"Why do people choose the substitute over God himself? Probably the most important reason is that it obviates accountability to God. We can meet idols on our own terms because they are our own creations. They are safe, predictable, and controllable; they are, in Jeremiah's colorful language, the 'scarecrows in a cornfield' (10:5). They are portable and completely under the user's control. They offer nothing like the threat of a God who thunders from Sinai and whose providence in this world so often appears to us to be incomprehensible and dangerous . . . [People] need face only themselves. That is the appeal of idolatry."
- David F. Wells
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Yes.
Perusing Fran Blinebury's Courtside blog on chron.com has got me feeling nostalgic this afternoon:
Yao had a sore left shoulder from a third quarter rejection and a lower lip that wouldn't stop bleeding.
He was lucky he didn't also have a severe case of windburn after the way Al Jefferson blew past him for 17 of his 36 points in the first quarter alone.
So before the cameras and microphones and most of the other notebooks gathered around his locker, Yao shook his head, leaned down to me and said, "Was Hakeem better than that?"
I nodded my head and grinned.
Having grown up in Houston I have fond memories of watching Hakeem Olajuwan dominate both sides of the court. The man was unbelievable. He didn't have the pizzazz of some of his contemporaries like Magic Johnson or Michael Jordan, but what he lacked in PR skills he made for on the court. Blinebury continues:
Jefferson is fast. Hakeem was faster. Jefferson is slick. Hakeem was slicker. Jefferson has moves like one of those 3-card monte dealers who fleece your money in Times Square. Hakeem was like David Copperfield. He could make the Statue of Liberty disappear right in front of your eyes.
"Really?" Yao asked as I kept nodding my head. "Look at that footwork by Jefferson. See those shots."
Just ask David Robinson. Olajuwon was out-dancing the stars years and years before it was a hit TV program.
It was never one move with Hakeem. It was a series of moves, one built upon the other, the answer to an endless puzzle that defenders were rarely ever able to figure out.
He didn't just slip around a defender for a layup like Jefferson. He also came dropping down almost from the rafters to hammer home a dunk. There was the jump hook that was unerring and deadly.
And, of course, there was the Dreamshake from the baseline. The closest Jefferson can come to that a little turnaround that looks like he's shot-putting.
Yao listened and his eyes widened.
"Oh, by the way," I told him, "then there was the other end of the floor where Hakeem was a defensive monster."
He blocked every shot within sniffing distance and he jumped into the passing lanes to strike like a cobra on defense while also controlling the backboards.
"I have heard all of the stories. I have watched videos," Yao said. "But, of course, our careers were in different times, so I never got to play against Hakeem in his time. I have always wondered what it would be like. I see Jefferson tonight and I think this must be it. Right?"
I shook my head and grinned.
Yao smiled back.
"Maybe it's good I never got the chance," he said.
He was one in a million.
