THE OREGONIAN

We’re practically brothers, San Antone. We’re multi-horse but one-team towns. Visitors think us charming. I like you in the winter. You like me in the summer. Neither of us is uppity like, oh, you know, Dallas. That’s why I thought we could haggle a little deal today.

My Blazers franchise for your Spurs.

Oh, come on, help out your Western Conference brother here a little, will you? All I want is some joy sprinkled over my basketball. Life is stressful enough. I work like an American, I labor to interpret Eminem, my stocks took up downhill skiing this year. It would be nice if in leisure time I could see Derek Anderson’s megawatt smile, Tim Duncan’s it’s-not-about-me earnestness and David Robinson’s unselfish essence, not to mention his essence of unselfishness.

Right about now, San Antone, I need Avery Johnson’s face.

That face is life, San Antone. You don’t know how badly I need that face to help medicate my perma-frown.

Your Spurs bear striking resemblance to the dimming memory I used to regard as a team. They seem thoughtfully--rather than incompetently--constructed. The parts fit. The seeding is No. 1. The series lead is 2-0 already. Heck, maybe their president is a chemistry major--or at least got a minor in it.

It’s not as if I asked for the RiverWalk and an Alamo to be named. I understand you’ll need more than just my discouraging Blazers. I want to negotiate in good faith. I’ve already apologized for the Holiday Bowl outcome. I am prepared to . . .

You want Mt. Hood?

(Hard swallow.)

Yeah, you sure need one, all right. But I’ll have to mull that. I know I can give you another river and the advice not to drink from it and maybe even the secret instructions on how to concoct decent coffee. You can have some of my clouds for your satanic summers.

I’m low as Calista Flockhart’s cholesterol and you demand Mt. Hood? Have you no empathy for impressionable and potentially confused snowboard-campers? Are you heartless toward my citizens who know the exhilaration of turning a corner and seeing that alp all inconceivably magical on a clear summer day?

Avery . . . Johnson’s . . . face.

All right, I’ll try to get by with a mural.