Given the Rockets mediocrity over the last decade or so, it’s hard to get too enthusiastic about professional basketball in Houston. This season’s Rockets team is not bad, but it hasn’t had all of its working parts playing at the same time yet and, even with all those components working, probably isn’t as good as the NBA Western Conference powers Dallas, Phoenix and San Antonio. By the way, the best way to keep up with the Rockets is through Jonathan Feigen’s blog, which is excellent.
About 30 years ago, the Rockets also had a pretty good team, but they were beaten in the Eastern Conference playoffs by the Philadelphia 76ers, who were led by Julius Erving and. one of the true characters of NBA history, 20 year-old center Darryl Dawkins, he of the “Chocolate Thunder-flying, Robinzine-crying, teeth-shaking, glass-breaking, rump-roasting, bun-toasting, wham-bam I am jam.” The NY Times checks in with the always entertaining Chocolate Thunder, who, among other things, used to claim to be an alien from planet Lovetron where he spent off-season practicing “interplanetary funkmanship” with his girlfriend Juicy Lucy.