Heat 113, Bobcats 93

The Bobcats traveled south on Monday to take on the Heat, easily Miami’s most impressive group of performers since the Sound Machine. Miami was down a couple of regulars, as Jason Williams was out with an injury, while future Hall-of-Famer Gary Payton (suspension) was replaced in the starting lineup by future legal drinker Chris Quinn—bleach his hair and roll some cigarettes up in his sleeve and this baby-faced youngster could pass for an Outsider. It didn’t really matter, though, because Dwyane Wade and Shaquille O’Neal commanded the team to an easy 113-93 blowout.

I have to give Miami credit too, because usually their scoring comes in one of three flavors:

1. Dwyane Wade layup
2. Dwyane Wade foul shot
3. Shaquille O’Neal slam (assisted by Dwyane Wade)

The result is an excruciatingly slow game that’s so repetitive it can be maddening—I call it the “Wade-r Torture.” I mean, I respect Wade as much as one can, but it sure would be nice if he didn’t get a foul called every time he drove to the basket. But that’s like saying I’d like Tom Cruise movies if he didn’t always put on sunglasses at some point while grinning maniacally; it’s pretty much all part of the package.

Oh wait, I was supposed to be giving them credit, and now I forget why…Oh yeah, well, that was the thing about this one: there was a little bit more variety to it than usual. Sure, Wade still had 27 points and roughly as many free throw attempts, and Shaq still threw down a ton from a foot out while the tiny little Bobcats buzzed around him like biplanes on King Kong—in fact, at halftime they did one of those scatterplot diagrams showing Diesel’s shot pattern and it looked basically like one big ink splotch in front of the hoop—but some other people contributed as well. Quinn actually scored 14 points and showed some nice touch. Meanwhile, Udonis Haslem, never among the leaders in anything (except maybe “Largest Mouthguard”—have you seen that thing? When he spits it out he looks like a Pez dispenser), showed his jack-of-all-trade abilities with 12 points and 8 rebounds.

But the one that really hurts is Jason Kapono. We had this guy with us when we first started, and I don’t even remember who we got for him (or perhaps “what” we got for him: it might have been 10 signed copies of The Winner Within for all I know), but I can’t BELIEVE how much he’s progressed. I know you always hear stories about guys coming out of nowhere to be great, but not like this. I specifically remember ESPN The Magazine’s preview for our inaugural '04-'05 season using a picture of Kapono looking incredibly dorky simply to point out how lame they thought the Bobcats were, and now look at him! He’s like the NBA’s Jerry O’Connell: from fat kid in Stand By Me to engaged to Rebecca Romijn.

Meanwhile, the Bobcats never gave up! Well, yeah they did—but not until about 5 minutes were left. Raymond Felton was spectacular with 20 points and 7 assists (albeit with 6 turnovers); he probably demonstrates better than anyone the double-standard in officiating. Wade gets continuation credit on fouls that happened a full two seconds earlier, while Felton gets nothing even though every one of his layups ends with him on his back and needing to twist the ball in like a trick billiards shot. Okafor also had his 29th double-double of the season (19 and 11) and Gerald Wallace attacked the baseline as usual to the tune of 19 points.

And Primoz Brezec was back! I’m pleased to report he still hasn’t lost his uncanny ability to miss from right under the hoop. At one point Primoz went 0-of-4 in about 3 seconds, missing a phenomenal string of put-backs.