Miles and miles of *******, beer, and benjamins
Once upon a time DMiles was my favorite blazer player. I loved it when he joined our team. His style of play added an exciting element to our teams game. Like other fans and the owner of our team Paul Allen I was looking forward to seeing him play for our team for a long time.
I didn’t feel that way for very long, because it didn’t take all that long for him to show us who he really is A doper, a drunk, and a slacker. A guy who called his coach that word that begins with an N that just about everyone finds offensive. A guy who helped get that coach fired, and a guy who now says… “The truth is, Maurice Cheeks was the best coach I had because he was the first person who told me I had way more potential than I was giving,”
I remember just a few months ago when Darius decided to hit the town with former Oregon Duck quarterback Dennis Dixon. Perhaps, as a pro athlete he thought it would be good thing to take a young fella out and mentor him. Providing a bit of fatherly advice for someone starting his pro career sounds like a nice thing to do.
So Miles showed up at the Dolphin2, Dennis in tow, and showed him what being a pro athlete was all about. *******, beer and benjamins. Stacks and stacks of 50 hundred dollar bills. Hundred dollar bills flying through the air to the delight of the dancers and no doubt young Dennis. The dancers had a good time, and I am sure Dennis and Darius had a good time because they made several trips to the VIP room. Usually those who visit the VIP room do have a good time. At least so I’m told. Of course, Darius is married so he probably just went in there for some conversation about his family.
Family is very important to Darius. Or so he would have us believe. Just recently he told Sports Illustrateds Ian Thomsen “I just had a son, he’s six months old, and I want my son to see me play basketball”. Hello, Darius? Were you thinking about your son when you went to the nudie bar with Dennis when he was just a few weeks old? Would you like your son to see you throwing stacks of hundreds at strippers?
Miles tells Thomsen that he thinks the labels people have placed upon him a bit unfair. “I don’t do anything out of the ordinary. It’s crazy how you get labeled.” I guess I am a little naive, because in the world I have known I wouldn’t call that trip to the strip club ordinary. Nor would I call saying the kinds of things he said to his boss (Cheeks) ordinary.
Maybe all those ******* and beer have affected his memory. It wasn’t all that long ago Miles told John Canzano…“Yeah, you probably smelled liquor on me before. But it’s not like I’m at practice drunk. I’m totally focused. I don’t care if you come to practice and take shower, once you go to practice and start sweating, its going to come out. That doesn’t mean you aren’t focused or ready to practice. Like you might go out, you might get drunk, and come to the gym higher than a mother, and you sweating, you smell like liquor, and you interviewing everybody. What does that mean? You still 100 percent focused. That’s just ridiculous. Ask any other team, little petty stuff like that, if you ask any other coach in the NBA if they smell liquor on a player, any coach would say, every year. Some players go out in every city they go to.”
That sounds more like a guy who doesn’t care what others think than a guy who is truly concerned with what other people think of him.
Darius entire attitude and demeanor changed after he signed a 48 million dollar deal with the Blazers. He got his. There was nothing left to play for.
He rewarded the man who placed forty eight million dollars of faith in him and who gave him a contract which was a lot more than he was expecting with halfhearted efforts and a bad attitude. He took the team out to a night club BEFORE a game on a road trip in Indiana. He and his posse were often in the news in connection with a disturbance at strip clubs, bars, and there were rumors of drug abuse and a connection to the Woods dogfighting scandal.
Ian Thomsen makes Miles sound like some sort of misunderstood boy scout in his SI article. Not once did he mention a named credible source that stated Miles medical condition was sound, or that he was demonstrating on a basketball court the ability to play at the level he was able to play at before his injury.
How many Benjamins did Miles agent stuff into Thomsens pocket to get him to promote him in this way? Why did Thomsen so willingly act as Miles tool?
Miles and his agent are clearly blowing smoke in every direction they can in one last attempt at cashing in on a contract he will not ever fulfill. Ian Thomsen is helping them do it.
I don’t condemn Miles for his attempt to resume his career. I do not respect him for the way he behaved after Paul Allen made him a very rich man. He made us believe he was someone he wasn’t, and as a result he got a big prize. A 48 million dollar contract.
He is not fooling me anymore. He is an ***. A very rich ***. But an *** nonetheless. All the garbage I read about him being a family man and having a burning desire to play basketball again are stories. Stories he and his agent are using to fool someone else into signing him to another deal.
Mike Barratt says the Blazers doctors have told him Miles knee is bone on bone. Kevin Pritchard said today on 95.5 the game that their doctor told Miles that if he was his own son he would tell him to never again play basketball. The likely scenario for Miles playing again would be that he would blow his knee out and require total knee replacement resulting in him never being able to walk properly.
We know Miles has been suspended for the league for violation of the substance abuse policy. Since it is a ten game suspension, as Jason Quick surmises, it is likely for steroids.
“Ten games is a very specific number, if you take that information to the CBA, you’ll find that there are two ways to get that suspension: For a fourth marijuana offense, or for a first performance enhancing drugs offense.
In the event that a ten-game suspension is for a fourth marijuana offense, it would follow a five-game suspension (for the third-marijuana offense). Darius Miles has not had a five-game suspension, and the League confirms that if he had had an earlier five-game suspension, we would know about it.”
I don’t think Miles wants to play basketball. I do think he misses the lifestyle. And I do think he’d take whatever drugs he thought might get him through a one year deal, hoping to snag one last big payoff. I think he and his agent are after some more money. And I wouldn’t put anything past them in their attempt to get it.
http://www.clubblazers.com/miles-and...and-benjamins/
CNNSI.com on Miles
