Damn You Kobe!

Note: I had planned to post this on Monday but my son was sick and my job actually wanted to earn my salary this week so I didn’t have time to finish. Apparently they’re not paying me to make blog posts. Who knew?

Watching the last seconds tick away of Cavs vs. Lakers yesterday, I thought the same thing I’ve thought for the past 13 or so years: Damn you Kobe! I thought this would be another chance for him to get embarrassed on national TV, I thought Lebron would show him who’s boss and punish him. Didn’t happen. Kobe and the Lakers won and made it look rather easy. A lot of it had to do with Lamar Odom’s 28 and 17 rebounds but Kobe hit some tough shots right in Lebron’s grill when he needed to. Damn him!

I played basketball in high school and a little in junior college, so got to travel and see some of the really good players around my age group. Players like Stephon Marbury, K.G., Allen Iverson and a couple of other NBA players. These types of players let me know really quickly that basketball would end for me after junior college.( I also found out that I was only 5’11 and not 6’1) Anyway, I remember hearing about this kid in the Philadelphia area who was supposed to be like a mini Jordan. I watched him a couple of times on TV and thought that he had serious talent. Then came the infamous news conference when he announced that he was bypassing college and going straight to the NBA. I don’t know if it was his sunglasses on his peanut head, the suit that looked 5 sizes too big or the way he was mumbling his words but something really irked me about this kid. The feeling only grew stronger during his first season in the NBA, he came across as a whining baby who seldom passed the ball. I remember laughing deliriously when he shot 3 air balls in a row in that playoff series against the Utah Jazz. Ha ha ha. But then he grew out that boondocks’ afro and started to dominate. Even went to work against a fading Jordan a couple of times (Jordan did abuse him in one All-Star game though). Once Shaq came and the Lakers started winning titles again, I had to see his face basically everyday. And for a person who supposedly didn’t want to be compared to Jordan, he sure was starting to sound like Jordan. He started copying his pigeon toed walk, the way he chewed gum and even the Jordan’s fist pump when he would make a clutch shot at the end of games. He basically did everything but move to Chicago and start cheating on Juanita…… I met my wife in 2001 and I remember going to her dorm room and hanging out for the first time. I was sitting down and I could feel eyes staring at me from her dorm wall. I look up and it’s a computer print out Kobe Bean Bryant. I started an argument with her and stormed out of her room. That night I had to decide whether I could see myself with a woman who liked Kobe. Thankfully I snapped out of it and thankfully she didn’t look at me like an immature loser. (she did) Only Shaq was happier than me to see Kobe get in to trouble with his “rape” case in 2003. I never actually thought he raped that girl but I was glad to see some of that luster was coming off his squeaking clean image when it was clear that he wasn’t that clean. I was glad he didn’t go to jail for something he didn’t do but that didn’t stop me from laughing at him fake crying at his press conference. It took him a little while but he’s regained much of his reputation back, especially on the court.

With Lebron averaging close to a triple double while leading his team to 23 straight homes wins, I thought this could be the year that Lebron passes him as the best player in the NBA. Watching Sunday I first see Kobe on the bench before the game looking like someone just farted in his face, then we’re told that Kobe is “sick” and he threw up before the game. Great, just when I thought he didn’t have anything else to copy Jordan about now he wants to copy his famous “flu game”. He didn’t have the great stats that Jordan had in his flu game but he did play well and at times he looked well. Why Lebron didn’t post Kobe up when he outweighs him by 40 pounds, I’ll never know. Instead he was launching jumpers most of the night and had a horrible shooting game.

Will I continue to hate Kobe, I don’t know. I hated Jordan for torturing my Knicks all of those years but I was actually rooting for him the year when his father was murdered and they won the championship. So there’s still hope for Kobe. I’m not saying I want someone to murder his father, I just want him to be a little less corny.

Free Beer

I complained last week about going out to watch the Super Bowl, specifically sports bars. So what do I do? Since I’m a glutton for punishment, I go to a sports bar of course. I knew it would be weird night, when my friend Ryan (who’s one of my more militant friends) says he’s rooting for the Cardinals because his boss likes the Steelers. I say “yeah but the Steelers coach is black and he’d be only the 2nd black coach to win the Super Bowl”. He says “So what, I don’t want to hear my boss’s mouth at work”. Mind you, this is the same guy who would have loud arguments with his girlfriend about black history at 2 in the morning when we were roommates. There were plenty of Steelers fans at the bar and many of them had buzz cuts or faux mullets. It’s safe to say they weren’t rooting for the Steelers because of its black coach. I started to feel a little uncomfortable being one of only a few black faces there until about 5 minutes before the game started and that’s when the negroes started to pour in. I've never been more happy that people were on CP time in my life! Some of the brothers strolling in looked a little shady though, especially one dude wearing an inside out camouflage outfit and these brown Timberland’s that looked two sizes too big. And his braids were all over the place. Ryan turns and says “That dude looks crazy as sh*t”. At this point the dry hot wings that I ordered have arrived at the same time as Jennifer Hudson sings the national anthem. The waitress starts telling me how a girl that usually comes to the bar told her she’d be out of town this week because her sister is singing the national anthem at the Super Bowl. Our conversation went like this:

Waitress: I guess she’s talking about her.

Me: She said Jennifer Hudson is her sister?

Waitress: Yeah I guess.

Me: She’s from Chicago and her family was murder a couple of months ago….

Waitress: Noooooooo really? So I guess that girl was lying huh?

Me: Ummm yeah, there’s a pretty good chance she was…....

If the waitress hadn’t forgot napkins for my wings. I wouldn’t have believed that she didn’t know who Jennifer Hudson was. Because really, who forgets to bring napkins when a person is eating hot wings? I thought the first half of the game was semi entertaining and it looked like the Cardinals were going to take the lead until the Steelers returned an interception all the way back for a touchdown to end the half. That was the Kurt Warner I knew and hated when he was the quarterback for the Giants. He always found a way to cost us the game with a fumble or interception with his big stupid gloves that he wears on both hands. At this point I had a nice buzz going from my multiple Coronas so I didn’t mind Bruce Springsteen’s screaming too much. Plus he has a new found cool since performing for Obama at the inauguration. The rest of halftime was filled by me and Ryan discussing the highs and LOWS of married life. Fun times.

After a pretty boring 3rd quarter with only 3 points the whole quarter, the game heated back up in the 4th after the Cardinals stopped the Steelers on the goal line and then drove all the way down the field for a touchdown. Then Ryan decides he wants to act goofy and makes the fatal mistake of jumping up from the table and screaming yeaaahhhhh! Crazy Inside Out Camouflage man see’s him and says “Yeah son, that’s what I’m talking about. Who yall for, Who yall for?” He then proceeds to philosophize in a “I just got out of prison way” about the NFL and how they don’t like signing black players even though the league is 90% black. Meanwhile Ryan is on one side of me laughing and texting on his phone while I’m sitting right next to this guy listening to him talk nonsense for 15 straight minutes without me saying a word. Finally I notice a woman in a skimpy outfit walking around with Heinekens bottles on a tray and say “Yo they’re giving out free beer!” Crazy Inside Out Camouflage guy sprints after her and almost tackles her, which gave me time to switch my chair around so that there was another chair between me and crazy guy. By this time the Steelers were driving down the field for what would be there game winning score and place was going crazy. After downing a fee Heinekens myself and watching the last seconds tick off the game clock, we were ready to bounce. Leaving the bar we walked past C.I.O.C. guy while he was talking to a man who looked borderline homeless saying “Man they got free beer and hotdogs?”. We then made a mad dash for the parking lot.

Super Bowl Ticket for One

Am I the only one who likes watching the Super Bowl by myself? No matter what the scenario I usually find myself irritated for most of the game unless I’m watching it by myself. First, there’s the whole sports bar scene where about 1000 people crowd around 3 or 4 flat screens hanging on the wall. Sometimes the sound is turned up on the TVs but you can barely hear it because it’s being drowned out by people yelling and screaming. Sometimes you’ll get sound until there’s a timeout and then it’s club time and the music is blasting at ear splitting levels. At every sports bar you always see the same characters, like the guy who’s sitting at the bar turning around every two minutes to see what girls (sometimes what guy) is looking at him,then he has to get up several times so every one can see his coogi sweater or new leather jacket that he has on. Not to be out done, you’ll have the woman who’s there either with her boyfriend or with a couple of other girls on the prowl (typically cougars) who will sash shay past your table 100 times so you have no choice but to look at her out of shape butt squeezed into some wack apple bottom jeans. Usually I have a headache by the second quarter from straining to hear my friends over the music or screaming over the music so they can hear me. The sad part is I’m still considering this option for Sunday.

Many people enjoy going to mini house parties to watch the Super Bowl. This option is cool if you either know a bunch of the people there or if some of the people there are knowledgeable about football and you’re able to have some good debates. If you don’t have one of those two things going for you then you’re in trouble. I went to Super Bowl party one year and had somebody’s drunk uncle spitting in my ear for 5 hours about how good the Steelers were in the 70’s he kept saying words like “Kordaback” instead of Quarterback. I don’t know if that was as bad as time when I went to a S.B. party with this girl I was dating. She knew most of the people there and I didn't know anyone. (Big mistake) Of course there was a hating guy at the party who kept saying phrases like “remember that time" to this girl and then looking at me for my reaction. After the 5th time I gave him a serious mean mug only to remember that he was there with 3 dudes and I was only there with that girl. I think we probably had a combined weight of 250 at the time. Not good odds for us. To make matters worse, the girl kept responding “ooooohhhh I remember that”. I remember that was the last time I went out with her dumb ass.

Most of my friends are doing their own thing this year and most of my wife’s friends are wack so I don’t know if I’ll be doing the house party thing this year. I’ll probably just end up watching the game on my couch at home by myself. Actually this could be a great father/son bonding experience. I can explain to my son why daddy is getting mad at the TV even though my favorite team isn’t playing. Then I can also explain what a “point spread” is and what is the “over/under” and how it’s relevant to paying the mortgage this month and keeping the heat on. Yeah that’s what I’ll do, I’d much rather hear him say “daddy, touchdown” then to have someone’s drunk uncle spitting in my ear saying “You got to sack da Kordaback “ all night.

Game?......What game?

It has taken four days but I’m finally ready to talk about the Giants losing this past weekend. It was a sad, sad day in the Allweez household. Ok maybe not the household but definitely for the daddy part of the house. My wife and son were oblivious to the fact that my favorite team was getting their taints handed to them by the Eagles. I knew I wasn’t over the game on Monday when I picked up my son from his daycare and saw that one of his classmate’s parents had on an Eagles jersey and I immediately wanted to punch him in his neck. And I would have done it if he wasn’t about 5 inches taller and 80 lbs heavier than me. All I could muster was “Aww man take that jersey off, ha ha ha”. Ha ha ha my ass. My pops had been warning me since week 14 of the NFL regular season that he didn’t want to see the Eagles in the playoffs and I told him to basically shut it, the Giants will handle it. I’m almost positive my Pops jinxed the game five weeks in advance. Thanks Pops.

I knew we (the Giants) were in trouble when Eli Manning turned into Eli from 2006 and threw his first pass of the game 5 yards short of wide receiver Steve Smith. We ended up kicking a field goal and losing the momentum we had from the long opening kick off return. It was all downhill from there. I have to pin most of the blame on this loss on Eli anyway. And don’t hand me any bull about it being a windy day and that affected his throwing. Donovan McNabb played with the same conditions and he played like it was 80 degrees out. It was funny hearing the commentators and various people talking about how Eli misses Plaxico Burress. NO SH*T! He’s 6’5 and can jump, you take him away and Eli can no longer just throw it up and have Plax go get it. Neither Smith, Domenik Hixon nor Sinorice Moss are game changers and Amani Toomer runs like he’s 50 years old at this point. Even before the playoff loss I though Plax should be brought back next year and this only reinforces that point but he would definitely be on a short leash. One man is not bigger than the team. With Osi “Five Hour Energy” Umenyiora coming back from knee surgery the defense will be strong again next year. I swear if I see that damn 5 hour energy commercial one more time I’m going to.........buy it. Many people will argue this but I believe Brandon Jacobs has to go. I like the way the offense flows with Derrick Ward starting and Ahmad Bradshaw coming in off the bench. Ward is a much better pass catcher and to me he runs just as hard as Jacobs and he’s 40 lbs. lighter. We’ll be alright. And I guess I’ll be alright also. I think I, like other Giants fans were spoiled after last years magical run and all the excitement that came with it. There’s nothing like having people congratulate you on your team’s victory because they know that was your team from the beginning and you didn’t just jump on the bandwagon. I hate people like that! I guess I’ll just have to sit back and see if Donovan McNabb can take “us” to the Super Bowl. Go Eagles!

Down, Set, Criticize

Neither the Eagles nor the Vikings are one of my favorite football teams, but watching the game between them on Sunday was kind of depressing. Although I was happy for my son to see two people that looked like him playing quarterback for their teams, I winced at every Donovan McNabb overthrow and every Tavaris Jackson pass thrown at the feet of his wide receivers. With each incompletion the image of black quarterbacks in the NFL took a hit. In a year in which black quarterbacks were constantly taking a media beating, this game only added insult to injury. The downward spiral really started last year with Michael Vick’s incarceration. Football analysts had already considered Vick to be just a physically gifted athlete who didn’t possess the skills to play the quarterback position. “Skills” being code for intelligence. And this was before he started pretending he was Will Smith in I Am Legend and choking out dogs. If you go down the list of black QB’s that started games in the NFL this year: Jason Campbell, DeMarcus Russell, Vince Young, Daunte Culpepper, David Garrad, Jackson and McNabb, only Seneca Wallace was given semi favorable reviews. But there was little mention of what these QB’s had to deal with during the season. Campbell was learning from his 3rd offensive coordinator in 4 years, Russell is playing for one of the worst organizations in the NFL in the Oakland Raiders, I think Vince Young is dealing with problems that go beyond football that he needs help with, Culpepper was set up to fail coming in trying to help the Lions who ended up with zero victories, Garrad ending up losing 4 starting lineman, one of which was shot 14 times and is now paralyzed. Jackson may be out of Minnesota soon but he’s young and still has time to develop.

McNabb easily receives the most negative press of all the black quarterbacks. I’ve always liked McNabb, we’re close in age and I was impressed by the way he handled himself after he was booed on draft day. I was also glad he took the high road and didn’t stoop down to that clown Terrell Owens level of shucking and jiving. That’s why I was so surprised when he admitted after a game earlier this year against the Bengals that he didn’t know NFL games could end in a tie. Whether he knew the rule or not, he knew better than to say he didn’t know. Listening to some of the sports talk radio after the game, I could just feel some of the caller’s venom towards McNabb and you sense that they were ready to say “stupid n****r” after each sentence.. Even with some of the disappointment McNabb has had the last couple of seasons,his stats (30,000 passing yards, 200 TD’s and a 73-39 win/loss total) leave him as one of the best black quarterbacks to ever play, alongside one of my childhood idols Warren Moon. Thankfully he was able to bounce back and lead his team to the playoffs and quiet some of his critics. Watching Ohio State’s freshmen quarterback Tyrelle Pryor last night gave me hope that there are future black stars at this position but it ultimately rests on McNabb’s shoulders and how far he take his team in the playoffs. With all that being said, I hope his @ss goes home this weekend since I’m a Giants fan but I hope he plays well enough not to receive most of the blame.