"Leave me alone, I gotta make a free throw here."

The other week I was out drinking after work when I met a guy from Chicago (the city, not the band), so I put out my feelers.

"You must be happy about getting the number one pick."

A tricky volley, because, had he not been a basketball fan, that awkward look of non-recognition is uncomfortable for both parties. To wit, the following week -- same day, same bar -- I met a guy from Dallas (the city, not the 80s drama) and said, "So, you must be a Mavs fan," and the uneasy silence that came next made him look down and me embarressedly reach for my cigarettes. (If he'd responded positively to my query, I was all set to twist his nipple and call Mark Cuban and Dirk Nowitzki queens. To quote David Aames, "The little things...there's nothing bigger, is there?")

But this amiable -- and that's an understatement -- Chicagoan's face instantly lit up. He gushed about how hype he was that the Bulls got the first pick, went on about how disappointing the season had been and how at least the No. 1 pick made up for it a little, then said to me (I had already explained that I'm from Toronto), "So you must be a Raptors fan."

The truth is that I care about the Raptors as much as I care about my cousins when I phone home and talk to my folks, which is to say that, while I wish them the best and hope they're doing well, their success doesn't particularly fill me with elation, nor do their hardships fill me with sorrow. The Raptors are my extended family, and they have been ever since I moved to Korea eight years ago. Maybe one day, when I return to the storied stomping grounds of my youth, I'll reconnect with the NBA franchise that buoyed my hometown b-ball fantasy when it was inaugurated in 1995, but until then, I'm a man of worldly pleasure -- what Free Darko refers to as "liberated fandom," but, in my case, minus the beatnik over-analyzing. I follow teams whose players make me love the sport of basketball, and I may lose my Canadian citizenship for this, but I'll say it anyway: the Raptors are dull. At least to me. Chris Bosh is a gifted athlete, but he's not that fun to watch. And watching five white guys run the floor makes me wary that I haven't walked into a Nazi time-warp.

Of course I didn't say all of that when the question was asked of me. Instead, I replied that the Miami Heat are my favorite team (and that only hinges on Dwyane Wade staying there...and staying healthy*), but that I also dig the Hornets, Suns, Nuggets, and some other teams, based on the players I like, the teams' coaches (and in the case of the Nuggets and Celtics despite their coaches), and their style of ball.

Heady stuff, I know; and I'm aware that if I were to like enough teams, a little or a lot, I'd be stepping into "everybody wins!" territory, but fuck it. In the 19 years that I've been an avid basketball follower, a total of six teams have won the title, and the only one that really felt meaningful was the Heat beating the Mavs in six two years ago. Can I live?

Let it be said that this year's playoffs, despite a so-called NBA renaissance during the regular season, have been dogshit**. This Celtics-Lakers Finals was supposed to -- tricky, tricky, Mr. Stern -- make people forget all that, but things don't always go according to plan. (I should know: I predicted that Thirstin Howl III would blow up like Eminem.)

You can't take two teams that were both put together -- by shady measures, no doubt -- in a year and expect them to clash in an epic battle à la Devastator and Superion. That shit is contrived. Water and oil, it looks pretty on the surface -- but there's little depth. I'll defend Kingdom of the Crystal Skull until I die, because the sentimentality of the film was more than skin-deep. This Celtics-Lakers Finals? Like me and my schizophrenic team allegiance, it's logical; but damned if it doesn't feel wrong...like a black man marrying a white woman. (Sarcasm never works on the Internet.)

If I have a (leather)vested interest in the Finals, it's that I want KG and Ray Allen to get rings (Pierce, eh), and that I'll probably choke myself to death if Kobe gets another. Boston -- the team, not the band -- need this like I need new T-shirts. I keep reading about how Kobe has changed his ways, how he's such a great teammate, but does anyone actually believe that shit? Call me a church-going ninny for not being able to separate basketball from real life, but even if Kobe is the dagger to which the hopes and dreams of other teams are struck (and he's not), he's still a superlative prick who only gets along with his team now because he's 1) afraid of his own legacy, and 2) surrounded by foreigners who lack the cultural awareness required to realize what a cock he is.

In that way, I suppose he and I have something in common. But if I were diagnosed with cancer and had to share the same hospital room as Mamba, I'm confident we wouldn't trade bagels or whistle the Great Escape theme.

But I digress. Once upon a time, I wrote the words "1999 was a good year for basketball," the first sentence of Memory Lane, my extremely outdated -- and lie-filled -- series of posts about how I fell in love in Korea. My marriage might be dead, thank God, but that opening sentence lives on, for 1999 really was a good year for basketball...as a Knicks fan. When the Heat won the title two years ago, it was satisfying, but moreso for the games they fought back from than for Game 6. Similarly, the Knicks didn't win the title in 1999, but, really, they did. At least for me.

See, it may be a sissy thing to settle for a one-game victory, but when that game is so epic in comparison to whatever happens next, and when it comes against a rival, it's hard to top. I was there when Jordan did the double-handed layup in Game 1 of the '91 Finals; I was there when Only Built 4 Cuban Linx dropped; and I was there when The Undertaker slammed Mankind through the top of a steel cage.

Transcendent moments, all. But nothing can compare to the night when Larry Johnson hit the 4-point play.

I said it at the time, and I'll say it again: even if the Knicks never win an NBA title, that moment will live forever.



* and, coincidentally, not being traded to Chicago for the No. 1 pick, a trade that has to be a fucked-up rumor, because a) Miami has the second pick, and right now it looks like the Bulls are going to take Rose, which would give the Heat a gift-wrapped Michael Beasley, and b) the idea of trading Wade and giving the Bulls the No. 2 pick is so patently ridiculous that I won't even entertain the idea.

** I know not many share my fond memories of the 2006 season, but those playoffs were the best I've seen.