6 Thoughts
1) Easy win tonight against the worst team in basketball. Miami struggled for a half before blowing the game open in the third quarter and cruising in for a victory while Dwyane Wade took the entire 4th quarter off. It's always nice to get him extra rest. Heat now a season high 6 games over .500 at 25-19.
2) In the 4th quarter, earnest Heat play-by-play announcer Eric Reid pointed out that the Wizards came in to the game dead last in the NBA standings with a record of 9-35, and then relayed a pre-game conversation he had with Washington's only two quality players, Caron Butler and Antawn Jamison. "I told them the same thing I told Kevin Durant before the game earlier this year in Oklahoma City: you guys are part of the solution!" Wow. That kind of makes it all worthwhile, I am guessing.
3) Earlier in the game, Reid and partner Tony Fiorentino talked about the strange injury odyssey of Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas, who now has missed most of the past two-plus seasons with a knee injury. "I would warn him," cautioned Eric, "about how difficult it can be to back from two entire years out of the league." It was unclear what Eric's point was - was he implying that Gilbert Arenas should just come and play regardless of the structural damage in his knee? Regardless, Gilbert currently holds the NBA's worst contract: another 5 years after this one, guaranteed money, at roughly 15 million per year. It is an absolute franchise killer in a league where a strict salary cap prevents you from signing players freely to replace him. Worth mentioning they gave him the contract last summer, after missing the previous year with a knee injury. And it was an extension - he wasn't a free agent, and thus they weren't bidding against anyone. Unfathomably bad management.
4) Heat second year guard Daequan Cook was left out of the Rookie-Sophomore game All-Star weekend, as was Mario Chalmers. Mike Beasley was selected for the rookies. Chalmers can be disappointed but it has been a tremendous year for rookies and not being selected is not a major slight. Daequan, however, has blossomed in to one of the better second year players in the league. He is a high quality NBA defender, is 4th in the NBA in three pointers made (in non-starter minutes), and has knocked down innumerable big shots. The case can be made that he is Miami's second most valuable player through the first half of the season. He is most certainly a better player than Aaron Brooks and Wilson Chandler, who were both selected for the sophomore team ahead of him.
5) You think you know someone so well and then you learn something that makes you love them even more...It turns out that Heat color commentator Tony Fiorentino was not only the head basketball coach at Mount Vernon High School back in the day, but also a history teacher. This is a particular passion at Dos Minutos' headquarters. It may be that Tony and I are slowly melding in to one person: M. Minutos has often pointed out this year that we make similar points, repeatedly, moments apart. Thank goodness that, due to the blowout, she was dozing during tonight's discovery...
6) Finally, I read that Ashley Simpson is positively outraged about the criticism her sister Jessica received for her weight gain, on display at the recent Chili Cook Off at CB Smith Park in Pembroke Pines, Florida, not too far from Dos Minutos headquarters. "A week after the inauguration and with such a feeling of hope in the air for our country, I find it completely embarrassing and belittling to all women to read about a woman's weight or figure as a headline on Fox News," Ashley seethed. Two important thoughts on this: 1) Fox News, as always, is totally awesome. First, the Mike Huckabee Show; now this. You really can't bring it stronger for redneck-y white people than Fox News. 2) Jesus! - of all the years I have faithfully attended the Chili Cook Off at CB Smith Park in Pembroke Pines, Florida, I have to pick this year to skip it. I will never forgive myself - never.
