For the past month or so, I’ve been glued to my TV, obsessively watching every minute of the NBA playoffs. I love basketball almost as much as I love football, but due to my ADD-addled brain, I can’t make myself sit still for an entire 82 game season.

But the playoffs? That’s a whole other beast. Ever since I first became interested in sports on television, I’ve obsessively watched the NBA Playoffs. Of course, it helped that my burgeoning NBA awareness coincided with Michael Jordan’s rise to playoff fame in the early 90’s. Two three-peats later, I was solidly entrenched as a playoff addict and Jordan fan boy.

But ever since Jordan retired, my allegiance has been up for grabs. If I have no rooting interest in a particular series, I inevitably root for the underdog. Years of living in Minnesota and cheering for the Twins, Vikings and Timberwolves have conditioned me to commiserate with the long-shot.

After moving to Portland in 2002, I started appreciating the Trailblazers, and though I’m not a full-fledged superfan, I consider them my team, unless they’re playing against the hapless T-Wolves or Kevin Garnett’s home-away-from-home, the Boston Celtics. I’ll also cheer for the Mavericks, because I like Dirk and so many of my college friends happened to be Mavs fans. I’m a bit of a sports bigamist, I admit. I’m an NBA drifter, going wherever the wind takes me. In the end, the game is larger than the players or the teams. I just like a good game.

I do have exceptions, though.

I’ve always disliked the LA Lakers. Ditto for Kobe Bryant.

The Lakers hatred is hard for me to define, exactly. The best I can explain it is that it’s some passed-down sour grapes from the Minneapolis Lakers jumping ship to LA in 1960. Believe it or not, basketball is almost as important in Minnesota as hockey. You’ll never see me wear a Dallas Stars jersey and you’ll certainly never see me pull out a George Mikan jersey.

My dislike of Kobe Bryant is easier to define. He’s arrogant. He’s dismissive. He’s…well, he’s an asshole. In a way, he’s the embodiment of everything that the rest of the country hates about Los Angeles.

I’m sure some of you are saying, “But Nate, you liked Jordan. He was much more arrogant than Kobe is.” And you’re probably right. But I liked Michael Jordan in the way that small children love their parents. Kobe entered the league during my rebellious teenage years, so I view him in that light and I rebelled against what I saw. It might be petty and unfair, but that’s life.

We all make snap judgments about people that we’ll never meet in real life. For example; I’m pretty sure that Barack Obama is a decent guy, relatively certain that the same is true about Steve Carell. On the other hand, Chris Martin from Coldplay is obviously an asshole, same with Glenn Close. Also, Tom Cruise is gayer than 8 guys blowing 9 guys.

This is the rationale that I employ to decide that Kobe Bryant is a blight on the world of professional basketball, even though he’s quite obviously the most talented and driven player in the league today. I could be totally wrong, but it’s too late. My mind is already made up.

Despite all of this, I’m cheering for the Lakers in the Western Conference Finals. It makes me cringe just to admit this fact, but there it is. My hate for the banality that is Spurs basketball trumps my dislike for the Lakers.

Why do I hate the Spurs more? They’re a bunch of floppers, for starters. It’s like watching the very worst of soccer; over-acting fouls, complaining about every call, Manu’s bald spot, scoring a goal every millenia or so. They’re full of goons like Bruce Bowen and Robert Horry. Even their only player with a redeeming quality, Tim Duncan, seems to believe that he’s never committed a foul on anyone ever. They’re just annoying. To cap it off, they play boring basketball. Nothing about them is electrifying or in the least bit exciting.

Plus, a Boston/LA Finals would be AWESOME.

So, here I am, left with little choice but to cross over to the Dark Side and cheer for the Lakers and Kobe to win a playoff series. The only way I can sleep at night is to remind myself to cheer even harder for Kevin Garnett and the Celtics. Garnett is easily my favorite player(#2, oddly enough, Allen Iverson) and I’m sure you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who knows anything about the NBA who doesn’t want him to win a championship. The guy bleeds on the court every night and plays the game the right way. Plus, I have this sneaking suspicion that he’s a really nice guy…