Boozer backs out

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!
Don't try to stop me now, I'm gloating.
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! Carlos Boozer is chicken! CLUCK! CLUCK!
The man who tried to pull a Baltimore Colts and leave Cleveland under cover of darkness last summer is now hiding behind a foot injury as the reason he won't be on the Utah Jazz bench tonight at Gund Arena.
Fans circled this date on their calendars in July, when Boozer saw the $68 million offer the Jazz dropped at his feet and began slipping on his own drool. Cleveland fans were locked, loaded, and ready to let Booz have it. But now America's favorite supplemental role player will be back in Salt Lake City tonight "rehabbing."
(He's probably actually going to hit the whirlpool for about 25 minutes, then retire to his home overlooking the Great Salt Lake, where he'll order in some lo mein, watch the Oakland-Alabama A&M NCAA play-in game and fall asleep, but that's a secret.)
I don't doubt Boozer's foot injury is legit, he's missed the last 11 games. But injured players making road trips is common practice in the NBA. The team is where the trainers and doctors are, and just about every NBA arena has state-of-the-art sports medicine facilities. There really isn't an excuse, barring hospitalization, that a player should miss being present for any game due to injury.
Boozer simply knows what awaited him tonight in Cleveland, and he didn't want to face it declawed, incapable of getting back at his persecutors with a 30-point, 15-rebound night and a win.
Or maybe he didn't want to have to spend two and a half hours sitting on the bench with his back turned on several thousand fans who think him a traitor. That might actually be a smart move on Boozer's part. We saw in Auburn Hills this past November what happens when heartily-disliked opposing players get too near riled-up and potentially liquored-up fans.
Given the staunch "us-against-them" attitude a lot of Cleveland sports fans have, and the very acute sense of getting screwed, this town is as ripe as any for another embarrassing incident. Cleveland fans, remember, are the ones that pelted the field of Browns Stadium with plastic beer bottles when the referees blew an instant-replay call in 2001, nailing the coffin shut in a loss to Jacksonville. Cleveland is also the town that showered left field with play money in 1997 when Albert Belle returned with the White Sox. For the remainder of that series, fans were kept about 10 feet back from the home run porch fence in Jacobs Field by strategically-placed bike racks.
With LeBron James holding court and Usher making Gund Arena Hollywood-hip, Cleveland doesn't need another black eye like that.
Boozer is ducking Cleveland's wrath, no question, and denying many fans the opportunity to let him know what a special mind-changing, money-grubbing backstabber he really is. But let's count our blessings before we take our stored-up, displaced anger out on the beer vendor for spilling our pre-St. Patrick's Day Bud Light our lap.
The Cavaliers are in second place, 33-27, and tied for the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference. They still have LeBron, and found Drew Gooden as a very serviceable replacement for Boozer. We also got Anderson Varejao in the Gooden trade, who has helped save the bench on many nights this season.
The Jazz overpaid for Boozer and Mehmet Okur this off-season. Neither one of their prize free agents was able to stop the team from going in the toilet when their real MVP, Andrei Kirilenko, went down with a bum knee earlier this year. The Jazz are now 20-42, dead last in their division. The only playoffs Boozer is going to see this year will be on TV.
Boozer has been publicly called out by Utah's owner for not answering the superstar bell in Kirilenko's absence, and was the subject of trade rumors before the trade deadline. As predicted, his defensive shortcomings have haunted him in the frontcourt-heavy west. He was a beast in the East. In the West, he's a bit undersized and not athletic enough to be a true marquee player.
All in all, things have shaped up well for Cleveland. The Cavs are in the thick of the playoff hunt with an outside chance at catching Detroit in the Central Division. We get to sit back and gloat as Boozer crawls back to Utah to hide out while his lottery-bound team plays in Cleveland tonight. He's paid, but as far as being the heir to Karl Malone's lofty power-forward throne in Utah as he wanted, it's not happening.
Maybe we all should just keep our mouth shut if we should pass Boozer on the street. Just stick your nose a little higher in the air and walk by with supreme confidence. Nothing else is needed.
Well maybe a little something.
So, how are things down there in last place, Carlos? HA HA HA HA HA HA!