Hey KD, Beware the Wrath of This 8 Year-Old

My boys, who are in second-grade and kindergarten, are becoming big sports fans, due to their own involvement in youth sports and their dad's incessant sports-watching. The NBA became a big hit this season, due to: 1) the front-yard hoop I painstakingly put together last spring, and 2) my son's interest in reading sports books. He has devoured some big picture books on the history of the NBA, which makes for fun questions like "Did you watch the Big O play?" and "Why did Dennis Rodman look like that?"

(Back to that hoop. It took me six hours, and every neighbor walked by and laughed at me for not paying somebody $100 to do it. But I figured it out all by myself and feigned competence in handyman things to my kids. And they are now mad bombers that shoot hoops every day. The same neighbors comment on how frequently they are out there. Great financial and time investment, in retrospect.)

My oldest has become a big Thunder fan, rightfully worshipping at the altar of KD and Westbrook. So much so that when we got him a youth Thunder uniform for his first Holy Communion (a Westbrook one, for reasons that become obvious below), he actually cried tears of happiness. My youngest...likes the Heat...because his first rec team was called the Heat...because that team had red t-shirts. That's all it takes for a six year-old. Both kids got caught up in the Kobe coverage that was on ESPN non-stop all year, but I forcibly steered them away, refusing to buy them anything with his name/number because "he was mean to his wife and to women." It worked.

So anyway, we are moving our boys into separate bedrooms this summer, and giving the oldest some input on decisions. His request to paint the walls orange, like the color in the Islanders and Thunder uniforms, was denied. But his request for a Thunder player Fathead was approved. My son asked for KD. I told him that would be okay, but we should wait a couple months to find out if KD was going to leave the team.

And that's when shit got real. My son's jaw dropped and he was visibly upset. I tried to explain free agency in general - KD grew up near Washington DC, his contract was ending, and some players like to play in Miami, where it's warm all year. He wasn't having any of it. He left the room in a pissy mood.

A few minutes later, I found this letter/rant/poster on our kitchen table. I have no idea if he planned to mail this, carry it into a game, or just use it to vent. But here it is. Look carefully at the "RIP 2007-2016" at the top. After I saw this, I picked up my iPad and saw "when did kd get drafted" as a recent search. He did his research. KD was picked in the 2007 draft.

So watch your back if you end up in Chocolate City or South Beach, KD.