A real tweet for twits
Twittoos© would give players instant fallout they crave
Having been behind the curve on every basketball innovation, trend or gimmick from dribble-drive motion to Bracketology to compression sleeves, I’m way out ahead on this one.
Are you ready for it?
Twittoos.
That’s trademarked, by the way.
In fact, if we can just skip the messy business of developing the technology and doing the marketing, and someone can just write me a $500 million check for the idea, I’ll get back to the important stuff, like ordering in pizza and Facebooking old girlfriends with Mark Zuckerberg.
Surely no more promising hoop concept exists than marrying the game’s hippest tools of self-expression: tattoos and Twitter. Think about it: instant body art to proclaim whatever a player happens to be celebrating or stewing about at the moment – in 140 characters or less, of course.
The immediacy will be much more gratifying for all. Remember last year when University of Idaho guard Kashif Watson got on his Twitter account after a loss to proclaim his frustration with coach Don Verlin?
“Wow just don’t gett this guys mind set, it’s like some times he don’t wanna win that bad!!”
It was two weeks before anyone in the mainstream media detected Watson’s Tweerade (thankfully, there are still a few people of the 30ish persuasion working in the mainstream media). By that time, Watson had Twarted – it’s what your brain sometimes does, only on Twitter – additional bon mots, calling Verlin a “punk ass” and saying “Don’t gett how we pose to win wit this guy coachin us.”
Verlin was none the wiser until apprised of his senior’s body of work, and because Watson was undermining the coach – or because he kept spelling “get” with two Ts and spoiling any program propaganda about an increased emphasis in academics – the player was suspended for his final home game and the conference tournament.
Imagine, however, if the means existed for Watson’s disaffection to spill straight from his heart midgame into rivulets of body ink for all to see – coach, school president, spectators. Colleges could double attendance – and ticket prices – for the sort of on-court drama that would flow from that.
Plus, coach and player may have made up in time for him to suit up on Senior Night. And Watson could have probably Twittooed his way into his own reality show, already being a hostage of his own reality.
There may be no “I” in “team” – but there is in “Twittoo.”
Not to pick on Kashif exclusively. Indeed, a few weeks earlier, Gonzaga backup Grant Gibbs didn’t play a minute in the Zags’ big win at Memphis and so, not needing to shower, headed straight for his phone and Twhined, “What a great seat I had at the game today! First class treatment!”
Gibbs has since transferred to Creighton, presumably with a promise that there will be no DNPs in his future there. If only Twittoos had existed, that process likely could have been expedited.
I mean, if these guys truly think their every thought and frustration needs a public airing, then let’s really get it out there. Make every body a billboard.
The science can’t be all that hard. You’ve seen those dry-erase basketball shoes that come with a black marker.
Naturally, there will be resistance from the coaches who already find Twitter a social netmare, never mind Twittoos. But coaches have Twitter accounts, too, and occasionally slip into too-candid territory.
Take Portland coach Eric Reveno who, while doing a little video homework on the Zags before a game last year, decided to Twash the audio track:
“Can’t take it anymore. Turning off volume of Fox’s Heister and Ehlo and listening to a little “Train” while (I) watch Gonzaga film. For sanity.”
Alas, coaches are decidedly bearish on tats and bullish on $1,000 threads that would cover them up anyway. Maybe some sort of graphic or LED technology could be rigged into their suit jackets to display these crucial thoughts.
There is no denying that Twitter has changed the game of college basketball – the LOLs and SMHs as pervasive now as ESPN and RPI.
It makes you wonder what it might have been like had the 140-character revolution been launched decades earlier, where coaches and players could Tweet at one another (“@”) and re-Tweet (“RT”) with impunity:
George Raveling: Just got WSU job. Not end of the world, but you can see it from here.
@Steve Puidokas: What, do you think those 25-footers are worth 3 points or something?
Casey Calvary: @QHall: I was open in the first place. SMH.
Paul Graham: Dick Bennett’s winnin with mah guys!
John Stockton: Hope I can get used to these shorts. Kinda tight.
Kelvin Sampson: Anyone know how to erase Call History?
Gregg Smith: CPOG! LMAO!
Kermit Davis: @Dennis Erickson: Thanks, I owe you one.
Ike Fontaine: Wow just don’t gett this guys mind set, it’s like some times he don’t wanna win that bad!!
Marcus Moore: RT @Ike Fontaine: “Wow just don’t gett this guys mind set, it’s like some times he don’t wanna win that bad!!”
Nick Graham: RT @Marcus Moore: “Wow just don’t gett this guys mind set, it’s like some times he don’t wanna win that bad!!”
OK, maybe not. But you get the Twidea.
The Social Net