There were worse ways that you could have spent your time Wednesday night than watching the Bobcats-Raptors game. You could have been robbing a bank, for instance. Or molesting a zoo animal. Or getting suspended for a physical alteration with a rival TV commentator (side note: good thing you couldn’t put money on which CSN commentator Kendall Gill would get suspended for punching first: Stacey King or the field, because I would have bet my life savings on King. The fact that Gill burned a suspension on punching someone other than King seems like a terrible waste of an opportunity). All of those options have their merits obviously, but only the Bobcats-Raptors game offered the possibility of witnessing effective play from Josh McRoberts and Jannero Pargo.

I am not a fan of overstating things. I still remember several years ago when Rolling Stone magazine was doing one of those “Top Albums of the 80s” issues, and one of the selections was Metallica’s Master of Puppets. I forget the wording they used exactly to describe the album, but I remember something like, “a stinging rejection of Reagan-era policies,” and I remember almost choking on my Yoo-Hoo. Look, I love that album with all of my heart, but it had NOTHING to do with Ronald Reagan, or really anything reality-related. This was four metal dudes chugging beer and writing about metal stuff, period; one of the songs featured a gigantic sea monster. In fact, if James Hetfield ever reveals that “Leper Messiah” was really a rebuke against the Tax Reform Act of 1986, I’m going to be really bummed out.

The Bobcats added two more losses to their dossier over the weekend, one a near miss and the other a far miss. Even the relatively close loss to the Pacers on Saturday would need to have an asterisk the size of Bismack Biyombo making a snow angel, because Indiana was without their best player, Paul George. The loss on Friday to Toronto was simply an undistilled humiliation; it was humiliation moonshine. The Bobcats might as well have played the game wearing red ball gags. For fans, every simple and advanced metric of our team generates a stench of losing with long-term rancidity. The best we can hope for is more articles like this one, in which members of the team are reduced to congratulating themselves for not brawling with each other.

These last two losses could also be titled “Revenge of the Obscure Bobcats.” The Raptors now prominently feature former Bobcat Alan Anderson, and the Pacers played ex-Cat Dominic McGuire (and DJ Augustin, but I wouldn’t call him “obscure”; at least, not without calling him many other things first). I have to admit, I consider myself to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the Bobcats, and I’m drawing a total blank on Mr. Anderson (side note: could there be a more useless encyclopedic knowledge of something? Maybe an encyclopedic knowledge of greeting cards for pets?). This is actually not necessarily a bad thing; for instance, I remain tortured by quite vivid memories of Primoz Brezec. Even writing his name as “Mr. Anderson” just now makes me feel like I must have made some sort of stupid Matrix/Agent Smith-type joke about him circa 2006, but I don’t think I did—probably because I was too busy making jokes about Brezec. But anyway, Anderson, McGuire, and Augustin are now all having the last laughs.

Don’t look now, but your Charlotte Bobcats are 5-4. That’s right, they’re a game above .500, riding a crazy four-game winning streak, and have a date with the hapless 3-7 Toronto Raptors on Wednesday night. Should they laugh in the face of the gods, they could enter Thanksgiving Day as a very, very thankful bunch. And even if they’re not so thankful, they’d still be 6-4.

But that’s if all goes according to plan. Let’s hammer out the details of their next court battle, and see if this Charlotte team can keep this run going.

1. The Point – Edge: Bobcats

Normally I’d five the edge to Toronto, as Jose Calderon is averaging an insane 13.5 assists per game, but we need to look at some other facts outside of gaudy assists numbers. First, all those assists aren’t really adding up to a lot of wins. Calderon pushes the pace and runs a fluid offense most of the time, but he also rarely is selfish and looks for his own shot. Kyle Lowry also isn’t around. I prefer Kemba Walker’s Tim Hardaway-esque game and Ramon Sessions helping out at the point and at the two spot. Not by much, but I prefer it, nonetheless.

Did anyone catch NBA Commissioner David Stern’s remarks to the New Orleans Times-Picayune?  He proudly announced that the Hornets are very close to having a new team owner with a sweet deal “that will have a very favorable lease, important capital improvements, intense tax benefits and a new TV deal to boot.’’  First of all, I love how he describes the tax benefits as “intense.”  Second, has anyone bothered to think about what any of that means?  Sorry to go all Dave Zirin on you, but check this out:

• A “favorable lease” translates to “cheap/zero rent,” which is crucial, because guess who owns New Orleans Arena?  The state of Louisiana.  No revenue for you, LA, except whatever you can get out of concerts and the occasional crawfish convention.  (But I’m sure that will be more than enough to recoup the $100+ million you charged taxpayers to build the place)
• “Important capital improvements” implies that somebody other than the team owner, such as the owners of New Orleans Arena (which is who again?) will be borrowing/taxing to pay for more luxury boxes for the ultra-wealthy so that they don’t have to mix with the plebeians (a.k.a., the ones paying the taxes).
• “Intense tax benefits” means “intense tax benefits.”

So congratulations, Louisiana, you’re about to go even further in debt for the privilege of making some plutocrat even wealthier than he already is!  I don’t know why I’m upset over this—I mean, it’s not like New Orleans has any infrastructure needs or anything!  Well, other than the Lower 9^th Ward, which apparently is in danger of turning into Cambodia circa-1975.  The few remaining citizens are afraid to go outside because they might get attacked—not by drug dealers or rapists, by wild animals.  But who cares when you’ve got the 2012-2013 Hornets: Catch the Buzz!

This is all Ron Rivera’s fault.  The head coach of the Carolina Panthers seems like a great guy, with solid Edward James Olmos looks and values.  I imagine he really appreciated the film Stand and Deliver.  But the man has an unfortunate verbal tick in which he adds the phrase “a little bit” to nearly every sentence he speaks.  Here’s a small sample, courtesy of the Herald Online:

• “I think I can help a little bit more on the defensive side.”
• “That was a little bit different for me, obviously.”
• “We’ve struggled a little bit. It’s going to be two teams that need to win.”
• “He’s kicked it pretty good but I’m a little concerned about him being just a little bit sore.”
• “You’d like to bring it up a little bit but Cam is able to scoop them up.”
• “It takes the wind out of your sails a little bit, especially the way we’ve been playing defensively.”
• “It was a little bit expensive back then but it stands the test of time.” (He was talking about his favorite Christmas present)

I don’t why I started noticing this, but now I can’t STOP noticing it.  I’m like Roddy Piper in They Live, except instead of aliens I’m seeing that stupid phrase.  And now I’m convinced that Ron Rivera was Patient Zero and the Little Bit disease is spreading.  I see why it would be commonly used among jocks, because they’re desperate to sound even-keeled and uncontroversial whenever speaking to the press, so everything is “kind of” this, “sort of” this, and “a little bit” that, but now it’s being taken to new extremes.  Witness Chris Bosh in Monday’s Daily Dime: “It kind of pissed me off a little bit.” (Bosh is the perfect victim for this syndrome, when you think about it: he’s mealy-mouthed and unassertive even when he’s trying to be blunt.)  Then last Friday George Karl upped the ante to a zany level: “I can’t deny that my head has felt like it’s ready to burst a little bit.”  C’mon, men, there’s no such thing as being a little bit pissed off (or sort of shocked or kind of furious); quit half-stepping and own your verbs and adjectives!

After living in Indianapolis and suffering through the last NFL season with the Colts I learned how to do one thing really well—enjoy the small victories that come with sucking. If there is one thing that the Bobcats have done real well this year it has been sucking, but on Saturday night they gave us a little something to cheer about.

They actually won.

In case you were not aware, the guys played the Toronto Raptors at home and won by the score of 107-103 (another rare 100-point game). What makes the win remarkable is the way that they did it.

Toronto out-shot the Bobcats, .521 (38-73) to .507 (36-71). The Raptors hit eight of 18 three-pointers; Charlotte only four of nine. The Bobcats were out-rebounded 35-28. So Toronto shot better, shot more, rebounded better, and nailed more threes. Typically when that happens a team is going to win. That is unless they totally blow in one other category.

Fouls.

Toronto could not stop sending the Bobcats to the line. On the night the ‘Cats were sent to the line for 34 free throws, 10 more than what Toronto had. Of course what makes it even better is that they made most of them (31 of those 34).

Coaches at every level of the game always preach fundamentals. If you can get the fundamentals right, then you have a solid base from which to work from. Too often fundamentals are forgotten by players. Since the ‘Cats remembered theirs on Saturday they were able to notch their seventh win of the season.