the Miami Sports Dude

The Dude's Report From The Miami Heat Parade of Champions …

First off, let me just say that I chose to be here because I wanted to experience the whole championship parade celebration thing. God knows I’ve waited long for this day to come and I was not going to be kept from it. Let me also say that as parades go, this one was pretty lame. Not sure if it was because of the weather or the fact that over 200,000 people showed up (a quarter of them not real Heat fans in my book), but it kind of sucked. BUT – a lame championship parade beats NO championship parade any day. I’ll take burning in the sun while waiting to catch a glimpse of Antoine Walker wigglin’ on a championship duck-boat with 199,000 other people, over whatever the hell was going on in downtown Dallas that afternoon.

So here’s how my day went down: I get there with the intention of meeting some friends. My buddy Cash had been there for hours, holding a nice spot for us. I call him on the cell while I wade through a sea of sweaty, pit-smelling Heat fans languishing about like zombies in the sun soaked afternoon. It was friggin hot, which is why I came armed with two water bottles. The Dude is always prepared. Cash didn’t pick up right away, so I walked towards the Freedom Tower that had a large banner draped over the front that read Congratulations To The World Champion Miami Heat. Very cool. Just then, a pretty girl and some of her friends approached me and asked me where I got my bottle of water. Being the smooth Dude that I am and, as always, looking to seize a moment with a pretty girl, I pulled out the other bottle of water from my shorts pocket and offered it to her. She refused. I insisted. She thankfully accepted and we stood there drinking water and shooting the breeze.

Eventually, Cash called. After finding out where he was standing, I said my goodbyes to, I’ll call her Amanda, and turned to meet Cash. I’m a loyal friend that way. But as I turned, Amanda asked if she could come watch the parade with me. “No, you can’t come with me! What are you? Some kind of leech? First you take my water now you want to use me to get a better look at the parade?” Actually, that’s not what I said. Just checking to see if you’re still paying attention. She was semi-hot. So I said, “Yea.”

We met Cash, who had himself a pretty decent spot on the north side of the parade route. We stood there in the hot, hot sun. Amanda asking me about myself. Me asking Amanda about herself. Eventually, the parade got started. Thank God. Did I mention that it was hot?

First came a convertible moving at 1 MPH filled with a bunch of people none of us knew. Two whole minutes later came a fire engine. Mind you, this fire engine was about half a foot behind the convertible. This frickin thing was like watching a glacier move, except that instead of freezing our asses off we were burning to death. On top of the fire engine was Burnie, looking very merry and waving with unbridled, flippant enthusiasm at us. I think I can capture 100% of the people’s sentiment when they saw that cute, lovable rambunctious orange-red colored fuzzy-wuzzy waving at us with such adorable flair and frivolousness from the top of a Dade County fire engine: Get the f$#@ out of our faces! Nobody wants to see you! I hope you’re melting in that dumb-ass costume you lame excuse for a mascot! Move along! Move along, damn it! I’M BURNING UP!!!! GO ALREADY!!!!

Mercifully, the fire engine moved on, revealing the next car: another convertible filled with more people we’ve never seen before in our lives. Again, the crowd’s sentiment was pretty unanimous: Who the hell are those people? Where the hell is Shaq? MY SKIN IS BLISTERING AND BUBBLING!!!!!

Finally, Cash spots a duck-boat heading our way. The crowd slowly starts to build up a powerful crescendo. The duck-boat floats past us. It’s Shaq! This is the closest I’ve ever seen him! Holy, he’s huge!! There’s Pat Riley! Where? Right there! He’s shooting a water gun at us! Wait let me take a picture! Hurry up! Wait! Hurry up! Okay … got it! Who else is on that float? I don’t know. I was looking at Pat Riley. Wait, where’d they go? They’ve moved along. What? Is it me, or did we catch a longer glimpse of Burnie than we did of Shaq? Ok forget that, forget that … the next vehicle is coming. This should be better.

That’s right – another convertible. This time the Heat dancers are on it, so that’s pretty good. Still, they look oddly out of place. They each have this Darryl Hannah semi-smile on their faces like they sort of know why they’re here but they’re not a hundred percent sure. They’ve stopped right in front of us. Why couldn’t Shaq’s float stop like this? Why are they still waving and smiling? This is getting a little Stepford Wives creepy. Okay, that’s enough. If I wanted to get a long look at fake boobies and dumbfounded looks on bubble-headed bleached blondes, I’d do it on the internet in the air-conditioned comfort of my own home. MOVE IT!!!

Another duck-boat coming up. Who’s that up there? Is that Gary Payton? I’m not sure. The duck-boats all have these make-shift tents over them to shade the players. And they’re all dressed in white. And their faces are all covered in the shade. Damn, did I just take a picture of James Posey or Khalid El-Amin??? Look, Dwyane Wade!!! Where? On the other side. Other side? What the hell, you got x-ray vision? How can you spot him on the other side? Look, he’s right there. Where? Right THERE! Where? Oh wait, is that him? I think so! Let me take a picture! Crap, that dude’s bald spot just got in the way! Let me try again … Oh … the duck-boat is gone. Crap it all!! Damn you bald headed man! I hope your bald spot burns like gonorrhea on a fat hooker in the middle of the equator!!! You son-of-a b...Wait … Here comes another car!

It’s Mickey Arison. Fantastic! I saw Shaq for two whole seconds, I may or may not have snapped a shot of James Posey, I caught an obscure, bald headed blocked-out glimpse of Dwyane Wade but, hey – Mickey Arison’s car has been standing there for a full minute. Lucky me! Take a picture! Go f%$# yourself!!

The parade once again gets going. Car after car passes with people I could give two craps about waving back at me. Another duck-boat finally comes by. Look! It’s Zo!! You know what? I don’t care. My tongue is sticking to the roof of my mouth. My sweat feels hot and cold at the same time, which can’t be good. And thanks to this 90+ degree weather, much like Lindsey Lohan, I am now officially a fire crotch. That might as well be a topless Maria Sharapova up on that duck-boat and I wouldn’t give a crap. Just get me to some shade and give me some water!

Like the others, Zo’s float speeds past us like Jeff Gordon is driving the duck-boat. Is it that all the floats are going at the same speed but in my excitement it seems like they’re zipping by? Or did we just park ourselves in the worst possible spot for the parade? Later on, I found out that further along on the parade route, Shaq got off his boat and started walking around among the people. This is what it must have felt like for the one town with lepers that Jesus did not stop to see. I want to leave. Cash and Amanda want to see the presentation on the stage in front of the arena. We wait for an hour for the parade to come back. Instead of it coming back our way, it hangs a quick right and heads off to the back of the American Airlines Arena. Seems fitting in a very sadistic way. The back of my neck feels like a solar panel.

The rest of the day has been well documented:

-Shaq makes Riley dance.
-Riley makes the team dance to Springsteen’s The Rising.
-Shaq introduces the players. He says Antoine Walker has a head the size of the Larry O’Brien trophy. He says Jason Kapono is the coolest guy on the team (what else can he say about a guy who saw as much playing time in the Finals as I did?). He says D-Wade is sexy. He starts an “Uno mas” chant when Zo took the mic.
-Mickey Arison tells the most culturally mixed city in America to “Stay White.”
-The team shows the crowd Antoine Walker’s head. That is, the Larry O’Brien trophy.
-Shaq says we’re going to do it again next year.
-They reveal the new billboard that hangs over the front of the AAA. It’s a team picture that reads 2006 NBA Champions. The team is in their best X-Men pose. Jason Williams’ whiteness stands out in a profound, almost blinding, way.

The ending was a bit anti-climactic. But I was able to hang out with Amanda until later that night. The partying and celebrating lasted all weekend long for us. You can fill in the details yourself. Go Heat!!!

All in all, I’m happy I went. It was a great experience and I do hope we can do it again, like Shaq said. Only next time, I’m going to see what I need to do to be one of the unknown people riding in the convertibles. If not, then I’ll just invite Amanda to watch it on my TV with a couple of beers. In fact, yea … that’s officially the plan. I’ll ask Cash to e-mail me the pictures.

Stay white everybody!

Labels: Miami Heat