Tuesday's Top Ten: Greatest, Must-Hear Christmas Songs

This week's Top Ten List is very simple. It's a list of my greatest Christmas songs of the season. It's not going to have a lot of songs that have been done to death over the years or have been rendered bad because department stores have played them out either. So sorry you won't find Boyz II Men on this list and you won't find Donny Hathaway either and you have the commercialization and oversaturation of those songs by the corporate world to blame for it. Now if you can get past that though than this list will be for you. My favorite Christmas songs of the season...

10.) Alvin and the Chipmunks- Christmas Song - I know this is a song from your childhood but if there's every a holiday that is all about you reverting back to that time, this is the one.

9.) Tchaikovsky - Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies - Look I'm a black man who listens to Mobb Deep, Clipse and a gang of other musicians who boast of tales of coke dealing and shootouts but at the same time I'm a college educated man whose confident enough in myown skin to own up to the fact that I also enjoy classical music, have the ability to play the cello and can appreciate some good orchestral pieces as well. If that qualifies me as (insert insult) then so be it. I can live with that. This is classic.

8.) Luther Vandross - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - You just can't deny Luther. Even if you wanted to, the boy had skills. The man one of the best friends song has ever had. He killt this. KILLT IT!

7.) Run DMC - Christmas In Hollis - This one is self-evident. It's as mandatory a part of Christmas as socks are to shoes.

6.) Charles Brown - Merry Christmas Baby - Old classic soul of the kind we're not likely to see again.

5.) Nat King Cole - The Christmas Song - LOL, the song is worth the price of admission in and of itself but the video is just class. Nat was smooth. No lie, he might have been cooler than Obama in his prime. His voice didn't miss a beat and his performance was polished too. Moms always let Nat live during the holidays and this is probably a lot to do with her influence as much as it my taste. Thanks mom!

4.) Frank Sinatra - A Merry Little Christmas - Old blue eyes doing what Old Blue Eyes do!

3.) Vince Guaraldi Trio - O Tannenbaum (A Charlie Brown Christmas) - This is just class personified. It's the living embodiment of the season really. It's what corny guitar riffs are to adult films. Mood setting.

2.) A Charlie Brown Christmas - Christmas Time is Here Song - If you can't appreciate this then something is wrong with you.

1.) Ray Charles & Betty Carter - Baby It's Cold Outside - Two things, the first being this song is all kinds of genius. The way it's laid out like a conversation is ill. I dig the style on this one. It's just before it's time. Two, LMAO @ Ray trying to get this chick to stay throughout the whole song, Dude is not playing and he's definitely not taking no for an answer. Listening to this song is like watching a cartoon of Pepe LePew. Class.

Ray Charles & Betty Carter - Baby It's Cold Outside - The funniest movie is here. Find it

Tuesday's Top Ten: Traits That Make Us HATE "Facebook Guy"

I absolutely hate "Facebook Guy". Let me be clear though, I like Facebook, I just don't like "Facebook Guy". I'm not saying you're automatically "Facebook Guy" because you're on Facebook. That's not what I'm saying. I've got plenty of friends on Facebook. I'm on Facebook. I'm not talking about them and I'm not talking about myself. I'm talking about "Facebook Guy". I just don't like "Facebook Guy". "Facebook Guy" could be a man, woman or amorphous person in the middle like Lady Gaga so don't automatically assign a gender to this being. I just use the handle "Facebook Guy" because it's simple. So let me describe "Facebook Guy" so you can spot this/these jerk(s) hiding out in your Facebook, lurking in the shadows and defriend him and his flunkies from your friends list.

10.) "Facebook Guy" changes his profile picture more often than he changes his drawers. He feels it's absolutely necessary to keep us afloat to his facial changes as often as possible and as frequently as daily. In "Facebook Guy"s mind a lot can change over a weekend and you must know what he looks like on Monday as compared to what he looked like on Friday.

9.)  "Facebook Guy" updates from his phone because the earth shattering nature of 'at the store buying a loaf of bread' just can't wait until they get home.

8.) "Facebook Guy" takes Facebook seriously. Most people are only on Facebook to occasionally get in touch with friends and keep a channel open to network with people in case somebody is looking for them and have no other ways to get a hold of them. For most people they can go weeks at a time without signing in. It's really not all that important to them. They just keep that Facebook account open for the same reason they keep their 'TheRockWWF1999@aol.com' email open; Just so that people who have no other viable means of getting in touch with them, have SOME glimmer of hope to hang onto in touching base. "Facebook Guy" updates his pictures all the friggin' time."Facebook Guy" is unloading a dozen or so pictures of themselves walking to the curb to get his garbage cans from this morning right now. "Facebook Guy" is a member of 653 groups because he cares that you know everything about him. "Facebook Guy" wishes there was something even stronger than an 'iLike' button. "Facebook Guy" wants Mark Zuckerburg to come out with a 'iLove' button because "Facebook Guy" wants to go steady with your status update. "Facebook Guy" wants to get on one knee and propose to your Facebook wall happenings.

7.) "Facebook Guy" is basically everybody's grandmother. They don't miss anyone's birthday. If you've got a birthday coming up, you should expect a 'Happy Birthday' at the bare minimum. If they're feeling particularly jovial you're getting a 'facebook birthday gift'. It's just a forgone conclusion you're getting Facebook Wall Love on your born day from them. In fact the only way you won't be getting it is if you forgot their birthday last time around. Oh yeah, "Facebook Guy" keeps track of whose been leaving them love. "Facebook Guy" makes a list and checks it twice. "Facebook Guy" looks into whose been naughty or nice. So always be appeasing to "Facebook Guy" because "Facebook Guy" is keeping the score.

6.) "Facebook Guy" laughs way too hard and way too much. "Facebook Guy" makes up stupid new ways to tell you that what you said is funny even when you know it wasn't THAT friggin' funny. 'I just spit my soda all over my computer @ what you just said'. No you didn't. If you did your computer would probably be messed up (YAY!) or at minimum you'd need a new keyboard. "Facebook Guy" also will drop a ROTFLMAOTGUSEITRWSOTAMASWIWID (rolling of the floor laughing my ass off then getting up slapping everybody in the room with slices of turkey and making a sandwich with it when I'm done). I mean damn. Is it really that funny? Like, really? "Facebook Guy" laughs at dumb stuff like there are terrorists that have their family at gunpoint hogtied and gagged. Like "Facebook Guy" is trying to get on their good side. An 'LOL' usually suffices. An 'LMAO' at the absolute most. Anything more and you're doing waaaaaay too much. Stop it.

5.) Believe it or not on certain occasions "Facebook Guy" might actually have something important to do and as you can imagine doesn't have the time to read through everyone's status updates like he normally might. In this circumstance he'll use the 'iLike' button like it's voicemail. He won't even read your status before just mindlessly pressing 'iLike'. You know how somebody calls your cellphone halfway hoping you don't pick up just so they can leave you a voicemail and say that they called you? That's what "Facebook Guy" is doing. "Facebook Guys" not even trying to leave his normal empty headed rambling nonsensical reply to your status. All they want to do is press the 'iLike' just to let you know that they reached out to you even though they don't care what you just said.

4.) "Facebook Guy" has over 1000 pictures on Facebook. That's just how "Facebook Guy" rolls. "Facebook Guy" doesn't retrieve his mail unless there's a red carpet trail leading up to his mailbox and paparazzi hanging over the barricades snapping pictures of him and getting him to pose. It's not that we don't all go out. It's not that we don't all get that we should have fun with our friends. We all have social lives, only the normies among us don't treat sitting in our friends' living room watching TV like it's on our bucket list and we have to snap 50 pictures of us watching 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' to preserve the special memory of us eating Dorritos and chugging a Mountain Dew like we could die any moment. "Facebook Guy" takes pictures of himself at the dentist getting root canals. It's not enough that he lives his life, you must live your life vicariously through his pictures and his updates. His life is being made into a movie everyday on Facebook. "Facebook Guy" takes a thousand pictures of himself a day just so that all his facebook friends know how much better his life is from yours.

3.) "Facebook Guy" loooooves to spam his status' to song lyrics, coded messages and general relationship whining to tell the object of his obsession that he/she is thinking about them or how they're wronging them or how upset they are making them. "Facebook Guy" couldn't care less that the other 200 people that they're friends with have to read this drivel just as long as there's an off-hand chance that the one person they're crying out to is reading it. "Facebook Guy" moans like Keith Sweat when they update their status when feeling emotional. "Facebook Guy" tries to be Edgar Allen Poe in the space of the 100 characters allowable in the status updates even though it all comes out less than poetic and more as bitter gibberish. "Facebook Guy" embarrasses themself and sounds like Kanye West on '808's and Heartbreaks' and should get a friggin' room instead of a mouse and keyboard.

2.) "Facebook Guy" LOVES to tell you what he's doing in his status updates no matter how stupid or pointless or how late or early it is in the day. "Facebook Guy" treats Facebook like it's Twitter. Only he isn't famous and you really don't care what he's doing but a.) he doesn't care that he's just some dude and not Diddy and b.) everything he does or feels is worth your time reading it -- and I mean EVERYTHING! "Facebook Guy" wakes up in the morning, walks to his computer and before he yawns he updates his status to "wiping the crust out of my eye and stretching". Before he goes to sleep in his bed at night "Facebook Guy" will lean over to his laptop and update his status with a "Good Night" as if neither you nor him could ever possibly fall asleep without knowing what he's doing at that exact moment in life. Because we all couldn't go to sleep without "Facebook Guy" bending down to kiss us on our forehead, whisper sweet nothings in out ear and tell us Goodnight.

1.) "Facebook Guy" LOVES the 'iLike' button and he's not afraid to use it. "Facebook Guy" reads every single friends status updates periodically through the day like it's his job. It's that serious to him. When he finishes reading every status update he will go ahead and click the 'iLike' button to every status update you ever write. It's a reflex to him. You could type 'My mom just died' and "Facebook Guy" will give your status the 'iLike' treatment. 'I just slit my wrists and I'm sitting in the tub, chest deep in my own blood waiting to die' and "Facebook Guy" will respond with an 'iLike'. You could update your status with "I just inhaled and oddly enough I exhaled two seconds later" and "Facebook Guy" will be sure to press the 'iLike' button express his approval. Or he'll leave some awful message that sounds like a 12 year old wrote it. A grown man/woman writing like a child. You might update your status with "I just ate Wendy's" and "Facebook Guy" might respond like:

OMG!!!! LOLz I wuz jus tlking 2 mah mom about that. What a coincidence!! We must be kindred spirits!!! OMFG!!

Anywhoo TTYL
xoxoxoxoxoxo

Just disgusting. And even after leaving said message, "Facebook Guy" will be sure to 'iLike' your status.
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My advice: Stay vigilant so that you don't go down that road that leads to becoming "Facebook Guy". You're better than that. Resist the urges to act like "Facebook Guy" on Facebook. It's hard but you'll be better for it. Old habits don't die. They never completely go away. They're like cancer cells, they can go into remission if you undertake the right steps but they're always there lying in wait. Plotting their resurface like Sadaam in a spiderhole. Realize that you'll probably never rid yourself of old habits completely and that all you can do is suppress them as much as possible.All I can do is add you to my Facebook Friends list but only you can decide if you'll stay there via your behavior.

Tuesday's Top Ten: Shittiest Candy Given At Halloween

.....when I was a kid Halloween was my favorite holiday, not unlike most other kids. The one thing I didn't like about Halloween though was getting home, after a hard day of begging strangers, taking off my costume, stretching out on the couch only to find that the majority of my spoils was shitty candy. You put so much into Halloween too. Your parents go out and buy you a shitty cheap costume that you only picked after trying on and subsequently rejecting several other equally shitty cheap costumes. You did this though, and made your parents a party of, and sold a part of your dignity in the process of the evening, in the pursuit of candy. One figures the least people could do was reward your effort by giving you something for your troubles. Instead of Skittles or Snickers or some candy worth its weight in sugar no you receive candy that starving kids in Africa would turn down. Todays list is an ode to the candy that people loved to give you that we all hated to get. This is candy so bad that it's almost a form of mouth rape when you eat it. So without any further wait, the list which is more of an FBI Most (Un) Wanted Top Ten than anything else ....

10.) Butterfinger - We all like butterfingers. You might even be asking yourself why would I put such a delicious candy on a list of this sort? I agree with the Butterfinger nation that they make a great product only where I find displeasure is because Butterfingers don't like us back. Butterfingers are a good idea up until 5 seconds into chewing it then it's like chewing sweet rocks. Just big, sticky annoying chunks of candy stuck to your teeth that have no intention of going anywhere for the rest of your day. Too messy a candy. Butterfingers are the candy version of Iraq and Afghanistan, easy to get into but hard to get out of.

9.) Black Licorice - LOL, I'm black and so it would make sense that I would like this candy, right? Wrong. I hate this candy and everything about it. I don't even mind red licorice. Twizzlers are great. As long as their red. Somebody ever gave me a black twizzler and I became David Duke. Get. It. Out. Of. Here

8.) Milk Duds - Who eats Milk Duds? Could it possibly be the same assholes who eats Peeps at Easter and other terrible candies? Why can't they round up all these douchebags favorite candy and sell them at their own stores so that their candy never even touches the candy I like?

7.) Boston Baked Beans - I have nothing against Boston or Baked Beans. Separately I like baked beans. I also like the Celtics and don't mind the Red Sox so I guess I kinda dig Boston too but Boston Baked Beans are just disgusting.

6.) Salt Walter Taffy - I say this as a life long and avid supporter of the Cincinnati Bengals but Salt Water Taffey is the candy equivalent to my football team. It casts no dispersions as to what it is or what it's about. You pretty much either associate with it out of choice or you don't. There are no gray areas. You know exactly what you're getting into going into it.

5.) Whatever The Fuck This Candy Is - Trust me, if I could identify this candy it would be higher. But I can't so it'll have to stay at ten. This ambiguous label will have to do in a way only 'suspect: black, male and between 18-49' has to do for cops. But I know you know this candy and that plurality of those reading this have even received this candy over the years.

4.) Butter Rum / Root Beer Dum Dums - LOL, We all know when we buy a bag of Dum Dums that once the cherry flavored ones and watermelon flavored ones are out, it's a crap shoot as to which ones are the next best but Butter Rum and Root Beer are the truly crap ones. The worst most evil devious thing that Dum Dum does though is labeling some of them with that question mark so you don't know what it is and you have to stick it in your mouth to find out what it is. And then just for fun they make probability of it being one of the two most disgusting flavors like 80%. You've got a better chance of getting the pretty girl in class at school to ask you out then get a cherry or watermelon flavored Dum Dum on a mystery flavor wrapped sucker. Terrible, no good, very bad awful candy.

3.) Circus Peanuts - This might be a generation thing. I've never met anyone under 50 that eats this. Are your taste buds the first thing that starts failing you as you get old? Because if that's the case I wish to die young and leave a pretty decent looking corpse in my wake. Circus Peanuts ought to be given to the animals of an actual circus and never to the humans in the stands or anywhere else. If I was God, these wouldn't even exist. Not in my universe. No way no how.

2.) Tootsie Roll - The only acceptable Tootsie Roll are the assorted fruit flavored tootsie rolls. The regular chocolately look and I would imagine also taste like rabbit shit. Not only is it cheap but it even tastes like it costs a penny per piece which is probably why after a long night of trick or treating when you looked into your candy bag it was almost all tootsie rolls. This also explains how easy it was to throw that shit in the woods before you came home. The effort of knocking on doors was greater than the coast of said candy. Tootsie Pops are a different case entirely though strangely enough

1.) Candy Corn - There are in fact things that are worse than death, like prison or what happens in prison and yes of course candy friggin' corn. Candy corn is so bad and so cheap that they don't even put it in a wrapper. They just put it in a bag, for easy access to for houses that offer candy for trick or treating, so all the person giving it has to do is stick a hand in the bag and spread it around. Like germs don't exist. It's not even the germs that's the worst part though. The candy is much worse. I'd rather have a scratchy throat, a runny nose and a cough than have a mouthful of candy corn. Corn isn't even a fun thing to eat and I'd rather eat corn than candy corn and I love sugar. I'm from a long line of people with diabetes. If restaurants served candy corn and the salad bar and nothing else, America would not have an obesity crisis on it's hands right now. We'd all have six packs. Bill Maher put it best in his book:

Tuesday's Top Ten: Corniest Caricatures On The Internet

Okay, if you've ever been a member of internet message boards or even lurked on a message board or two in your time this list will make sense. These are the most loathsome creatures on the internets as far as I see. Most people will find this funny and if you don't then you're probably one of these guys on this list if not a full manifestation of 3 or 4 of these guys.

Onto the list...

Get Personal With a Screename Guy - We all know a guy or two who gets all worked up and tries to set up an encounter with someone they don't know because their feelings were hurt and its always corny. Then there's the people who talk about children and mothers and family members and go all disrespectful to try and come across as the bigger douchebag and that's equally corny. I've never had to resort to calling someone's dead mother or newborn child something because I had a beef with anybody on the net and if you have to do that seek help. The internet isn't real and you're reaching way too far to make it real.



I Got 150 posts and 147 Of The Were From Arguing Guy - This guy doesn't back down under any circumstances. His mother's funeral could be going on in an hour and you just know that if you say something else to him, he'd tell the family that he'd meet them at the church even though the family limo is out front. He'd be still going back and forth with the internet decked out in his suit with the jacket on the bed, rolled up sleeves, ready to go in because that guy doesn't lose an internet argument. He's a warrior and it's just that serious to him. I mean this guy doesn't even go to sleep if he's in the midst of an argument because no matter what he will have the last word. In his mind he can't let the fight go to the judges card overnight after you've both said your peace. No this guy will sacrifice sleep and if he's got a girlfriend, which I doubt, he'd sacrifice the sex too. Because that's what champions do and this guy if nothing else is all about the 'W'. If there's a power outage, he's got a backup laptop. If there's no juice in it, he's got a iPhone to argue on. If that's broke as a last line of defense he's got the friend with computer and don't think he won't break the glass to get to that fire extinguisher. That's who this guy is.

I'm Only Online For The Sex Guy - This character is not an internet geek, he's just a geek who in his mind just so happens to be on the internet. There's a difference. He just gets girls exclusively online. Not that he doesn't get them in real life because of course he does. Just ask him. It's just easier and less time consuming to just add somebody as a friend, go back and forth on each other's wall trading notes, finally getting the number, working up the nerve to call said girl only to repeat earlier back and forth conversations only this time over the phone instead of the internet. Everybody has their goals on the internet and this guy is just clear about his objectives and you should respect it. He's Pepe LePew with a laptop.

I'm Cooler Than Everybody Else Using The Computer Guy - This guy is probably the worst of the worst because he's every arrogant person you've ever met in real life all rolled into one and to make matters worse he's got the anonymity of a screename so he's got the prick knob turned all the way up even more so than he does in real life because you don't know him and never will and he knows it. This guy thinks everything you ever do or says is irrelevant and everything about him is relevant and he's not afraid to tell you either. He's all about himself. If he listens to it, it's great music and if you don't, then stop breathing and collapse to the ground and die. And if it isn't too much to ask, make sure you fall in a hole so the graveyard doesn't have to do much. Actually that may be too much, I mean contrary to most people's beliefs he thinks everybody should have an opinion, just make sure that your opinion and his opinion look alike though before voicing it and I'm not talking just brother-sister alike but twin brother-sister alike. If this guy digs a song, it better be your ringtone. If he hates an album you better have photos on your blackberry of you taking a shit on it after you've burned it, used the ashes to roll a blunt with it, smoked it and put it out with your shoe on the ground.



Tough Guy - He's similar to 'Get Personal With Screename Guy' but this guys more of a fighter. If you piss this guy off the least you're going to get is an asswhooping. That's the minimum. The most that will happen to you might be death. This cat might bring the desert eagle to your door and go Tony Soprano all over you and your family. You don't want to piss off this guy. Lest you do, don't give him any information about yourself or he's likely to go Liam Neeson on you in "Taken" and hunt you down. He's been to jail and he'd love to and wants to go back.



Give Me Attention Guy- He'll act like he's crazy and he's not all their and that he lives an unorthodox life and he's done everything that you haven't but he hasn't done shit. He wants attention and he'll do anything and say anything to get it from you because real life deprived him of it completely a long time ago. There are walls worth watching more than him.

Contrary Mary - Whatever you say, he's going to say the opposite. No matter what position you take, he's running counter that. This guys running an internet playbook loaded with trick plays and gadget plays designed to piss you off. If you say its sunny outside he'll call you a blind idiot and say that it's night. You say the sky is blue, he'll swear by green. I wouldn't even be surprised if you told him that his mother was a fine, upstanding model member of the community that he would just tell you that she's a whore and that he himself was conceived in the backseat of a car by a guy who isn't his father. There are no limits to this guys fullofshitness.



The Professor - Sure, he could get his point across with a sentence or two but it wouldn't be an appropriate means of conveying his intellect. No, this guy doesn't get out of bed in the morning unless he's got a page worth of conversation in his skull to type first.

Makes No Sense Guy - This person is one of God's special little projects. He speaks only in a manner decipherable to himself and makes sense only to himself. He's got 1000 posts under his belt and everyone of them has gone unreplied to. The next time somebody read his shit would also be the first. Best of all, he's not a quitter and his will can't be broken.



Mr. Co-Sign - He jumps from post to post cosigning people at random with LOLs and LMAOs and ROTLMAOs and any other absurd abbreviated cartoonish way of approving somebody else's words. He's of no real value to the messageboard he posts at or the internet itself. He's an unabashed consumer of everyone else's efforts on the internet giving only the illusion that he's one of the guys adding to the website by saying something only everytime he says something, he says nothing; less than nothing really because echoing someone else most of the time is often worse than just being quiet. Vile, wretched human being.

Even if you haven't enjoyed these jerks I hope you've enjoyed the list. More to come later....

Tuesday's Top Ten: Worst Chains In Black Music

 

 

I'm too disgusted to put these in any order and worst of all I don't even know what 1-10 would even mean? Worst to best? Best to worst? Words lose their meaning when you relate them to this magnitude of foolishness. I give up on black people.

Tuesday's Top Ten : Best Shoes Of The Year

For the first time in a very long time, the shoes coming out this year are actually as good or a better option than buying deadstock shoes from your childhood in the past. Now a big reason to this admittedly is that a lot of the shoes coming out this year are either retros or fusions of great shoes that have come out in the past but either way I'm not complaining. I haven't bought a pair of current shoes that weren't just some exclusive hard to find ridiculously priced shoes on eBay since like 2003 because shoes have been so weak. That was all I had in my closet other than boots, Stan Smiths, Uptowns and dress shoes. So this list will need no real commentary obviously, just pictures. I pray that you cop at least a couple pair as if you do not then you will hurt my feelings by making me feel the shoes I like are wack.

Here's the list...

1.) Nike Zoom Flight Club

2.) Nike Air Yeezy

3.) Nike Air Griffey

4.) Nike Air Sharkley

5.) Nike Air Power Max

6.) Nike Air Jordan Force 9

7.) Nike Air Force 1 - 2009 NFL Pro Bowl

8.) Nike Zoom Phenom

9.) Nike Vandal High Supreme EX Rock n’ Roll



10.) Nike KD1

I'm going to waste a great deal of money on shoes this year...

Tuesdays Top Ten: Basketball Players Of This Decade

Tuesday's Top Ten this week was one of the most painstakingly hardest lists I've ever made. Not because I don't know basketball because believe me I watch enough basketball to son Hubie Brown and Bill Russell at the same time *obvious hyperbole*. No the reason this list was harder than most others was because I had to do a lot of soul searching and put aside petty grievances I had with some individuals on this list and acknowledge strictly what they've done on the court and how that correlated through their performances and while my hate might have held me back from rooting for them this decade, their numbers couldn't hold them back from being on this list. And so that is how these ten names came to be...


Shaquille O'Neal - This was almost a coin flip between him and Timmy D for the top spot. They both won championships this decade. They've both been the main focal point of their teams in three championships. They've both been dominant big men in a new era that has seen no other real peers. Both of their numbers has been every bit legendary as their status would indicate . The only difference is the fourth ring that Shaq got in Miami as Wade's sidekick. It wasn't in near the same fashion as his previous three but I won't split hairs. It's rarefied air to have that many championship rings and not only have them but be able to have actually contributed a great deal to all of them. For this reason you have to give the edge to Shaq.

Tim Duncan - The Big Fundamental is just the most underappreciated star of this decade other than maybe Paul Pierce. After all, all he's done is rack up three NBA championships, three NBA Finals MVPs, much like Shaq, and unleash the kind of steady neckbreaking work load that a bulldozer would be jealous of without complaint and to little fanfare. Even if the fans don't recognize him for what he's done and who he's been the least I can do is do my part in honoring him.

LeBron James - LeBron James hasn't won a championship yet but what he has won is the title of the most outstanding player in the league universally. I don't think there's a player in the league with his size, strength, quickness and explosiveness. He's just not human. He's like that dog that was genetically engineered in a lab in "Man's Best Friend" that's just a hybrid of 20 animals all rolled into one K-9. The movie trailer is literally the same concept as LBJ.


I'm sorry but when you're 275 pounds and you play like LeBron does and tell gravity it's on timeout with your dunks you certainly have a place on this list. Not to mention literally singlehandedly willing your team through to the NBA Finals at 21 you need to be on this list.

Jason Kidd - As I said before, this guy is the Jadakiss of NBA players. Great enough to command respect off his talent. Sees the game for others better than he can see through his own efforts and yet will never find individual glory. Kidd was just a victim of who he was playing at the time he went to the Finals. To have to go up against the Lakers two years in a row was just unfair. Especially when they've got a top 10 and a top 15 player on their side and you'd got Luscious Harris and Jason Kidd. That's just not a battle you can win and it's just not a battle people can expect you to win or fault you when you lose. Jason Kidd played the point better than anybody else this decade and we ought to commend him for all he did with those Jersey teams. That's the closest that organization, that rag tag bunch of outcasts they gave him or that city will ever be to a championship and all the credit is due to Jason.

Kobe Bryant - I struggled how high I wanted to put him. I mean he got three rings this decade but he was also not the main guy on those teams. You certainly can't minimize his contributions though in the slightest. At the end of the day though rings matter. They have to matter no matter what. There has to be a consistent standard when judging players even when you don't like them. Otherwise when your guy wins a championship you undercut your own favorite player if and when they win a championship. It has to mean something when your favorite player wins and when your least favorite player wins. This is just the reality. I can't overlook Kobe's MVP last year either. It was a particularly hard fought close race that year two. A lot of different players could have won it but Kobe did and for that he gets props and respect.

Paul Pierce - I have Paul just outside of the top 5 and I think it's about right. He's my favorite player but it's important to me I do a thorough and accurate job here in listing the players and how their resumes compare relative to their peers this decade. Paul Pierce had a spectacular decade even if it didn't get off to the best start back in 2000 in his unfortunate stabbing incident in late summer. The guy overcame that though. Love him or hate him you have to admire a guy whose stab wounds were half of an inch from killing him who didn't miss a game that season or the next one after that. With the cast of scrubs that Boston gave him in the next seven years though I'm sure he wish that whoever assaulted him would have went on and killed him because with that crew he was dead in the water. However he did bring his merry band of bums to the cusp of the Eastern Conference Championships in 2002 almost completely by himself (the second best player he had from the day he entered the league up until 2007 was Antoine Walker and the third was Raef Lafrentz) coming up short just two games from going onto face the Lakers in the Finals. However, six years later he'd get his chance to play the Lakers in the Finals and much like he had been the best player throughout the playoffs up until that point he was the best player once again in the Finals stunning Kobe Stanleys everywhere on his way to a ring and an NBA Finals MVP trophy. After putting up similar numbers to the oft-heralded Kobe Bryant throughout the decade (look the stats up here for yourself and here) he finally proved what I had been saying all along which was that him and Kobe were both on the same level much to people's dismay. I staked my whole basketball credibility on this subject for years like Barack Obama opposing the war from the beginning back when everybody else thought otherwise. Thankfully we were both right and we proved to know what we were talking about. Now I'm not denying Paul Pierce didn't have any help in winning that title, but I am saying he was the best player on that team and when the chips were down you know who to go to on that team. He's earned his spot on the list.

Kevin Garnett - The Big Ticket is to me the best 2nd option in the history of the league. Now I don't mean that as a diss, I mean that as a reality. I mean he was the original T-Mac before T-Mac was T-Mac. He couldn't get out of the first round for what he tried and last year aside, he didn't get out of the first round but one time in his whole career. He'd never been enough to take a team to the promised land. What he was however was a athletic, rail thin freak who gave you 110% every night, did all the things that you want your big man to do, inspired everyone else on the team and gave your defense the boost it needed to keep you in every game you played indiscriminately. I'll even go as far as to say, this guy out-Pippens Pippen as far as the best sidekicks of all time. He just can't be recognized as The Man but that doesn't mean this guy isn't great and doesn't belong on this list.

Allen Iverson - This one probably makes the least sense out of everybody I put on this list considering my love-to-hate past with this guy but there is something that I have to admit, the little shit went hard all decade. There's a lot to hate about his game but if you can get past that there's also a lot to say about a guy who took his team to the Finals against a Lakers juggernaut that was just starting to hit its stride, win or lose. Iverson was unquestionably the go to guy on that Sixers team (even though technically if you take 40 shots a game no one else is even in the running to be the go to guy) and he faced and beat a Milwaukee Bucks team at the time a lot of people though was going to beat them but he moved on. He also won an MVP award that same year that can't be dismissed. Over the course of the decade there hasn't been a more controversial player, there also hasn't been many tougher players and to his credit a more willing player to take the last shot, hit or miss, and deal with the criticism. Respect.

Dwyane Wade - The guy was just phenomenal in 2006 and his motor hasn't ever really stopped. Won a ring, won a Finals MVP, was the most outstanding player in the playoffs that year and continues to this day to dominate. It's really a shame that he came out the same year as LeBron James or he'd get, rightfully so, more recognition. Wade is great.

Dirk Nowitzki - Dirk has to be here. He won an MVP, albeit the most embarassing MVP trophy of all-time and he got his team to the Finals. Dirk is one of my favorite players but he's also only almost good enough to be great but not quite great. He's had chances he just hasn't taken advantage of them all in his career. If he played defense and was a little bit grittier he'd be higher.