A Birthday List For Joe Dumars

I’m sure if there were a way to change the date of your birthday, Joe Dumars would do it. Alas, you can’t, and this date marks the 48th birthday of the current Pistons’ President of Basketball Operations and two-time NBA champion.

But, I doubt there are too many people celebrating for him right now. What was once an impeccable run of moves as an executive has collapsed in the last few years. Dumars went from being voted the league’s Executive of the Year in 2002-03 to having perhaps the most dysfunctional team in the entire league. Players who don’t want to play. Coaches that don’t want to coach.

Back in the day, Dumars would never settle for this. He was a Bad Boy and the Bad Boys were never down with mediocrity or selfishness.

I doubt Dumars still puts together a birthday list. But if he did, here’s what he would’ve asked for:

-Tequila Gold to make it through November and December
–Mobb Deep‘s “Hell On Earth” for Austin Daye
-a personal motivational coach to shout obscenities and piss Greg Monroe off every day
-an NBA executive job for Bill Laimbeer in Minnesota so the former teammates can complete trades like Tayshaun Prince, Jonas Jerebko and five North Face jackets for Kevin Love, Jonny Flynn, two first-round picks, a copy of Telfair‘s “Through The Fire” and the rights to Ricky Rubio‘s future children
-a meeting between Rick Mahorn and Jason Maxiell
-a free week at Mark Price‘s shooting camp for Rodney Stuckey
-salary cap relief from the NBA to get them off from having to pay $11.6 million to the guy who abducted Ben Gordon and replaced him with Akon
-a time machine for Tracy McGrady‘s knees and back
-a time machine for himself
-Jim Thompson’s book “The Double-Goal Coach: Positive Coaching Tools for Honoring the Game and Developing Winners in Sports and Life” for John Kuester
-a statue of himself outside of the Palace of Auburn Hills
-Bacardi Gold to make it through February and March