Oh well, five more days at the resort.
It turns out the Chicago Bulls are here for the long haul, or at least until Game 5 on Wednesday, and that should be enough time to either bond or blow up. Las Vegas is tempting Dennis Rodman, the hotel golf course is calling Michael Jordan, and if all else fails, there is always basketball practice. So nobody should be bored.The view from the top is more hazy some days than others, particularly when Karl Malone is in sync, and Friday was one of those poor visibility evenings for Chicago. They got in their 3-point shooting repetitions - which wasn't exactly the game plan - and now they will need at least 24 hours to get their hearing back. The decibel levels at the airport hangar that is the Delta Center reached unhealthy heights during Utah's 104-93 Game 3 rout, prompting the jocular Bulls Coach Phil Jackson to threaten legal action. But he might want to shake some sense into his power forward first.
A scapegoat is born every day, and Friday's was the one with two hoop earrings in his left ear, a stud diamond in his right and a nose ring to boot. Rodman had zero points, three rebounds and the seven continents dyed into his hair, and that had Jordan and Scottie Pippen pointing their fickle fingers directly his way.
"Dennis, he really didn't give us much tonight," Jordan said after the game, and the shock is that Rodman could not have agreed more.
"If you know where Dennis Rodman is, find him," Rodman said. "I've played terrible. I've let my teammates down."
Utah's Malone wore those same goat horns after Games 1 and 2, but it turns out all he needed was a brisk motorcycle ride in the country. The Jazz organization would rather Malone sell his three Harley Davidsons, lest he fall off of one at 55 miles per hour, but they may back off now.
Malone was a virtual mess after the first two games, having shot a raw 16-of-42 from the field and settling for one fadeaway jumper after another. In Chicago, the crowd had chanted "MVP! MVP!" for the other guy (Jordan), and Utah officials felt it was tearing Malone's guts out. He ended up trying too hard - his sub-par performances exacerbated by the quarter-sized gash on his right palm courtesy of that Houston nuisance, Charles Barkley - and John Stockton certainly was not going to win this title alone.
But Malone flew home, slept in his own bed Thursday night and ambled over to his Harley Davidsons late Friday afternoon. One is a two-seater that he takes his wife, Kay, on; another is a light, tame one that is suitable for residential neighborhoods, and his last one is a raucous, heavyweight bike that sounds as if it could use a muffler transplant.
"Well," Malone said, "I was going to get on the one that was kind of quiet, and my little son kind of shook his head. He liked the other one. So, that's the one I rode."
Before he kissed little Karl Malone Jr. goodbye, he "got a big jaw full of sunflower seeds," and began the commute of these NBA finals. Spitting seeds at every red light - or at least the ones he stopped for - Malone went 40 minutes out of his way to visit the state capitol and some small canyons, and arrived at the arena thoroughly juiced.
He told his teammate Bryon Russell he was going to dunk the first time he touched the ball Friday, and when he later used some profane language, the Jazz ball boys knew the Bulls were in deep trouble. "Karl doesn't curse," said one of the ball boys. "But when he does, watch out."
Some 37 points, 10 rebounds and three assists later, the Bulls were unamused.
"What I was thinking while I was riding my Harley was, `Just block everything out,' " Malone said. "Just kind of being in my element and just relaxing. Everybody's got their own way. Even though I was coming to the game, I didn't feel like I was. I kind of felt I was somewhere else."
The Bulls are somewhere else, too: in Park City. Most teams stay at one of the hotels on West Temple Street in downtown Salt Lake City, but the defending champion Bulls chose the nearest ski resort, which conveniently has its own golf course. Jordan may or may not have shot the back nine Friday, but he certainly didn't suspect he would shoot 10 3-pointers Friday evening. He finished with a substandard 26 points and heard the Jazz fans call him the "Vice MVP." Meanwhile, Pippen (27 points) ended up launching 11 3-pointers himself.
If Rodman had rebounded some of these horrific misses, the Bulls might have had their happy ending, but instead someone named Greg Foster (17 points, six rebounds) beat the tattooed forward to them.
Rodman, asked if he would be flying to southern Nevada immediately or if he had other plans, said: "Plans? I'll try to get in some trouble, but you can't in this town."
Who knew the Bulls could be dominated so completely, 47-35, on the backboards? It had a lot to do with Malone, who was swallowing rebounds whole, and the other Jazz players quickly fed off of his energy.
The Bulls would have never believed it, coming off Games 1 and 2, but this is a confident Jazz team (at the Delta Center, anyway). Malone - whose frowning, dictatorial 25-by-30-foot photograph hangs from the rafters here - has always been that way, and his wife would testify.
Kay Malone hardly knew basketball when she met Malone nearly a decade ago, and when someone alerted her that she had just met the Mailman, she said, "I thought I had met the first black postman in Utah."
Instead, he autographed a poster for her. "He was so cocky back then," she said.
The Jazz players simply need to see Malone continue to act that way. "They need me to set the tone," he said.
That is what Malone did on Friday, and the team reverted to its usual feisty self. Antoine Carr, the backup power forward, got into a minor shouting match with coach Jerry Sloan, and the beauty of it was that they laughed about it later.
The same way Sloan and center Greg Ostertag laughed about their shouting match a few months ago. That was the day that Sloan lifted Ostertag and screamed, "You're not ready to play, son."
Ostertag screamed back, "Yes, I am!" and then told Sloan to sit down.
"No you're not," Sloan said, before sitting. And the coach actually forgave and forgot an hour later.
Now, in June, Utah is forgiven again - for its two Chicago debacles - and could tie this series, 2-2. That would mean at least a Game 6 in Chicago, and their power forward has a wild idea.
"You know what?" Karl Malone said. "I'll ship the Harley to Chicago. It's coming with me, and I'll ride it there. It's coming with me."