THE OBSERVER NOTES ON THE PASSING SCENE
WE HAVE BEEN A PART OF THE DOWNTOWN SKYLINE FOR OVER 38 YEARS!
NBA season
A
rkansas will never have an NBA team. This is a law of nature — like gravity. But, in case you need proof, let’s discuss the Arkansas RimRockers. First off, great name. Even the Harlem Globetrotters would find “RimRockers” too gaudy. Secondly, they were actually a pretty good team! In their first year in the league in 2004, they won the American Basketball Association title game against the Bellevue Blackhawks 115-103. After trouncing the ABA on the first go, they moved up to the NBA Development League. This was Arkansas’s “10th grader with an egg that a teacher says is a baby” moment for pro basketball: If we could handle the D-League team, maybe, way down the line, the NBA would give us a real team. But, no. Onlythree years after their title, the Arkansas RimRockers became the La Crosse RimRockers. La Crosse, Wis. (population ~52,000 and with no other facts worth mentioning after skimming its Wikipedia page other than something about fur trappers) was able to fill seats for RimRocker games; Little Rock was not. We broke the egg. Add that fact to these: We can no longer ignore — though we tried — that the NFL is killing its players for money; the NCAA is a scam and Rick Pitino stealing money from his players is just the crusted scum atop a uranium-polluted swamp; and baseball sucks except for the playoffs. (Full disclosure: the Observer spends significant time caring about and watching all sports.) That means the NBA is our last hope to watch American sports without any pangs of shame. (Fútbol is not American, hockey is Canadian and golf is worse than baseball.) So when the NBA season begins Oct. 17, The Observer needs to watch. Who do we root for as Arkansans? There are two ways to go about choosing: geography or bandwagon. If you root for the Cleveland Cavaliers or the Golden State Warriors — fine
— The Observer is sure you’ll have a fun season but you’re also a traitor and a low-down coward. OK, now to geography. The closest NBA teams are: Memphis Grizzlies (139 miles to FedEx Forum), Dallas Mavericks (322 miles to American Airlines Center), Oklahoma City Thunder (339 miles to Chesapeake Energy Arena). The Thunder had the off-season of a lifetime after re-signing Russell Westbrook (averaged a historic triple-double last year) to a long-term contract, finally pulling Carmelo Anthony away from the New York Knicks, and adding Paul George. But, if you like the Thunder you have to root for Carmelo Anthony. For all the unstoppable combustion of Westbrook’s game — who would dunk a child without remorse — you have the unmistakable lethargy of Anthony. The Observer is not a hater, just someone who does not have the time for the emotional toil that cheering for Carmelo entails; it’s too much. We can decide on the Mavs with the same pettiness The Observer rejected OKC fandom: Owner Mark Cuban is annoying. The Observer can’t watch a game that is going to cut to his face reacting. Done. That only leaves the Memphis Grizzlies. They’re the team closest to the state. (Actually, in some ways, by being in Memphis, they are very much part of this state: What’s more Arkansas than having to go to Memphis for a major event?) Mike Conley Jr. and Marc Gasol are both talented, likable star players. They’ve been going to the playoffs in the better of the two conferences for the last seven years. And, their slogan is “Grit and Grind.” Grit and Grind! Most importantly, after a game of last year’s playoffs Coach David Fizdale was complaining about the lack of fouls called on the San Antonio Spurs and, after listing off a few statistics, yelled, “TAKE THAT FOR DATA!” at reporters. It’s now the perfect thing to yell during any Memphis Grizzlies scoring run. It’s so good you can yell it all the time.
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