Tuesday, July 19th, 2011 at 10:00 am  |  25 responses

The ‘Chin Check’

Thanks, Undercrwn!

by Bryan Crawford / @_BryanCrawford

Sadly, with no season to look forward to at this point, the NBA lockout has driven me to watch old games saved on my DVR or catching whatever NBA TV is showing at the time. Here and there I’ll go over to YouTube and call up old highlights of some of my favorite players, but most of the time, I’m usually just reminiscing on the days when the NBA was “real.”

As a diehard Bulls fan, I have no problem whatsoever in admitting that there was no team realer than the New York Knicks back in the day. Real recognize real, I suppose.

If you’re a fan of the Knickerbockers — or a closet fan, like me — you know from watching this team that they’ve never had a problem when it came to getting down and dirty with other squads.

You wanna take it there? Fugheddaboudit… The Knicks would meet you halfway. Aiiight?

Credit the attitude and spirit of toughness that possesses the Big Apple which gives this team the propensity for finishing what it starts, and giving us some very memorable dust-ups in the process.

Willis Reed taking on the entire Los Angeles Lakers team in 1967. Knicks guard and current Boston Celtics Head Coach, Doc Rivers, squaring off against Kevin Johnson of the Phoenix Suns in ’93 with 21 players fined and 3 suspensions being handed down as a result. During the ’94 NBA Playoffs, Bulls guard Jo Jo English and New York’s Derek Harper got into it in plain view of The  Commish, David Stern.

And who could ever forget The Notorious JVG, Jeff Van Gundy himself, hanging from the leg of Miami’s Alonzo Mourning as he went head up against his former teammate in Charlotte, Larry Johnson, who was rocking orange and blue back ’98.

If the Van Gundy/Knicks/Heat brawl is the most infamous fight in the history of the franchise (well, other than that one time Marcus Camby dotted JVG’s eye), the skirmish that took place in April of 2000 against LA will probably go down as the team’s most famous altercation.

It was just a regular Sunday afternoon game between the Knicks and the Lakers… Right up until Chris Childs gave Kobe Bryant the two-piece in his biscuit. It’s an all-time favorite NBA fight memory for both Knick fans and Kobe haters alike. The scuffle has certainly been etched into our collective basketball consciousness forever, and even if you didn’t see it happen live, you’ve no doubt heard the story and then watched the video on YouTube over and over and over again.

And now, thanks to the fine folks over at Undercrwn who have been blessing us with hotness since 2005, they’ve done their part in making sure this legendary moment in NBA history will never be forgotten… They put the damn Chin Check’n on a t-shirt, son!

Chris Childs is once gain pleased at the outcome. Bean? Not so much.

Own a piece of history… Buy you one.

  • Add a Comment
  • Share
  • RSS

Tags: , , , , ,

  • seriousblack Posted: Jul.19 at 10:37 am
    Shout out to B Crawford. I need this t-shirt ASAP. Watch the haters come out in drones tho.

  • airs Posted: Jul.19 at 10:48 am
    mannn, childs didn’t even really land those punches

  • JTaylor21 Posted: Jul.19 at 10:50 am
    Aw sheeeeeeeeeeeeeit. Time to throw away all the Jordan Ts and polos in my closet, I need these in my life.

  • Allenp Posted: Jul.19 at 10:59 am
    Ah yes. This did my hating heart good back in the day.

  • what Posted: Jul.19 at 11:19 am
    airs…..yes they did

  • walt williams Posted: Jul.19 at 12:02 pm
    Thought that was Doug Christie rocking Rick Fox at first glance

  • niQ Posted: Jul.19 at 12:10 pm
    Man, this is hilarious. Good look.

  • LakeShow Posted: Jul.19 at 1:43 pm
    Lmao, what a pic. Love how it’s all grainy. BBall will be remembered as black and white to color, short shorts to long shorts, and standard defintion to HD! Yo, Childs, if ya can’t beat em, punch em.

  • LA Huey Posted: Jul.19 at 1:43 pm
    “I’m feeling Chris Childs and you’re looking like Kobe Bryant’s jaw” – Wale
    Anyone think this has anything to do with how he juts out his jaw sometimes?

  • Enigmatic Posted: Jul.19 at 2:53 pm
    Dope shirt, BC.
    But I have to say, that LJ vs. Zo “fight” was one of the wackest things I ever seen.
    Both men circling each other throwing wild haymakers that had no chance of landing, neither cat wanting to go in.
    It was like Friday Night Sissy Fights.
    I was only like 13 when it happened, and in my young mind I was convinced that the whole thing was staged to attract more viewers in the post-MJ era. That’s how bad it was.
    I thought PJ Brown slamming Charlie Ward and the ensuing bench-clearing brawl in ’97 was way more gangsta.

  • Enigmatic Posted: Jul.19 at 2:54 pm
    Wait, my bad, I did think it was staged, but MJ was still playing then. But it was still wack.

  • Bryan Crawford Posted: Jul.19 at 3:33 pm
    PJ Brown v. Charlie Ward!! I knew there was a fight I was missing!!

  • KOBESbestFRIEND Posted: Jul.19 at 5:21 pm
    i bet chris childs doesn’t have enuff $ 2 by this tshirt these days

  • add Posted: Jul.19 at 5:24 pm
    Pistons vs Pacers

  • robb Posted: Jul.19 at 5:59 pm
    wow he punched Kobe’s shoulder. Tough guy!

  • Spaceship Jay Posted: Jul.20 at 5:43 am
    Anyone and everyone that has a doubtful comment about the 2 piece delivered to Kobe’s jaw obviously wasn’t alive to see it.

  • Arch Posted: Jul.20 at 6:06 am
    lol Mamba fan but…Cosign @ Jay

  • Kenny Posted: Jul.20 at 7:24 am
    Funniest shirt ever made.

  • Allenp Posted: Jul.20 at 10:51 am
    Co-sign Spaceship Jay to the fullest.
    The level of “Oh SH*T” this inspired in the hood cannot be overestimated. Whenever somebody is hating on Kobe, and I mean EVERY time, the two piece and his dry snitching on Shaq are the first things mentioned after his blatant swagger jacking of MJ. The list goes 1. Jordan jocking 2. Shaq dry snitching 3. Chris Childs two piece.
    This is law.

  • airs Posted: Jul.20 at 11:31 am
    i dunno guys.
    its looked like he barely grazed his chin and hit his chest.
    im sure it was cool live though, but i wasn’t watching the game, mightve been like 13 at the time

  • x47 Posted: Jul.20 at 11:38 am
    If you guys look closely at Kobe’s jaw it looks like it has a bulge in it, thats because this is the after hit. After he hit his jaw. Trust he landed 2 shots to the dome on him..

  • LA Huey Posted: Jul.20 at 1:46 pm
    I fully support the “Mamba Hate Law Allenp” speaks of.

  • HAMMER Posted: Jul.20 at 2:14 pm
    That ’93 Knicks/Suns brawl was crazy.

  • HAMMER Posted: Jul.20 at 2:23 pm
    And 2 be honest, n my opinion, I never saw those as true punches. And I did c it live. Childs had a chance 2 punch him n the face, but he didn’t. Now, that being said, if these 2 were 2 go @ it 4 real, I put my $ on Childs. No doubt!

  • Kap Posted: Jul.20 at 3:00 pm
    blasphemy…

Comments




The comments section is a place to further discuss the topics in this post. Commenters who seek to accomplish any of the following may be banned: - Personally attack other commenters. - Make derogatory comments regarding race, ethnicity, language, gender, sexual orientation or religion. - Troll, or comment with the intention of creating problems. Trolling includes, but isn't limited to, baiting people to flame at you, encouraging people to leave the site, spamming and using alternate IDs.