Jan. 6--Only four days remain until the Arizona Cardinals come to Charlotte to play the Carolina Panthers and I can't find anything about the visitors to hate.
How do you hate the Cardinals? They're to football what the Tampa Bay Rays are to baseball. I'm sure there are bad guys on the team, but the team gets so little attention we'll never know. The players I have spent a little time around -- Kurt Warner, Larry Fitzgerald -- I like. And the only people who hate Phoenix have never been there.
Phoenix offers year-round sunshine, dry heat and, until this season, a template for how professional Basketball is supposed to be played.
Phoenix gave us Boris Diaw. Well it didn't give him to us. The Charlotte Bobcats traded Jason Richardson and Jared Dudley to the Phoenix Suns for Diaw, Raja Bell and Sean Singletary.
I like Richardson, but a lot of guys can score. Diaw makes passes most big men don't even see. The brand of Basketball Larry Brown craves was a concept until Diaw arrived. Now it's becoming concrete.
Despite Diaw, there is no trade deficit on Arizona's end. Arizona State stole former N.C. State Basketball coach Herb Sendek. Although Herb undoubtedly angered Wolfpack fans by refusing to wear a bright red blazer or declare that games against North Carolina are more important than games against everybody else, he has developed a top-20 program amid the cactus and sand.
Charlotte is one of only eight cities with a team still playing meaningful professional football and one of only four that this weekend will host a game. But is this enough?
Many of us wake up needing to hate something -- sunshine, rain, life. How will we enjoy Carolina-Arizona if it's not personal?
OK, a reporter in Phoenix did go so far as to suggest that the Cardinals would rather play the Panthers than the New York Giants. He probably bases this on Carolina's 27-23 October victory against Arizona.
The Cardinals led by 14 in that one. But coming close to winning is not the same as winning. Do the Panthers think they can beat the Giants just because they were handling them 21/2 weeks ago before New York rallied to win in overtime?
Wait. Here's something. Last week, there was a celebrity party outside Phoenix and according to reports, Charles Barkley was one of the celebrities and Urkel was another. How come Urkel refuses to go to our parties? How cool would it be to say, when somebody asks you what you did last night, "Oh, not much, I only hung out with Urkel!"
Barkley was arrested that evening for suspicion of driving under the influence.
Barkley is the funniest, most refreshing commentator on TV, and if the charge gets him booted from his TNT gig, can we blame Arizona?
Of course we can't. Driving drunk, if that's what he did, is not amusing.
So I've failed to find a reason to despise Phoenix or the Cardinals. How can I possibly enjoy the week?
I know. I'm an NFL fan. I'm thrilled the local team still is playing.
That's enough.
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