guys have gravitated toward KG?

  12. That’s not a lie. I spent as much time working out the kinks for this MVP theory as Jonas Salk did on the polio vaccine.

  13. Come on, he was the heart and soul of the Tankapalooza All-Stars in Miami! Do they get Michael Beasley without him?

  14. I think this is how the annual Rucker League tournament works in Harlem. I’m not kidding. 15. Do you think they created the verb “wilt” because of Wilt Chamberlain? It’s an honest question.

  16. The NBA definitely needed a Barkley charisma injection that season. Look at the elite veterans other than MJ: Malone, Stockton, Ewing, Hakeem, Dumars, Drexler, Mullin, Pippen, Robinson, Brad Daugherty, Mark Price. All nice guys, but would you want to spend the weekend in Vegas with any of them?

  17. I keep typing “Chris Paul” because he’s one of those guys whose name has to be said all at once. It’s weird to call him “Chris” or “Paul.” He’s like my friend Nick Aieta in this respect. 18. The same phenomenon happens with parents: they spend so much time with their kids that they begin to think, “There are no other kids like this!” and “He’s so far advanced over every baby his age!” By the way, you should see my daughter run. Fast jets, phenomenal balance. Much better than the other four-year-olds.

  19. They didn’t hand it out this year, but Cousy averaged a 21–8–6 and finished second in scoring and first in assists. He was the Imaginary MVP.

  20. Kareem was a wash with McAdoo in ’76 and Walton in ’77–’78.

  21. Can’t pick between Magic and MJ in ’89–’90. Impossible.

  22. I hated the 50-game, strike-shortened season when everyone was out of shape. I refuse to pick an alpha dog. You can’t make me. It’s like choosing between syphilis and anal warts. 23. The case for Wallace: 23 games, 10.3 PPG, 14.3 RPG, 100 combined blocks/steals, excellent D

  on Shaq in the Final, and a splendid afro.

  24. Again, I’m ignoring the ’99 season. I went to most of the Celtics games that year because my dad never wanted to go—the lockout ended too abruptly and three-fourths of the league was out of shape. Awful season. No award should have been given out other than the Eff You Award. Which, by the way, would be an awesome award. “Ladies and gentlemen, our five-time Eff You MVP, Mr. Vince Carter.”

  25. Goes to show you where the league was in 1962—it couldn’t even pull some strings to get its most exciting player out of military duty.

  26. Kobe settled with the alleged victim for a significant amount of money before the case went to trial. We never heard from her again. You could have a good “Has anyone ever paid more money for one sexual encounter that we know about because of ensuing legal arguments?” argument between Kobe and Michael Jackson.

  27. Those numbers stand for first-, second-and third-place votes. Russell’s 51–12–6 means he had 51 firsts, 12 seconds, and 6 thirds.

  28. The ’62 Knicks were outraged by his 100-point game against them, specifically how Wilt hogged the ball and the Warriors fouled near the end to get him the ball back. It’s safe to say he didn’t get any of their votes.

  29. Here’s how we know this: If Boston called L.A. and proposed a Russell-Elgin trade, L.A. would have initially thought, “Wow, Russell is available?” and maybe even had a meeting. If the Lakers proposed the same trade, Auerbach would have hung up on them. 30. Barnhill was a rookie guard for St. Louis who averaged a 12–5–4 and didn’t make the ’63

  All-Star team, but somebody gave him a third-place vote. Inexplicable. His nickname was

  “Rabbit.” Don’t you miss the days when athletes had animal nicknames?

  31. I am not an unbiased observer. Wait until we get to the Pyramid section; I do everything but splooge on Walton’s ’77 Topps card.

  32. “Messy” is an understatement: Walton demanded a trade, filed a medical malpractice suit, lost some friendships and signed with the Clips in 1979. This was one of the ugliest sports divorces ever. Right up there with Clemens and McNamee.

  33. That was also the year he cut down his afro. Big mistake. That afro made him look six foot ten and added at least a foot to his vertical leap.

  34. I have no clue what the scoring system was this season; all they released were final points. For all we know, the players voted right after plowing through a pile of cocaine the size of a Gatorade bucket. I can’t make enough coke jokes about this era.

  35. If I ruined the movie, too bad—it’s been out for two years. That reminds me: at a New Year’s Eve party in ’95, my buddy JackO told me that he hadn’t seen The Usual Suspects; I had a few in me and blurted out, “Kevin Spacey is Keyser Söze.” He’s still pissed 14 years later. And you know what? I don’t care. If you haven’t ruined a movie twist for a friend as a way to bust his balls, you’re missing out in life. I’m telling you. We’ve had probably a hundred hours worth of conversations about me blowing The Usual Suspects for him. Even right now, he’s fuming. This is great. 36. Anytime “he smacked his wife, let’s get him the hell out of here” is the only reason for dealing one of the best top-ten point guards ever, I’m sorry, that’s a shitty reason. By the way, this footnote was written by Ike Turner.

  37. This backfired when Kidd dove into the stands for a loose ball, landed on his son and broke his collarbone. Karma is a bitch, isn’t it? No young child should be allowed to sit courtside or in the first few ro
ws of a basketball game. It’s too dangerous and any worthy parent would know that. I never liked Joumana after that. Hold on, I have to get off my high horse. 38. Ironically, Kidd had a career year in ’03 (19–9–6, 41% FG) and finished ninth in the voting because everyone was still mortified by how ’02 turned out.

  39. You can still find pieces of Todd MacCulloch’s body sticking to the ceiling of the Staples Center after Shaq ripped him apart like a pit bull.

  41. Elgin won Rookie of the Year and finished with a 25–15, yet earned as many first-place votes as Sears and Schayes combined. Huh?

  42. Totally underrated sports nickname: “Boo.” When I’m the tsar of sports, I’m going to demand that we always have athletes nicknamed “Boo,” “Goo,” “Night Train,” “Blue Moon,” “Goose,”

  “Rabbit,” “Cool Papa,” “Turkey” and “Bad News.”

  43. The Bullets were weakened before the playoffs when Gus Johnson blew out his knee, but still

  … an MVP can’t get swept in the first round, right? The Grumpy Old Editor says Bullets coach Gene Shue blew that series with the not-so-brilliant idea of having Unseld bring the ball up like a point guard. The ruining-to-helping ratio over the course of history with NBA coaches has to be 8:1.

  44. As a freshman in college, I made the rookie mistake of buying Janine Cunningham a half dozen roses after sucking face with her a few nights before. She left treadmarks running the other way. I could have given her a handful of plutonium and it would have gone better. And she was a cool chick. In fact, I guarantee she loves being referenced in this book. The point is, don’t overreact with women or MVP votes.

  45. The real outrage was that Russell didn’t win Coach of the Year. Name me another coach that was also playing 45 minutes a game.

  46. In fairness, Mac had a monster series, averaging a 37–13 in a whopping 327 minutes and even interacting with a teammate two different times.