TORONTO — There weren’t any Utah Jazz players participating in the NBA All-Star Game on Sunday night, so my brave editor gave me free reign on my story topic.
It was tempting to explore an angle no other sports writer thought of tackling — Kobe Bryant’s final All-Star appearance, for instance — but I don’t want to get laughed at the next time the Professional Basketball Writers Association meets.
Writing about the hometown cooking by the referees was another possibility — after all, the East had 250 percent more free throws than the West — but nobody wants to read about refs.