Sunday, March 15, 2009

DOES THAT NAME MEAN NOTHING TO YOU? So I did indeed take Lucy to see the Harlem Globetrotters last weekend, and it was indeed fun -- all the shtick, alley-oops and dunks you'd expect, and even a girl who doesn't know the intricacies of basketball understands when someone's playing a joke on someone else. (Her favorite player was indeed lead "showman" Special K, who Lucy keeps referring to as "Cereal K".)

Except (and you knew there was an "except," because otherwise why blog?) there was a Message. (Well, there were two messages, but we'll set aside the Buy Our Sponsors' Products for tonight.) And that message -- as demonstrated through the Washington Generals' various thwarted efforts to place a sheet of plexiglass above the Trotters' rim, or manipulate the scoreboard to give themselves extra points -- was that Cheating Is Bad. [They should have listed to this guy.] Indeed, they asked the kids to chant it -- No Cheating!

But these are the Harlem Globetrotters, and, um, isn't deception and playing fast-and-loose with the rules pretty much their raison d'ĂȘtre? Isn't blowing an airhorn at a foul shooter, or stuffing the basketball under the back of an opponent's jersey (so he'll be called for traveling) a form of cheating? What am I missing?

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