Posted on 01/29/2016 3:25:49 AM PST by Theoria
Why one determined feline enthusiast has embarked on a quixotic journey to determine which basketball players own--or would consider owning--a pet cat.
An otherwise ordinary basketball fan named Alex recognized someone walking into a recent Chicago Bulls game and thought: Wait, is that Dikembe Mutombo? Then something else occurred to him.
"I thought about running after him and asking about cats," he said. "I'm really regretting that I didn't."
Alex is a 34-year-old radio producer who enjoys cooking, gardening and meditation. He's also the anonymous owner of a website that, somehow, has become a cult hit in basketball circles. It's called NBA Catwatch.
Almost every night of the NBA season, Alex sits down at his computer, flicks on a basketball game, pours a tall glass of ginger ale and gets to work. He spends more than 10 hours each week trying to answer an important question: Who are the NBA players with cats?
The man behind NBA Catwatch is extremely serious about his absurd quest. Now, three years after he began asking NBA players for their opinions on cats, Alex's website has thousands of Twitter followers who alert him anytime it appears possible that an athlete owns a feline. His site is so popular that when Alex started selling $25 shirts with the NBA Catwatch logo--which is the NBA logo with a cat instead of Jerry West--he had hundreds of buyers and raised $3,500 that he donated to animal shelters.
"This is the most successful thing I've ever done," said Alex, who declined to give his last name and prefers the identity of NBA Catwatch.
NBA Catwatch is the inevitable union of two Internet obsessions. There is no American sport more popular online than basketball, and there is no animal more viral than the cat.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Is that Jerry West’s cat!?
I’d like to think that West is a dog man.
This piece prompted a question, that was answered in the same article:
What sort of person would think “This is the most successful thing I’ve ever done,” which is answered by “Almost every night of the NBA season, Alex sits down at his computer, flicks on a basketball game, pours a tall glass of ginger ale and gets to work. He spends more than 10 hours each week trying to answer an important question: Who are the NBA players with cats?”
PING!
Ditto.
This is the kind of endeavor a cat would undertake if they were a person....
Why not? Cats are the ideal pet.
Metro? Poofter? Or just a Pajama Boy?
I shant venture a guess.
please take me off the kitty ping but know that i still love my little guy.
And, oddly enough, also the ideal predator.
No worries. You’re removed.
Mutombo is such a gentle giant off the court and does so much charity work for his nation that he probably has cats. ALL gentle people have cats dontchallknow.
Ping
Never mind, he loves cats and basketball, he can’t be all bad, at least 45% totally OK I’d say.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.