http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=1895868
Emeka Okafor quickly is learning the dos and don'ts of being an NBA rookie.
Rule No. 1: Don't promise to dunk on Shaquille O'Neal.
Okafor made that mistake last week at a news conference with 300 schoolchildren to promote a preseason game between his expansion Charlotte Bobcats and O'Neal's Miami Heat. Getting little reaction from the crowd, he tried to excite the kids.
"Come on!" he yelled. "Don't you guys want to see me dunk on Shaq?"
Charlotte management, aware of the TV crews in attendance, immediately cringed. In the days since then, the No. 2 pick in the NBA draft has taken a ton of ribbing about it.
"Will I dunk on Shaq? The likelihood of that happening is very small," he said. "You've got to put in perspective where I said that."
One day into training camp, Okafor already is guarding his words a lot more carefully.
He won't predict what kind of NBA player he'll be, and he won't dare set numerical goals that could be used to define his first season. Pressed over and over to list some sort of statistic, he finally explained why he wouldn't do it.
"I'm going to give you the numbers, and when I don't get them, here comes the noose," he said. "So I just want to come in and play hard and go through my growing pains."
Okafor and the Bobcats are going to face a lot of bumps and bruises during their inaugural NBA season. It will be a far different climate than anything Okafor has ever experienced.