Return with us to the thrilling days of the Celtics- Knicks rivalry, or as it’s known in Boston, “Come again?”
If the Knicks were down so long that a 15-9 start looked up to them, Boston’s
Paul Pierce
was so surprised to be asked about the “rivalry,” he laughed.
If people outside Gotham missed it, the Knicks were “the story of the early season … more than the Heat, more than the West. More than the Celtics,” according to the New York Daily News’
Mike Lupica
.
Pierce then hit the game-winner with 0.4 seconds left — and took bows to the Madison Square Garden crowd while officials watched the replay showing that
Amare Stoudemire’s
shot was late and
Spike Lee
went berserk.
“I guarantee you that Boston respects us,” Stoudemire said afterward.
Well, a little.
“Come on, man, you got to beat somebody to have a rivalry,”
Kevin Garnett
said. “I know, years past, (
Larry
)
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Bird
, (
Patrick
)
Ewing
,
Bernard
(
King
), but right now? Come on.”
Attack of the Mad Chickens:
Next up were the Knicks’ old rivals from Miami, who rumbled with them annually in the ’90s, featuring
LeBron James
, who snubbed them last summer and was dubbed “LeChicken” by the New York Post.
“We’re gonna kick LeBron’s (backside),” Lee told the Daily News.
But as ESPN’s
Jalen Rose
noted, if some players don’t like notoriety, LeChick — er, LeBron isn’t one. Thirty-two points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists later, the Heat won by 22.
Maybe Gotham should zip it until after those rivalries get renewed.
He opened up U.S. for China:
Showing good things don’t always happen to nice people,
Yao Ming
, who missed last season and all but 91 minutes of this one, has another stress fracture that might end his career at 30.
Yao not only revived the Rockets, but also opened China’s vast, and now uniquely NBA, market.
Denied permission to leave until he was 21, Yao was obliged to spend summers with the national team, accelerating his decline.
He also showed a peculiar Chinese graciousness with no pretension whatsoever — and a surprising sense of humor.
“I haven’t died,” Yao told ESPN’s
Rick Bucher
last week. “Right now I’m drinking a beer and eating fried chicken. What were you expecting, a funeral?”
Coast to coast:
The Spurs’
Manu Ginobili
is the best player in NBA history who never got a first-place MVP vote — or a second-place or third-place vote. He did get a fourth-place vote last season and nine fifths in 2007. Burnishing his credentials, Manu won back-to-back games against the Bucks and Nuggets with late shots and drew a charging foul on Denver’s
Carmelo Anthony
to save that one. This time it’s a third-place vote or bust! … With losses piling up, Bobcats owner
Michael Jordan
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, who let the Knicks sign
Raymond Felton
away with a two-year, $15 million deal, joined coach
Larry Brown
in blasting the few players who remain. Said
Stephen Jackson
: “I guess it comes down to leadership. I guess it’s
Gerald
(
Wallace’s
) and my fault.” This is a staple of a Brown farewell season, like 1996-97 in Indiana, when
Reggie Miller
gave the all-time reply: “If Larry says we lack it, we lack it.”