Fish finally hits the nail on the head.....

[dalmations202]

Dirk's Detractors: The Paper Tigers Of TNT
C-Webb And Barkley Couldn't Put Brakes On Their TV Train Wreck
By Mike Fisher -- DB.com

The NBA jungle is suddenly full of a lot of “paper tigers’’ on the prowl.

The folding chair known as C-Webb is now in charge of who isn’t a “true warrior.’’ Charles Barkley, flawed enough as a human being to deserve being called “soft’’ in every way, is now in charge of trying to look beyond his own gut to judge others’ guts. Trite observations about the Mavs portray them as being as “delicate as Swarovski crystal.’’ And heck, Kenyon Martin’s so tough he’s got his sister standing up for him.

Paper tigers, all of them, disingenuous fake-toughs who in their heart of Bravehearts surely must enjoy watching Dirk Nowitzki roar.

Another round of this ridiculously fraudulently chest-pounding/Dirk-bashing starts with the TNT studio guys. And I’ve got so much to say about it I’m going to have to go stream-of-consciousness on you:

ITEM: Nowitzki granted TNT a pregame G2 interview. In the session, he was asked about the assorted skills of Martin, Andersen and Nene. He politely mentioned each Nugget, noted a strength of each, said something about how they challenge him.

In his exact words:

“I think Birdman does a good job because he's so long, he can contest my shot. And K-Mart and Nene are stronger and try to body me more. And Birdman is just long and even when I want to shoot it he can contest it. They have three very good defenders in the post position."

That’s it. Fairly innocuous, eh?

Back to Charles and Kenny and C-Webb in the studio – and down the rabbit hole we go.

ITEM: The TNT idiotainers said that Nowitzki –by admitting that his opponent is skilled -- had just ceded a psychological edge to Martin and Co.

Said Kenny Smith: “Wow! I never heard a great scorer say somebody can guard him!’’

Said Chuckles: “If a guy says he can stop you, it should piss you off.’’

Said Webber: “Dirk’s throwing a rose petal. I’m just shocked.’’

WTF? Dirk didn’t say or do ANY of that!

He was simply being polite while doing what he’s done his whole life, and doing what he’s done all year and all series against Denver: be too busy scoring 30 to crow about it.

But somebody doesn’t like it because while he’s conducting the interview he’s not wearing a vanity Band-Aid with his German area code on it?

Check this, peeps: What if Dirk’s politeness, frankness, self-evaluation, intelligence, whatever, IS his edge? What if deep analysis and deep thought are what got him to the point of being one of the world’s 10 best basketball players in the first place?

Are we calling for Dirk to be stupid? Or rude? Or both?

Fellas, there’s enough ignorance in the world, in the sport and – honestly, enough ignorance in your studio – to go around without asking the intellectually enlightened to join you in leftover primordial muck.

ITEM: Now what, exactly, was The UberMan’s crime?

Barkley and Webber kept quoting Dirk as saying those Nuggets “can check’’ him. Kenny Smith misquoted Dirk as saying they do “a great job’’ stopping him.

But none of those “rose petals’’ were ever said, either.

What happened was, Barkley and Webber heard Dirk’s quotes -- heard him not say he'd packed a shiv for the Denver trip -- and were in position to give quick-on-their-feet analysis.

And they were not mentally nimble enough to do so.

So instead, they went all Scarface on the thing. Talk tough. Act tough. And as the cameras keep rolling on live TV, back it up by. …

Saying it again. And again. And again. Even though their portrayal of Dirk’s comments were inaccurate, even though their reactions to Dirk’s comments were unjust …

They said it again and again. And once a poser acts tough, he’s required to maintain that position. Because admitting an error is a sign of weakness, right?

I see 16-year-olds from broken homes, kids scuffling for some status in society, do this all the time. I rarely see millionaires with media jobs who are in their 40's scuffle so pitifully.

ITEM: Anchor Ernie Johnson tried to steer them right. So did colorman PJ Carlesimo. But they are white they never played the game… so what do they know about being “true warriors’’?

If you know Ernie Johnson or his recent health battle, you might agree with me that should be especially offended at that inference.

And speaking of knowledge: Dirk's excellence is revealed in the numbers everyone knows, the stats, the All-Star Games, the First-Team-All-NBA honors, the MVP. Maybe TNT needs a research boy to check on Dirk's "toughness'' as it actually relates to basketball: In the last 10 years you know how many regular-season games he's missed?

A grand total of 28. That's basketball-tough -- and no boxing gloves, because it's hard to score 26 points a game while wearing boxing gloves.

ITEM: Why did TNT keep going back to this obviously shallow well? I guarantee this: In this Twitter/Facebook/internet/immediate-repsonse era, somebody at TNT realized they had a controversial hit on their hands. Barkley/Webber vs. Dirk Nowitzki? It’s a hit!

So like a top-40 radio station, they kept playing the hit. Like a record, baby. Right round round round.

ITEM: At one point, Webber and Barkley both stated strongly that great players they’ve been around NEVER concede the greatness of an opponent.

It was at this cartoonish point, at that hyperbolic proclamation, when SOMEBODY should’ve pulled the brake on this train wreck. In Barkley and Webber’s combined 70-odd years in basketball, NOBODY ever offered a respectful evaluation of an opponent?

They even mentioned Jordan and Kobe by name.

This was outrageous and irresponsible. ... and all those 16-year-old "toughs''? They were listening.

I have on a dozen occasions listened to Kobe Bryant in person evaluate an upcoming opponent thoughtfully and respectfully. I’ve heard Jordan do it with ease and eloquence. Magic did it. Bird did it. LeBron does it. Didn’t Duncan and Parker just get done doing it? Don’t Kidd and Billups do it? Tom Brady and Peyton Manning do it. Derek Jeter and Albert Pujols do it.

I will swear that Barkley and Smith and Webber, as players, did it, too.

It’s not a sign of weakness; it’s a sign of intelligence.

And only on the blacktop playgrounds of Chris Webber’s imagination are “intelligence’’ and “toughness’’ mutually exclusive.

ITEM: One more thing about this "nobody ever'' issue: If Barkley, Webber or you look at the upper-left chest of every NBA player, you will see a logo. On that logo is the reflection of a man who was a superstar and still is a superstar and all he's done for 40 years is say nice things to people.

How can these guys say "nobody ever'' when the vision of Jerry West has stared them in the face every day of their adult lives?

ITEM: I still can’t figure out the notion that Dirk’s comments fueled Denver’s confidence. How can he grant a pregame interview that changes what the Nuggets think of themselves? Are they collected around the warmth of the TV screen before the game and then high-fiving when they hear Dirk say they are “long’’ and “strong’’?

ITEM: This is all entertainment, I know. Or idiotainment. The TNT "studio analysts" are paid to be funny and paid to say things that get written up – and Barkley is masterful at that. Webber, on the other hand, has no self-awareness. Because if he did, he wouldn’t be posing as a “street rat’’ and he wouldn’t be pretending he knows what it takes to be a champion.

Look it up – and I’ll stand corrected if I’m wrong. But I do not believe that Chris Webber the high-school star (illegally recruited, by the way) was runnin' the streets in the ghetto and I do not believe he’s won championships. He's got infinitely more arrested on his record than Dirk has. But otherwise? In my memory, he had repeated chances to advance in the NBA and all he had to do was beat Dirk.

And Chris Webber all too rarely beat Dirk. Again – in my memory -- generally, when Chris Webber was faced with crunch time, against the Mavs, the Lakers, UNC, whomever – the big, broad, loud, braggy personality on display there on TV on Tuesday shriveled up.

And became Raisinettes. If you know what I mean.

ITEM: Furthermore, I believe if you time-traveled back five years and cornerned Charles and Kenny in a bar and asked them which NBA “star’’ has himself a pair of Raisinettes, both of them would mention Chris Webber by name.

ITEM: Funny thing about spoken ignorance/racialness: It usually reveals nothing about the victim and everything about the speaker. Dirk doesn’t “pose.’’ He doesn’t fake bravado. And that’s bad? “Posing’’ is simply not part of his personality, his culture or his upbringing.

Just imagine, if Dirk was doing German TV and commentating so harshly on the unsavory on-court (or off-court) behavior of Martin or JR Smith or Barkley or Webber?

“Dirk doesn’t understand,’’ somebody like Barkley would say, “what it’s like to grow up in the hood.’’

Shouldn’t the reverse be recognized?

People from different cultures speak and act differently. Are those TNT guys too dense, too lacking in worldliness, to realize that?

Dirk was respectful. It’s the way he was raised.

And that makes him inferior to Chris Webber … how?

ITEM: Here’s the truth about the “Nappy-Headed Schmoes’’ thing: Most of those guys have relatively high highs. But they crash and they burn. A team like Golden State, it wins a playoff series once a decade, gets all fired up about itself, prints 20,000 yellow T-shirts, and then re-disappears into the Bay.

And right now in San Francisco/Oakland, 20,000 people are using yellow "I believe'' rags to wash their cars.

It’s fun and it’s exciting but it’s not Dirk.

JR Smith? It’s been a good year.

Dirk Nowitzki? It’s been a great decade.

I wish it wasn’t so easy to lose sight of that. And if you are a Nuggets fan, you should pray that the decade ahead gives you anything close to what Mavs fans are now spoiled by. You should hope that the Smiths and the ‘Melos have half the career that Dirk has had, and carry themselves with a fraction of the dignity. Because that will be special.

ITEM: Meanwhile, Kenyon Martin, the Denver Delinquent, earns praise. And has really only impacted this series in one way: His Game 1 cheap shot of Nowitzki cost him $25,000. Meanwhile, Dirk has single-handedly kept his Mavs in both losses, scoring 28 in the first and 35 on Tuesday.

Dirk’s being accused of a lot of things here.

Denver exec Rex Chapman called him “an actor.’’

Webber suggested he’s not a “true warrior’’ or a “true dawg.’’

Barkley did the same. Kenny Smith piled on (leaving poor Ernie Johnson outnumbered by morons teetering toward bigotry.)

The Denver Post used the “delicate as Swarovski crystal’’ line. (What kind of salaries are they paying at the Denver Post? Who among them knows what the hell “Swarovski crystal’’ is? Damn Googlers.)

It’s actually an insult for those idiots to attempt to set this all up as if it’s Dirk-vs.-Toughness or Dirk-vs.-K-Mart. The point isn’t that Nowitzki is a saint, but rather that he’s a king.

Kenyon Martin and his ilk? He’s allowed in the castle because he is a court jester. Or maybe he’s the bouncer.

What Kenyon Martin is not is. … much of a real factor.

Unless, of course, the two teams want to sign up for a rollicking game of “Smear The Queer.’’

ITEM: The Mavs are down 0-2 here. It ain’t pretty. Mavs fans have little to root for right now, except the continuing excellence of the franchise’s best-ever player, Dirk Nowitzki.

You wanted him to step up, to do most everything possible to win, to shoulder the responsibility to the point of exhaustion … and to do it all, if possible, with a level of class far too rare in professional sports?

Done.

And if Dirk Detractors and Paper Tigers are going to ignore facts to mislabel the Dallas MVP, I feel obliged to counter by being dragged into a Dirk-vs.-K-Mart argument that I cannot lose … by citing facts that accurately label K-Mart.

ITEM: Kenyon's sister, Tamara Martin-Harris, called into 103.3 ESPN Radio this week. It was Michael Irvin’s show.

"My brother's not a thug," said Tamara, and all I can say about that is – as somebody who has a key to the ESPN building and an occasional microphone -- good thing Sis didn’t call in when I was on the air.

Because I might have politely mentioned to Tamara that:

*He is a thug basketball player -- a “cruel ruffian,’’ using the dictionary definition.
* He has been labeled that way by the league itself, and by the owner of the Sacramento Kings, among others.
* He has prided himself on being perceived as such throughout his career, even in college at Cincinnati, a program that prided itself similarly.
* Three years ago he was kicked off his own Denver team during the playoffs for his dangerously screwball attitude.
*Other players have called him a 'fugazi.' (I’ll let you look that up, too.)
*His classy streak shined through when he once mocked Alonzo Mourning's cancer while guarding him.
*He was suspended by the league in ‘08 for having too many flagrant fouls.

*He was also suspended in 2002 for the same lack of self-control.
*The Darrant Williams murder occurred following one of Kenyon's parties.
*Kenyon has a habit of driving 100 in 30-50 mph zones, yet mysteriously never seems to surrender his license.
*He allegedly hired his bodyguard to confront fans who didn't like him. The bodyguard allegedly went into the stands and called a Nuggets fan and his kid a "fat f----- white boy.'
And by the way, as racial thoughts fill the air, from TNT’s Atlanta studio all the way to The Mile High City: That reference – “fat f---- white boy’’ -- is the only moment up to the Barkley/Webber embarrassment where in any of my coverage of Kenyon Martin race has been mentioned.
And it's HIS camp's mention.

ITEM: In real life, Kenyon Martin is probably a peach. You know, “misunderstood.’’ And I betcha in real live, C-Webb "throws rose petals.'' But Dirk should be more like Martin? Or Dirk should be more like C-Webb? (Webber’s playoff averages are 18.7/ 8.7. Dirk’s coming into this year were 25.3/11.1.)

Newsflash: Dirk shouldn’t try to be more like those people. Those people should seek to be more like Dirk.

And I’ll say the same for most of Nowitzki’s critics, including Barkley and C-Webb.

Paper tigers, the lot of ‘em.