wildyams

First off, I want to say thanks to John Stockton. For those who don't know who he is, he was a basketball player for the Utah Jazz for 19 seasons. I say "was" a player because he retired yesterday. He retires as the NBA all time leader in assists and steals. While I hated him as a Laker fan (and Dennis Rodman once singled him out as the "dirtiest player in the league"), I think he is one of the best examples in all of sports of a guy who played the game the way it should be played with none of the bullshit that goes along with it. Stockton was not flashy in any way at all, he didn't like the celebrity that went with being a professional athlete, he wore shoes that were a couple years old because they were effective not because they looked great, he negotiated his own contracts with the owner, and never asked for a ton of cash, and more than anything he just loved to play. In 17 of his 19 seasons he played in all 82 regular season games, so that shows how tough and durable he was. Just a great, solid player who was arguably the most down-to-earth sports figure in the last 20 years. He even gave his "retirement speech" while cleaning out his locker, and it lasted about 20 seconds, and it went approximately like this:

Stockton: "I just told the guys I'm moving on."
Reporter: "So are you retiring?"
Stockton: "Something like that."
Reporter: "How excited are your kids that you're going to be able to spend more time with them?"
Stockton: "I don't know."
Reporter: "What will you miss the most?"
Stockton: "I don't know." Then as his voice started to crack with emotion he said almost in a whisper "That's all, thanks." With that he walked away.

Love him or hate him, you gotta respect him. More people should be like him. He got the job done with no bitching or whining, and no ego or glory, none of that bullshit. Pure class all the way.

Man, my little Stockton tribute got kinda long there so the rest of this will be short. I tried to get Matrix tickets today, but was foiled at every turn, so it looks like we're all probably gonna get tickets to see it on the 15th instead of the night before on the 14th, just so we can see it at the Mann's Chinese. Tonight I met Jon at the Apple store at the Grove where we briefly met Seal and then watched BT show us how to make unbelievably cool music with just an Apple powerbook and a keyboard. We briefly spoke with BT afterwards, he was a very gracious and cool guy, and Jon got pictures taken with both him and Seal (check his blog in the next few days for that, whenever he puts them up). Then Jon and I grabbed some good Italian food for dinner and called it a night.

Speaking of calling it a night...