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Banned cram on LeBron Blair Witched us!

By J_Logan | View all Posts
Posted Friday, July 24, 2009 02:30 PM

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Remember the summer of 1999 - when the Blair Witch Project took all the fun out of camping?

I was heading into my freshman year of university and working at a local sporting goods store peddling $200 Air Jordans to white kids with identity crisis. Even before the movie’s trailers and radio ads started scaring the bejesus out of me, I had heard about the film in magazines and newspapers.

It was this documentary gone wrong (and not in the good Spinal Tap way) that captured the torment and eventual disappearance of three film students making a movie on an urban legend in Maryland.

I recall walking into the theatre with my heart in my throat in anticipation of the supposed scariest film ever. But when it was over, the fear in my stomach had turned to motion sickness. What was billed as the next step in horror was a snooze fest punctuated by moments of sheer panic and poor focus.

My grandmother’s old home movies provoked more fear than the low-budget flick. The Blair Witch Project had fallen far short of all the hype.

A couple weeks ago, another home video was billed as “Must See”. Word spread like chicken pox about Xavier transfer Jordan Crawford’s dunk on Cleveland Cavaliers (+275 to win the championship at BetJamaica.com) star LeBron James at a camp hosted by the NBA MVP.

What made this dunk so famous was the hype surrounding it. Nike, who pays LeBron a pretty penny to do what he does in their shoes, black bagged the dunk and confiscated any video that happened to catch the posterization of their most popular endorser.

Those actions turned Crawford’s slam into a folk legend – like Earl Manigault’s double dunk or Wilt Chamberlain’s bedroom track record. Crawford was on ESPN talking about the dunk and Nike scrambled to defended their actions, saying it was policy and that media isn’t allowed to film LeBron’s camps.

Whatever the case, the buzz surrounding the dunk was at an all-time high when the video was finally leaked by two media sources. And much like frightened college kids lost in the woods, it failed to live up to the hype.

The two-handed stuff was a great play but not the end all and be all of slam dunks. I actually feel sorry for Jordan Crawford because no matter what he does at Xavier this season or throughout his career, he will always be that guy who dunked on LeBron (which isn’t the worst title one could have).

LeBron comes out of this mess looking like a self-conscious primadonna and Nike continues to be viewed as the evil empire it is (love the shoes, by the way).

At least basketball fans didn’t have to fork over nine bucks to feel disappointed this time. Like Flava Flav wisely said, “Don’t believe the hype”.

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User:	J_Logan
Joined:	October 2008
Location:	Canada
Team:	Dallas Cowboys
Occupation:	Media

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