Can't Knock the Hustle ...

What's good family?

I’ve kept my nose to the grindstone, hustled for my dreams and showed extraordinary dedication to the task of editing. But then there is this Twitter addiction I’ve recently developed. When that red light blinks on my blackberry delicately requesting my attention for a brief jaunt into the musings of celebrities, strippers and the latest Lebron James rumors (please dear Lord let Bron-Bron choose the Knicks) I must answer her. Twitter is my side piece she only ask for whatever time I can spare until I actually look at a time stamp and see it’s been forty-five minutes of virtual voyeur practice ... but I can’t stop, I have a problem, I need help ... even though I can quit anytime I want to ... I’m just not ready yet #classicjunkyspeak. See! Even in the blog she finds me! Ok but let me get back to the Knicks.

Saturday May 29, 1993. Game three Knicks and Bulls in the conference finals. The Knicks were up two games to none on the mighty two-time defending champs. 2-0! Held court at home, didn’t let them steal one. It was game time and I sat with my game face on flanked in the day room by Boo, PJ, Tiny and the rest of the New York squad. Our shit-talk to the Chicago dudes was on fire. All those years spent watching mediocre basketball at the Garden with my dad and Shante went to the playoffs while I watched it on TV in rehab. Bob Fennimore, a friend of my father worked for WOR-TV back when the Knicks played on Channel 9. I felt like a season ticket holder we went to so many games at the Garden. We had floor seats behind the basket. Back when they were red. They became lavender when Dave Checketts and Pat Riley took over. I use to go when it was Red Holzmen before it was Hubie Brown before it was Rick Patino and the Bomb Squad. Holzmen was my dad’s dude. Ray Williams, Michael Ray Richardson, Truck Robinson, Sly Williams, Rory Sparrow, Marvin Webster, Bill Cartwright. I was raised on the Classic Roundball logo listening to the Garden sound system blare ‘We are New York and we know basketball, we will win it all, cause we’re the New York Knicks.’

But I was also a tongue wagging-long-shorts-black-ankle-socks-wearing-Air Jordan poster-having kind of dude too. To be a Knick fan and a Jordan lover is pure self-hate. Oh and in case you wondered the last time the Knicks won the championship it was 1973 and I was one. The Yankees and Giants have taken our team/fan relationship to its zenith. The Knicks have continually delivered heartbreak and disillusionment. But in the ‘92-‘93 season Pat Riley had us believing. They were 60-22, the number one seed and on a collision course with the Bulls who had knocked us out the playoffs three of the last four years. And just like Jordan had to go through Bird’s Celtics and Isaiah’s Pistons we knew all roads went through his Bulls. And of course what do the Knicks do in game three? They shit the bed. The Bulls toyed with them. Just embarrassed and frustrated the Knicks. Of course John Starks got ejected when he went after Jordan. Like he was gonna touch the franchise. The Knicks had TWENTY turnovers in the game! The Bulls scored sixty-two in the first half! Outside of Ewing’s twenty-one points nobody stepped up. It was tough to sit through. Most of the bandwagon New York niggaz turned on the Knicks before the end of the third quarter. Starting with that game the Knicks lost by twenty, ten, three, and eight. But game five was the worst! I still see all six-foot-eleven of Charles Smith’s-I can’t-understand-why-he-didn’t-just-dunk-it-ass getting his shot blocked while leaking blood from stab wombs as the refs swallowed their whistles. It still remains in the top five worst sports moments of my life.

These wounds of a life long Knicks fan have healed with time. And tomorrow’s announcement brings the anticipation that one day my dad and I will celebrate with delirium as the Knicks play late into June.

What better video to play?

See you on the other side ...

M