The NBA’s Yoko Ono couldn’t resist, force feeding himself into the most anticipated season opener in league history.
In 84 days, Miami and Boston will destroy the NBA’s regular season ratings record, unleashing a new team of superstars who could redefine basketball or epically fail trying.
The new order of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, the team everyone outside of South Florida lives to despise, will attempt to make Boston’s established trio of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen feel antiquated and helpless. An easy Heat victory in Boston, on Day 1 of a 2,190 day experiment, would demoralize the Celtics, the majority of basketball fans and the notion of salary cap parity.
It packs so much drama for an opening game, the NBA might as well go straight to the playoffs afterward with a quick Heat pit stop in Cleveland.
But just when it looked like David Stern really knows how to throw a party, Yoko O’Neal had to crash it. That’s what Yoko’s do -- they take a good thing, and squeeze all the fun out of it until it combusts.
The Celtics were rolling, albeit toward retirement. Yet they have one or two great adventures left in them, and with the realization that Miami might have leapfrogged them in the Eastern
hierarchy, they acted in fear and desperation.
But if the reports of a Yoko-Celtics marriage become a reality, it says a lot about Boston’s psyche that they gave in to Yoko and all the baggage he’ll bring to Beantown.
Statistically and theoretically, the Celtics can justify bringing Yoko to Boston. In limited minutes for the Cavs last year, he still averaged 12.2 points, 6.7 rebounds and 1.2 blocks per game.
With Kendrick Perkins out until January, and Rasheed Wallace screaming at a TV set that can’t give him a technical no matter how hard he hollers, Boston’s only left with another Heat castaway, Jermaine O’Neal, at center.
Last season, Cleveland thought Yoko would give the Cavs’ their kryptonite to weaken Orlando’s Superman, but they didn’t even make it to the Magic Kingdom. At least Yoko won’t have to face Perkins come spring.
With Yoko comes headaches that could threaten to break up a harmonious clan. All reports sign to Yoko nearly destroying Cleveland’s locker room last year. He’s a prima donna who also happens to be the league’s oldest player, and there’s a reason nobody else over 38 is playing a young man’s game.
If the Celtics think Yoko will help them defeat Miami come playoff time, they went the wrong route. The Heat’s strength lies with its uncanny up-tempo offense, not its power game. Upfront, you have to match up with Joel Anthony and Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Reread that.
The Celtics should have used its exemption to sign a guy like Matt Barnes, who would give Boston athleticism and a shot of youth. Yoko is old enough to be LeBron’s dad, and the Celtics could have scrounged up a cheap early season fill-in who wouldn’t threaten to disrupt the good vibes come playoffs. It's why Miami never considered a Yoko reunion show.
Yoko, once a cherished player, now walks a fine line that threatens to turn him into the Barry Bonds of basketball. And he didn’t he even cheat, he simply kept playing, talking and eating.
In just a few short months, the Heat and the Celtics will do something no Tuesday night October basketball game has ever done. It will overshadow every NFL game from the previous weekend.
The Vikings-Packers is the only football game with a shot of equality that weekend, and with Brett Favre maybe, possibly, sort of retiring, that game is delegated to regional curiosity.
Even the Heat-Lakers Christmas game, and LeBron’s return to Cleveland on Dec. 2, won’t compare to the Celtics opener because of the pure wonderment of what Miami can bring to the show.
If only Yoko would kindly watch from the stands, where he can keep his dignity and quit showing up in our living rooms where he’s no longer invited.
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