How was yesterday's game?

First off, check out Posting and Toasting for yesterday's game notes - they have some good ones.

My trip to the Garden yesterday was my first in a couple of seasons.  In the time that has passed, I’ve been to games to all the “nearby” arenas – Philly, Boston, DC, Toronto.  Sorry, Jersey, but I don’t own a car, so no way am I going to the swamp.  When the player intros were done, the PA started playing “Apache” by the Incredible Bongo Band, a song that is one of the greatest break beats in hip-hop history.  It’s good to be home.  Sidenote on the game I saw in Boston: James Brown (“I Feel Good”), briefly in the third quarter.  That was the only song recorded by a black artist they played the whole evening.  One!  I understand that you play music to appeal to your crowd, but that’s gotta be definitive proof that Boston is the whitest place in the Northeast.  Seriously, Toronto had more flava.

We discovered what Jerome James is good at (besides eating pizza, hot dogs, cookies, rat droppings, pretty much anything unhealthy in his path).  During a timeout, the Garden had some lame “Who Wins The Oscar” feature in which three scrubby Knicks have to reenact a line from a movie (sort of like movie-karoake).  The line was Christopher Lloyd as Doc Brown in Back To The Future: “One point twenty-one jigawatts!  One point twenty-one jigawatts?!?”  Balkman went first, and was pretty awful (he started cracking up Jimmy Fallon style during the line); David Lee was second and he just spit the line out way too fast.  But Jerome James… Jerome was the Tom Hanks of the Knicks.  He won the contest (as measured by applause) hands down.  From now on he’s Future Notorious Academy Award Whore Jerome James to us.

I think the public announcer was drinking on the job yesterday.  He first introduced Malik Rose as “Jalen Rose”, and I think later on called him “Mike Rose”.  Or maybe the PA is just anti-Arabic (“Malik” is Arabic for “Rey”).  

As for the game play: We were disappointed that we didn’t get to see Renaldo Balkman (out with either a groin pull or a stomach virus, according to the Daily News).  We knew we were in big trouble.  Still, after a sloppy first half we were only down seven points (45-38), thanks to a nice end of the half play to Curry, who drop a spin move fadeaway from 8 feet away.  Awkward-looking (Barnesgasm at P&T said "It looked like the Christian Laettner play was being reenacted at a fat camp.").

The Knicks were terribly outrebounded in the 1st half, and Detroit was particularly aggressive with the offensive rebounds, getting what seemed like a lot of second chance points.  Balkman was clearly missed.

Nate Robinson went off in the third quarter, spurring a 21-4 run that put the Knicks up ten near the end of the third.  It was cut to 5 by the end of the third, thanks to a three by Billups, a moving pick by Cato, and a deuce by Billups.

The Pistons took control of the game in the fourth.  We saw that coming, mostly because the Knicks have no bench (they're all starters now!), so we figured they would hit a wall.  Seriously, we counted three guards (Collins, Robinson, and the prematurely ejected Francis), and there were some parts of the game where all three where out there at the same time.  Frye and Jeffries didn’t seem to get much time, and Rose was the only other forward.  Curry (spotted by Cato and James to the tune of 8 total minutes) logged a lot of minutes, and started fading in the fourth.  Nate, too, after carrying us in the third.

Your totals: The starting backcourt – 45 minutes for Collins, 42 for Nate; Curry got 40.  I’m sure people will say Curry is out of shape because he got tired after 40 minutes, but that is a lot for a freaking basketball player (and he’s been putting in that many minutes for the past three weeks).  Put it in perspective: Tayshaun Prince led the Pistons with 39 minutes.  The Pistons being one of the least deep teams in the league.  Iverson is the league leader in minutes played, averaging 42 per game.  Only six player average more than 40 minutes per game – Iverson, Johnson, LeBron, Bryant, Ray Allen and AI2.  All of them (except for Iverson since the trade) are their respective teams’ only reliable offensive option.  Curry’s last five: 40, 50 (!), 36, 40, 50 (!).  That is a lot of freaking minutes.

One last story:  The game I saw in Boston I ended up with a ticket to the Promenade.  The short story why - I went to see it with my friend; his car broke down the day before the game, so his girlfriend had to drive us there, and so he brought a ticket for her the day of the game, in the Promenade; I offered her my seat so they could sit together, and took the Promenade ticket.  If you sit in the Promenade (Greek for “The Roof”), you take an elevator to either the 6th, 7th, or 8th floors.  I saw a lot of people getting off at 6th and then everyone else left getting off on the 7th, so I got off, too.  Turns out those were the luxury corporate boxseats.  Since it was early, I ducked into an empty corporate box and starting eating some chicken wings and fingers, drinking a beer.  It was the AT&T box. 

When the first two dudes showed up, I just told them I was “Roberto from Accounting”.  Talk a little bit about the company, then quickly switched the subject (“How about them Pats?  Looking good this year”).  Grab a second plate and beer before ducking out just as the other three guys showed up. 

The Promenade is one floor higher, on the 8th floor, literally above the scoreboard.  You sit in a little desk chair in a small cubicle watching the game.  I have no idea who watches games from up there, but I was literally within arm’s reach of Larry Bird’s retired jersey.  I would have grabbed it and put that sh*t on sale on e-bay, but I was woozy from the altitude.  Nosebleeds, indeed.  If you need a helicopter ride to get to your seat, it ain’t worth it.  Now maybe you understand why I was more concern with the music selection being played by the PA than the little ants on the court....

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