Tell the truth. Just tell the truth. Seriously, stop lying. Everybody. Tell the truth. All of you. The whole truth and nothing but. For real.
Only one man actually gets to be The Truth (assuming you're not super religious or anything). Number 34 for the Boston Celtics, Paul Pierce. The Truth. As far as nicknames go, it's not bad, in a lame sort of way.
Not as good as Mr. October or the Refrigerator or Clyde the Glide, but better than the Unabomber (a nickname with an offensive lineage if there ever was one - maybe next a poker player can start wearing a turban and call himself Osama or something cute like that).
Of course, just because Pierce is The Truth doesn't mean he's always surrounded by it. Celtic Executive Director of Basketball Operations Danny Ainge claimed in May of last year that he had "absolutely no intention of trading Antoine Walker;" Walker was gone by the end of October.
And as for that other Boston team, let's just say one side definitely wasn't telling it straight in the whole Nomar debacle. And yes, I will refuse to refer to Nomar as Nomah in this space. And yes, I used a Guster song as my headline to try to attract non-sports fans.
There's just so much, uhh, twisting of the truth, shall we say, in sports, even if I can't prove it. Latrell Sprewell broke his hand on his yacht, he says. Maybe he did; I doubt it, but I don't have a yacht yet so I can't tell you about the dangers of yachting. Kobe cut his hand cleaning out his garage?! I can't believe Kobe even cleans out his own garage, but once again, I don't have a garage, so what do I know. Brian Griese tripped and fell on his dog? Foiled again - I don't have a dog; maybe they do get in the way. And O.J. never murdered anyone.
I do know for sure Pete Rose lied, and anyone who thinks that he should be in the Hall of Fame doesn't deserve to call themselves a fan of baseball (that was me filling my serious, profound statement quota for this column).
Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying athletes are the only ones who play with the truth. It's a whole American thing, from Enron on down.
Justin Timberlake said in February after winning a Grammy Award that it was the greatest moment of his life, which seems improbable considering that it's just a piece of metal, and he was once the only person on the entire planet to have had sex with Britney Spears.
He also "accidentally" declothed Janet Jackson in front of 100 million people, and was once linked with Alyssa Milano, who was definitely the hottest of the three witch sisters on "Charmed" (not that I've ever watched that show). So that makes it hard to believe that an award that's just going to sit on the shelf of his big expensive living room which Ashton Kutcher is about to come and repossess on behalf of the government is his crowning achievement.
And don't even get me started on BushCheneyRumsfeldAshcroftRove, or I'll end up in the next edition of The Primary Source (don't worry guys, I think Clinton lied too - his lies just never cost a lot of American lives).
So it's not just sports that are afflicted with the dishonesty disease. But the thing is, we turn to sports to get away from real life, to immerse ourselves in a silly fantasy world that, on its own level, is actually real. (That's why I don't watch the WWE.)
So what I want is Just the Truth. J.T.T. I'm starting a national campaign for it, with Jonathan Taylor Thomas as my spokesperson, since he's better looking than me, and he doesn't seem to be doing anything these days. (And he has the right initials, geniuses. J.T.T. Get it?)
We want athletes to step up to the podium and tell it like it is; when they're wrong, no excuses, just what they actually think.
And I know some of my boys are down with that.
Guys like Jim "Playoffs? ... We're trying to win one game!" Mora and Allen "Practice!" Iverson.
Guys like Kevin Millar, who said he'd rather have A-Rod than Nomar, and Mark Cuban, who said that from a business perspective, the Kobe rape trial was great for the NBA, and Larry Bird, who said that the NBA would be better off with more white superstars (three statements that, while painful, in hindsight are all true).
In sports, we appreciate guys who speak their minds. I think there are a couple of reasons for this. First, athletes can diss their bosses, unlike us, because they can afford $5,000 fines, unlike us.
Second, it's always entertaining to hear some of the preposterous things that come out of their mouths when they turn off the censors and just shoot from the hip. Hell, a lot of ridiculous things and grammatical mutants come out of my mouth, and I have been trying to focus on an education my whole life, so is it any surprise when professional athletes says things like, "My game is like the Pythagorean Theorem: there is no answer"? (Shaq, by the way, ladies and gentlemen, and he actually does care about education more than most.)
And third, we're just used to hearing so much spin, so many excuses, too many lies. Sports practically own the tired clich?©. That's why we it's so refreshing to hear the forthrightness of guys like Sam Cassell and Gary Payton, Mo Vaughn and Shannon Sharpe, guys like Mike Tyson.
Please notice that while all the other athletes above were paired off, no one was paired with Mike Tyson. There's a good reason for that. NO ONE can be compared to Mike Tyson. When Tyson said he was going to eat Evander Holyfield's children, it was outrageous, but considering he had already taken an ear, it was probably true. I mean, if he hadn't gone soft on us, he seriously might have gone cannibal.
And when Tyson boasted that he could sell out Madison Square Garden masturbating, I mean, that was really, really gross, but he probably could have in his hey-day. He gets points for honesty, if nothing else.
(Unfortunately, shooting from the hip too much can be too much. We don't need to hear Tyson saying, "I really wish I did [rape her] now. Now I really do want to rape her and her f--- mama.")
Of course, just to throw you, I lied twice in this column. One of them you might be able to spot: Allen Iverson isn't actually my boy. The other? I actually have seen "Charmed" (just half an episode, honest).
Note: Just because "Charmed" isn't worth watching doesn't mean I'm trying to hate on witches here. Historically, they're probably the most honest of everyone. At least the accused witches who weren't actually witches. People were crushing them with stones and they still wouldn't lie and say they were witches. That's pretty honest.
