I have been a little distracted lately, so my posts have not been as shitty as usual. I also learned Saturday night why I should not be allowed to speak with anyone who has had any type of fame. I left the attic for a few hours and went to go see a couple bands in a nearby town and after the concert spoke with the the lead singer for a bit, then offended him. Not an exciting story but I will share it regardless.
(Me) "Good show tonight. I read about you guys in some article online about the Ten Best Bands Nobody Has Heard Of."
(Lead singer not sure what to say at the back handed compliment) "Thanks, it seems like everyone has read that same article."
(Me) "I bought the CD and it is really, really good, when are you coming out with the next album."
(Singer tells me the answer and then my lady of long term committment speaks with him, all the while I am stewing over the real name of the article)
(Me) "Actually, I think the name of the article was the Ten Best Unknown Bands."
(Singer wishing I would just drop it goes into his various marketing promotions they are doing to change this and finally we leave)
(Me as I am walking back to the car) "Oh yeah, it was the 10 Best Unsigned Bands. That sounds a lot better than what I was saying."
So I am a moron and the band name is Locksley, and they are all really cool guys who put on a great show. You can look them up and hate them if you want, but they are really good and deserve to be more popular than 95% of the music in the world.
Ok, to the article that irritated me by Jeff Goodman.
http://msn.foxsports.com/cbk/story/8238982
The title of the article is.........."Beasley: How Mature Do You Want Me To Be?"
Since he is supposed to be a millionaire in 2 days and the title already make excuses, I knew this article was shit. See the problem is not that he has character issues, which is no big deal but everyone is writing puff pieces about him that act as if he does not have issues that would make NBA teams wonder if he is mature enough to be an NBA player. So to be clear, I do not think he is a bad person, but in a billionaire dollar industry the following antics, even if done in High School which was only 2 years ago, could be a cause of concern. If Jeff Goodman can't see that, then that is not good, man.
First Beasley antics from this article. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/11/AR2007031101466.html
-Since he entered the eighth grade, Beasley's career has followed the same cyclical pattern: He's dismissed from one school for misbehavior and immaturity;
Bouncing from team to team does count as a character issue that should be addressed.
-Beasley practices for two hours in the afternoon, takes a nap and then practices again at night. "The basketball team is pretty much the only thing this school's got," Beasley said.
Clearly a man ready to contribute to the community or maybe the school really sucks and it boring. At least pretend you have some interest in academics though. Character issue.
-He wore pajamas to the school cafeteria. He threw sticks at teachers' houses. He snuck out of his dorm after curfew and organized games of hide-and-go seek.
Why would you wear pajamas to the cafeteria. Too lazy to put on clothes or just that sleepy? Either you have a medical condition or drink some red bull. Throwing sticks at teacher's houses is a clear character issue, as is not following the rules.
-"Me and Tywon Lawson had a competition at the beginning of the school year about who could sign their autograph the most around the school," And I don't lose at anything, man, so I walked around with one of those Sharpies and signed graffiti everywhere. Every day, they were cleaning my name off water fountains, ceilings, desks, offices -- whatever. I just thought it was funny."
Here is another character issue. In this paragraph the only positive thing that could come out of it is that he is a competitive person. It is funny to do this once, not every single day as he indicates. So what he thinks is funny is actually destructive to school property, not to mention disrespectful to those who have to clean his shit up. I would like to personally punch him for this.
-So, with two weeks left in the school year, Smith offered his star player one final chance: He told Beasley that, to be invited back to Oak Hill, he needed to impress administrators with flawless end-of-year behavior. Two days later, Beasley signed his name in black ink on the principal's truck, Smith said.
If anyone does not see this as a problem, then they are fucking retarded. I don't mean to insult mentally handicapped people by comparing them to anyone who thinks this is not a problem. No one is perfect but Beasley obviously has/had some sort of complex where he believes he can get away with shit like this. He could not be on good behavior for two days. This does not translate well to the NBA where nobody is there to babysit.
- In less than 24 hours, the team played one of its most important games of the season. Barton stood still, with a basketball under his right arm, and talked quietly. "Pay attention, 'cause this is important," Barton said. His players leaned in to listen. Then Beasley started shouting.
This is not supposed to bother Vinny Del Negro or any team that is looking to draft him? Some people in this world "get it" and have not been treated like royalty their entire life, Michael Beasley does not seem to be one of these people.
He is a pretty typical high school student in my opinion and there is nothing wrong with that. The problem is he is still 19 and is going to the NBA. So knowing all you know from this Washington Post article, why is Jeff Goodman shocked at questions of maturity?
Beasley is a class clown. Beasley is immature. Beasley likes to pull pranks as much as the next guy. But what do you expect? "How mature do you want me to be? I'm 19 years old," Beasley said.
What a nice short article, so everything is resolved now. People are afraid he is immature because he is 19, he acknowledges this, so I think both sides understand the problems that need to be overcome before the questions stop. Now let's work on this global warming issue.
Michael Beasley deserves an explanation.
He just provided one. Here's the problem. You can't say "I'm only 19, so I am going to be immature," then complain when people constantly bring up you're being immature. This fucking pisses me off. Humans have control over their behavior, we aren't like lions who see a human in a field and don't have the capacity to think, "I probably should not eat that because I will be killed as a reprecussion." Michael Beasley, as far as I know, has the ability to reason and control his actions.
That's the fucking catch to being in the NBA. You have to act mature because you are getting a paycheck. If you have a history of not listening to your coach and undermining him, acting non-chalant about your school, vandalizing school property, and just being an overall asshole, then that is going to follow you around. How is this not understood?
All he wants to know are these so-called "character issues" that seem to follow his every move.
The character issues are that Jerry Reinsdorf nor Pat Riley want to wake up one early morning and find that some punk ass kid has drawn on his new Lexus. Is this hard to understand? Beasley has a history of vandalizing authority figure's property and this history includes every authority figure at a school. Teachers, coaches and principals. The school nurse is the only one that got off easy on this one.
"Compared to stuff other players do, that's nothing." He's right. The NBA is full of guys with real-life character issues. Just look at Allen Iverson, Stephen Jackson, Ron Artest, Zach Randolph, Darius Miles. I could go on and on.
He is right and Jeff Goodman is wrong. Those players are WHY Beasley is being critiqued so carefully, how is this not understood?
Beasley doesn't fit that mold. He hasn't assaulted anyone, hasn't fired a gun in the air or made obscene gestures to fans. In fact, his record is completely clean.
He has on the other hand vandalized property and been kicked out of 4 schools for immaturity. What do you think a top 5 high school basketball player has to do to be kicked out of a school? I would guess a whole lot. So his "record" is completely clean but he has a record of immaturity. You can't be arrested for immaturity unless it leads to a criminal act...like vandalizing school and personal property. So he could have a "record" if someone had pressed charges.
I should have done one sentence pithy responses but this puff piece has me too pumped up.
He's only racked up a handful of technical fouls in his entire life.
No one is arguing on the court problems. This would be Jeff Goodman, esq. defense attorney for a murderer/rapist at a trial. Using an argument involving something completely off point that has nothing to do with what he is discussing.
(Jeff Goodman, esq.) "Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, Sparky Spanklepants may have raped and killed five women and two men. So he has a sexual problem. He has admitted this and wonders why you keep holding this against him. If the victims were alive, they would have positive things to say about him, because he cooks an absolutely wonderful chicken cassarole. Besides, there are tons of other murderers and rapists not currently in jail. If we can't catch every single one of those people, how can we jail Sparky Spanklepants? You honor the defense rests it's case and would like to invite you out to lunch."
"He never once answered back, never once even made a face," said DePaul coach Jerry Wainwright, who coached Beasley in the Under-19 World Championships in Serbia last year. "I was with him for 9½ weeks and he never lied to me. Not once."
If I can't trust a man who has this site dedicated to him... http://firejerrywainwright.com/
who can I trust?
My question to Wainwright is how he knows Beasley never lied to him. Did he hook him to a lie detector, try to tickle the truth out of Beasley, or did he do the Larry David stare down? Either way, if Beasley never made faces at someone, that is the true sign of maturity. Point Goodman!
"Of course it bothers me," Martin said. "If Mike had issues in the past, I'd understand. I've dealt with character issues. Mike doesn't beat women, do drugs and he hasn't been arrested for anything. He's the best teammate I've ever been around."
Lowering standards for athletes does not make them better people. Also Frank Martin could be biased since if it were not for Michael Beasley I would think Frank Martin was a character from a movie about Chicago gangsters or a shoe shine clerk at the Holiday Inn, and not the coach of Kansas State University. Also, he referred to him as the best teammate he has ever been around but Martin is the coach, so he should mean the best player. Interesting...
Beasley admits that he didn't exactly fit in when he went down to IMG Academy, which is primarily comprised of rich, white kids.
He will do well when he is being cheered on in the NBA at every game by rich, white kids and their parents.
Also, in my continuing attempt to get "covert racism" as a tag, I would like to say the sentence, "Kevin Love admits he didn't exactly fit in at the Compton Academy, which is primarily comprised of poor, black kids," would get Kevin Love in a lot of trouble and cause Around the Horn to label him a racist. Just saying.
Wainwright said that in Serbia, which was profoundly anti-American, Beasley went out of his way to interact with children, women and anyone else.
Fuck the NBA, Michael Beasley should be named U.S. Ambassador to Serbia. He can teach the kids there how to vandalize property and just enjoy life. Part of his interactions will be a lecture on how if you have unbelievably good talent for a sport then people will make excuses for you and you get away with more in life. This lecture will reach one child, Slavon Slabadorviak, a 8 year old child who is a master at shuffleboard and will one day go on to make shuffleboard an Olympic sport and land on the cover of the Serbian version of Time Magazine (Tjime). All because of Michael Beasley. What maturity issues, bitches? Point Goodman!
"We went back to the locker room and he gave one of the best talks I've ever heard," Wainwright said. "He said things I would have said and I've been coaching for 30 years."
Did he follow up the speech with a spitball to your eye, coach, followed by the rest of the team bursting in laughter? Also, if Michael Beasley is giving great postgame speeches compared to you, you may want to read a motivational book or two.
So did Duke guard Nolan Smith, and no one has questioned their character.
"I keep asking what are these character issues," Smith said. "Maybe if someone can tell me what they are, I can explain them. Michael has never done anything malicious. Is he immature? Yes, but everyone has some immaturity about them. Maybe Michael's a little more so than others."
So Michael is less mature than others his age and this is not supposed to be a cause of concern for NBA front office types? I think Jeff Goodman and Michael Beasley have the answer they need now.
All he wants is an answer.
Riddle me this Goodman. How don't you get this? I will even let Michael Beasley get the last word with a little help from the Miami Herald. http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/story/573950.html
• On whether he can succeed in the NBA like he did in college: "Depends if I like the coach.''
There's your answer. Mark my words, Michael Beasley will have maturity problems in the NBA.
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