¡Fuego!

And I finally got hot last night. Hell, I was On Fire!

First got it going when I (uncharacteristically) called for the ball down on the right block. No cutters and no double-team, so I faced my man, beat him with the left hand and scored with a little leaner from about two feet. The next possession I knocked down an open three from the right wing, then barely missed another from the same spot the next time down the floor, which a teammate rebounded for an easy put-back. Then I scored with an easy "J" from the left elbow, and finally beat my man on the left baseline and scored over the second defender with a teardrop finger-roll. 11 quick points to win the game, and I’d scored 9 of them.

Then we switched ends, and I cooled off a little. Had a shot rejected in the lane, then missed another easy lay-up while my defender leaked out to cherry-pick on the other end. Eventually scored three more buckets (and made two assists) before we ended our run a couple of games later: another short jumper off a curl, a second from the short corner on the right baseline, and an easy lay-up going again to my left to beat the cherry-picker off the dribble. Missed another good look at a three which was half-way down before bouncing out. Anyway, not a bad night: 15 points, a handful of assists, a few more than my fair share of rebounds, and (relatively) good defense too.

But here’s the embarrassing part. Why did I suddenly catch fire? Because I was pissed off at one of my teammates who (IMHO) is a selfish player with modest skills but little modesty about anything else; and I just felt like showing him how it SHOULD be done. I did eventually give him the ball out in the corner for a wide-open three rather than scoring something closer to the basket myself, but even that was a bit “in your face” since he would NEVER have given the ball up to me in a similar situation if our positions had been reversed. Yet maybe in his selfish play he knows a little something I don’t: nothing like a good dose of attitude to sharpen the competitive edge.

Of course, it also helps to have other teammates who understand about sharing the ball (especially one who was willing to feed me down on the block in the first place), and then kept giving me the ball right where I wanted it. Not to mention that after a week-long layoff my legs were fresh and I was feelng pretty frisky too (once I got properly warmed up and stretched out).

I do feel a little bad because the guy I torched in that first little run is a good friend of mine, and I know he felt guilty about not defending me better. But to tell the truth, nobody (well, nobody in THAT gym) was going to defend me during that three minute spurt of points. I really was “in the zone,” and it felt pretty darn good.

Got back to the house just in time for a hot shower, a cold beer, icebags on my knees and the fourth quarter of the Heat/Pistons game. So life is sweet (except that the Heat turned as cold as I'd been hot). Game Six is Friday night...this time I hope to be home to watch the whole 48 minutes.