UK-Associated Celebs

Ever since Coach Cal rolled into town, the University of Kentucky basketball squad has extensively added to its celebrity rolodex. Whether it's the fact that he's simply reignited the dormant part of the fan base or he just brought along a sizable bandwagon behind him, a lot of people have suddenly claimed UK as their own. I wanted to take some time to highlight those people.

1. Ashley Judd - She wins out because she's been the vocal celeb endorsement since day one. She was a French major at UK and found time to collect minors in anthropology, art history, theater, and women's studies. Well crap. And she's been hitting up basketball games ever since (whenever she could fit 'em in between filming Kiss the Girls and Double Jeopardy and getting her masters degree at Harvard and being a Global Ambassador for YouthAIDS and little stuff like that. Even though there's been intrapersonal fan squabbles amongst the mostly conservative fan base and her outspoken liberal support, she's still majorly beloved for the fact that she's always and will always claim UK as her home. Half the restaurants in Lexington have her risque hockey poster hanging on their walls, so I think pretty much all is forgiven when you're an attractive woman who wears nothing but a jersey in support for one of your college's obscure sports clubs. And she killed it with The Rock in that Tooth Fairy movie last (... which I haven't seen).

2. Drake - Canada's half-Jewish rapper son spent every free moment in his April 27, 2010 Memorial Coliseum concert shouting out Lexington as his "second home". It must be true then, right? Hip hop's newest poster child, between his So Far Gone mixtape and Thank Me Later album, made sure to be the head coach opposite Tayshaun Prince at 2009's Big Blue Madness and then attend four additional contests, including the Wake Forest NCAA tournament game, throughout the year. He started his relationship with the ball club through a chance hook-up with John Calipari through their mutual friend LeBron James. Yeah, that LeBron James. In the aforementioned concert, Drake brought all of Coach Cal, John Wall, Demarcus Cousins, Patrick Patterson, Ramon Harris, Perry Stevenson, Mark Krebs, and even former star Ramel Bradley out as "his family" for his performance of "I'm Goin' In". This relationship made its rounds on MTV and every major newspaper publication in the world. One of the world's biggest rap stars with the world's greatest basketball university? That's a big deal.

3. LeBron James - I'm pretty sure Coach and LBJ are simply BFFs. They meet on recruiting trips, summer camps, facility visits, playoff games, and one can only assume for $100 million buy-in poker nights switching back and forth between Jay-Z and William Wesley's houses. Once The King made his way to Lexington for the summer to hang out with the newly assembled ball club and tour the Joe Craft Center before they ever even had an official scrimmage, the "LeBron Watch" was on. He was supposed to make it for Big blue Madness ... but he missed it. And this isn't openly known, but I dead serious know for sure that it's because he stayed too late at a crazy Jay-Z party off on some tropical island the night before. Quote me. And then LeBron was supposed to make it for the big North Carolina game ... but he missed it. That one was during the regular season of the NBA, though, so it's a little more understandable. There were a few more false starts, but James finally made his way to Rupp Arena's front row for a publicity shoot during our Vanderbilt game, which completely (non)coincidentally coincided with the debut of the basketball team's official new kicks, the custom blue Air Max LeBron VIIs. I'm sure he didn't even know. Though Cal didn't quite leave to any random team that LeBron was randomly gonna sign with, they're insanely close and that sense of family extended down to Wall, too. I have a guess who the second-most called person on Wall's cell phone is after his mom. Drake's prolly third.

4. Magic Johnson - We'll pretend this one was strictly about basketball even though it wasn't. He was Kentucky that afternoon supporting a bill raising the HS dropout age from 16 to 18 in the Commonwealth and came to our home game against South Carolina as Governor Steve Beshear's guest. Magic's history of collegiate run-ins with UK is what makes this visit so intriguing. In his freshman year at Michigan State in 1978, the Spartans lost to UK (the eventual champions) in the Elite 8. What makes that sting even further is that just a month later, Magic was relegated to second string status to those same UK players on a team coached by Joe B. Hall in the amateur World Invitational Tournament. In Magic and Larry Bird's book When the Game was Ours, both speak very scathingly about Hall's neglect of reaching out to them and their lack of playing time whatsoever during that summer tournament. But that just shows you Magic's love of the game and maturity level at this point in his life. He spoke glowingly of John Wall after this game as "the best player in the country."

5. Mike Tomlin & Ben Roethlisberger - Even though the Cincinnati Bengals hold the hearts of the majority of locals, Calipari's Pittsburgh roots have brought around a friendship with that particular faction in the NFL. Tomlin may have been upstaged by Ashley Judd at the Georgia game and Big Ben may have been upstaged by Magic at the South Carolina game, but they still let their friendship to our Coach be known. And the best part? Both guys were halfway cheered and openly booed when they made it onto the Jumbotron. Big Ben may be the one guy moreso than LeBron that Kentucky may want to distance themselves from in the public's eye ... but oh well. Americans forgive everybody who's slightly famous, so it'll all be good. With Cal's recent visit to Bengals training camp, maybe he'll pull Ochocinco and other more locally favored footballers this upcoming year.

6. Josh Hopkins - Though I've seen a single YouTube clip of it, Hopkins stars in the ABC sitcom Cougar Town. He's a career TV film, short film, and guest starring actor who's finally been given his major break on the Courtney Cox-led major network show as a major character. He was born in Lexington and is the son of a former Kentucky Congressman. He's most famous for actually incorporating the "John Wall Dance" into an episode of Cougar Town, the aforementioned YouTube clip. And then he took it a step further and got a picture out in the world of Cox doing the signature arm move as well. But his highest form of UK fandom came when he followed Kyle Wiltjer, one of our 2011 recruits, to a high school Elite 24 game "just in case" he committed to UK that day at the event. Kinda creepy. Kinda awesome. Either way, the guy's a rising star who's got local roots, which makes him a big deal. I'll never watch the current show he's on, but I'll still vaguely care about him anyway.

7. Irv Gotti - Who even knew this guy was still alive? The guy who composed "Can I Get a ... **** You?" The guy who started Murder Inc. The guy who originally shoved Ja Rule, Ashanti, and Lloyd down commercial radio's throats. The Hollis, Queens producer donned his John Wall jersey and sat front row for College Gameday against Tennessee. Even though Irv got arrested and such on crack-related money laundering ... it's kinda cool that he's close with assistant coach Orlando Antigua, right? That's some heavy street cred. Sure, he hasn't made a hit in years, but when I walked out of the Wildcat Lodge that morning to see one of the biggest hip hop presences from the '90s cheesing like a mug while watching Coach Robic lecture the guys over some game tape, it felt pretty cool. Then he gave me a head nod. I'm pretty sure that means that he wanted to sign me.

8. Charles Barkley - It's pretty crazy, but Chuck (a very proud Auburn alum) decided not to travel a little ways over for the final game in his alma mater's ancient arena, the very one he spent his playing days in bulldozing over SEC competition in the early '80s. Instead, he visited Athens to see the Kentucky Wildcats. Undeterred by all of his DUIs and recurring mishaps, I was enlightened to the fact that he showed up to the game plastered. Even though he kinda talked us down after the game as still being a step behind Kansas and Syracuse, you can tell he was still there to witness the John Wall show. And I'll choose to assume that his later disparaging remarks about Cousins' readiness for the pro level were due to the same ethanol-related influence. But Charles did take the time to meet and take a picture with Coach in the tunnel, so all's forgiven.

9. Big Tigger - I just remember the guy from being the host of 106 & Park back when I used to watch BET for anything other than their award show cyphers. What he's known for now is being the Washington Wizards' resident in-game DJ. Hmmm ... now what is the connection between the University of Kentucky and the Wiz? Just a minute ago, Big Tigg hosted John Wall's personal professional Midnight Madness in the District of Columbia. So since Wall couldn't make his way back to Lexington other than by video message this last weekend for our Big Blue Madness, he sent the BET host to us in his place. And, in my professional opinion, he did a pretty great job. "Big Blue Nation" (as he called us a minimum of 75 times for response) approves.

10. The NBA - Kelenna Azubuike, Eric Bledsoe, Keith Bogans, Demarcus Cousins, Chuck Hayes, Jamaal Magloire, Jodie Meeks, Nazr Mohammed, Daniel Orton, Patrick Patterson, Tayshaun Prince, Rajon Rondo, and John Wall. Enough said.

... and Free Enes.

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Lakers x 16

So I heard that the Los Angeles Lakers won one of those championship things or something. That's pretty nice.

This season was somehow the most emotionally insane for me. Maybe it was just by default as Ron Artest's general craziness must've transferred to me since I was so elated at his signing and completely sure that he would never have a blow-up this season. That moment-by-moment tension could have done it. Or maybe it was the 17 games apiece missed by Pau and Bynum conjoined with the constant fear of Andrew's inevitable new season-ending knee injury. Or maybe it was the fact that Kobe made less than a hundred three-pointers for only the second time in the last eight seasons (with the other being the '04 trial year). Or maybe it was the fact that we needed literally 7 game winners to drop from Kobe's dislocated/fractured/crippled/arthritic fingertips that, record-wise, would have dropped us from 1st place to out of the play-offs in the West. Or maybe it was the fact that Shannon Brown actually became a 20-minute-a-night rotation player when his only reliable basketball skill is dunking on a fastbreak. Or maybe it was because we never had a single late season stretch that you could point to and proclaim as a reason that the Lakers were the best team in the 2009-2010 season. I don't know. Regardless ... I was stressed.

The prevailing talk before the first round was whether the Lakers could possibly be considered the underdogs while facing the eighth seed in the West. While Kobe & Co. may not have exactly dominated their way through the final two weeks of the regular season, the fact that the conversation was held at all is ridiculous. Kevin Durant is nice and all, but he's the future. Kobe is the now. And while everyone was waiting for LeBron James to claim his (apparently) inevitable first championship, Kobe was putting in work. Spanning over the course of the first three series, the Black Mamba put up six games stringing together 32, 31, 30, 35, 32, and 40 points, all in winning efforts. The Thunder were supposed to be the up-and-comers with enough firepower to surprise the champs. The Jazz were supposed to be the rough-and-tumble band of misfits led by D-Will and Booze who could have been the best team in the West if not for the injury bug. The Suns were supposed to be the revamped run-and-gun, 2-time MVP-led squad that dominated the second half of the season and were poised to break into the Finals. The Lakers knocked them all out without so much as sniffing an elimination game. Of course we needed a set of miracle game-winning rebound-putbacks by Pau and Ron Ron off of Kobe misfires to achieve that feat, but I'll take it.

And then we had to face the dumb Celtics. I'll have a soft spot for Rondo due to his UK-loyalty forever, but I still hate them. All of them. Every screen is moving, every call is b*tched at, and every conceivable level of arrogance is surpassed. The perception is that the Boston trio is a band of winners, even though they have 16 seasons of missing the playoffs between them. They're old, they're fake, and they're one hit wonders. But oh well. Even though the Lakers decided to wait until the Finals to have their first series deficit at 2-3 going back to L.A. for the final two games ... we still won. That's all that matters.

This year was a big deal for Kobe and the rest of the team. We unfortunately needed this title for affirmation. It was nice that Bryant won his first title without Shaq last season, but it wasn't as sweet as it should have been because it was against the Orlando Magic. Kobe didn't directly eliminate LeBron in the Finals and Kobe didn't exact revenge against the Celtics' defense that stifled him a year prior. If the Lake Show had lost these Finals, it would have validated the detractors who claimed that L.A. won by default of Kevin Garnett's knee injury. This championship had to be had because it was figuratively worth two of them. With the win, Kobe forcibly cemented his status in the ring of the game's all-time winners. He has more hardware than Shaq and Duncan (his modern era competitors). He matched Magic. He's one under Michael. It's his most important to date. It gives him the opportunity to step onto the same plateau as anyone not on the 1960s Celtics or named Robert Horry with one more perfect season. While LeBron James is still ringlessly fighting the expectations of his career in worst-case scenario fashion, Kobe is fighting his way into the upper echelon of all-time great and creating a resume that will eventually be inarguable.

This season was my absolute favorite in my seven years of keeping up with every microcosm of the NBA. It ended in an end-all, be-all Game 7 that was perfect for every terrible reason that a sloppily-played, nerve-inducing, highly-physical game can be played. And the Lakers won. My guys. It's the reward for all of my own personal (literal) sweat and (figurative) blood that I shed during the year-long grind of fandom. I care. Probably more than I should. But this year's Laker squad made it worth it. Sucks to be a Celtics fan. We got revenge. You all are dismantling and starting over with Rondo within the next calendar year. I got a summer to just relax.

Who am I kidding? I'm already stressed out again over the draft and free agency. Here we go again ...

... and do the John Wall.

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Starting Lineup

So I've done my top 5 greatest rappers of any and all applicable time, but I just realized I haven't let it be known on here my all-time NBA starting line-up. So ... here I am to let it be known.

Point Guard: John Stockton

Shooting Guard: Kobe Bryant

Small Forward: Julius Erving

Power Forward: Karl Malone

Center: Shaquille O'Neal

And I'm pretty much immovable from my stance on these guys. The only position I'm somewhat wavy on is the five spot. And even then it's just a three-headed race between Shaq, Hakeem Olajuwon, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. The only thing that makes me sad is looking at this dream lineup and instantly being distraught at the fact of three of these guys being on my absolute favorite Lakers squad and not winning a championship. But Karl was almost a decade past his prime so that's my only harbored tranquility. Also just for the record, I think the single greatest actual NBA team of any single season is the 1983 76ers. They could darn near destroy any other champion there ever has been. I promise it. Just saying. I might do full blown posts on each baller on my list to tell you why they're so important to me and to the NBA world but until then, let them all marinate in your brain cavity until you're convinced that Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, and Magic Johnson actually shouldn't be in any of these guy's spaces ...

... but do take my word for it.

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