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djsunyc
Posts: 44929 Alba Posts: 42 Joined: 1/16/2004 Member: #536 |
2/12/2010 10:48 AM
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Nalod
Posts: 71763 Alba Posts: 155 Joined: 12/24/2003 Member: #508 USA |
2/12/2010 10:50 AM
Farve will be loved soon enough in Green Bay.
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Nalod
Posts: 71763 Alba Posts: 155 Joined: 12/24/2003 Member: #508 USA |
2/12/2010 11:32 AM
Kobe changed his number. Used to be "8".
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GodSaveTheKnicks
Posts: 23952 Alba Posts: 21 Joined: 11/21/2006 Member: #1207 USA |
2/12/2010 12:48 PM
This article makes me think he is not leaving Cleveland. I'd say there's a very slim chance of him leaving and if he wins there a 0% chance. He'd have to come up with a whole new Routine in NY. Hopefully the four horsemen wanna live in NY. What the Knicks should really be doing is sending an army of hot NY girls to hook Lebron's friends.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/sports/basketball/12lebron.html?ref=basketball February 12, 2010 By SEAN D. HAMILL Thanks to the postgame highlights that show it, the posters that celebrate it, the shoe that is named after it and the 10-story billboard here that depicts it, the Ritual, to much of the sports world, consists of LeBron James’s tossing a handful of moisture-absorbing chalk into the air and then extending his arms as if offering himself to his fans. But the in-group secret, shared by seemingly every one of the 20,500 delirious fans inside Quicken Loans Arena, is that the chalk toss is only one part — albeit a defining one — of a much more complicated choreography of actions that James must perform before the Cleveland Cavaliers tip off. In the sequence, James, who will be front and center at Sunday’s N.B.A. All-Star Game in Arlington, Tex., tries to hit an underhand shot from halfcourt during warm-ups; he forms a 3-3-0 with his fingers — the area code for Akron, Ohio, his hometown — after the national anthem; he exchanges a handshake with one of his lifelong friends when he is introduced; he offers a different shake, hug or salute to each of his 14 teammates; he puts in his mouth guard; he tosses the chalk and extends his arms; he points to the fans in the upper deck; he greets each opponent; and, finally, he takes the ball from a referee, massages it and passes it back. “It’s official! It’s game time!” Ahmaad Crump, the Cavaliers’ arena host/hype man, then shouts over the public address system. “Well, when you’re the king, it’s good to be the king, isn’t it?” Knicks Coach Mike D’Antoni said before a recent game against the Cavaliers. “You know what, he brings so much enthusiasm to the game and he’s so good, if he wants to take some leeway, he deserves it.” Together, James’s actions have created something of a subculture in Cleveland, one in which the seemingly most mundane gesture is charged with meaning, each helping to stoke emotion. Fans wait for them, document them with their cameraphones. “You know when he gets his mouthpiece in, he’s going to do the chalk next,” said Shannon Beckley of Uhrichsville, Ohio, who was at Tuesday’s game against the Nets with her 4-year-old son, Conner, who wore a No. 23 James jersey. But the Ritual, fewer realize, cannot happen without the Routine. The Routine begins long before James steps on the court. It is a methodical series of steps, some that date to his high school days, that help him prepare to play. “He’s always been pretty — I don’t want to say superstitious — but he likes routine,” said Randy Mims, 34, one of James’s three lifelong best friends, who manage his career and are collectively known, with James, as the Four Horsemen. “A lot of this hasn’t changed since high school: when he gets taped, when he stretches, when he shoots, when he arrives before a game — it’s all designed so he has time to do the Routine,” said Mims, who also takes part in the Ritual, being the first to exchange a handshake with James after he is introduced. The Routine starts before the team’s game-day morning shootaround. James likes to be there an hour before, at about 9 a.m., so he can stretch. Then, after shooting for an hour, he returns home. “One thing consistently I have always done, starting in high school, is I take a nap before the game,” James said after scoring 32 points with 11 assists against the Nets. “We had shootaround in high school and I’d go back home and take an hour or two nap before the game. Now it’s like three or four hours and just relax and have the energy for the night.” James eats a light meal, typically chicken and rice with vegetables, then leaves for the arena, arriving at least two and a half hours before tip-off. “I have a lot to do,” James said. Team officials say that on most days, James is the first to arrive and the last to leave — in part because of news media demands, but also because part of the Routine calls for him to ice his legs. “When I come in,” James said, “I get dressed, shoot for half an hour and then do a stretching routine that lasts about 25 minutes, then go in the training room and get my legs worked on by the masseuses, and then I get taped. Most of the time I do media. Then I do the team meeting and prepare for the game.” Mike Mancias, the Cavaliers’ assistant athletic trainer, stretches and tapes James. “He wants the taping done the same way every time, nice and snug,” Mancias said. “He wants everything sharp, clean and routine.” Mancias has also created an analgesic muscle warmer for James. “We call it Jump Juice,” said Mancias, who said he came up with the secret mixture four years ago. “He wanted something that kept his leg muscles warm, but not too warm.” While the opposing team is being introduced, Mancias rubs the concoction into James’s Achilles’ tendons, patellas and calves, a responsibility that makes Mancias part of both the Ritual and the Routine. Mancias takes part in another part of the Ritual as well, standing on the baseline near the bench after James is introduced to give him his custom-fitted mouth guard. “It may seem minute, but it’s just part of his game-day structure,” Mancias said. “If one thing is off, it’s not catastrophic, he can adjust, but it can throw him off. He’s just very, very structured and ritualistic on game day.” Even when James adjusts his jersey as he prepares to take a free throw, or his wristbands and headband when he is on the bench, it is all in service of performance. “Everything has to be in alignment, everything right, so he can perform at his best,” Mancias said. “No matter what he feels like when he comes into the arena, he’ll take the necessary steps to get to a level where he’ll dominate.” If the Routine is about getting himself ready physically and mentally, the Ritual is primarily about getting himself, his team and the fans ready emotionally. The Ritual actually begins out of view of the fans, with the team gathering in a tight circle near the locker room. As the players head to the court, James and Mims exchange the first of two handshakes. This one, Mims said, represents a “friendship bond” with the Four Horsemen. The team then runs onto the court to “Forever” by Drake, a hip-hop song featured on the soundtrack to the film “More Than a Game,” which is about James’s high school basketball teammates and their friendship. The chalk toss, which James started three years ago, has become such a focus in the Cavaliers’ pregame home ceremony that there are no overwhelming audio or visual distractions. “We try not to do anything to take away from it,” said Amanda Greco, the Cavaliers’ director of game presentation. The chalk toss, followed by the pointing to the upper deck, then the checking of the ball, all occur with the starters and the referees on the court, waiting. To date, no opponent has complained publicly. “You understand it’s going to happen,” the Knicks’ Chris Duhon said. “You can’t do anything about it. He’s the face of this league, so he’s able to get away with more things than most people can.” There was at least one game, on Dec. 9, 2008, though, when the Ritual apparently upset the longtime referee Joey Crawford. According to game reports, Crawford became so irritated waiting for James to finish that he gave three technical fouls to Cavaliers players in a five-minute span of the first half. Fans at away games do not generally seem to mind either. Even at Madison Square Garden, “two-thirds of the people in the stands have his jersey on anyway,” the Knicks’ David Lee said. One detractor, Bryon Maschari, a Knicks fan from Sandusky, Ohio, called the Ritual absurd, though he conceded that “it would look a lot better in a Knicks jersey at Madison Square Garden.” James, who had his teammates to his house for a Super Bowl party, said his goal was to foster closeness among the players. “Over the years it has evolved from the handshake,” James said. “It came from leadership, that I wanted to become more of a leader. I’ve always believed if you’re friends with your teammates off the court, it gains you access to them on the court. “It promotes team chemistry and team camaraderie. It’s something that we all bond over. It’s basically how we prepare for battle before we go out. It’s how we get our mind set.” In the end, James said, the Ritual and the Routine have the same objective: “It gets me ready to get out and do what I do best, and that’s to go out there and play basketball at a high level.” His fans — and even his opponents — would say he routinely does just that. Let's try to elevate the level of discourse in this byeetch. Please
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