I’m not much of a dancer, not since that time that a preacher banned dancing in my town and my family moved away right before a rebellious teenager arrived and showed everyone that dancing is actually fun. But the word on the streets these days is that all the cool hepcats and daddy-O’s are getting funky to a new little move called the Harlem Shake.

Unfortunately, a Harlem Shake is not a Dairy Queen Blizzard mixed with cognac as I originally hoped, and as our Warming Glow comrade Josh Kurp previously pointed out, it is a strange dance craze along the lines of Psy’s “Gangnam Style” and Oprah’s* “twerk”. Basically, you just shake your arms like a car dealership balloon guy and hope that no one calls an ambulance for that “crazy drunk a-hole” having a seizure. Even the Norwegian army is getting in on the action.

And because they’re hip to all the new styles, the Dallas Mavericks players made their own Harlem Shake video and it’s as strange as everything else they’ve ever done.

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Last week we featured a video of the Dallas Mavericks murmuring their way through ‘Sleigh Ride,’ and if you thought that’d be the end of their wacky Christmas updates, you are underestimating a 12-13 team with nothing better to do.

Today’s installment in what I hope is a Dallas Mavericks Christmas Trilogy is Dirk Gives Presents To His Mavs Teammates, a short film about “Santa Dirk” giving Angry Birds boxers, rotary phones, ‘Saved By The Bell’ sweatshirts and Viking helmets to his fellow Mavericks. It also features O.J. Mayo delivering the best line of dialogue I’ve heard in months:

“Yo, Dirk got me a Christmas gift, I wonder what it is.”

Nailed it.

Anyway, you’ll want to watch this clip. Shake Weights are involved.

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For my money, there’s no greater MS Paint artist in this generation or any other, for that matter (suck it, Picasso), than our own Danger Guerrero. His efforts within this specific medium have been unparalleled over the decades that I’ve known him, and I believe that he has no less than 75 works currently hanging in the Smithsonian and the Louvre. Do not quote me on that number, as it may be off just a tad.

However, despite the important life lessons that we were given by The Highlander series, there doesn’t have to be only one, and I recently stumbled upon the works of another outstanding MS Paint artist (pronounced ar-teest) who sadly remains anonymous at this current time. But like most great reclusive artists of the last several centuries and great artistic periods, this unknown person got his or her start on Tumblr, with the site “Great NBA Moments”.

Sure enough, this collection of artwork re-captures some of the greatest moments in NBA history through the stunning use of basic colors and brushes that only MS Paint can provide. Included in these incredible works are Michael Jordan’s iconic game-winning jumpshot, Dirk Nowitzki’s three-pointer in Game 5 of the 2011 NBA Finals and even the cover of the video game masterpiece, Shaq Fu.

Short of Larry Bird sharing a milkshake with Skeletor or any of the sketches that we’ve previously viewed from the artists at Double Dribble, this is probably the best NBA art that you will see this year. While there are many more beautiful works available at Great NBA Moments, I have included some of my favorites in this week’s With Leather Wild Art Gallery.

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LeBron Iver

People send and Tweet a lot of links to me each week and the results range from tame and general to bizarre and borderline terrifying, but every now and then somebody shows me something that just makes me giggle with delight, and that’s good for everyone. That happened the other day when a friend passed along the Tumblr site Indie Basketball, which, as the name implies, combines popular indie bands with NBA stars. Simple and sweet.

But more than anything, I’m a sucker for puns, so that more than makes up for my shameful lack of knowledge when it comes to who some of these bands are. For example, Bat for Lashes? No clue. But Bat for Nashes? That’s a giggle-maker right there. So let’s get the pun machine rolling with some of our own names (that aren’t exactly indie bands, I know):

Earl the Pearl Jam
Houston Rocket from the Crypt
Kids in Glass Eddie Houses
King Charles Barkley
Franz Vasquez Ferdinand
P.J. Donnell Harvey
Heypenny Hardaway

Damn, that’s some fine punning right there. I’ve included some of my favorite Indie Basketball efforts after the jump, but don’t let that stop you slick hipsters from suggesting your own with your favorite Bright Eyes and Wolf Parade jams playing in the background.

*picks Frisbee off of lawn, keeps it*

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The two Vince Carter videos you’re about to watch, when viewed in succession, can illustrate one of two themes:

1. It is life in a nutshell. Even if you’re the guy who cleared a seven-footer in the Olympics, you’re capable of taking one of the worst shots in basketball history. And if you take one of the worst shots in basketball history, you’re still capable of throwing it down on the tallest guy on the court.

2. Blake Griffin’s playbook: you are terrible at basketball so just dunk, because you are so good at dunking.

Video number one features Carter pulling out a great ball fake, tries to softly finger-roll it in like so much George Gervin and airballing it like he’s me trying to pull that shot off in HORSE. Video number two, about three minutes of game clock later, features Carter dunking on 7-foot Kings center Hassan Whiteside like it was nothing.

A brief miscalculation, or Father Time chipping away at his legs? You make the call.

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There have been very few surprises in the NBA through the first 7 games of the season. The Los Angeles Lakers struggled out of the gates but have turned it around, the Dallas Mavericks made some roster changes and their chemistry is hurting because of it, the Oklahoma City Thunder are dominant but need to solve the Kevin Durant/Russell Westbrook thing, and the Miami Heat are already in postseason form. With the exception of the Boston Celtics and the New York Knicks struggling early, it’s mostly business as usual.

So instead of boring everyone with make believe insight and analysis as teams are still finding their feet after a 6-month vacation, I thought we’d dip into the game photo well to have some more fun with our new weekly ROFLMNBAO feature. Especially since the above image of Alex Rodriguez at yesterday’s Lakers game has given me such joy today.

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