Jimbo’s Mailbag – Houdini, Spanish Lesson, Exum’s Caretaker

Remember this guy? Jimbo’s around if he needs help with his juice box. (Brent Asay via utahjazz.com)

Welcome to your first regular season dose of Jimbo Rudding, our resident mailbag artist. Jimbo provides our regular dose of levity here at Salt City Hoops, and he does it by answering the burning questions to which Jazz fans just must have answers. You can submit questions to Jimbo at mailbag@saltcityhoops.com or by tweeting to @JimboRudding.

Q: If given the chance, how would you decorate Gordon [Hayward]’s cast?

@cdsampsondds

OK, this is my favorite question… maybe ever. Just imagining a group of Jazz fans decorating Gordon’s cast makes me smile. Even if he disapproves of the way we’re decorating it, what’s he gonna do? Kick us?

I’ve thought a lot about Hayward ever since the “crooked ankle heard round the NBA.” Before I go into his injury, let me just get a few things off my chest about Hayward:

1. He made up his mind about leaving Utah WAY before most of us realize. And that’s pretty lame.
2. On July 4th he lied to three teams so that he could finish writing his Player’s Tribune article.
3. He still needs to call Gail Miller and thank her for everything she did to further his basketball career. Not calling her because you’re not “good at that stuff” isn’t an excuse. It’s being childish and ungrateful.
4. He should’ve acknowledged me when I patted him on the shoulder and welcomed him to Utah his rookie year. He just pretended I wasn’t there. It was like I was at my high school prom again.
5. He isn’t, nor will he probably ever be, a leader.
6. It would’ve been REALLY nice to have his scoring on the team this year.
7. His injury wasn’t funny at all.
8. What WAS funny was the Twitter responses from all the fans and professional athletes making it sound like he had died.
9. His hair game took a giant step back this year.
10. He really shouldn’t have dismissed me like that. His loss. I’m a great guy.

Whatever you guys do, don’t make fun of his injury and don’t be happy he got hurt. That’s just mean and vindictive and… You know what? I’m not your dad. Do whatever you want.

Back to Gordon’s cast—I would use acrylic paints to decorate it with a small mural of Professor Harold Hill from “The Music Man.” That ought to cause some strange looks from his teammates when they come visit him. Also, Harold Hill would have a tattoo on his bicep that says, “76 Trombones.” Also, he’d be riding a Ski-Doo.

Q: Have you seen this guy named Alec Burks everyone is talking about? I think he may also be called “Houdini” by some Jazz commentator.

@TrevorVillalobo

You mean THE Alec Burks? The one who gets beat backdoor on defense? The one who dribbles into three guys and loses the ball? Or are you talking about the guy who gets hurt all the time because he throws his body into defenders and falls on the ground a lot? I think you’re gonna have to be more specific on this one.

Contrary to what you just read, I don’t dislike Houdini’s game. I think there’s a small place for his skill set on an NBA team. There are times when he just seems dialed in and his line-drive shot falls…and then there are other times he can’t get on the court because he won’t do what Quin asks of him. Occasionally he makes a nice dunk or a three pointer and causes us fans to forget about all his lapses in judgment, but Quin doesn’t forget. That’s why he’s the coach and I’m not, I guess. Even though I should be the coach. I mean, I have TONS of experience screaming at adolescents, which is actually 98% of coaching anyway.

I also realize he’s been hurt for a good two years and we’re only seven games into his comeback season. So, maybe let’s give the kid a chance to start breathing again before we declare him dead, huh Jimbo???

Q: How long until Imodium is an official Jazz sponsor?

@Mickeyvp

If the Jazz organization had improved Utah/Imodium relations before the season started, maybe they’d be 6-1 instead of 4-3.

I also think it’s strange that the NBA uses the term “gastric distress.” Why not call it what it is? “Saucy diarrhea brought on by anxiety and some iffy salsa that smelled OK, but sort of tasted like metal.” I mean, c’mon NBA. We all know what it is you’re getting at. We’ve cracked the code. There are no secrets anymore.

We’re all human, even multi-millionaire professional athletes. No one is immune to the “downtown pooly browns” or the “frothy broths” or the “runny bunches of oats.” Everyone gets a turn on the “corned-beef carousel;” everyone has free tickets to the “despair-ium aquarium;” and EVERYONE gets a “private booth at Bomb-a Juice.”

I guess what I’m trying to say is, we all have our turn feeling like Artax drowning in the Swamp of Sadness from time to time. It’s just a part of life. But does it HAVE to be? Yes, yes it does. Imodium doesn’t work for some people.

Q: How early is too early to listen to Christmas music if your name is Derek Fisher?

@UtahJazzyman

It’s never too early to listen to Christmas music… as long as you do it in private far away from me and my kin.

Q: If you were given a day to be caretaker for recovering Dante Exum, what would you do with him?

@Cutch_22

Poor Dante. It seems like he gets hurt almost as much as Rodney Hood gets the “downtown Rodney browns.” He just can’t stay healthy for long periods of time, and if he IS healthy, then he’s not great at basketball. I feel for him, I really do.

Because I feel so bad for him, I would gladly accept an invitation to be his primary caretaker for a day. In fact, I think the Jazz should run a promo for that. Maybe like, “bring a couple of non-perishable foods to the arena for a chance to tuck Dante in and hold a cup of water with a bendy straw up to his mouth.”

If I won the non-perishable food contest, I’d first make sure his feet were elevated so that the blood in his legs can pool more towards his shoulder allowing the blood cells to heal the shoulder more quickly. Then I would browse Netflix and together we’d try to decide what to watch. Then after the argument gets a little heated, we’ll give up picking a Netflix show and  just watch a bunch of those paralyzed-from-being-terrified goat videos on YouTube. Then, I’d tuck him in just before I leave.

Also, right before I leave, I’d poke his shoulder to see if it really hurts as bad as he says it does. I just want to make sure he isn’t faking it to get out of having to go to practice.

Q: How many $15K Ingles fines is it going to take us to get back on a winning streak?

@nickwh23

Well, he can afford them now that he’s been paid. Can I just say that I love Joe Ingles? Well, I do and I just said it and I don’t need your permission to do anything. You’re not the boss of me!

Here are some fines I wouldn’t mind Ingles getting:

• Convincing a really good scorer to be on the team.
• Pushing Draymond Green into the pregame meal.
• Punching Jim Les.
• Consuming performance-enhancing dingo.
• Yelling Styx lyrics every time he dribbles.
• Constantly making fun of the refs’ shoes.
• Making fun of the reporters who use PCs.
• Having WAY too many puppies in his locker.
• Instead of calling the opposing players by their name, he calls them all “Lyle Lovett.”

If that’s what it takes to win, I’m all for it.

Q: How many teams did Derek Fisher lie to in order to get out of his contract?

@WarBeavr

Three.

Q: Does Rubio in Spanish translate to “turnover?”

@DaveDaBomb

Yes, yes it does.

I know it’s easy to say now, but I wasn’t fully on board the Rubio train when that trade happened. Sure, he’s a big point guard who plays good defense and gets a lot of assists, but the dude has never been to the playoffs and can’t shoot.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m willing to see this play out. I just don’t have a lot of hope that he’s the final answer… which is exactly how I feel about Exum too, so…

You have to take everything I say with a ton of grains of salt though because I don’t know a lot about basketball. In fact, I just learned what “the paint” is. Pretty clever whoever named the parts of the court.

Thanks for submitting questions to the one and only Jimbo’s Mailbag! Remember to tell it on the mountain about what you read here. Even if no one’s on the mountain, tell it anyway. Maybe tell it while wearing 13 sombreros just in case there’s a hidden camera on the mountain somewhere. Make it weird.