Dennis Rodman is once again in trouble with the law. He was arrested on Wednesday night, April 30^th, at a hotel in Century City, California, and was booked on suspicion of domestic violence. The spokesman for the Los Angeles police department stated that “During the investigation, police learned he (speaking of Rodman) had hit a woman and she suffered injuries to her arms.” A few hours after Rodman's arrest, he was released on $50,000 bail.

I would guess that even the most casual fan of the NBA was not surprised upon hearing that Rodman was once again arrested, but apparently Rodman's agent, Steve Simon, does not qualify as a casual fan. Upon hearing of Rodman's arrest, Simon made the following comment: “The legal process will sort itself out. I'm kind of waiting for the facts to unfold because it's really uncharacteristic for him.” I initially thought that Simon was either delusional, or totally ignorant of Rodman's history, or trying to play the straight man to Rodman's “comedic” antics in order to get booked at the Improv. But upon further review, I think that I understand the point that Simon was attempting to make, and I have to admit that I am in total agreement with Simon's assessment of Rodman's latest problems. Allow me to explain.

The NBA playoffs are about to begin and so we must all prepare ourselves for the seemingly endless and sometimes painfully vacuous predictions and analysis of the empty suits at ESPN. Legler and Bucher will provide some fairly intelligent commentary, but will make predictions and somehow simultaneously avoid making predictions -- “Well Mike, if Alan Iverson plays the way that we all know that he is capable of playing, and if Gilbert Arenas is actually fully healthy, and if Shaq cannot avoid foul trouble, and if the rumors of Sam Cassell's being from the planet Krypton somehow affect the way that Garnett is playing, and if Ginobli continues to favor his left groin as opposed to his right groin because he is left-handed, then we might just possibly see a Nuggets/Wizards finals.” Steven A. Smith will spew some intelligent commentary, but because of his nasty habit of angrily yelling it at us, we won't hear it. Bill Walton, famous for his convoluted way of somehow comparing the philosophies of Pliny the Elder to the coaching techniques of Flip Saunders, will come down off the high caused by the painkillers that he his taking for his pinched nerve in order to make some comments. But because he is Bill Walton, everything that he says will still sound as if it is coming from a Darvon-induced euphoria. Dick Vitale will chime in with his usual meaningless and moronic predictions, a la “the Cavaliers will beat the Spurs in six games” (For those of you who may have forgotten, the Spurs swept the Cavaliers).

Now that I have preemptively criticized the analysis and predictions of the Empty Suit Programming Network, it is only fair that I expose myself to similar criticism by providing my own vacuous analysis and laughable predictions. I will agree with most of the analysts and say that the NBA playoffs this year have the potential of being the best playoffs that we have seen in a long time. Through a seemingly magical confluence of events and some blockbuster trades, the NBA is close to parity among it's playoff teams. The talent level is very close to being equal on each of the eight competing Western Conference teams, and there are only small variations in the level of talent on the first five seeds in the Eastern Conference. I am not willing to state that the big three of Garnett, Pierce, and Allen is clearly superior to Wallace, Billups, and Hamilton. Nor will I state that Gasol, Bryant, and Odom are clearly superior to Duncan, Parker, and Ginobili or that Shaq, Stoudemire, and Nash have more talent than Camby, Anthony, and Iverson.

In an interview yesterday, a New Jersey Nets executive, Julianne Waldron, spoke candidly about the real reason behind the Jason Kidd trade to the Dallas Mavericks. On February 19^th of this year, the New Jersey Nets traded Jason Kidd, Malik Allen, and Antoine Wright to the Dallas Mavericks in exchange for Keith Van Horn, Devin Harris, Trenton Hassell, Maurice Agar, De Sagana Diop, first round draft choices in 2008 and 2010, and cash considerations. Many New Jersey Nets fans were very unhappy about losing Kidd, a long-time star and future Hall-of-Fame point guard.

Ms. Waldron, who manages environmental issues for the Nets, held a press conference to discuss last night's first “carbon-neutral” NBA game between the New Jersey Nets and the Philadelphia 76ers. The game was hosted by New Jersey, and all of the carbon emissions generated by fans and the 76ers traveling to and from the Izod Center will be offset by so-called “carbon emissions credits” purchased by the Nets organization and their partner Barclays, the British financial conglomerate. The game has been dubbed “Green Night” and also featured several environmental extremist groups providing propaganda to fans.

In referring to the “greening” of the New Jersey Nets franchise, Ms. Waldron said that “I believe that this will be our strategy for years to come. This is part of who we are. Many of our fans were unhappy when we traded away Jason Kidd to the Dallas Mavericks, but they should be happy because trading Kidd was the best move for the environment.”

Ms. Waldron went on to explain how the Kidd trade was the environmentally-friendly thing to do. “Jason Kidd always hustles when he is on the basketball court, and we all admire that greatly. But all of that running up and down the court, pushing the team out on fastbreaks, expending extra energy just to make a few extra points and possibly win a game, caused all of the players to breathe a great deal more heavily and thereby expel extra amounts of carbon dioxide into the air, and we all know that is bad for the environment. We made the difficult decision to trade Kidd in order to save the planet.”

Avery Johnson, head coach of the Dallas Mavericks, has written a book entitled Aspire Higher: Winning on and off the Court with Determination, Discipline, and Decisions. On page four of his book, Avery Johnson tells the story of a young player that he recently had in training camp that was very good at numbers, but not so good at basketball. Avery's assessment was that the guy “needed to be on Wall Street, not in the NBA.” He summed up his assessment of the potential player by saying that “Basketball wasn't his gift – numbers were.” Unfortunately, a similar assessment of Avery Johnson must be made: Writing isn't his gift – basketball is.

Avery's current position as head coach of the Dallas Mavericks does leave me with a dilemma when the Mavericks play. While I am a great fan of Avery because he represents to me all that is good in the NBA, and I am always quietly rooting for his personal success, I simultaneously despise the asinine owner of the Mavericks and wish that they could lose every game. Regardless of Mark Cuban's existence in the equation, I have always admired Avery both for his playing, and now for his coaching, and I purchased his book because of that admiration. But Avery should stick to coaching. His writing simply is not of a quality that justifies the killing of trees.

Roy Johnson, editor-in-chief of Men's Fitness magazine, is the co-author of the book. One would assume that a purported journalist such as Roy Johnson was needed to co-author the book in order to add a degree of polish and writing style that might be missing from the skill set of your average NBA coach, but in the case of Aspire Higher, one's assumption would be wrong. Roy Johnson failed miserably in this endeavor. I must admit ignorance of any of Roy Johnson's other journalistic endeavors, so I am not certain as to whether he is just a horrendous writer, or if his “co-authoring” was limited to proverbially urinating on Avery's proverbial leg and telling him it was proverbially raining. Regardless of Roy Johnson's actual role in “co-authoring” this book, I would advise all retired athletes who are aspiring authors to steer clear of the co-authoring skills of Roy.