"hard to be humble when you stuntin' on a jumbotron"

this next post is about lebron james...

i wanted that to sound like when you're at a rock concert and the singer says something like, "this next song is about carpooling to work in order to protect the environment," or something like that and you're not sure what song it's going to be, because none of their songs sound like they're about that, but then they start playing the intro to one of their top three hits, which isn't about carpooling to protect the environment. the crowd starts making noise, because they like the song and you're thinking to yourself, "these guys know how to play music and they're funny," because that's not what the song's about, but then you remember some of the lyrics and they're pretty vague and general and open to interpretation and could really be attached to a lot of different issues if you wanted to, and you think, "maybe this is about carpooling to work in order to protect the environment."

while typing that i was reminded of the two boyz II men concerts i've had the pleasure of attending. the first time was the fulfillment of an unrealized childhood dream and the second was more of a victory lap. i bring up these experiences because they do a lot of storytelling before their songs and let you know exactly what they're going to be about. i think that's why i'm so fond of 90s r&b in general. r&b lyrics are the antithesis of the general and vague lyrics of some rock songs, like the one explained above: straightfoward and without ambiguity. mostly about love or the loss of love. the descriptiveness of that love and love loss is the only thing that really changes from song to song.



(if you don't like professional basketball you probably won't care to read this)

this isn't a top three hit, but it is about my good friend, lebron james. he was kind enough to provide me some upper bowl seats for the heat-jazz game the other night. despite being the friends that we are, i had never seen lebron james play basketball in person. it was a good game and the heat ran away with it at the end. to be honest, i was as excited to see lebron throw his powder into the air as i was to watch the game. there's something so arrogant about it, but i kind of got chills watching the powder go into the air and hearing the boos. i'm surprised opponents haven't thrown powder into the air to mock lebron. it's interesting that they just let him come into their house and do what he wants. it would be funny if the player mocking lebron threw powder in the air at the start of the game and every time they checked into the game, as well as after each timeout. i would laugh.

the heat are starting to play really well. what's kind of funny about the whole thing is that the heat seemed to really come together during the hyped up cleveland game. i think lebron was wondering about his new team, the south beach heat, at the beginning of the season and missing his old team where he was everything and all of his teammates knew their spots on the court, and everyone in cleveland, as well as so many other people, really loved him. then he went back to cleveland and remembered why he left. the cleveland cavaliers just aren't good at basketball right now. a team unfit for a king, if you will (i wonder how many stories used the title, "unfit for a king," or something like that after lebron left?).

lebron's absence has shown how bad the cavs really were/are and how much he did for their team. i watched a lot of their games the past few seasons and to watch them this season was sad. the only guy i'd want on my team from their roster is jj hickson. he goes for a dunk every time he shoots the ball and he seems to try on every play. i'm not sure if that's true, but his eyes are always wide open and he's always heavily breathing so it looks like he's trying every play. the rest of the cavs team without lebron? i just don't know. it's my opinion that anderson varejao's just become a big guy with bad hair, antawn jamison has found comfort in the familiarity of being on another losing team, and the rest of the team used to stand around the perimeter waiting for an open three, but that's not happening anymore. i think i mostly feel bad for cleveland's commentators. their voices used to be on youtube clips of lebron, and there used to be exciting plays to get loud about, but i'm guessing that's a rare occasion these days.

who was affected the most by lebron's decision? mo williams. it really turned his world upside down. he was very open about considering retirement after lebron left. he looks like he's tried to distance himself from lebron and the recent past by removing the headband, but they still have similar shaped tattoos on their arms. not saying who copied who on that one, but the whole thing's curious. during the heat game i think mo tried to put a tough guy look on his face, but it came across as pouty. i kind of wanted lebron to say something about it during the post-game press conference. finish his last answer and then say, "...oh, and mo? stop pouting." but he didn't.

(i'm currently listening to the led zeppelin song, "that's the way," and the first line is: "i don't know how i'm gonna tell you, i can't play with you no more..." a humorous coincidence, because lebron didn't know how to tell his old team either, so he ended up telling them on national television.)

i feel like we need stuff like that from lebron, though. i really like watching him play, but his interviews are rarely, if ever, controversial. when he retweeted all the hate tweets he'd received from internet thugs at the beginning of the season i thought the heat were going to completely embrace the bad boy image, but you can't be the bad guy when all you really want is to be loved. if he really just wants to be loved i think he picked the wrong place to play. also, during the cleveland game, those fans were really loud. they really showed up. lebron won't admit it, but i feel like there was a moment during the third quarter when the fans kind of got to him. he played it cool the whole game and went off for 24 points in the third quarter, but there was a time near the end of the third where one of his teammates was shooting free throws, maybe bosh, and the crowd restarted the chant, "akron hates you!" and lebron stood at half court and bobbed his head up and down with the chant, but he wasn't smiling. now, i don't think he started to believe that akron, ohio, (his hometown) really hates him, but the fact that he acknowledged the crowd surprised me.

but yeah, i saw lebron james throw powder into the air the other night.