Remember how we had that one series, a long time ago, where we'd entreat our writers to scribe short vignettes on the previous night's games? We've consistently discovered there's no way for us to do that every night, but with the capsules done and Aaron back in the saddle as a more active managing editor, we're hoping that we can bring the feature back as a weekly Wednesday post. Sometimes Thursday, like today. As always, the vignettes may not always be tactful, tacit, or terse -- they'll always be under a thousand words, though, and generally attempt to work through a question, an observation, or a feeling. Today's short pieces are as follows.

• GENERAL: A Prelude to Prognostirank (by Aaron McGuire)
• GENERAL: The Stephen Jackson Story (by Alex Dewey)

Read on after the jump.

• • •

GENERAL: A Prelude to Prognostirank
Aaron McGuire

As our main playoff preview feature, I'll be bringing back a revised form of one of last season's staples -- Gothic Ginobili's Prognostirank series, where I rate the playoff teams in the order I expect them to be eliminated. Hence, it's a prognostication combined with a ranking. I'm a beautiful butterfly made of slideshows and click bait, folks! This year we're going to include a few extra tidbits, as well; Dewey will be adding minor blurbs on each team as we go along, and I'll be rating not only the series length and winner predictions I considered last year but also the general confidence I have in the prediction, and the number of double digit wins I'd predict for each round. (Note: I will inevitably get each and every one of these playoff predictions wrong. I will laugh at myself about it. You are wholly entitled to do the same.)

Still, that feature never really covers the entire league. So I concocted a half-baked idea. For this final regular-season outlet, I decided I'd do a short version of the Prognostirank series that ranked the final 14 teams in the league, by my assessment of team quality and their chances of an upset if they faced the Heat in the first round. Yes, even the Western teams -- for this exercise, we're saying that the Milwaukee Bucks literally resign from the playoffs tomorrow and are replaced (in order) by every single lottery team in the league. How would they fare? Who would be most likely to upset the Heat? Valid questions, all. Let's start it from the top.

1. DALLAS MAVERICKS (41-41; 13th ranked O | 19th ranked D)

Is this a homer pick? Perhaps. Out of all the lottery teams, I realize that Utah has a better record and can be reasonably argued to be the better team. But let's be frank, here -- the difference between Dallas and Utah isn't enormous, and I'd take Carlisle and Nowitzki over Corbin and Utah's stable any day. Nowitzki can be counted on for 2 or 3 vintage games in any given playoff series -- it's pretty hard to sweep the Mavericks, all things considered, and I'm not sure it would be THAT hard to sweep the Jazz. But alas. Dallas' porous defense and complete lack of offensive coherence would doom them in the end, but a Mavs/Heat grudge-match re-match would be excellent theater and -- for my money -- more competitive than anything the Heat are going to see in the first two rounds of the playoffs.

2. UTAH JAZZ____ (43-39; 10th ranked O | 21st ranked D)

Although I lightly implied that the Jazz would be swept by the Heat above, it certainly isn't a given. Three main reasons for this. First, Paul Millsap has a weird tendency to have impossible performances against the Heat. Seriously. Millsap -- a 27% three point shooter -- has shot 75% on threes against the Heat in his career, mostly in that one unforgettable game. Second, the Jazz actually managed to split their two games against Miami this year, winning their home matchup relatively comfortably in early January. Finally? Four words. Mo Williams revenge game. Enough said.

3. MINNESOTA TIMBERWOLVES (31-51; 25th ranked O | 13th ranked D)

Alright. Hear me out. Yes, I may be slightly biased by the fact that the Timberwolves absolutely handled the Spurs in their last two matchups of the season. But the T-Wolves have the most intriguing combination of talent currently slumming around in the lottery, and they've got several legitimate star-level pieces in Rubio and... oh, wait. Love and Pek are both injured. Still. Rubio would cannibalize Chalmers and Cole with his head's up defense, leaving Chase Budinger and J.J. Barea to defend LeBron and Wade. Seems like a perfectly reasonable matchup. Wolves in five.

4. WASHINGTON WIZARDS (29-53; 30th ranked O | 5th ranked D)

This is another "screw the records! THIS FEELS RIGHT!" pick, I'll admit. But there are a few numeric reasons I'd think the 30th ranked offense in the NBA would have a chance to steal a game or two from Miami. First, out of all the defenses staying home, the Wizards are FAR AND AWAY the best one. They're borderline elite, especially since Nene and Wall returned to bolster their rotation. The team only won 29 games for a reason -- they're not very good. But having one elite trait gives you a stepping stone to work from. The other teams don't quite have that.

5. TORONTO RAPTORS (34-48; 13th ranked O | 22nd ranked D)

At this point, I'm starting to lose hope that ANY of these teams would take more than a game. But I'll play along. On the ropes in game #3, down 2-0 and down by 20 points at the half, the Raptors announce that they're waiving their vets mid-game and signing Tas Melas, J.E. Skeets, Trey Kerby, and Leigh Ellis to 10-day contracts. The Basketball Jones crew comes in and absolutely styles on Miami, taking the next two games after they break out the pun gun and literally shoot LeBron James in the shoulder. After upsetting the Heat in game 5, the Heat announce that they're waiving every single player outside their big three and signing TBJ's sworn pick-up court enemies, The Sex Warriors. The so-called "Sexy Heat Warriors" proceed to destroy the Raptors in the final two games of the series, freeing TBJ to get back to the booth and greatly confusing everyone who doesn't listen to the podcast.

6. PORTLAND TRAILBLAZERS (33-49; 15th ranked O | 26th ranked D)

Because it's the playoffs, coach Stotts decides to simply play the Portland starters 48 minutes a game to try and avoid relying on the worst bench in the NBA. This makes Portland a dramatically better team during the first three quarters, going into every fourth quarter of the series with a lead. Unfortunately, the players are all too exhausted to actually keep the lead, and the Blazers collapse in the fourth quarter in each of the series' four games. Sorry, Blazer fans.

7. PHILADELPHIA 76ERS (34-48; 26th ranked O | 15th ranked D)

No.

8. DETROIT PISTONS (29-53; 21st ranked O | 24th ranked D)

Andre Drummond and Greg Monroe take advantage of Miami's terrible big man depth and the Pistons push the Heat to six games. (What's funny about that sentence is the fact that many analysts continue to pound the "Miami has terrible big man depth, teams with good bigs will obliterate Miami" trope into the ground to the point where typing that ridiculous sentence didn't actually seem that far from the norm.)

9. SACRAMENTO KINGS (28-54; 12th ranked O | 29th ranked D)

The Kings would have a significantly higher chance of beating the Heat if they smudged out the names on their jerseys and rebranded themselves "the Kinks." Mainly because they could play Dave Davies' voice over the PA throughout the games and viscerally terrify the Heat. Kind of want to see this happen, all things considered. I love the Kinks.

10. NEW ORLEANS PELICANS (27-55; 16th ranked O | 28th ranked D)

In a bold move, the Hornets decide to change their name and brand right before the series. They win the first two games as the Heat are just terribly confused about the whole thing. They proceed to get destroyed in the next four, but hey, they got three home games!

11. ORLANDO MAGIC (20-62; 26th ranked O | 25th ranked D)

The Magic have actually played Miami oddly close ever since the Heatles got together, and Vucevic has been HUGE for them against the Heat this season. Still feel like they get swept, but it'd be more akin to the 2010 Magic's close sweep of the 2010 Bobcats than their monstrous sweep of the 2010 Hawks. Also: Tobias Harris would go OFF at some point, I guarantee it. (This series would go better for Orlando if they could get J.J. Redick back. J.J., come home!)

12. CLEVELAND CAVALIERS (24-58; 20th ranked O | 26th ranked D)

To prepare for the series, the Cleveland Cavaliers hold a pow-wow with Dennis Kucinich, Dennis Kucinich's incredibly smart and attractive wife, and Drew Carey. The trio teaches the Cavs about the true meaning of friendship and togetherness, and teaches Byron Scott that suicide sprints and making everyone throw up repeatedly isn't quite the right way to coach a young team. Bolstered by their pow-wow, the Cavaliers proceed to pull everything together and get everything right... only to get destroyed by an exponentially increasing margin in each game, losing the final game by a score of 256-0. Kyrie scores 0 points with 0 assists and 0 rebounds in the final game, but stays after the game. I bet Cleveland fans will like him again!

13. CHARLOTTE BOBCATS (21-61; 28th ranked O | 30th ranked D)

Desagana Diop has started more NBA Finals games than Dwight Howard. That's all I've got.

14. PHOENIX SUNS (25-57; 29th ranked O | 23rd ranked D)

Michael Beasley revenge series. Dude averages 70 PPG... on 95 shots per game. Unfortunately, they forget they aren't supposed to keep tanking in the playoffs, losing each game by upwards of 30 points. Good show, guys.

• • •

GENERAL: The Games That Mattered
Alex Dewey

[EDITOR'S NOTE: The following is a fictional tale. It marks the return of "John", Alex Dewey's alternate reality San Antonio ballboy. It is set directly before Game 6 of last year's Western Conference Finals.]

The Spurs would face a 2-3 deficit and perhaps the end of their season tomorrow night. Tim Duncan's legendary career, the legendary Spurs dynasty, all of this was perhaps at its twilight. I felt anxiety and restlessness that night, as I'm sure all the Spurs also felt on some level. All that considered, I wasn't terribly surprised when a couple of players woke me up at midnight to fetch a couple basketballs from the storage locker. After all, I'm just an exhausted equipment lackey sleeping in a run-down motel room. It was my job back in that warm and pleasant June, so I certainly didn't resent it when Tim Duncan and Stephen Jackson came knocking at my door. I grabbed the keys, rubbed my eyes, and silently walked down to the outdoor courts a few hundred feet from the base of the hotel.

"Just gonna shoot some hoops, you guys?" I asked as we entered through the locked fence.

"Yeah, probably. Maybe not." In four words, Tim had managed to assert and cast doubt on the very assertion. I couldn't even get a scare quote from him!

Not so savvy was Stephen Jackson: "Kid, you like the Thunder?"

I responded honestly: "Sure. Just not as much as the Spurs, Stephen."

"So you might not be so interested in this little pick-up game. Alright, kid. Just go back upstairs."

Tim Duncan gave a dry, furious, expressionless stare at his friend's characteristic lack of couth or patience. "Come on, Jack, you just had to be silent for a few seconds. Come on, man. Heh."

"I was discreet, though, Tim! No way he guesses it's Durant and Westbrook from that!" I blinked quickly in befuddlement at Jack's amusing attempt to rectify the situation. S-Jax, that fount of self-awareness, found it pretty funny himself, "Come on, who cares, Tim, heh? It's not like the mop-boys have picnics on the hotel lawn in the middle of the night, heh. He's just one dude," Stephen Jackson was needling Tim Duncan with no regard for human life. I wasn't sure if Tim ever changed his facial expression during the conversation.

As this absurd discussion settled down, my thoughts turned back to the situation before me. Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook against Tim and Jack, in a red-eye pick-up game the night before their possibly-decisive playoff game? I couldn't think to do anything, so I stood silent. But even then, I couldn't help but grin in anticipation. Tim noticed and told me: "You can't tell anyone about this game, John. I mean it. No one's violating curfew or their contracts, or anything, but I don't want any of this to reach the public."

"Alright, nothing. Not a word," I said with surprising conviction. After all, my sights had turned to something larger, and I didn't want the story so much as I just wanted to be a part of this game. No one else had to know about it. I took my watch off and started shooting hoops. At halfcourt, Tim and Jack started doing some passing drills that I saw intermittently after I'd get the rebounds from my shots. Gradually, though, the drills became more engrossing than my own shots, and I caught a final rebound and turned to watch from the top of the key.

Having been a mopboy for several years, I'd seen plenty of these kinds of drills, but what I hadn't seen was the level of focus and chemistry Tim and Jack possessed and brought to the table. They were passing from and to every angle that the hand can reach to throw and catch. They were moving with and without the ball, passing off the dribble, passing into the dribble, throwing and gathering hailmarys over their shoulders, and so on.

They would soon lose to the Thunder, of course. Both that night when it didn't matter and the next night when it did. No one on Earth could stop Kevin Durant on either night, much less a couple crafty vets on a pale-lit blue on green court without a hotel or a dozen crafty vets on a Chesapeake court so blue and bright you'd test it with your feet as water if it weren't so eerie and unnatural of hue. This historically dominant team the Spurs, full of every type of doer and thinker in an offense, was unseated by their young, more openly pious and brash brothers in the Thunder. There was nothing to be gained from the loss but the mystic's absurd purchase, a purchase of land that one alone can walk upon and which one cannot confer.

We Spurs fans know it; that team was something else, something special. Plenty of writers and league observers know it too. But for the most part we're the only ones that do, and, as memory fades, all that is left is the experience and the testimony, and finally nothing as we go. And friends come and go, too, and Stephen Jackson got released the other day, and Tim's not too far from the end, despite his dogged insistence on writing his final chapters with a most emphatic ink.

But those final days are always coming, aren't they? And with the benefit of reflection I'm so glad of what I did next, as I watched their mesmerizing passing drill. I told Tim maybe they should try with two at once, and so I sent a bounce pass his way with the ball I'd been shooting. They obliged and, with the extra projectile, the level of focus between the two grew still more intense, the passes got faster, and sometimes the trajectories of the simultaneous passes were so close that the gap could scarcely fit the width of a pin. These were the passes that only the ultimate teammates could pull off, what with their collective proprioception that bordered on telepathy. I reasoned that subtle hints in body language and eye contact must have tipped one off to the other's intentions, but I wondered if the court wasn't too dimly-lit for that. No matter the mechanisms, I know that the world beyond the chain-link cage had faded into black, and all of existence was a converted street-light throwing pale blue light upon a pale green court.

They were friends.

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As Kobe Bryant took his fateful final step and hobbled off the court with a grimace and a quieted crowd, visions of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid loomed over the proceedings. Because, let's face it -- they never had a chance. You know the apocryphal story of the two old western outlaws. Everyone does. And most people know the film, too, where the two friends gamble with fate all throughout the duration. They endure close call after close call, openly debating whether to hang up their guns or keep searching for a final heist to end it all. They go straight, then they don't. You CAN'T just go straight after what they did. You think you can evade that world, but you simply can't. The film fools some into thinking they'll find their eternal idylls, but that was never in the cards. Never is, really.

In the end, it was never some incredible feat that had them knocking on death's door. It was the tiniest mistake. The most imperceptible setback could ruin them -- and it did. What finally brought them down was the most innocuous heist of all time, and a detail they simply couldn't have seen coming. A small child recognizes the brand on their mule, and the Bolivian police force isn't about to let the two men go. They go out in a blaze of glory, shining brightest before their shortened last breath. The outlaws spent the whole movie fleeing from the stark inevitability of consequence. But that mistakes the moral of the movie -- the two were cornered from the moment they started the grind.

For a variety of self-evident and not-so-self-evident reasons, Bryant's injury brought me back to that film's conclusion. That same feeling of disturbing inevitability fell over the proceedings, despite the nature of the pain. Not a single doctor blames Bryant's insane minutes total, or the irresponsibility of keeping Bryant in the game after his numerous contusions and scary falls. But SOMETHING was going to happen. A 34-year-old player simply can't play 48 minutes a game to close a season. There was going to be a break, a strain, a pop. And it wasn't going to be pretty. Degradation by aging is inevitability -- by cheating it, you evoke Death's wrath and risk a more sudden and overwhelming pain than you'd have experienced if you simply tamped it down over time.

But Bryant doesn't seem the type who simply sees fit to fade away. Not to me. He's the Butch Cassidy player. If everyone goes out, they'll go out -- Bryant will go out in a blaze of flaming glory, challenging Death to a tête-à-tête on his field of battle. "Just TRY and strike me down. Just TRY and injure me. I'll come back. I'll keep fighting." And so it has been -- Kobe Bryant has cheated Death. He's put off his career's closing act as long as he possibly can, putting up the best offensive season of his career at an age where the superstars cease to be super. And when he returns from this injury, he'll continue to do so, for a time.

Bryant's career is mortal. It's quite the depressing reminder -- everything ends.

• • •

Kobe Bryant's injury causes us to think back on what he accomplished this season. Spoiler alert -- he accomplished a lot. The superlatives that can be applied to the severity of the L.A.'s' disappointment can be applied in the inverse to Bryant's incredible season. He was phenomenal. As the team concept of the "72-win Lakers" crumbled around him, Bryant leaned more than he ever did before on his court vision and applied a new devotion to his potential as off-ball threat. He lowered his usage to accommodate L.A.'s ever-shifting roster of refuse and injured stars. His defense was awful, and that must be noted, but one can't look away from what Bryant accomplished on the offensive end of the floor. One could make an argument that Kobe's 2013 season was the best offensive season of his career. It certainly isn't that far off.

The 2013 regular season, despite Kobe's triumphs, was not about Kobe. It was about LeBron James and Kevin Durant, the two effortlessly dominant players that look set to run things around here for the next several years. It was about a two-city cage match for a rudderless franchise, with two cities prostrate before the grace of Stern and Silver in a gasping lunge for a team to call their own. It was about win streaks and dominance. It was about tanking and cowardice. It was about the people that weave the tapestry of this wonderful league, and the personalities that make the game a joy. As it always is, and always will be.

Yet, Kobe Bryant's injury -- grisly though it may be -- casts another light. A further purpose to the season, and something I can't ignore. It speaks to the old souls of the NBA, the dominant renaissance players who are simply destroying the league in their waning years. You have Bryant, who dominated in a new way and answered his critics like never before. You have Tim Duncan, obliterating players with dunks that fans thought were gone a decade ago and leading a top-3 defense. Dirk Nowitzki battled back from injury upon injury, returning to his title-team form and very nearly leading his prized franchise back from the brink. Kevin Garnett remains, like clockwork, a strong contender for the best defender in the league. Ray Allen, Manu Ginobili, Andre Miller -- they aren't dead yet, and each still had ample flashes of their former glory.

Which is to say that alongside all those other factors that defined the season, we had one further -- the old guys got it done. They defied age, by and large, and burnished their resumes with the kinds of seasons we never thought they had in them. And Kobe's injury casts a pall on the proceedings, as we realize the sad undercurrent to this unexpected brilliance of the relative archaic. These players -- these invincible old souls with their ageless wonder and their timeless legend -- are mortal. And whether they get struck down by a freak injury or a sudden snap, Father Time goes undefeated. Even superhumans like Kobe can get struck down without warning.

• • •

The horrific scene in Boston last Tuesday reminded us of several contradictory things. It reminded all of us of the damage wrought when fundamentally awful people enact their darkest desires. It reminded us of the horrors that some see fit to indiscriminately unleash. The worst dregs of society pay no quarter to reason or empathy. They destroy and they ravage and cause us to question humanity. There is nothing positive about the villains who decided to turn the pride of Boston into their own warped fantasies of destruction and misery.

There is no moral to their actions. But there was a moral to the reactions.

All tragedy reminds us of the kindness in the heart of strangers. The same race that produces the horrors who blow up the innocent is the same race that produces the heroes who, upon hearing and seeing the explosions, run directly towards the flames to help the victims. The same race that produces the humorless cretins who joke about the tragedy and "push the line" to try and turn the deaths into a sick joke was the same race that produced the marathon runners who, upon reaching the finish line, ran to the hospital and gave blood to fill the blood banks. The same race that produces a single killer produces a dozen healers, amped to fix the wrongs wrought by the thugs who cause these sorts of tragedies.

In a hopeless tragedy, there remains proof of a fundamental good in the hearts of many. And that counts for something. So, too, does the tertiary lessons of a tragedy. What's really important? What matters, in the grand scheme of things? For the first time in NBA history, the league cancelled a game that will never be made up. Boston and Indiana were set to play a meaningless late-season scuffle. The league axed it, and openly announced that it wouldn't be made up. The Pacers and the Celtics will play 81 games this season, for the first time ever. And all of us -- from the devoted fan to the front-row-ticket-holder -- nod in assent.

Because at the end of the day, basketball is an escape. It is an expensive facsimile of life, a technicolor television show with heroes and villains and good people all around us. It comes second to life, and it comes second to repairing a broken city. In our fandom and our devotion, we oftentimes find ourselves lost in the gravity of a basketball tragedy. Basketball loss is not real loss, no matter how strongly we feel it in the core of our fandom. We lose sight of the human core of the game we love. And we chance to forget the most necessary saving grace of all.

In this case, it's a simple three words: Kobe Bryant lives.

• • •

Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, Dirk Nowitzki, Manu Ginobili. All of them will be gone one day, and one relatively soon. Yet here they are, the stage producers in a final one-act drama. They're dazzling and mystifying us all once again. And like the greatest films and screenwriters, they've given us no indication of when -- or where -- they'll end the streak and fall for good. Kobe has suffered a setback, and he'll likely return to the stage a lesser performer. But he will still return, and more importantly?

He'll still be there to watch the next act.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were never to know of the ubiquity of their story. They were as any old outlaws in their day, with knowledge of their passing fame but no awareness of their future reputation. The inverse of this lies at the heart of what may be the greatest saving grace of becoming a sporting legend. After your career draws to a close, and the curtain falls? You can sit back and watch as your legend takes shape and form. Michael Jordan dominated the league for over a decade, and retired having answered every critic he possibly could. And now, Jordan lives. He lives on to enjoy his reign as the greatest player to ever play the game. He watches as player upon player takes him as an idol, basing their games on the shadows he left behind.

And so it will be with today's NBA legends, as they exit the stage and move to their dens and their futures. They too will watch as the players of tomorrow take their games as gospel. Basketball death bears little resemblance to a person's true death -- it is the death of a hobby, and the death of a talent. But it is just as pressingly the birth of a retired benefactor, the start of a new journey for the player and the fans who adore him. A player hangs up their Jordans, their fortunes and legacies replete in their wake, and gets to watch their devotees defend their honor. The depression and the horror of watching our favorite players break down and suffer is deep, because a sport close to the vest can touch the soul. It is our gift and our curse, and it's part of what makes following professional sports so engaging -- it is all too human to feel pain. To care is to hurt.

But there are worse things in life than a retired player getting to watch their legacy evolve in real time. There are worse things in life than one's favorite sports stars entering the next stage in a life of purpose and luxury. And it holds true to perhaps the greatest gift in sports -- even as a player ceases to matter in present-tense of the game that they love, their last blaze of glory in the sport they love is never quite the end of a fulfilling and satisfying life. Children. New jobs. New challenges. Our sporting heroes do not die, not yet -- they merely drive upon a new road. Replete with personal purpose, and the promise of an unknown tomorrow.

And thank God for that.

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"Alright, Starr. I'll play your little game. Call me Phil Jackson, savior of Los Angeles."

"What?"

"I mean, Goodsprings. Sorry. Got caught in the moment there."

"Alright. Well, that's cool, didn't actually expect you to say that. Here's the situation. My caravan was attacked by the Powder Gangers. I fought back, but they killed my two associates and chased me around for a while. I was able to snipe two of them, but I ran out of ammo and had to hide out in this town. I'm 90% sure they're going to send someone to attack me at some point. Now, the people here have been really nice to me. I don't want the Powder Gangers to destroy their town. But I also don't want to die, and if I leave the town, I'll probably die. So I'm caught in a conundrum."

"If I help you eliminate these guys, will you tell me how to get to Las Vegas?"

"If you mean New Vegas, I mean..." Ringo paused, made to say something, then smiled. "Sure, I guess."

"It's a deal. What do I need to do?"

"Well, we need to round up a few people. Get Sunny Smiles in on the game, she's good at fighting. Try to get the barkeep in on it. Maybe the general store guy can provide us some armor, and maybe Doc Mitchell can provide us some chems. You never know, right? Anyway. You and Smiles come and see me when the Powder Gangers approach the town. I know they will. We'll kick their butts." Jackson nodded, and headed out towards the town_._

• • •

Although Jackson doubted that he had to talk to everyone Ringo mentioned, the completionist within him bid it so. He made a little mental list of the people he needed to talk to, and headed first to Doc Mitchell's place when he realized it was barely a stone's throw from the gas station. He entered the house, wandering aimlessly around looking for the doctor. As he wandered, he shortly pondered how weird it was that the doctor was letting him amble about his home aimlessly, and furthermore how odd it was that the doctor left all his valuables lying around. It was almost like he wanted them stolen... Finally, Jackson ran into the doctor in his kitchen, where the doctor was sitting at an empty table and staring at the wall. There was no food in the oven or on the stove.

"Hey, Doc. Uh... you OK, there?"

"How're you holdin' up?"

"Pretty well, I guess. Hey, can you help us out with some free medical supplies to fight the powder gangers?"

"Seems like wherever I go it's always the same. Folks just never leave each other alone."

"Wait, are you criticizing us or them or what?"

The doctor didn't answer, silently handing Phil several syringes filled with a darkish gray liquid. They said 'STIMPACK' on them. He shrugged and pocketed them. "Thanks. Hey, uh... are the objects in your house free to take?" Again, no answer. "It's definitely a yes if you don't tell me not to." The doctor stared impassively at our hero. "... alright, thanks for your patronage." Phil wandered around the house, taking a few guns, some ammo, and a few trinkets and baubles. He also took some cigarettes, just in case. Phil walked out of the doctor's house, his pack a bit heavier and his conscience more muddled.

From the doctor's office Phil ran the gauntlet -- he started with Sunny Smiles, who was seemingly more interested in killing off the Powder Gangers than Ringo was. She was in. Trudy took some convincing, but I mean... it's Phil Jackson we're talking about here, folks. He convinced Rodman to keep his lunacy off the basketball court for three years of his career. He's good at convincing people to help him out, and a barkeep named Trudy was well within his wheelhouse. She was in, and along with her the hastily cobbled together militia that Goodsprings called "protectors." From there Phil returned to the confusing and disturbingly emotionless husk of a man known as Easy Pete, where Phil pretended to know anything whatsoever about explosives to much success, easily convincing Easy Pete that he was an explosives mastermind who totally deserved five free sticks of dynamite. He then faced his last challenge -- convincing the shopkeeper to give them all free leather armor.

"Hey, Chet. Want to help us out and give us some free armor to fight the Powder Gangers?"

"This again? Like I said, I'm against taking on the Powder Gangers. My supplies aren't cheap, you know."

At this, Phil Jackson found himself uncharacteristically speechless. He'd easily convinced just about everyone else to give him aid -- this shopkeeper's blithe refusal took him off guard. "Uh... well... the Powder Gangers are really bad, man, and I'll totally give you a cigarette if you help us out, you know?" Phil Jackson pursed his lips. If I was him, I'd punch me right now. That was bad.

"... no. Make sure they know that if they kill you all I'll still do business with them, alright?"

"... why would I let them know that?"

"Good question. I don't know why I requested that. Anyway. Scram, unless you want to buy something."

Phil sifted through his pack, taking out a few things and asking prices. It took a while, but he was finally able to get around 100 bottle caps for some combination of gecko meat, cigarettes, gecko hide, and a flower he'd picked. While he had no idea if he'd sold those items at face value, that certainly seemed like a lot of currency for very little in the way of valuable material. I am the king of bartering. Time to try to get him to supply leather armor again...

"Hey, Chet. Want to help us out and give us some free armor to fight the Powder Gangers?"

"This again? Like I said, I'm against taking on the Powder Gangers. My supplies aren't cheap, you know."

"Yeah... well... if you ran the triangle offense, you'd make more money. Like Kurt Rambis did! Take that, jerk!"

At this, Phil Jackson nervously looked from side to side and fled the shop. Note to self: don't barter. Ever again. Wow.

• • •

Before heading back to Ringo, Phil Jackson decided to look into a claim that Trudy had mentioned was yet to be scavanged -- a safe in the Goodsprings schoolhouse, to be exact. She'd given him an issue of Lockpick Weekly, which struck Phil as quite possibly the least necessary weekly human interest publication on the face of the earth. Still. Jackson entered the abandoned schoolhouse, where he was immediately met by a giant mantis the size of a small toddler. Phil pondered. Why is everything larger after nuclear war? That doesn't even make sense.

He considered the thought as he quickly dispatched the unreasonably large mantis, abandoning it when he realized there was quite literally no way to sufficiently answer that question without a level of science expertise that Phil Jackson adamantly refused to have. Phil walked over to the safe. He sized it up, just like detectives do in detective movies. What would Indiana Jones do, though? Because I am now Indiana Jones. Phil thought on it, then without warning whipped out his pistol and shot the safe.

It remained closed.

That was a terrible idea.

Finally accepting that he was going to have to try and pick the lock, Jackson took out a bobby pin and kneeled down next to the lock. How do they do this in movies again? He got as close as he could to the lock and placed his ear on the safe, listening as he fiddled with the bobby pin. It quickly snapped. He threw it out and tried again, only to snap the next one. And the next one. And the next one. Phil closed his eyes in frustration and took out the magazine Trudy gave him earlier. He read through it cover-to-cover, quickly internalizing a lot of the ins and outs of lockpicking. The magazine may be completely and utterly useless as a weekly digest, but Phil could not deny its usefulness -- on his first try post-magazine, he unlocked the tumbler and opened the safe in less than 15 seconds. Inside there was a strange wrist device that looked like he could snap to the weird console on his left arm, as well as a few hundred bottle caps and a few magazines.

Score.

With his pockets full of change and his allies rallied, Jackson returned to Ringo's abandoned gas station. He explained to Ringo that he'd gotten the medical supplies, enlisted Trudy's aid, and gotten Sunny to agree to help out. Ringo nodded along, sharpening a machete and loading a gun while Phil explained the score. "Alright, then, Phil. Are you ready to take on the Powder Gangers?"

"Wait, don't we need to wait for them to show up? What if I say I'm ready?"

"Then they'll show up."

"And if I say I'm not ready yet?"

"Then they won't."

"That's awfully polite of them."

"I'll take your sass as you being ready. OY! SUNNY!"

As if on command, Sunny Smiles ran into the gas station. "Time to look alive. The Powder Gangers are here to play."

Phil stared at the two of them, completely befuddled. "... what?"

Ringo smiled. "How many are there, Sunny?"

"About six. Look mean, too. Joe Cobb's with them, he's no joke."

"Let's go, then."

The three left the gas station, taking their positions in front of the saloon. Indeed, six members of the gang were approaching from the north -- Joe Cobb had a shotgun, and was staring Ringo down from a distance. They weren't approaching very quickly. Phil leaned over and whispered to Ringo. "Hey, can we attack them at any time?"

He shrugged. "I'd assume so. All's fair in love and war, right?"

"Neat." Phil took out two sticks of dynamite, lighting them and tossing them at the Powder Gangers. They started fleeing, with half of them running into the desert (where they were stung by inordinately large scorpions and immediately killed) and half running into town, indiscriminately shooting at the townsfolk and Phil. "That's not very nice." Phil took out his pistol, cocking it and charging forward into the fray. He was flanked at his side by Sunny's dog Cheyenne, which was probably not for the best -- one of the Powder Gangers immediately caught Cheyenne in the face with a bullet, killing her instantly. "HEY! I like dogs!"

Jackson whipped out his shotgun and unloaded straight into the offending gang member's shoulder, reloading as Joe Cobb shot round after round into Phil's frame. He aimed out and shot Cobb in the head, satisfyingly ending Cobb's one-episode reign of terror over this particular episodic story. He approached the last Powder Ganger, throwing dynamite at the townspeople and generally looking like a jerk. "Are you gonna leave, or do I have to pretend I'm Michael Jordan?" The Powder Ganger made to slash Jackson with a machete, causing our hero to unload his last shotgun round straight into his chest.

"You reach, I teach."

The battle over, Phil walked over to Ringo in front of the saloon. Time seemed to stop, much as it had in Doctor Mitchell's house -- a weird pop-up dialog box covered his vision, telling him that he was now "vilified" by the Powder Gangers and would be attacked by any he subsequently met. Conversely, he was now "idolized" by Goodsprings. Nice. The screen faded as soon as he'd read it, and he stopped in front of Ringo. "Alright. Gonna be honest. I owe you a huge favor for this. Here -- these are technically Crimson Caravan funds, but I know they'll understand once I explain things. I'll give you a bit more if you meet me at the Caravan's outpost in New Vegas, but thanks for helping me out regardless"

"Not a problem, Best Beatle. But you agreed that you'd tell me one thing before I did this. How the hell do I get to Vegas?"

"Alright. So... I didn't want to tell you this until you'd helped me out, but... you know that thing on your left arm?"

"What, this giant bulky thing?"

"Yeah. That's got a map on it. It also organizes all of your items and stuff."

"... SONNOVAB... so I could've skipped all this and used the map at any time?"

"Yep."

"And you kept this from me just so I'd help you kill some crooks?"

"Yep."

"I hate you."

"Catch you in New Vegas, bud."

And so Ringo left Phil in the dust, as Phil narrowed his eyes at the console on his left arm. Jerk.

• • •

After taking a short nap and pondering the contents of his map, Phil decides he'd like to get a better real-life view of the road ahead. In so doing, he decides to go back to a place he left behind -- that is, the mountain where Barton Thorn's girlfriend was captured by geckos. If she's still alive, I'll save her, I guess? He also figured he'd find a few notable claims in the gecko's nest -- seemed that most people were afraid of the geckos, although they weren't that hard to dispatch. Jackson snuck past a sleeping Barton Thorn, making his way up the mountain and running into somewhere along the lines of 10-15 geckos along the way. They were aggressive, as was their wont, but they weren't really that hard to beat. A slice or two of Phil's machete seemed to do the trick, and his armor saved him from the bulk of their bites.

Phil Jackson reached the top relatively quickly, encountering the Gecko's nest. There was a half-eaten body of a girl around Barton's age, but it looked several days old. Given that Barton had asked him to save her yesterday, that struck Phil as odd. He made a mental note never to trust a man named Barton Thorn. There was also an inexplicably-still-working refrigerator, four incoherently well-placed red balls, a lookout table, a chair, the whole remains of a scavenging man, a few bear traps, and an old timey camera. Also a few boxes of ammunition, too!

Jackson sat down at the lookout table, staring into the distance. He was immediately struck by how utterly stupid of an idea it was to backtrack in an effort to see the road ahead -- instead of seeing Vegas, he just saw the cliffs and hills between Goodsprings and Vegas, with absolutely no better sense of where he was going. Smooth move, Ferguson. That said, looking at his personal map, he had a pretty good idea where he needed to go -- if he wanted to get to Vegas, he was going to have to go northeast through a mining town called Sloan (which, not coincidentally, was where Ringo's caravan had been robbed and murdered) and a patch of deserted highway.

Seemed pretty elementary to Mr. Jackson, if not a bit of a cop out. It didn't appear that there was anything remotely approaching a working car in the world as it is, but the distance didn't look like more than seven miles or so, which was absolutely doable. Probably even in one night, if he headed out now. Phil rose from his lookout, closing the dead scavenger's eyes and heading back down the mountain next to all the gecko corpses. Looking up, he noticed a scraggly haired man running up the mountain. Phil raised an eyebrow quizzically, quickly realizing it was Barton Thorn. Barton stopped.

"Your girlfriend had been dead for days. Why did you tell me to come up here?"

"Sorry I tricked you, but thanks for clearing out the Geckos. Now I can get to that stash up there... after I deal with you."

"... I just eliminated a gang. I think I can handle a guy named Barton."

"Take THIS, Phil Jackson!"

Barton whipped out his gun. Phil whipped out his machete.

Welp.

Given how easily Barton was dispatched, Phil was surprised to find that he actually had quite a lot on his person. A few hundred caps, several suits of armor, three weapons, and a magazine. Nice. Taking an inventory of his outfits after looting Barton's remains, Phil quickly realized he had accumulated quite a few outfits. Enough so that he started to take them out, one by one, trying to figure out which one was the most Indiana Jones-esque for the road ahead.

• • •

WHAT OUTFIT (OF THE FOLLOWING 1 THROUGH 6) DOES PHIL JACKSON WEAR AS HE MAKES THE LONG TREK TO VEGAS?

Decide in the comments below, or on twitter -- mention Phil Vegas to @gothicginobili or use the hashtag #PhilVegas for all responses. Leave any format-type concerns/thoughts in the comments as well. This is, as you must have noticed, decidedly a work in progress.

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"Please, mister, you have to save her!"

"Nah, that's alright. Go rescue her yourself. Waste not, want not."

"What?"

Exactly. Phil Jackson parted from Barton Thorn, leaving the young man frustrated and annoyed. Jackson walked towards the main road, but stopped at an odd sight -- here, in the middle of the desert, he saw a beat-up rusted out refrigerator with a corpse inside. He leaned down to get a closer look and started cackling. The dessicated corpse was dressed in a semi-familiar archaeologist's outfit, with the tell-tale vest and the tell-tale hat. It was -- by all appearances -- Indiana Jones.

You know, when you think about it, this is exactly what would happen to anyone stupid enough to think that a lead-lined refrigerator would save them from a nuclear blast. Phil pondered. I mean, really -- the lead might protect you from a bit of the post-explosion radiation, but lead isn't some magical shield that keeps the explosion out. Why did Spielberg inspire kids to do that, anyway? Maybe this was Indiana Jones. But maybe this was some random kid pretending to be Indiana Jones, actions telegraphed by his favorite stupid movie. God. What a crock. Phil shook his head and made to leave, but he stopped for a moment. He'd always wanted to be Indiana Jones...

"This is the greatest moment of my life."

• • •

Walking along the road back to Goodsprings, Phil spied a small shack. Ever-curious, he ambled forwards -- it looked unlocked. Indeed, it was. But the sign on the door brought a pang of sadness as he walked through -- it said "Jean's Sky Diving." Jackson walked in, half-heartedly hoping that the interior of the shack would give him a sign. "Jeanie was here", perhaps? Or, better yet, "Jeanie Went There, You Can Go Find Her There, Just Go Get Her Phil." Alas, nothing but a locker full of rubbish, a few extra guns, and a strange blue-star bottle cap. Given the post-apocalyptic wasteland thing, Phil hadn't chanced upon some time to himself. He sat down and started considering his position.

On one hand, the situation didn't seem particularly grim. Goodsprings seemed like a relatively ramshackle town, but that wasn't a huge deal -- there appeared to be at least some vestige of a functioning economy, which naturally meant that there was some place in the world that was better off than Goodsprings. He'd find it eventually, and he'd make it his own -- his body felt younger and more limber than it used to, and he still had all that classic Phil Jackson guile that inspired fear into the hearts of men. He could use a few more luxuries, but he'd find those eventually. He'd make his bread. I'm an adaptable jerk. I'll be fine.

On the other hand...

Phil Jackson was not a man used to utter and complete confusion. Even in his lowest moments of coaching in the NBA, there was always some sense of broader order in his life. He had his friends, he had his love, he had his reputation. There wasn't much else a man needed in life, although the fifty-eight championship rings surely didn't hurt. He found himself in a situation lacking every single one of those essential staples. His friends were absent, and the only person he'd even vaguely recognized in this new world was -- somewhat ironically -- the man who had inexplicably shot him. And he didn't even get THAT good of a look at him, so it was hard to tell for sure whether it was Sager or not. His love was obviously gone -- perhaps she was somewhere in California, but he had his doubts. And his reputation? NOBODY KNOWS WHAT A BASKETBALL IS. There was a certain level of discomfort and dissatisfaction with each one of these realizations.

Phil Jackson had spent a long time cultivating each and every one of those staples. They were gone. He was alone, left to rely only on his own devices. And the more he thought about it, the more he felt he needed to track down Sager. It didn't really matter if Craig was the one who brought him to the Mojave Wastelands or not -- if there was anyone in this place who had the slightest idea what Phil was doing there, it'd be the first one he met and the one who shot him in the first place. Sager's a schlub, but he's not stupid. He had to have a reason to shoot me. There has to be SOME reason. In his irritation at the loss of his well-cultivated life, he'd shifted all the blame to the closest recepticle: the clowning sideline reporter who simply must have been tangentially related to his arrival.

And so, Phil Jackson was solidified in his plan. He would find his way to Vegas. First he needed a map, but he'd find that in due time. He would head out and find Craig Sager. And he would find his answers. First, though? Time to make some money.

• • •

Returning to Goodsprings, Phil saw a strange looking red man in front of the saloon. He'll know how to make money. He looks legitimate. Phil waved him down, which turned out to be completely unnecessary since the man was completely immobile in his chair. "Hello, sir. I'm Phil Jackson."

"Howdy."

"Who are you?"

"The name's Easy Pete. What can Easy Pete do for you?"

"Why do they call you Easy Pete?"

"Because the name's Easy Pete."

"I'm starting to understand how sideline reporters felt when they interviewed me."

"Howdy."

"OK, OK. Cease. What do you do?"

"I was a prospector. Now I ranch Brahmin."

"You were a prospector -- like digging for gold and silver?"

"Nah, nah -- means I poked through old buildings looking for old tech and such. Some people call it salvaging, but I don't. There's good money in it."

"Interesting. Did you ever find anything good?"

"Nope. Had a good claim once but got run out by raiders -- eventually got too old to go out."

"So... you can make good money salvaging, huh?"

"Yep."

"Do you make any money ranching? Is it enjoyable?"

"I was a prospector. Now I ranch Brahmin."

"... Alrighty then. Hey, any idea where I can get a map? I need to get to Vegas."

"Howdy. The name's Easy Pete. What can Easy Pete do for you?"

"... you know what, I'm gonna go now."

"Yep."

• • •

Phil entered the saloon, walking in on what seemed to be a very heated argument between a man dressed up in a prison uniform and the saloon's barkeep. He stepped back and watched the fireworks, ending when the prison man spat at the barkeep and stormed out, pushing Phil over on his way out the door. Phil dusted off his shirt and looked over at the barkeep, a woman named Trudy.

"What the hell was that?"

"Haven't gotten to meet you yet. Welcome to the town. Name's Trudy."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Phil Jackson."

"Cool. Anyhow, that's Joe Cobb. He's the head of them Powder Gangers."

"What's a Powder Ganger?"

"A punk, more like. They're a faction of ex-cons that go around the countryside throwing dynamite at people and scarin' the heck out of any old town they pass through. Broke out of the NCR prison a few lengths from here, then they stormed the prison and took it over. That's their base of operations now."

"The NCR?"

"New California Republic. You really aren't from around here, are you?"

"I'm not. Regardless, why was that one guy so annoyed?"

"Fools have been out putting pressure on Chet and myself to give them discounts and free drinks and stuff. Gotten rowdy with my patrons, gotten fresh, et cetera. They've been annoying, but it's only recently they've gotten violent and dangerous -- we've been helping a trader named Ringo hide out here, because apparently the Powder Gangers robbed and tried to kill him a while back. Ringo's good people, so we're bound to protect him, but it kinda looks like they're going to burn down the town to try and get to Ringo. Dunno if he's quite worth that, but we don't send people to slaughter, so we're in a bad position here."

"That's not good. Is that Ringo Starr from the Beatles?"

"No, it's not good at all. And I have no idea who they are. Still, if you could help Ringo escape, that'd be mighty nice of you. Or you could help us fight off the Powder Gangers. Or something. Also, can you fix my radio?"

"What?"

"I have no idea what's wrong with it."

"... what does that have to do with anything? Why are you telling me this?"

"I love the radio."

"I don't understand the world. OK. Where's Ringo again? Also... do you have a map? I need to get to New Vegas."

"Gas station up the hill. And no maps here, kiddo."

"My hair is white."

Contrary to his better judgment, Phil booked it to the gas station atop the hill. He'd tried to get in earlier, but the place had been locked up tight. Ringo must have recently left. Phil walked inside to look for clues to Ringo's whereabouts, but stopped and raised his hands as soon as he walked through that door -- a man with black hair was pointing a gun at him. "OK, look. If you're with the Powder Gangers, I'm going to kill you. If not, you best state your business right quick. Or just stay silent and get the hell out of here. One or the other, I suppose. Really not in the mood for games, friend."

OK, yeah. That's definitely not Ringo Starr.

• • •

DOES PHIL JACKSON HELP RINGO AND THE TOWN OF GOODSPRINGS FEND OFF THE POWDER GANGERS?

or

DOES PHIL JACKSON HELP THE POWDER GANGERS KILL OFF EVERY RESIDENT OF GOODSPRINGS?

or

DOES PHIL JACKSON REALIZE HE'S HAD A MAP ON HIS LEFT ARM THIS ENTIRE TIME?

Decide in the comments below, or on twitter -- mention Phil Vegas to @gothicginobili or use the hashtag #PhilVegas for all responses. Leave any format-type concerns/thoughts in the comments as well. This is, as you must have noticed, decidedly a work in progress.

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Remember how we had that one series, a long time ago, where we'd entreat our writers to scribe short vignettes on the previous night's games? We've consistently discovered there's no way for us to do that every night, but with the capsules done and Aaron back in the saddle as a more active managing editor, we're hoping that we can bring the feature back as a weekly Wednesday post. Sometimes Thursday, like today. As always, the vignettes may not always be tactful, tacit, or terse -- they'll always be under a thousand words, though, and generally attempt to work through a question, an observation, or a feeling. Today's short pieces are as follows.

• IND vs CLE: The Bizarre Diamond in the Roughest of Roughs (by Aaron McGuire)
• GENERAL: Derrick Rose and Selective Empathy (by Adam Koscielak)

Read on after the jump.

• • •

IND vs CLE: The Bizarre Diamond in the Roughest of Roughs
Aaron McGuire

I'm going to make what I believe is a fair assumption. Most of our readers didn't watch last night's game between Cleveland and Indiana. Not an unreasonable stance. There was absolutely nothing on the line last night -- with a loss, the Pacers would've effectively clinched New York's hold on the 2-seed, but chances are reasonably low that Indiana pulls off the seed even with their win. After all, they're 2.5 games back with 4 to play. If they want to get the 2-spot, they'll need to beat New York in the Garden in their one remaining matchup and hope that New York drops two more games in their remaining four (@CHI, @CLE, @CHA, vs ATL) -- for a team that's rolling, that seems exceedingly unlikely. So the game meant little to the home team, other than a virtually guaranteed win.

As for Cleveland, they've reached the point in the season where wins are actively detrimental to the franchise's overall health -- one more win will effectively take Cleveland out of the running for the 4th overall pick in the 2013 NBA Draft, and they've reached the point where they need to lose out if they want to have any chance of tying the tank-happy Suns. All in all, it was a decent recipe for a garden variety blowout. You'd be excused for skipping it. But there's a reason I'm writing about the blasted game at all -- it wasn't any old garden variety blowout. The few people who tuned in were treated to what may have been the single most bizarre game of this NBA season. Really! The final score -- 99-94, Indiana -- doesn't do the night's action justice. Here are just a sample of the absurd runs and confusing peculiarities that those watching got to witness:

• On the offensive end, Tyler Zeller completely outplayed both David West and Roy Hibbert. Tyler Zeller. Tyler Zeller.

• In 17:45 span that enclosed both the start of the game and the final quarter, the Pacers outscored the Cavs 55-18.

• In the remaining 30:15 of last night's game, the Cavs outscored the Pacers 76-44. Not a typo.

• The Indiana Pacers nearly dropped a game where they shot 31 more free throws than a 24-win team.

• The Pacers won a game where they were significantly outshot from two point range, three point range, and the free throw line.

It was a strange night.

After the game, that last point slayed me. The Cleveland Cavaliers shot 46% from the floor -- the Indiana Pacers shot 41%. The Cavs shot 30% from three -- the Pacers shot 25%. The Cavs shot 86% from the line -- the Pacers shot 67%. It felt worse than that, too! The Cavs were getting easy baskets for most of the night, and actually found themselves shooting 54% entering the fourth quarter. Against the best defense in the NBA, no less. After the game, the percentages made me curious. How many times a year -- on average -- does a team outshoot their opponent from every box score-tracked area of the floor and still manage to lose the game?

The answer: not many. In the past 20 years, it's only happened 44 times, which amounts to scarcely more than two such games per year. Considering the fact that every year includes 2460 NBA games, that nets out to a 1 in 1100 chance that any given NBA game is going to be a game like that. What's more, the margin is somewhat rare as well -- the Cavs not only lost the game, they lost by two possessions! If you sort the aforementioned list by margin, you'd find that only 6 of those 44 games were won by more than two possessions. Fundamentally, that makes sense -- you aren't going to blow out a team that's comfortably outshooting you from every area of the floor. But it added another amusing layer to a game that was about 100 times more entertaining than all reasonable expectations.

As we stumble and gasp our way to the close of another long season of NBA basketball, it's worth casting an extra eye of appreciation to these unexpected gems of random chance. At some point yesterday I had a short conversation where my friend Angelo said he was going to skip last night's CLE/IND game -- and all remaining games between central division teams -- out of a sincere desire to never see the sort of plodding, grind-it-out basketball that those teams tend to play. And I still think that's a fully reasonable stance. But oftentimes the NBA sees fit to remind us of what makes it fun with these dismal, write-em-off games. And I left the night feeling lucky I got to watch it. Thanks, NBA's late season slump! The obscenely low expectations you engender made a weird game like this the highlight of the NBA's recent schedule.

... Is that a good thing?

Hm.

• • •

GENERAL: Derrick Rose and Selective Empathy

Adam Koscielak

"Holding on to his knee and down!" That's what Kevin Harlan says, in what would later become the most blatantly overused injury clip in NBA history. As the Chicago Bulls retreat looking to defend their basket against the Philadelphia 76ers, Harlan adds. "He was flying, and he came down wrong on the left foot, whether it was an ankle or a knee, I do not know." Cut to Derrick Rose cringing, as he lies in pain. I can't imagine that pain myself, combined with the realization that this is probably his last game of the very promising playoffs. His teammates surround him. Everyone knows it's not good. Chicago fans instantly fall into a state of depression. Or is it apathy? The rest of the basketball world freezes, feeling the loss of the brightest superstar. Twitter instantly speculates that it's an ACL tear. Others blame Tom Thibodeau for keeping Rose out in de facto garbage time. Some Nike rep blames Adidas for the ACL tears to Rose and Iman Shumpert, as if sneakers could save the ligaments in their knees from rupturing. In the end, however, everyone seemed to empathize with Rose's fate, a rare fan-wide show of solidarity.

Nearly a year later, Derrick Rose is playing basketball, and according to some reports, dominating at it. We can't see it firsthand though, after all, this is just a Chicago Bulls practice. Patience is wearing thin -- this here superstar has been "medically cleared" to compete for the better part of two months now. Iman Shumpert -- who suffered the same injury on the same day -- has been back in action for a while now. But Rose doesn't want to come back. What does that make him? Some compare him to Andrew Bynum, who never seemed to care about playing basketball, preferring to bowl and build computers, others point out the mental discomfort of coming back from any injury as an excuse for Rose's reluctance to come back. Then the screaming matches begin. One side will note Rose's gigantic salary, while the other notes that ACL tears are pretty hard to recover from.

This is where Rose's low-key personality seems to hurt him, really. If this was Kobe Bryant sitting out two months after a clearance to return to action, we'd be sure that something must be really wrong. If it was Andrew Bynum, we'd be sure he's "resting on company time" all over again. Rose? We don't know Rose. We know he's humble, and we know he's a warrior. But we don't know how much pain he can play through. We don't know his comfort levels. Would it be so surprising if we found out that Rose felt he needed an epic return, rather than a half-ready start in a late season snoozefest? Would it be so surprising if we found out that Rose wanted to make sure that he's not only healthy, but ready before he hops on the floor? It seems as though Rose's public persona often makes people assume that he doesn't have an ego. I can only speculate on what his motivations for sitting out are, but nobody becomes a league MVP without an ego.

In the end, whether Rose wants to return as he left, return in the right moment, or needs a few more days, weeks or months to defeat some anxiety connected with returning to the court? He should have the benefit of the doubt. For all I care, he could've decided to skip this season altogether and start anew next year. If Michael Jordan -- the greatest to ever play the game -- can go play minor league baseball for two years, why can't Derrick Rose take a few months off to adjust to life after a devastating injury? Why can we feel for Rose as the injury happens, but not when he might be suffering from the sports version of shell shock?

A topic for all of us to consider – selective empathy.

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... What seemed like a simple delivery job has taken a turn for the worse. ...

"Guess who's wakin' up over here."

Phil Jackson blinked twice -- his hands were tied. He was kneeling in a graveyard on a dry, dark night. His head was pounding and his mouth was parched. Sore all over, like he'd been thrown around by a tornado for the last seventeen years. The pronounced aches of an old center's age were replaced by the more pressing aches of a man beaten to hell. He looked up, the blur in his vision fading. The confusion got worse. There was a young man in a strange suit with two weapon-clad bodyguards at his sides. The man looked at him. "Time to cash out." Phil blinked again. Is that a young Craig Sager? Before he could vocalize the thought, one of the armed guards jeered at the younger Sager. "Would you get it over with?"

"Maybe Khans kill people without lookin' em in the face, but I ain't a fink. Dig?" Phil stared blankly. OK. He's definitely talking like Craig Sager. "You've made your last delivery, kid." The man took out a silver poker chip, acting as though it would mean something to Jackson, then pocketed it. "Sorry you got twisted up in this scene. From where you're kneeling, must seem like an 18 carat run of bad luck. Truth is, the game was rigged from the start." The man who resembled Craig Sager whipped out a gun -- it had a picture of the Virgin Mary engraved into the handle. _Wait, for real? Craig Sager... kills people? With a stupidly ostentatious pistol? Is THAT where he gets the money for those suits? __Everything makes sense.___ The man pointed the gun at Phil's head. Phil opened his mouth -- partly in speech, partly in shock.

"Wait... Craig, really?" BANG. Phil Jackson's world went dark.

• • •

"You're awake. How about that?"

Phil Jackson awoke with a flash of light, sitting up in bed as though he'd been shot. (Funny story: he had.) At the chair beside him sat an old doctor, devoid of lab coat or identifying features. "Woah, easy there. Easy. You've been out cold a couple of days now. Why don't you just relax a second, get your bearings? Let's see what the damage is. What about your name? Can you tell me your name?"

"... name's Phil. Phil Jackson. You've probably heard of me."

"Can't say it's what I'd have picked for you, but if that's your name, that's your name."

"OK. First, that's a remarkably rude thing to say about a man's name. Second, stop playing dumb. I've won eleven rings. You know who I am, doc."

"I'm Doc Mitchell. Welcome to Goodsprings."

"Way to totally ignore what I just said. Look, I'm Phil Jackson. I used to coach the Lakers. Anything? The Bulls? Michael Jordan? Made a hilarious twitter account?"

"Now, I hope you don't mind, but I had to go rooting around there in your noggin to pull all the bits of lead out. I take pride in my needlework, but you'd better tell me if I left anything out of place." Doc Mitchell handed Phil a mirror. Jackson examined himself, scratching his beard. The Doctor said he'd only been out a few days, but Phil didn't know if he believed him; his beard was scraggly, like he'd been out for months on end. Otherwise, he looked about the same -- thinner, certainly, and (strangely enough) a bit younger. But he wasn't too worse for the wear. The Doctor did good work. That said, there was still the matter of Mitchell's responses -- the Doctor seemed to have little to no recognition of anything Phil was telling him, and his utter disregard for everything Phil said both bothered and intrigued him. He nodded, as though to approve of his surgeon's work. The doctor smiled. "Well, I got most everything right. No sense keeping you in bed anymore. Let's see if we can get you on your feet."

The doctor wrested Phil up from the bed, causing Jackson to wobble precariously at his bedside. "Are you SURE I was only out a few days?" After a few false starts, Phil finally got the hang of his legs. He quickly noticed that his gait -- once a bit awkward -- was now extremely regularized, each step virtually exactly like the one before. He had three speeds with no in-between: a slow walk, a brisk jog, and a breakneck sprint. After he jogged around Doc Mitchell's home a few times, toying with his new speed and his strangely regular gait, he realized that the doctor had been talking to him the entire time. Mitchell was pointing him towards an exceedingly odd contraption, a next-level version of one of those quarter machines you'd "test your strength" at in the 80s. Phil stepped up and put his hand on the lever.

His general confusion at the situation didn't abate with the strange machine -- if anything, it got more pronounced. As Phil adjusted the numbers, he could feel the edges of their impact on his frame as a whole -- as an experiment, he pushed Strength all the way to ten and felt his biceps ripple and bulge in a way they hadn't done since his New York days. As he raised his Charisma, he felt a calming trust fall over his countenance, as though he was becoming a new-age Ghandi. After playing around with the machine, Jackson settled on a set of numbers he felt allotted him the most reasonable facsimile of his day-to-day attitudes and skills: slightly lowered strength and agility, befitting his general age, but a high dose of luck and intelligence to counteract that. A touch of extra Charisma, Endurance, and Perception finished his work, allowing Jackson to step back and admire the statistics whose meaning he couldn't really understand.

As Phil turned off the machine, Doc Mitchell beckoned him into the next room, where there was a couch and a chair. He intimated that he was going to do a personality test -- Phil stared at him quizzically, made to refuse, then decided that it wasn't worth the effort. None of this makes any sense, but maybe if I play along I'll get out of here a little bit faster. Jackson sat down across from the doctor, who shuffled a few papers and took up his clipboard. "OK, Phil. I'm gonna say a word. Say the first thing that comes to mind. Let's start with... dog."

"Shep Smith."

"Night."

"Player Piano."

"Shelter."

"A one-armed bandit."

Doc Mitchell stared at him a few seconds, confused. "... Interesting. Now I've got a few pictures. Tell me what you think of when you see each one, Phil."

"Obviously that's the Larry O'Brien trophy... if you turned upside down and blew it up."

"The Triangle offense has gone horribly wrong."

"My 2009 championship ring placed upon an immaculate bed of velvet."

Phil Jackson sat, contented. The doctor nodded, jotted down a few notes, and then stared at Phil. Time seems to stop momentarily as a screen pops up, a screen that only Phil could see -- it had upon it a variety of skills and abilities. His screen explained that the skills came from his personality test, and that they show him to be skilled at energy weapons, explosives, and speech. After mulling it over for a minute, Jackson accepted the premise of the proficiencies. Energy Weapons is probably a thinly veiled critique of Sun Yue and Trevor Ariza, but I'll take it. Explosives makes a lot of sense -- I mean, Christ, I coached Ron Artest for two years, didn't I? As for speech, I'm not really sure about that. Doc must have a sense of humor. Maybe he HAS been listening to me. Whoops.

Phil nods, causing the screen to vanish and another to appear -- this one explains that Phil has a choice between a series of "perks", with the "Wild Wasteland" already selected. He scrolls through the screen, but it gets stuck on "skilled" -- the screen explains that Jackson will get two more skill points per level at the expense of 10% of all experience points going forward. Phil stares at the screen, completely at a loss as to what that means. He shrugs, accepts, and the screens leave him. The doctor escorts him out of the house, giving him "back" a bunch of personal effects that had been on Phil when he was brought into the doctor's office. Phil was surprised at the depth of his inventory -- he had (for whatever reason) a lot of bottle caps, a ton of guns, and a bunch of different variations on the concept of armor. After letting Phil pick out his clothing and put on his hat and his glasses, Doc Mitchell opened his door and sent him off, staring at his patient with a strangely vacant expression as Phil took his first steps forward into the Mojave Wasteland.

• • •

As Phil Jackson stepped into the barren Mojave, deja vu came over him. The world was familiar but unsettlingly different. Most of the houses in Goodsprings were boarded up, with a few of them completely obliterated. The mailboxes were all dusty with disuse and neglect, and nobody seemed to be bothered when Phil opened a few to examine the contents. Most of them had a strange assortment of junk -- one had a baseball glove, another a toy truck, another a flatiron. Occasionally, one would have a stack of money or a bunch of bottle caps. He pocketed the bottle caps, sensing in them some element of importance. He made his way up the hill behind the town, eventually stopping at the first place he remembered being -- the middle of the cemetery, right at the dug-up grave where he'd been shot.

Before he could examine the gravesite, Phil took out a machete and took on some obscenely disgusting creatures that were buzzing about -- giant toddler-sized flying roaches. Having quickly dispatched them, he sheathed his weapon and approached the gravesite, intently examining the area in hopes for one of those perfect moments where he'd suddenly remember everything that happened.

... yeah, no, that was a stupid idea.

Phil sighed, looking around. He closed his eyes and tried to think. Other than his general career as a basketball coach and as the world's most confusing motivational speaker, he couldn't really remember much of anything before he woke up with his hands tied at the gravesite. He supposed, on further examination, that such a response was to be expected -- his head still smarted a bit from the smack upside the head he'd taken at some point before this all began. That certainly wasn't going away for a while.

That said, he didn't necessarily need to know all that much more to know what he had to do. He vaguely remembered that the town of Goodsprings was in Nevada -- he'd visited Goodsprings long ago, with pals and peyote. He also vaguely remembered that it was reasonably close to Las Vegas, the only place on Earth that Craig Sager could escape into a crowd. In fact... that silver thing that Sager had flipped appeared to be a poker chip. So he's in Vegas. Impressed by his deductive reasoning, Jackson turned tail and headed for the town saloon -- perhaps they'd have a better idea of where he could find a car and make his way to Vegas. Perhaps if he was lucky, they'd even supply him some Absinthe!

As he entered the saloon, he noticed a lady leaving the saloon with an enormous, imposing dog. She was dressed in leather armor and bore a large varmint rifle, wistfully reminding Phil of Jeanie's short stint as the queen of a rogue biker gang. God, I miss Jeanie. I wonder where she is... He waved the lady down, explaining his situation to her. Her name was Sunny Smiles. As with Doc Mitchell, she had little to no idea who he was and hadn't seemed to have ever heard of "basketball" before. She laughed at the idea of a car, disturbing Phil -- how am I going to get to Vegas without one? Sunny was good people, though -- she offered to take Phil out to practice his shooting. As Phil hadn't shot a rifle in years, he accepted the offer.

They ran towards the town water supply, Sunny barking targeting orders and Phil trying to get everything straight in his head. Don't aim at the other person, kneel to steady your stance, "press V for VATS" ... wait, how do I press V? What does that even mean? Phil made to ask Sunny, but she shushed him -- they were crouched, now, sneaking up on a trio of giant geckos eating the piping at a well. Phil thought the flying roaches at the cemetary were big, but he was absolutely speechless at the size of the geckos -- they were 3-4 feet tall, with two rows of sharp, gnashing teeth and ghastly blackened claws. Their eyes were empty and soulless, and they looked like they'd tear anyone who met them to shreds. Jackson bit his lip and leaned over to Sunny.

"Are we... uh... are we sure we have to kill them?"

Sunny stared at him disapprovingly.

"OK, OK, fine."

Sunny shrugged, taking out her rifle. She aimed with her tongue out -- Jordan style! -- and pulled the trigger, letting off a perfectly aimed bead that caught one of the geckos straight in the face. The Gecko let out a piercing cry, causing all three of them to stop what they were doing and rush towards Phil and the gang. Phil crouched, aiming his gun carefully. He pulled the trigger and a similarly well-aimed shot hit another Gecko in the head -- it stumbled backwards. Phil shot again -- the Gecko's head exploded in a satisfying crack. Sunny and Phil continued, killing the lot of them without even needing to reload. The shooting over, Phil placed the rifle on the holster that adorned his back. Sunny punched him in the shoulder. "Good shootin', Phil!" Nothin to be scared of with these Geckos, you hear?"

"Yeah, yeah." Jackson shrugged, pretending he hadn't been mortified out of his wits just seconds earlier. Phil accompanied Sunny to another two wells, eliminating the Gecko problem and parting ways with a small payment for his services. The payment was in bottle caps, which confused Phil greatly, but not enough to ask any more questions.

Phil sat down to get his bearings, considering his options. It was almost night -- he'd been told he could sleep in one of the Goodsprings houses. Before he could decide, he was beckoned by a strange man by the name of Barton Thorn -- apparently, he needed Phil's help. "Mister, my girlfriend's trapped up on the old radio tower -- the geckos have trapped her up there. Please, mister, you have to save her!"

"The name's Phil Jackson. I won some rings. You've probably heard of me."

"Yeah, me too. I could really use some onion rings right now."

Phil stared.

• • •

DOES PHIL JACKSON HAVE THE SYMPATHY IN HIS HEART TO HELP BARTON THORN'S GIRLFRIEND?

... OR DOES HE HAVE NO TIME TO SUFFER FOOLS?

Decide in the comments below, or on twitter -- mention Phil Vegas to @gothicginobili or use the hashtag #PhilVegas for all responses. Leave any format-type concerns/thoughts in the comments as well. This is, as you must have noticed, decidedly a work in progress.

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Remember our cracked-skull columnist, Alex Arnon? He hit his head a while back, fainted, and woke up a delusional man with tidings of a world where small markets ruled all comers. Over the past month, Arnon has been dealing with "personal matters", a thinly veiled cover-up for Arnon's voyage through the Serengeti to produce his new TV pilot for the local access channel: "What Blue Wildebeast Wants to Be A Millionaire?" (I tried to tell him it wouldn't work, especially with a total production budget of $3.54, but Arnon is a freakishly determined young man who doesn't need my sass.) Regardless. He's been kidnapped by a rampaging horde of zebras and is being ransomed off for drugs and money, even though zebras don't have the opposable thumbs necessary to do drugs or the credit score to spend the money. Until I can patch together a resolution to the situation, I'll be taking the reins to our Small Market Monday feature. Just let me knock myself in the head with this small market butter churner and I'll be right with you.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Gaze upon them, young small marketeers. Once, this team was the league's holy-of-holies. The team that the modern league juts out and features more than any other. The team with a market bigger than its britches and stars upon stars upon stars. But stars can't match grit and heart and guile -- not like you see in teams like the 29-48 Washington Wizards or the 24-52 Cleveland Cavaliers. No, this team of star power and free agent shuffling isn't a lock to win anything.

I refer, of course, to the Miami Heat.

"What!" you say, exclaiming in shock. "But Aaron, didn't they just win a flippity-gibbit of games... in a row?" Yes, readers, I looked it up -- they did indeed. But when I turned on my nationally televised grit-n-grind matchup between the plucky Charlotte Bobcats and the flagging Miami Heat, I couldn't help but feel bad for the boys in the gross-looking black and red jerseys. Sure, they had LeBron and Wade -- once. But they're gone now. And Chris Bosh can't play the entire game! Just look at some of the lineups Coach Spolestra was forced to play now that the team has lost their two stars!

• Norris Cole / James Jones / Shane Battier / Rashard Lewis / Chris Anderson (Outscored CHA by 4)
• Mario Chalmers / James Jones / Mike Miller / Rashard Lewis / Joel Anthony (Outscored CHA by 1)
• Norris Cole / James Jones / Shane Battier / Rashard Lewis / Chris Anderson (Outscored CHA by 5)

Look at those lineups! Isn't that wild? Somehow, Miami's D-Team gutted out a win against the good ol' Bobcats -- it was tough, but the Bobcats took pity on those hilarious lineups and decided to lay off the gas a bit. But we all know who's going to be laughing in the end. Just goes to show you, really... there's no such thing as a shortcut to a championship. You need to play terrible basketball for enough seasons in a row to luck your way into a franchise-changing superstar, potentially playing poorly enough that you alienate one of the NBA's best fanbases and force your team to move to a different location where the team will blossom into a perennial contender and cast the ire of the fanbase scorned, strengthening the resolve of the players that had little to no control over the move in general! That's how you get a ring in the NBA, not with this "free agency" stuff. Because if LeBron James and Dwyane Wade are "free" to "agent" for the Miami Heat, they're also "free" to "not-agent." And this is clearly -- CLEARLY -- what they have chosen to do. Good luck getting past the Eastern Conference Finals without your stars, Miami!

... wait, the Knicks are the 2nd best team in the east? OK, maybe they'll still get past the ECF. STILL THOUGH.

• • •

The State of The Small Market Union (Sponsored by The Memphis School of Modern Dance)

The state of the union is strong, folks -- like it always is, and always will be. We currently have FIVE solid small market playoff matchups to look forward to as the regular season winds to a close and the playoffs begin to play-off. In the West, the two topline matchups are small market mainstays -- San Antonio and Oklahoma City will be facing off against some combination of Utah, Los Angeles, Golden State, and Houston. Hooray! Elsewhere in the West, the Memphis Grizzlies look to be facing off against the Los Angeles Clippers in the first round, searching for redemption from their discouraging playoff loss against the Clippers this past season. In the East, there are quite a few more large markets at play -- only two small market mainstays are in the East's playoff picture, and it's entirely possible they'll meet in the first round! Those matchups, as we stand: ATL/IND & MIL/MIA. Go team!

• • •

Minnesota Air Traffic Control presents the "Raven in a Jet Engine!" Ricky Rubio MVP Watch

Goodbye, handsome Chandler Parsons. Hello, handsome Ricky Rubio! And just in time, too -- Rubio's last week has been a veritable Typhlosion of small market heroics. His overall averages over that timeframe? Twelve points, four rebounds, ten assists, four steals, and four turnovers per game. Nice, right? Nice! But to simply glide over the statistics is to glide over what makes Ricky the truest small market hero of them all -- in the past week, Ricky Rubio has gone 7 of 33 on two point shots. That's 21%! Look at this man, this beautiful man. Here he is, seeing his big men struggling to get rebounds. His heart! -- ... she aches. But Rubio is not a chump. He's a lover. He's a fighter. He's the kind of a player who misses 26 of his 33 two point shots just to help his friends catch a break. Whattaguy. Easily this week's Small Market MVP. Easily.

• • •

Small Market Mondays Game of the Night: LOUISVILLE vs MICHIGAN

There aren't any NBA games on Monday, because David Stern doesn't want to one-up March Madness. That's totally fine for us over here at Small Market Mondays -- there are few things more Small Market than a game in the Georgia Dome between a team from Louisville, Kentucky and a team from Ann Arbor, Michigan. AND you're telling me the shot clock is 11 seconds longer, AND you're telling me there are a maximum of three real NBA players in the game, AND the three point line is incomprehensibly close... even though the kids can barely hit it? It's everything I've always dreamed of, friends. SIGN ME UP.

Other quick-hits for great small-market matchups in the coming week:

• Cleveland Cavaliers at Indiana Pacers (TUE, 4/9): The Pacers are probably going to wipe the floor with the Cavaliers, but it's always nice to see Kyrie Irving playing unnecessary basketball games at the end of a season when it's actually in Cleveland's best interest to close the season on an incredible losing streak. Everything's great!

• Charlotte Bobcats at Detroit Pistons (FRI, 4/12): It's a wonder this one isn't on Pay-Per-View. Two teams with absolutely nothing left to play for are in essence shelving their young players and putting out rosters that barely resemble NBA teams. Gonna be great! Grit! Hustle! Grind!

• Milwaukee Bucks at Charlotte Bobcats (SAT, 4/13): If you thought Charlotte was FLAT on Friday, wait until you see how FLAT they are on a back-to-back at home against what passes for a playoff team in the Eastern Conference! [Ed. Note: FLAT is an acronym standing for "Fantastic Largesse! (... and Also Tenacious!)"]

See you next week, Small Marketeers! Stay frosty.

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Hey, folks. In our stable of rippling thoroughbred writers, we've managed to accumulate four writers whose names begin with "A." It's hard to fashion a feature out of the first letter of someone's name, though. We've also managed to accumulate two San Antonio Spurs fans and one Oklahoma City Thunder fan. Fitting with that, after every Thunder/Spurs game for the rest of eternity, the powers that be at Gothic Ginobili ... er, me ... will throw our three SAS/OKC rooting authors in the sarlaac pit to talk about the game and the matchup, all while being slowly digested by the most confusing creature George Lucas ever imagined. Today's broader topic: the April 4th, 2013 matchup in the Oklahoma City Thunderdome.

First question isn't a question. It's just a quote and a statement. "Home-court advantage mattered more last year because the Spurs were on a 20-game win streak." That was an actual thing Reggie Miller said on live television. No moral.

Alex Dewey: I agree with that. It makes perfect sense to me.

Jacob Harmon: What is he even saying there?

Alex Dewey: Oh, wait. Hold on. I'm that guy from Memento, I forgot.

Aaron McGuire: I have absolutely no idea. I mostly just noted it down it so we could gawk at it. What could he possibly be saying? What could that possibly mean?

Jacob Harmon: Who did it matter more to? The Spurs? The Thunder? I... I don't know.

Aaron McGuire: Is it... like... "the Spurs were on a 20 game winning streak therefore home court was... less important... because... they were 20-0 in the streak, and they won everywhere. The Thunder didn't care about home court advantage because the Spurs were 20-0 during the streak but 0-4 afterwards. Professional analyst, Reggie Miller, reporting for duty."

Jacob Harmon: Did you hear him say "Tim Duncan looking for the foul on the block by Tim Duncan"? Reggie's observations come from a place outside time and space, man.

Aaron McGuire: Fair.

Alex Dewey: Look, Aaron. You're being such a jerk about this. I'll have you know, Reggie was using an advanced maximum likelihood estimator with some factor analysis. He reasoned backwards from the 20-game winning streak and noticed that 10 of those came in the playoffs and 10 came in the regular season, therefore, home court was not the dominant factor in the Spurs winning streak.

Aaron McGuire: Haha, look at Dewey, with his nerd-rat pocket square statistics.

Alex Dewey: Real talk, though -- was Reggie Miller smoking a tailpipe blunt filled with neurotoxins on-air?

Aaron McGuire: That seems unlikely. Anyway, one last thing that has to be noted before we stop talking about Reggie. "MOMMY HAS SOMETHING FOR DADDY TO DO" has to rank among the worst dunk calls in the history of the sport, doesn't it? It just... it didn't make sense in the moment, and even afterwards, there was a lot of innuendo and sketchiness in that commercial in general.

Jacob Harmon: I felt the gutter thing was really meta. The innuendo is that this kid's mom is about to take Kevin Durant to town, then it turns out she just wants him to do chores. But he's cleaning the gutters, the implication being that the viewer's head is in the gutter for thinking that there was a sexual connotation to the "mommy has something for daddy to do" line. Was this obvious, or am I a genius?

Aaron McGuire: I thought something roughly similar when I first saw the commercial, but I never stated it as eloquently. Respect. Still, I'm struggling to think of any dunk calls that would be worse than that in terms of being creepy and out of place. Best I can think of are some don't-you-dare ones, like "BOOM GOES THE BOMB" in OKC or "THE JET PLANE HAS CRASHED INTO THE BUILDING" if Jason Terry hits a game-winning three in New York. Just these horribly offensive wastes of nature. That's how that dunk call struck me, albeit in a much less offensive-to-my-core-nature way. Come on, Reggie. Pull it together. Anyway. NEXT QUESTION, FOLKS.

• • •

Actual basketball analysis this time. Name one thing you saw in this game that isn't going to happen if these two teams meet again.

Jacob Harmon: I don't predict Derek Fisher being the Thunder's third-leading scorer again. Ever, really, but certainly not in a playoff series. That was insane. And I don't expect the Spurs offense to be so disjointed if either Manu or Parker gets back to a decent facsimile of their full form.

Alex Dewey: Tony Parker isn't missing three straight chippies again. Alternatively, the Thunder letting the Spurs back in it while the Spurs are playing that terribly.

Aaron McGuire: Mine's more of an anti-Spurs omen, unfortunately, but it has to be said. The Spurs are never ever going to shoot more free throws than OKC in OKC. Ever again. Period.The Spurs defense did a great job of defending without fouling, I felt, but the Thunder are built to go to the line. They're programmed to go to the line. And even when your team schemes them perfectly? They still go to the line. They're eldritch. That's simply not going to happen, and it's unfortunate for San Antonio that they were able to execute their defensive game plan really well and still come up so short.

Alex Dewey: True point.

Jacob Harmon: I'd agree with that. I don't remember the last time OKC spent so little time at the line.

Aaron McGuire: There's a good reason you don't remember it. The last time the Thunder shot 13 or fewer free throws was in a game against the Bulls... on January 4th, 2010.

Jacob Harmon: AHAHAHA JESUS

Aaron McGuire: And that one was on the road. Their last home game where they shot 13 or fewer free throws was April 10th, 2009. All this is to say I feel like I can be reasonably confident that the Thunder won't be shooting 13 or fewer free throws in the playoffs any time soon, even if the Spurs continue to defend them so well. Will they face a Spurs team with a 1-6 Tony Parker? Not in the playoffs this year, because if Tony's playing that badly, the Spurs won't make the conference finals. But the Spurs are going to have to live with the fact that the Thunder will inevitably be at the line more than they were tonight. And their offense really needs to step up to match that. Anyway. Next question.

• • •

Name one thing you hadn't thought of going into the game that could definitely swing a playoff game.

Aaron McGuire: Tony Parker getting injured, or Kawhi Leonard having a breakout series.

Jacob Harmon: Besides the obvious things, like "no Tony or Manu" or "Fisher getting hot from three"... I'd go with Kawhi giving KD some real problems. That surprised me.

Alex Dewey: I was thinking the opposite thing, actually -- that Kevin Durant could kill the Spurs offense if he keyed in defensively against Kawhi Leonard. Kawhi isn't a distributor like Manu or Tony, but he's grown to become a vital part of the Spurs offense. Doesn't mean he's not a heck of a lot smaller than Durant, and despite Kawhi's amazing game, there were times when Durant's length seemed to bother him a bit and it stagnated the Spurs offense.

Aaron McGuire: That might get fixed when Tony gets back, but it's a good point.

Alex Dewey: True.

Aaron McGuire: It didn't swing this game, but in a game where Fisher doesn't make 6 of 8 shots, it could've swung it -- Kevin Martin looked straight-up terrible against the Spurs. He's way less versatile than Harden is, and if this is the kind of ball he's going to play in the playoffs, he'll be worse than useless.

Jacob Harmon: I'm with you on that. He's been the biggest question mark all season and that hasn't changed. He's efficient as all get-out, but like... he's been incredibly inconsistent. Some people are saying it's because Westbrook and Durant don't get him the ball, but it's really not. He just looks completely lost half the time, even when he gets his.

Alex Dewey: Yeah. Dude doesn't have the offensive creativity or athleticism of a James Harden. Makes me think he'd be potentially dominated in a series against any team with a wealth of perimeter stoppers.

Aaron McGuire: Doesn't need to be a stopper. Just someone who gets close and puts fear in his eyes. Anyway. Net result is you have this player who's incredibly efficient, but whose teams rarely make the playoffs and who -- at least now -- is so far down the food chain that teams don't put an excess of energy into scouting him like they do with Oklahoma City's big three. In a playoff series, though? The other teams key in on everything. And that may make him way less useful.

Alex Dewey: I've been saying this since October! Remember Magic Bonner?

Aaron McGuire: Yes.

Jacob Harmon: Ibaka is the X-Factor. I worry more about those games where nobody looks for him than all the ones people gripe about where Martin gets left out. He's more important on offense AND defense. We've lost so many games where Ibaka leaks out, gets to his spots, sneaks open, puts his hands out for an open jumper he's automatic with... and just gets ignored. Completely and totally ignored. And his rebounding is inconsistent. It can be the difference between a dominant performance and a surprise upset.

Aaron McGuire: That inconsistency is huge. During OKC's big run to pull away in the first half, Ibaka had something like 6 rebounds. But during all of the Spurs runs, Kawhi Leonard would box him out and snag rebounds over him. It was a tale of two teams when Ibaka's rebounding was on and off. Ibaka shouldn't have trouble rebounding over Kawhi Leonard, much as I love the kid. He outweighs him by Ten Mo Williamses, the traditional unit of weight in the NBA. Next question.

• • •

Russell Westbrook has never missed a game in his NBA career. Please advise.

Alex Dewey: ...

Jacob Harmon: Russell Westbrook is a cyborg.

Aaron McGuire: Russell Westborg? Also, let's be clear -- without Westbrook, the Thunder lose this game badly. He dominated it.

Jacob Harmon: A lot of people think that fact is brought up constantly. I don't think it's mentioned enough.

Alex Dewey: ...

Aaron McGuire: It really isn't. No other elite point guard does that. Shouldn't he get a pass, sometimes, for having a bad game where he makes the court? Elite point guards seem to average, like, 70 games per season. Tops. He's always there. Isn't a 50% Westbrook better than one of those nights when Deron Williams leaves the work to New Jersey's third string, or Kyrie Irving leaves the work to Cleveland's anything-but-him string? It's HUGE.

Jacob Harmon: Exactly! How in God's name do you play at his level -- and specifically, the way he plays -- and NEVER miss a game or get hurt? It's not like he doesn't take hits. He takes falls that would put mortals in stretchers.

Alex Dewey: Well, uh... I um... I bet he misses a ton of games at... making... shots? I can't even believe the premise of the question. You're lying. This is a ruse. It's a troll you've cooperated on to expose my ignorance. There's no way Westbrook hasn't missed any games. That's impossible. Next question.

Jacob Harmon: No, it's true. Not in high school, not in college, not in the NBA. He's a robot.

Aaron McGuire: Dewey, click on this and look at his games played by season. I dare you.

Alex Dewey: ... DAMN, homie. Please advise. I scared. I'm shook.

Jacob Harmon: Honest fact and possible emotion admission from an off-the-reservation Thunder fan: I've felt like Westbrook has dominated this Thunder team this season. I find myself feeling he's "the guy" offensively more than Kevin Durant, nearly every night.

Aaron McGuire: While I instinctively disagree because I'm not Westbrook's biggest proponent, and I haven't seen every Thunder game this season... I can't disagree completely. I'm one of the leading proponents of the "LeBron isn't auto-MVP" argument in Durant's favor, but there have DEFINITELY been games that I've felt that Westbrook has been the more important star when you watch the Thunder get into their sets and move the ball. Durant's efficiency has come coupled with a drop in usage. Westbrook's has stayed flat. Westbrook handles the ball more and Durant's major flaw remains that he's arguably the worst elite scorer in the league at simply getting open to receive a pass. It's frustrating.

Alex Dewey: That's one reason that the Durant-for-MVP case never felt quite right to me.

Jacob Harmon: Possible sacrilege -- I've had a lot of trouble getting really enthused about Durant's efficiency feat this season. It's a really eye-test sort of thing to say, but I've felt he's been really unreliable this year. Scoring to the handle. ESPECIALLY the handle. I expect him to lose the ball every time he puts it down. Maybe that's just an emotional thing -- he hit a ton of huge shots last season that could be serendipitous. But I've trusted Westbrook more this year. And I understand saying this makes me very weird.

Aaron McGuire: This year's Thunder team demonstrates a funny truth about the usage/efficiency tradeoff. When a crazy-nuts scoring talent like Kevin Durant lowers his usage and has a subsequent increase in efficiency, people want him to use the ball more with the idea that he'll continue shooting the same way rather than revert to his prior form. Westbrook maintaining his usage ends up looking like he's cheating the fans, even though Durant returning to his former usage would probably lead to a return to his old efficiency. It's a catch-22 for Westbrook.

Jacob Harmon: Otherwise known as the ever-popular "if Westbrook would pass more, Durant could score infinite points per game" theory.

Alex Dewey: It's ironic because that theory is low-key opposite of the discourse 10 years prior. The narrative has shifted from Jordan to LeBron as the basketball ideal, except for crunch time and who hits the "big" shots. Probably an overstatement, but still -- we lionize Durant's 50-40-90 over the equally insane feat of playing every game ever and shooting like his life depended on it with slightly worse efficiency. I wonder if he'll always be relegated to that Dirk status of needing a perfect complement in order to have a chance at a title at all, now that Harden is gone.

Jacob Harmon: ...

Aaron McGuire: ...

Alex Dewey: Well OK that wa--...

Aaron McGuire: That's a Sean Elliot-level overstatement. OKC's point differential this year is nearly +10. They're winning games -- on average -- by blowout margins. This team is really really good. They have more than just a "chance" at a title. That's a clown statement, bro. Come on.

Alex Dewey: Yeah, that was the textual equivalent of a shot that felt bad coming off my hands.

Jacob Harmon: Yeah. Numbers-wise, the Thunder are a great team. There are just questions. There are always questions.

Alex Dewey: OK, fair. My main point was that Westbrook -- contrary to the prevailing view -- actually IS that perfect complement. He uses the possessions Durant can't get open for. He elevates Durant and fills in his weaknesses, and visa versa.

• • •

"If the Thunder lose the first round, _______ will be responsible for it." and "If the Spurs lose in the first round, _____ will be responsible for it."

Alex Dewey: Two questions, one answer. Rockets.

Aaron McGuire: Note -- doesn't have to be a team. Can be a player.

Jacob Harmon: The first round matchup I most want to see as a Thunder fan is Houston, but I don't think they've got a snowball's chance in hell of winning it. So that's out. Assuming the 8th seed is the Lakers, which I do? I mean... crap, man. I don't know.

Aaron McGuire: My answers would be Ibaka/Martin and Tony Parker, respectively. I can see scenarios playing out where Ibaka gets flustered by a rejuvenated Howard/Gasol pairing or overwhelmed playing center against Asik in an absolute worst case scenario. Or, as we discussed earlier, simply ignored despite being one of OKC's biggest matchup advantages against any of the low-seed teams. Martin... we talked about. I think him fading would hurt the Thunder a lot more than most people think -- he's important to them. As for Parker, when he has a "bad Tony" game, the Spurs can get beaten by anyone. Regardless of who else is on the court. He makes the Spurs offense coherent. The days of perfect pinpoint offensive execution are long gone -- the Spurs haven't looked like that since December, and I doubt it's coming back this season. They need Parker playing well to bring naught more than a vestige of order to the offense now that their Duncan/Splitter defense has evolved into an elite crew. Without him? Life's tough.

Jacob Harmon: Absolutely no doubt that Ibaka can't handle a rejuvenated Gasol/Howard. Thing is, I don't see any rejuvenation in their future. Between him, Perkins, and Collison? They haven't had much trouble all season. I don't think anyone should be scared of the Lakers. This question is tough for me, because I don't think either team CAN lose in the first round. But I'd consider picking the Rockets to steal a few games, simply because of Harden.

Aaron McGuire: The Rockets are credible nightmare fuel simply due to their overreliance on threes. They could get swept if they have a bad series from behind the arc, but get hot for a few games? They'll steal more than their fair share and they'll make it a hard fought series. Period.

Alex Dewey: Same with the Warriors.

Aaron McGuire: I think they're a worse team than the Rockets, but fair point. Anyways. One last thing...

• • •

_Alex Dewey _made this image tonight. Respond.

Jacob Harmon: What is this. Why am I looking at Matt Moore. What.

Alex Dewey: Yep.

Aaron McGuire: Dewey why.

Alex Dewey: Yep.

Aaron McGuire: Also, one tertiary question -- why in God's name do you use "puu.sh" for everything?

Alex Dewey: It's really cool, you just press CTRL-SHIFT-F4 and it lets you take a screenshot and then you puu.sh it to the server.

Jacob Harmon: Unh. Puu.sh it. Puu.sh it good.

Alex Dewey: Puu.sh it real good now.

Aaron McGuire: ... Forget I asked. Readers, these are my writers.

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This part of the NBA season sucks.

No, really. It's awful. For the fans, players, media... everyone. Beat up and burnt out NBA teams with little left to play for don't make good television. They don't make compelling analysis, either -- at this point, most teams have cast their gaze to the barren playoffs, lying in wait as the games that REALLY matter beckon them forward. Players rest, teams tank, and the NBA product becomes trite and uninteresting.

Of course, this isn't news. People have known about the NBA's general March miasma for a while. Here at Gothic Ginobili, we've been lagging a bit. Partly due to our writers being astonishingly busy, partly due to the general lag in the NBA lately. I've always been a strong advocate of the idea that you should fix a period of lagging content and lacking inspiration by going completely off the wall and trying the weirdest idea that comes into your head. After all, I hired Dewey. So I took a few ideas into the back shed and came up with what I believe to be one of the alternatingly worst/best ideas I've ever scribed. Please join me in extending a warm welcome to GG's newest feature -- Fallout: Phil Vegas.

• • •

Let's start with the basics. In its simplest form, Fallout: Phil Vegas is going to involve a playthrough of Fallout: New Vegas. For those of you who aren't familiar with the game, here's your summary. The game centers around a post-apocalyptic world where the world's been utterly ravaged by nuclear war and taken over by several disparate ruling factions. You play the role of the Courier, tasked with delivering an unreasonably important item to an unreasonably important faction leader. Throughout the game you fight various radiation-mutated beasts in the Mojave Wasteland, gaining levels and experience as you find progressively more ridiculous weapons and armor. You eventually have to choose which faction to align with out of four entirely different choices. Fun times. This won't be any old vanilla playthrough of the game, though, and it won't be formatted in the same trite "let's play!" format that's common among video game playthroughs. That's too simple for me. The main conceit behind this particular playthrough of the game is three-fold.

First, the Courier -- the game's main character -- is familiar to our readers. It's Phil Jackson. This is what he looks like:

Classy, Phil.

Second, I won't be taping the run and putting it on YouTube. I'll be playing the game, taking screenshots, and writing a story using the screenshots and the in-game dialogue as one side of a two-sided conversation. The second side -- Phil Jackson's thoughts, hopes, and dreams -- will be handled through text. Ever hear the old thought experiment about how Twilight was only produced so that someday Kanye West would someday be hired to play the role of one of the vampires without ever being given the script or the slightest idea what was going on? That's the goal here, with good ol' Phil. While the events of the game take root, Jackson serves as the completely confused (and fittingly bemused) straight man. "What am I doing here? What's going on? WHY ARE THESE GECKOS SO HUGE?!?"

The third side, as you may have surmised, is that there will be a certain amount of reader interaction. We'll be using a newly established @gothicginobili twitter account, the comment sections, and email. At the end of each post we'll have a set of reader-choice "next moves" for our bespectacled protagonist, and as I play through the game, I'll post the occasional question to Twitter asking readers to pick between several possible decision points. I'm not entirely sure how much reader interaction we'll be modeling into the playthrough -- I may realize early on that it's better to keep things surprising and axe the "reader choice" part of the deal. But I'd like to try it out, if nothing else; I'm not an experienced gamer whatsoever, and I'm positive we have readers with awesome ideas that could burnish this segment greatly.

Regardless. This whole idea could crash and burn on arrival. I realize that. It still seems really silly to me, but in a good way -- it's like a fun little throwback to the #RedDocRedemption saga where I played through Red Dead Redemption and vocalized my non-gamer confusion at everything that ever happened. That said, it's a strange series. It's weird, it's stupid, and although I'm trying to simplify it as much as possible, I can already tell it's going to be a bit complicated. I've started working on a rough order-of-operations for the game and some of the big "decision points" I can float out to you readers. I'm going to try to post one Fallout: Phil Vegas post every Tuesday and Thursday from now until the game ends or the overall segment becomes loathed by our readers. I see you, folks.

Until then, check back at Gothic Ginobili every Tuesday and Thursday to gradually answer the question that everyone's always wondered.

If Phil Jackson was tasked with saving the world in a post-apocalyptic Nevada... what would he do?

• • •

EPISODE INDEX

EPISODE #1: "A Run of Bad Luck" -- Phil Jackson wakes up in the Mojave Wasteland, shot in the head and confused about everything. Phil picks his stats, learns to shoot, and gets his bearings.

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Last night's contest between the Dallas Mavericks and the Los Angeles Lakers pitted against one another two disappointing teams fighting for their rapidly fading dreams. On one side, you had L.A.'s wayward title aspirants -- once ballyhooed as the greatest collection of talent since the 1996 Chicago Bulls, the end result seems to have erred on the side of the 2011 Boston Red Sox. Lots of glitter, lack of grit. Lots of glamor, lack of glory. Et cetera, et cetera. The Lakers entered the season with a singular dream: that of a dominant title-winning season, coupling a return to glory for Kobe and Pau with a late-career sparkle for Steve Nash and the first of many for their mercurial center.

Now, of course, they're scrambling to make the playoffs.

As for the Mavericks? Dominance was never in the cards for this Dallas team. They started the season without their centerpiece and featured a cobbled together roster of ancients and refuse, one of the greatest challenges of Carlisle's career as a coach. The goal wasn't a title, even if that would've been wonderful. The goal was to keep an even keel and show the world that the Mavericks don't back down. The goal was a playoff team. And not just that, perhaps, but a strong one that pushes a higher seed and provides the basis for Dirk's future. The tertiary lights behind a future title team. Home court? Inconceivable. But stealing home court? Perceptible, with Dirk's quintessence and possible throwback years from the likes of Carter, Brand, and Marion.

Alas, it was not to be. The Mavericks entered the year without Dirk Nowitzki, which wasn't their death knell; all things considered, their opening schedule was astonishingly easy and gave them the chance to tread water. And they did tread, standing at a respectable 7-9 at the dawn of December. Originally, we thought Dirk would be back then. A return just as the schedule started to get rough. But that didn't happen. Dirk's rehab took just a few weeks too long, and his original on-court manifestation was balky at best and depressing at worst. The Mavericks were 12-15 when Dirk returned, but Dirk wasn't quite Dirk yet -- he returned to the court in a 38-point loss to his team's bitter rivals, and the Mavericks lost 8 of the first 9 games Dirk played in. Thirteen wins to twenty three losses. Ten games under 0.500 -- it was a dismal record, one that Dirk Nowitzki had never seen before this season. The dream appeared to be dead. The playoffs were a distant, bitter memory in a season gone completely awry.

But a funny thing happened on the way to obsolescence. The Mavericks -- those downtrodden, downbeat Mavericks -- finally began to win again. It was slow at first. An overtime win against the Kings, a four game streak, a three game streak. Nothing world-breaking, nothing astonishing. In a season of 15-game win streaks and 55 win five seeds, nothing that moved the radar. But, life support or not, the dream wasn't quite dead yet. All of the sudden, after going ten games under 0.500, the Mavericks were 22-13... with four heartbreaking losses by 3 points or less in the stretch. They were virtually tied for the 9-spot. They were knocking at the door. Dirk was magnificent, although the team had no idea how to get him the ball. The defense was shaky, but Marion and Brand did just enough to pull out the wins. Players were in-and-out, but Carlisle was putting together a rotation again. The door was open, and in one fateful night, they had the opportunity to wrest it ajar and pronounce their arrival to the world.

The final margin -- that grisly 20-point margin -- looks rough. But it wasn't quite as rough as one would think. This wasn't a laugher. It goes down in the record books as a 20-point blowout, and the Mavericks season may go down in the record books as a generally awful sub-0.500 affair. But that understates the torment for the fans and the team and the general public. This uneven, unlucky season was much more painful than a garden variety blowout.

Consider the turn of events that decided the game. With 4:20 left to play, the Mavericks were within 7 points. Dirk Nowitzki had just entered the game, and Dwight Howard was headed to the line. And Dwight missed both! But Earl Clark, everyone's least likely Laker mainstay at the start of the season, corralled the offensive rebound and dished to Pau Gasol for an easy two. Suddenly, it was a ten point game. Carlisle drew up a play for a Nowitzki three. Clank. The Mavericks foul Dwight Howard, praying for the seemingly inevitable misses. He makes 1-of-2, but Dirk misses another three. Another Howard foul, which is again the right move -- probabilistically, Howard should miss 1-of-2, and it should remain a game. But he doesn't give away the points -- this time he makes them both. The Mavericks rush their next possession and end it with an awkward Vince Carter two. Clank. Another Howard foul, another 2-for-2 trip. Nowitzki gets fouled himself, but probability mocks these Mavericks -- Dirk goes 0-for-2, as Howard makes another 1-for-2 on the next possession. And then, to cap things off, Kobe Bryant drains a pretty two pointer with 1:46 left to play. The once-surmountable lead is now 19 points strong, and the game is over.

There will be no miracles. There will be no comebacks. These merry, plucky, bearded Mavericks trudge to the bench as Sacre, Dentmon, and Morrow take the court to play out the string. And as a proud Dirk Nowitzki and the remnants of one of the league's most impressive champions watch their season slip away in a single game, everyone's left wondering what might have been. Without Dirk's injury, do these Mavericks -- they of a 22-14 record with a healthy Dirk, I might remind -- challenge for the 5 seed? These Mavericks were beset by bad luck from the get-go, and over the course of the season, they've lost a startling 12 games by five points or less. For comparison, Golden State lost only 4 such games. Houston? Only 7. Sometimes, the chips don't fall. You don't hit your straight. You're one roll short.

On a warm spring night in the City of Angels, two dreams met on the field of battle. One left bolstered -- the other, defeated. The Los Angeles Lakers still have their unlikely title shot -- their flagging, fading, sputtering title shot. It's a shadow of expectations, certainly, but the expectations were too high to begin with. They've come accustomed to their new reality, and they're persevering in the face of adversity. But they're also one more thing, perhaps more important than anything else. They're lucky, once again.

The Mavericks are not. And as we bid adieu to the 2013 Dallas Mavericks, we happen upon their eulogy.

"You were alright, but you just weren't lucky."

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