Why I Hate Kobe

DISCLAIMER: I’m a wounded Celtics fan. I don’t even claim to know a ton about basketball or the NBA. But I do know a douchebag when I see one. And sorry, this might be more for me then for ya’ll.

For years, watching Kobe play (typically in the playoffs) has given me a nasty kind of tight feeling in my stomach. Disregarding games where the C’s are involved, I still get that feeling when it looks like he might beat other teams. I just kind of hate seeing him get what he wants. But why?

I don’t think it’s a sheer talent/watching my boys lose thing, I really don’t, because I don’t hate Pau like this (even though he looks like a recreational heroin user). I never hated Shaq like this (even though Glen Davis is my favorite +6′ first grader). Like Derek Jeter: sometimes I hate what he did to my team but hearing the man’s’ name doesn’t get my Irish up. Kobe is… different.

Long ago, sometime after he refused to sign with the team that drafted him and bitched his way onto a team with a more obvious playoff shot, but before he nicknamed HIMSELF “Black Mamba”, Kobe decided that he was gonna be Michael Jordan. (By the way, he nicknamed himself “Black Mamba” AFTER he was charged with sexual assault. Awesome.) I don’t mean play like Jordan, put up numbers like Jordan, or win rings like Jordan, I mean BE Jordan. If you don’t believe me take a closer look at Kobe’s vamping anytime ANYTHING happens (this man abuses the fact that cameras are constantly on him for reaction shots more than any player I’ve ever seen, something in the LA water has made him realize that every play is a future poster opportunity). Or how he’ll grab his teammates heads and scream inspirational bullshit at them. Or how he hangs onto Phil Jackson (a man who he nearly ran out of town, who has called him “uncoachable”, and who revealed that Kobe used to sabotage his own high school games to keep them close) like a newborn with a tit.

Apparently unsatisfied to simply play amazing basketball, something Kobe does do well, and let the sportscasters make the comparisons, he instead decided to focus on constructing an entirely fake image for himself. I don’t know if Michael Jordan was a good teammate or fun to be around. I know he never ran a teammate out of town (shit, he managed to help keep Dennis Rodman on planet earth), he never called out a fellow teammate as a cheater in an attempt to get the cops to drop AND hide your sexual assault charge (oops, sorry Shaq, it slipped out) and he never looked some kids with a camera in their faces and bitched out a member of his own team “Andrew Bynum? What the f—?” Bryant says in disgust. “Are you kidding me? Andrew Bynum? F—ing ship his ass out. Are you kidding me?” (how the fuck does Bynum continue PLAYING with this asshole?). Now, because Kobe has learned that passing earns him a different kind of gold star, and he calls his teammates his “brothers”, we’re supposed to pretend he’s a team player.

What we’re really dealing with here is a spoiled brat, raised in Europe and pretending to be from Philly, who refused to earn a reputation on a small-market team, hissy-fitted his way on to the Lakers, where he proceeded to get whatever he wanted (after a year or two) because Shaq was about to be old anyway, and then took his very real, unbelievable talent (along with Jerry Buss’s willingness to give him whatever he wants and the league’s willingness to give the Lakers whatever they want), and bought himself some “brothers” with the promise of finals rings (and some help from the Celtics). Maybe that’s why I don’t like Kobe… all of that privileged attitude, inside-fixing, and “brotherly” play-acting just reminds me of L.A.

Oh, wait.

A Love Letter to Hunter S. Thompson

So, on a whim, I bought “Gonzo” from the Barnes and Noble bargain section a week or so ago ago. It’s an oral history biography with over 100 sources. Jann Wenner is the editor, which, honestly, at this point, is a strike against the project, but from multiple sources and my own creepy assessment, he’s one of under five (most likely under three) people who could tell Hunter “no”. Also, reading the book on the bus everyday and then rotting in a kiosk produced the following:

Dr. Thompson:

You sniveling, greedy, mewling, childish, pig-bastard. I have a bone to pick with you. You,a bumbling street-freak, have somehow, quite incredibly, cast a spell on the less desirable elements of this great country, and has proceeded to use them to drag this country down the stony path towards European Maoist Communism. No doubt, whatever small degree of “fame” or “success” you may have achieved is similar to to that of a donkey born with its head upside down: at first, everyone gathers around to see the freakish ass, but soon, as you will realize, Dr. Thompson, they realize that simple ogling produces no understanding, merely disgust and pity, and then everyone backs away slowly, hoping not to startle the animal and attempting to forget the whole incident.

I have read a hearty portion of your work, more than a hearty portion, and despite my best efforts to the contrary, various bits and pieces have stuck like a speed freak’s frantic spittle when he realizes that They are coming this time, and within minutes, a thousand cops will be breaking down doors seeking vengeance and fresh necks to stomp. This just goes to show us that it is rare that we can choose what we remember: as much as we might like, life is not a New Ivy fundraising event, where a few calls to the Right People can reveal an open bar, even without access to a 6-figure check.

That said, to this day, there seem to be a number of kindred-spirit Dope Fiends, criminals, hippies, roustabouts, and otherwise unsavory characters who see some sort of “Wisdom” or “Truth” in your work. This strikes me as USDA-approved Division I codswallop, but there they sit on street corners or in public parks for hours, smoking opium and cackling at your virulent drivel, only to expose mud-covered teeth and bleeding gums, each one filed to a jagged point. Cazart!

Personally, I have never been one for opium, preferring cold whiskey, but I suppose I must give you credit for keeping the wild-eyed vagrants amused and out of my hair while I deal with Matters of Import and Questions of the Soul.

Jesus. Is this what we’ve come to? Using dead men to navigate some sort of Internal Landscape? As a means to clarify the line between Truth and Fiction, or beyond that, to decide if that line even matters if people Understood?

Maybe so, but it seems there is still time to pull back from the edge, pour another Seagrams and Coke (my god, man, didn’t the Wild Turkey bills add up? I suppose those of us without access to Jann Wenner’s expense accounts have to make due.) and come to terms with the facts: Despite the unacceptability and unpleasantness of your personal character, personae, and demeanor, you somehow tend to come out on the right end of things on many of the aforementioned Matters and Questions. I admire your understanding of the fundamental importance of immediate, meaningful, decisive action in the face of monolithic Insanity, regardless of questions of scale or size. When the bastards are coming, they’re coming, and the only thing left to do is to arm ourselves and shoot until enough people have dropped. Otherwise, the scum-suckers never learn, and we would be forced to wait out some sort of Strange and Conciliatory Mercy, no doubt leading to disenchantment and the further water-logging of what little brains remain in the American Public.

May there be all the Wild Turkey, .45 Magnums, and Vincent Black Shadows a Doctor of Journalism could ask for in what comes after.

–Sarah

Stadiums: What the hell do we do with them??

The following is 100% Mallrant, bout a week old, though not directed by Kevin Smith:

So, as I’m sure the Minnesota/Midwest local know, the MOA was originally the Vikings/Twins stadium. There’s a plaque in a corner of Nickelodeon that commemorates where home plate once stood, and supposedly if you ride the log flume there’s a chair attatched to the wall in a seemingly random manner that notes where the longest homer ever hit in the park landed (Harmon Killebrew, 500 and something feet). Looking around, I got to thinking: what an awesome reconstitution of that space (from a financial standpoint). The renovations, obviously, must have been incredibly expensive, but the creation of the Mall has made a lot of people a lot of money, and maintained Bloomington’s status as a thing on the map you should give a damn about.

Then, I got to thinking again (perilous, I know): the MOA may have worked out well for whoever, but what about the Metrodome? What about any of the other stadiums that major teams are moving out of or the ones they will move out of in the next twenty years? What can we do with these massive spaces? Particularly considering how much all pro teams LOVE new stadiums, and the fact that professional sports are more and more embracing the idea that attending games/events is a luxury experience, the demand for these giant buildings doesn’t seem like it will decrease any time soon.

It seems there are two options:
1)Tear the place down, but are we really going to do that anytime a team wants a new box to rattle around in? It seems like a waste of money, as well as possibly causing major traffic inconveniences if we’re talking about a place like the Metrodome.
2) Rent it out for other things. Well, fair enough, but what has the kind of draw of a pro sports team? Seems like it would have to be catered to a group of people who need that kind of space and that kind of parking (indoors, in the case of the Metrodome, which eliminates the fair, which is the only thing I can think of with anywhere near the same draw as a Twins/Vikings game).

Essentially, it seems, my point is that we can’t exactly make a habit of this musical-stadium game, particularly considering the interesting sort of local-pork-barrel-pawn status that stadiums have acquired in local politics over the last 20+ years.

Beyond that, we (as a public) should have, at this point, realized that while it may be enticing to consider the enclosures that we make as permanent, do we really want them to be?

At the very least, looking at how the uses of homes has evolved over time (take a look at how we use houses today vs. before (kitchen size, dining rooms (which are tragically underused), closets, etc.). Even if we continue to ignore the means of sustainable construction that are becoming more and more popular right now (I assume that for the most part, our apathetic asses will mostly continue to ignore them) but can’t we at least recognize that how we use space has changed over time and will continue to change? That maybe, if we plan that a space will exist for decades, that it should be usable for decades without massive overhauls every other ten years. Just sayin’.

Next Time: Non-Mall Related adventures? Could be!