From Casey Jacobsen at Slam Online's Yearbook Awards:
Weirdest teammate… in a bad way: Darko Milicic
It’s nearly impossible to explain the weirdness that is Darko, but he told me one time that he did not keep his money in any bank, nor did he invest in stocks or bonds. "I just keep it," he told me and then turned away. Looking back, I should have asked a follow-up question. I don’t know if I believe him, but he was making over $6 million that season. That’s a lot of cheddar to stash underneath a mattress! On another note… that was easily the longest conversation we ever had, and that was how he preferred it.
By Darko Milicic*
(*No.)
I, Darko, see that Casey Jacobsen has been revealing my investment strategies to the world. I cannot understand this! I thought that Casey Jacobsen and I really developed a bond that day, and I would have called him my closest friend in basketball! Surely he is dead to me now. It is just as well; he is playing in Germany, and I am not allowed to go there any more. You would think that Nena would take it as a compliment when one demands to hear "99 Luftballoons" for a tenth time in a row, but those German police, they get all huffy.
Nevertheless, Casey Jacobsen is right. I do not trust banks or investment persons. If I give them my money, they will just take it and spend it on stupid things and then I will have no money left. Much better that I should I hide my checks inside my stuffed pig, Porkita. Porkita will not lose my money, has always absorbed my tears, and makes me hungry for bacon when I am sad. And you must admit, if the rest of the world had Porkita, we would not be in the same trouble we are now. Perhaps the European Central Bank should give Greece a Porkita. Then they will not spend their money on stupid things, like falafel and the Olympics.
But banks and investment persons are not the only thing I do not trust. Here is a list of other untrustworthy things, which I will now call Casey Jacobsens:
- Dunking. You start dunking and pretty soon everybody wants you to dunk all of the time and there is no time left to show off left-handed hooks and behind-the-back passes. One might as well not play basketball anymore. Sure, let us all dunk, and then we can grunt and go drink watery American beer and headbutt one another! MANLY DUNK ROAR DARKO MAD! Please. I am not your Frankenstein.
- Coaches. I see Mr. Rick Adelman might be a little mad at me for being hurt. I am sorry, Mr. Rick. However you will have a long way to go before you are the meanest coach I have ever had. Larry Brown used to put cigarettes out on my arm. Mike D'Antoni tried to knife me in an alley. Calling me out in the media is practically a compliment.
- Spaniards. Did you see how that jerk Rafael Nadal tried to kill my countryman Novak Djokovic? And Pau Gasol likes to elbow me when I am not looking, and Ricky Rubio did not seem to like the collage I made for him even though I stayed up like all night. No, I do not trust Spaniards, not even the ones with dreamy eyes.
- The Eisenhower Interstate Highway System. Whoever this Eisenhower fellow is, he should have considered that maybe people LIKE not getting to Detroit very fast. I, Darko, will stick to the back roads. You never get forced off the road by a semi-truck there, and only sometimes do you get lost in a small town somewhere west of the Twin Cities and stop at a gas station to ask for directions and the cashier thinks you are a Golem and you are chased out of town by two yokels with a wizard painted on the side of their truck.
So maybe I do not trust banks, Casey Jacobsen. At least I am a trustworthy person, unlike you. I would never reveal private conversations like you. I am so glad now that I never told you about Porkita. You clearly would not have understood.