That Golden Company

Dear Paul George,

It recently came to my attention that you grew two inches in between this season and last. In the city of Super Bowl XLVI, the city of the Indiana Pacers, this has apparently been common knowledge for some time, but I only heard about it in the last two weeks or so. I was fascinated: Who gets taller as a pro? That's crazy. Before I heard about the growth spurt, your half-the-Beatles name had only vaguely registered on my fan radar, but after that I started paying more attention. And just in time: In last week's games, I saw two spectacular highlights from you. I really wish I would've seen these plays live, but ESPN and TNT aren't interested in broadcasting the Pacers. (Paul, I've already spoken to other people about the difference between seeing a play happen in real time and seeing the highlight, but let me harp on it some more: it's like the difference between stumbling across one of your favorite obscure songs on the radio and playing it yourself on iTunes.) Still, I was super-impressed with the highlights: Your double pump reverse against the Nets would've been the dunk of the week if Lebron hadn't jumped over John Lucas III to finish a one-handed alley and if Blake Griffin wouldn't have done whatever crazy thing he did above Kendrick Perkins. But your dunk wasn't even last week's most impressive Paul George highlight. Against the Mavs, you ran the length of the court, caught up to Jason Terry on a fast break, and made one of the best rejections I've seen this year, sending Terry falling into the base of the hoop just by the force of the (clean) block, and then--THEN--while Terry was still lying there, you ran the length of the court the other way, caught a skip pass in the corner and nailed a three, your sixth of the game. That has to be the first time in NBA history that a dude has blocked someone on a fast break and then hit their sixth three pointer in a game. Incredible. But not as incredible as the fact that the play might not have happened if you hadn't grown two inches over the off-season.

The Beautiful Game

Dear Ricky Rubio,

First of all, I'm not gonna worry about the language barrier here. You speak decent English, judging from this strange clip I saw on YouTube where you get interviewed by Drew Gooden (?) on what appears to be the set of a fake news show while wearing some sort of sweater that only a Euro could pull off. And anyway, the subject I wanna talk to you about knows no language barriers. I'm talking about delight, Ricky. Or we might refer to a related term: beauty. You know as well as anyone that the most consistently delightful, purely beautiful action in basketball is a nice pass. When people fall back on that old metaphor of basketball-as-jazz, they're not thinking of dunks or blocks or Carmelo holding the ball for almost the entire shot clock and then taking a jumper. They're thinking of nice passes. There’s nothing better than a nice pass, nothing more delightful than watching a great PG improvise beauty. And ever since news came across the Atlantic about a Spanish kid playing pro ball in Europe at the age when we get driver's licenses in the States, we'd heard that you, my friend, were a purveyor of nice passes.

I'll admit, though, that I was skeptical about you. You decided to stay in Spain after you got drafted, and you hadn't been impressive in the Olympics--no double digits in scoring or assists, not even once--and then you had more unimpressive numbers in the Spanish League last year, averaging well under double digits in both categories. I understood that you were still just a kid, with room to grow, but how could you be a special player in the NBA if you couldn't even be a special player in Spain? It didn't seem possible. It isn't possible, really. Let me speak to you in soccer terms. Your situation would be like a decent bench player in the MLS--you know the MLS?--moving to Europe and dominating the Premier League. Or La Liga, if you prefer. Or let's just say the Champions League. Anyway, that would never, ever happen, correct?