June 1, 2006
I blame the Dream Team. If Magic, Michael, Barkley and the crew don't go to Barcelona, then a youthful Dirk Nowitzki in Germany and a soccer playing Steve Nash in Canada don't go all ga-ga and start hooping their heads off.
But the big day has arrived, and like a NFL Conference championship game featuring two black quarterbacks... we's about to have an NBA Championship series with a team led by a white superstar for the first time since the Hick from French Lick days.
For the math impaired, that would be Larry Bird, exactly 20 years ago.
However, this is a much different world than it was 20 years ago, according to people who use 9/11 as an excuse to divest us of our personal liberties and kill brown people. The nation is completely patriotic and nothing is more important than preserving the American way of life.
So white people have to decide. It's going to be either Shaq or Ben Wallace leading the Eastern Confernce rep in the Finals. Who does white America value more? Americans or white people?
If history is any indication, we all may as well go back to Shaqrifa. During the 2004 Olympics, white people openly rooted against the Men's basketball team, even though they had such "good guys" as Lebron James and Tim Duncan.
Not because they're black, of course. Oh no, the team was hated on because some of them wore jewelery. And had the nerve to get some tatoos. A couple of the guys had actually purchased REAL ESTATE, of all things, with their millions. So it's easy to see how patriotic Americans might go for the dashing Dirk over the mumbling O'neal, or the smart (how many times will we hear that word beginning June 8?) Nash over the big Ben (cornfro) Wallace.