Meet Ken Berger
Ken Berger can't dunk, and never could, although he was a bench warmer with the West Islip varsity boys' hoops team back in the day. Which is sort of like saying you were captain of the chess team.
But hey, what do you want from someone whose basketball career officially ended with freshman orientation at Indiana University? What do you want from someone who covered the Jets for seven years before going back to the NBA beat?
Back to the NBA beat, as in Ken covered his share of hoops as a sports writer for The Associated Press before coming home to Newsday in 2000.
Some of his favorite moments include the historic (it turns out) clash between Kobe Bryant and Allen Iverson in the 1997 rookie game at All-Star weekend in Cleveland; rubbing elbows with the 50 greatest players in NBA history at the same All-Star weekend; Michael Jordan's last All-Star Game at the Garden, where Ken had a better seat than Prince; MJ's ankle-breaking foul-line jumper over a prone Bryon Russell to clinch the '98 title; and Charles Barkley's "last" game in Philadelphia as a member of the Rockets.
Ken doesn't know if he was the only West Islip grad present for Larry Johnson's four-point play in the '99 Eastern Conference Finals against the Pacers. But he's quite sure that can be said about LJ's infamous rant comparing the Knicks to "rebellious slaves" during the '99 Finals against the Spurs.
Truth be told, Barkley's press-conference zinger after his Philly swan song was ruined by a ruptured quad takes the cake. Flanked by his ma and grandma, Barkley limped into a silent, sullen press conference room afterward, sat down between them at a table, and said, "Well, guys, I guess this means sex is out of the question tonight." Only in the NBA.