Horace and Harvey Grant, just a couple of begoggled Yankee Doodle Dandies. Happy birthday, fellas.
If you’re between the ages of, say, 35 and 45, it’s likely you had a Costacos brothers poster on your wall. Michael Jordan dunking the moon may have been their most well-known effort, but they also were responsible for such notable images as LT as the Terminator shooting lasers from his fingers, Jim McMahon and Walter Payton as Miami Vice (standing in front of Payton’s own Lamborghini) and Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire bearing some cartoonishly outsized bats (foreshadowing!) as the Bash Brothers. If you’re in New York City, you can get a look at a gallery full of their original designs over at Salon 94 Freemans (click image for link). And not only is this Chuck Person poster part of the exhibit, it’s his birthday today. Happy 47th, Rifleman.
Sam Perkins didn’t actually sleep through his entire NBA career — that’s just how he looked. Looks, actually. Big Smooth seemed to have a blood pressure of roughly 12 over 2, never getting flustered, making even “Never Nervous” Pervis Ellison look like a basket case. His career was forever intertwined with the other guy in this picture — from winning an NCAA championship alongside him in 1982 to hitting a game-winning three against his Bulls in Game One of the 1991 NBA Finals. The Bulls went on to win the next four games and the title, but Smooth had made his mark. Happy birthday, Sam.
It’s entirely appropriate that, after 19 seasons, Shaquille O’Neal would announce his retirement (via Twitter, no less) during the NBA Finals — after all, the Big Fella played in six of them. He only won one MVP to go with his four titles, and maybe the results didn’t quite match the outsized bravado, but Shaq always reminded us that the game was supposed to be fun. Enjoy retirement, Diesel — we miss you already.
Happy birthday to former Celtics first-round pick Joseph Forte, drafted ahead of (among others) Tony Parker and Gilbert Arenas. While Parker’s and Arenas’s career highlights include winning championships and scoring 60 points in a game respectively, Forte once wore a Magic Johnson throwback on the Celtics bench during a playoff game. Genius!
Happy birthday to former Bad Boy Piston (and Heat/Raptor/Bull/Laker) forward John “Spider” Salley, seen here politely creating space under the basket. Fellow former SLAM Ed. Ryan Jones and I once spent a very entertaining evening drinking with him and Judd Nelson at the Rainbow Bar & Grill in Hollywood during the 2004 NBA Finals.
Congrats to Lamar Odom for winning the Sixth Man of the Year. Anyone who likes Coogi and Henny can’t be all bad, right?
Yo Money, it’s GOTTA be the shoes!
