Game 20 : Jerry West - Sangria
Jerry West is many things to the NBA. As a player, he was a 14-time All-Star for the Lakers and the only person to earn NBA Finals MVP despite being on the losing team. As general manager of the Lakers for nearly 20 years, he drafted James Worthy, A.C. Green, Vlade Divac, and Derek Fisher, traded for Byron Scott and Kobe Bryant, and signed Shaquille O’Neal. Bored after the Lakers threepeated in 2002, he joined the Memphis Grizzlies to challenge himself, winning Executive of the Year and pulling off the Pau Gasol for Marc Gasol trade that took a few years to show West’s genius. Then came a couple short spells as an executive board member with the Warriors and Clippers, helping one win multiple championships and the other to win the Kwahi Leonard sweepstakes.
But Jerry West transcends all these rings and numbers and honors. His grace and ability was so indicative of the beauty contained within the sport of basketball, that the NBA made him the logo. The literal logo!
That’s West, making a tight pivot cut, his two legs melding into one. But in recent years, it turns out that Jerry didn’t like being the logo. West has always been somewhat of a mercurial man of mystery, but it likely didn’t help that the NBA has refused to acknowledge him as the logo. In other words, they don’t want to pay him decades worth of back royalties. So I thought I’d help out the NBA and West by diving into my 15+ year old folder of NBA/Lakers photos that the NBA could use as a new logo. And since the logo is currently a Laker and this blog is also a Laker, my new options will only be Lakers.
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I have a soft spot for Andrew Bynum, one of my favorite oddities to suit up for the purple and gold. Bynum was drafted in 2005 at 17 years and 244 days old, the youngest person ever to be selected to the NBA. Hopes were high that the string bean would grow into the next great Lakers center, especially after his 2006 scuffle with Shaq. Though he became a starter his second season, that year he suffered the first of many debilitating knee injuries over his career. When Pau Gasol was traded to the Lakers, he and Bynum were predicted to become a historic twin tower frontcourt. And while Bynum battled through his injuries admirably, he didn’t play important minutes during the Lakers’ two Finals victories, foreshadowing his decreased role on the team.
In 2012, Bynum was shipped to Philadelphia as part of the 4-team trade that brought Dwight Howard to the Lakers, but he never played a game for the Sixers. Bynum only played 26 games for the Cavs and Pacers before vanishing into New Jersey, only briefly reappearing in 2018 for a comeback that nobody took seriously.
So. Two championships and ten years of high-level basketball ability that were curtailed by shoddy knees... and what’s the image that rockets into my brain upon mention of Andrew Bynum? The time he rocked a bowl cut on the sidelines. This is a bit of a cheat because Bynum was on the Cavs at the time. But this Young Gohan look would make for an instantly recognizable silhouette on the NBA logo. Iconic in every sense of the word.
Lakers fans love to riot. When the team christened the Staples Center’s opening season with an NBA Finals victory over the Pacers, Angelenos did their own baptizing of cops cars and storefronts outside a pre-gentrified DTLA. I remember as a 10 year asking my mom to drive us Downtown so we could see all the fun. For some reason, she did not want her car to get tipped over by a dude named Edgar in an Eddie Jones jersey.
When the Lakers won game 7 at home against the Celtics in the 2010 NBA Finals, the Laker fans hanging outside Staples Center once again went absolutely apeshit. I’ve had this photo of a middle-aged mom getting her groove on in a more peaceful area of the riot for years. I know nothing about her. I just see joy. The kind of joy where she probably wasn’t even that big of a Lakers fan, but decided to join her son (the puppeteer on the left) and his buddies who needed a ride from Whittier. Cut to four hours later: Mama is on one. Where’d she get that Mexican flag trumpet? Why is she in the middle of a dance circle? Why isn’t this beautiful image the new NBA logo? These are questions I’ve been asking myself for about five minutes.
Remember when Metta World Peace elbowed James Harden in the face? That was some real brutal stuff, especially coming just months after he changed his name to Metta World Peace. I didn’t buy his excuse then, but overall, the short lived Ron Artest/Metta World Peace era of the Lakers is better remembered for the high points. Those moments --like his FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON’T TAKE THAT SHOT! OH MY GOD HE MADE THAT SHOT! three in Game 7 of the 2010 Finals -- are encapsulated in this astounding photo. Artest, as he was known at the time, floats in the air, flexing both arms to the crowd after a shot. It’s Ron Artest/Metta World Peace in a nutshell: A human filled with erratic joy buoyantly rising away from the more important matter at hand.
Bench players on a championship teams are fascinating. During a grueling season, a coach will use nearly all of his 15 active players to keep his stars fresh. But when the playoffs hit, especially the Finals, their rotations shrink to only include a few key bench players. Almost half of the team becomes glorified cheerleaders.
D.J. Mbenga was one of those guys, a guy so far down the depth chart that he never averaged more than 8.1 minutes during the regular season. But Mbenga had an improbable journey to becoming a bench warmer on two Lakers championships. He was born in Zaire to a civil servant father who was imprisoned when Mobutu was overthrown from power in 1997. Mbenga and his mom barely escaped and were granted asylum in Belgium. There, the seven footer was discovered by a basketball scout who taught D.J. the game he grew into.
Mbenga eventually made it to the NBA for short stints with the Mavericks and Warriors that went nowhere. But in 2007, the Lakers offered him a 10 day contract. Then he earned another. A team can only offer two 10 day contracts. After that, they must sign that player for the remainder of the season. Mbenga was just a smidgen good enough to remain with the Lakers for three straight trips to the Finals, with a little extra help from Bynum’s shaky knees. And I’m glad he did because of this amazing photo. A former refugee, covered in champagne, resting on a golden trophy. His eyes staring into the distance, a sly grin radiating incredulous bliss at an unbelievable life.
It’s the “Kirk vs Picard” or “David Lee Roth vs Sammy Hagar” of Lakers nerds. What was the better dance, Mark Madsen in 2001 or Mark Madsen in 2002?
To figure this out, we have to debate two points. The silhouette potential and the context of the dance itself.
In 2001, rookie Mark “Mad Dog” Madsen was the token white guy you find on many championship teams: physical on the court and a puppy dog off the court, with some nerdy quirks like driving a beat up Toyota. Madsen was basically Y2K Kurt Rambis. During the 2001 championship parade, Shaq serenaded the crowd with a rap (he’s actually an underrated rapper but that’s for another blog) and Madsen felt it. Like, really felt it. His body became possessed with the kind of white person dancing you see on sitcoms but rarely view in the wild. And he danced with his t-shirt tucked so tightly into his pants, a little bit was probably coming out of his socks!
But that wasn’t the only memorable moment. Madsen also snag “Who Let The Dogs Out?” and spoke directly to the Latinxs in the audience with a rousing speech in Spanish that gave off heavy South American dictator vibes.
The context for the 2002 is nowhere as good. It was a retread, an empty calorie sequel we enjoyed but didn’t really need. Mark Madsen once again gave a speech in Spanish, but when he wrapped up, Chick Hearn, the parade’s M.C. and malevolent overlord, ordered him to “dance!” Madsen begrudgingly obliged as Chick yelled “dance faster!” but it just didn’t have the same spark.
HOWEVER, Madsen gave us several options that would make a perfect silhouette for the new NBA logo.
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So, who’s the winner? DJ Mbenga gave the Lakers Mama a run for her money, but I’m ultimately going to have to give it to her. Her moves, her poise, her energy: It emits everything that makes the newest golden age of basketball so much fun to watch. Sorry, Jerry. You’re a legend, but being a curmudgeon is not the move in 2019.
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Sangria
½ gallon burgundy; Cabernet Sauvignon
1 cup sugar
1 cup orange juice
3-4 tablespoons lemon juice
1 cup water
1 cup apple juice
Mix all ingredients together; chill. Serve over ice. Serve with fruit slices. For a real kick you can add vodka!
Sangria is a fun way to get drunk. Why don’t we do that more in America? Our versions of “fun” drinking are games like beer pong or flip cup. We like to pretend we had fun playing these in college, but they got dull by the end of freshman orientation.
A friend was coming over to watch Temptation Island, a show my girlfriend worked on in the casting department, so I mixed up a huge jug. Sans water and apple juice since there wasn’t any room. It was… fine? I got a nice buzz, but I’m old enough to know drinking anything with a full cup of sugar will lead to a brutal hangover the next day. Maybe it’s by design. You know more than two glasses of this wine-vodka-sugar-juice concoction is going to ruin you, so moderation is the only way to drink this. Coincidentally, in this episode of Temptation Island, two of the contestants played a game of 1 vs 1 flip cup. They did not have fun.
