by Patrick H. Moore
Lamar Odom is in a world of hurt. He’s just been picked up on a DUI after spending the week holed up in an undisclosed location allegedly holding hands with a crack pipe. It’s been a long-time coming for this troubled and superbly talented hoopster who was once the prized 6th man on championship Laker teams — Lamar Odom with the athleticism, the skills, the smooth moves and ability to put the ball on the floor, even the other-worldly rebounding instincts, everything that goes into the make-up of a superstar except the killer instinct of a Kobe or Magic or Jordan or Bird, or any other deadly serious competitor. The rap on Lamar was that sometimes he would bring it and sometimes he wouldn’t. For the last two years he hasn’t been bringing it.
But how could he have been otherwise, Lamar was cool jazz in a red-hot hip-hop league? Although he may be wealthy and famous/notorious today, Lamar didn’t always have it easy. He was born in South Jamaica, Queens, New York City. His father was a heroin addict and his mother died of colon cancer when he was twelve years old. He was raised by his grandmother Mildred.
Lamar hasn’t always been an angel. After being tossed off the UNLV Runnin’ Rebels basketball team, Lamar hung around Vegas (which makes sense, he was in school) but received a citation for soliciting prostitution following an undercover operation by the Las Vegas police. Later, an NCAA inquiry found Odom received payments amounting to $5,600 from booster David Chapman. Coach Bill Bayno was fired and UNLV was placed on probation for four years.
Fast forward — Lamar’s talents take him right to the top in Tinseltown where he seems pretty comfortable, comfortable enough to fall in with the Kardashian family and marry Khloe, but slowly but surely Lamar’s talents begin to erode; before long he’s mostly just a fading veteran on drugs and alcohol.
The signs had been there all along. After being named to the 2000 NBA All-Rookie First Team, Lamar was involved in controversy the following fall when he got suspended for violating the NBA’s anti-drug policy for the second time in eight months for smoking marijuana, which doesn’t merit the NBA’s harsher “Drugs of Abuse” rules. At that time, Lamar admitted that he smoked the herb.
It’s well-known that cocaine and the various white powders — not to mention Ecstasy — makes the rounds in Hollywood. The more decadent the scene, the more likely narcotics will be present. And Kardashian-land is arguably part of the scene. Ergo… Or maybe the white powder just found Lamar; after all his father was a heroin addict — some families are just cursed that way.
Now, the story goes like this. The details are not yet in place but the general outline is as follows:
In recent years, Lamar allegedly started hitting the crack pipe. At times it was apparently a big problem. So when DMZ reported that Lamar was holed up somewhere smoking crack I gave the rumor quite a bit of credence because that is exactly what a white powder addict will do — hole up somewhere with a big supply of the drug and whatever paraphernalia is required.
Once the addict has locked himself into whatever space he has chosen, he starts hitting the pipe, gets that rush OH WOW BABEE it’s so good, but the rush never lasts so it’s back to the trough for more and after a while the rush gets shorter and more and more jagged and it wears off faster and faster and the paranoia which is never completely absent gets a handhold and then a foothold and then you get really scared and so it goes and you smoke every piece of rock on hand and after a few days you’re just gone, baby, just wishing to everything holy that the nightmare would end, and you’vereally got no choice but to drink a lot to try and take the edge off.
And so days are lost locked in this labyrinth of fear and self-loathing but then you emerge and when Lamar emerged things just got worse. The Associated Press reports:
The husband of reality TV star Khloe Kardashian was stopped shortly before 4 a.m. and was arrested after a field sobriety test.
The CHP said Odom’s car was observed traveling in a ”serpentine manner” before he pulled off the freeway.
”Mr. Odom showed objective signs of intoxication and was unable to perform field sobriety tests,” the CHP said in a report. Authorities said he later declined to take a chemical test.
Odom, 33, was booked for investigation of driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs and jailed on $15,000 bail.
He was released Friday morning after posting bail.
According to Natalie Finn and Claudia Rosenbaum of eonline.com, if Lamar is convicted of a DUI and refusing to take a chemical sobriety test, both misdemeanors, he could be sentenced to up to six months in jail and a nine-month substance abuse program.
At times like this, the wise defendant does one thing and one thing only. He checks into rehab. E! News reports today a source has informed them that Khloé and the rest of the family are urging him to seek treatment.
As for the arrest, “Khloé has been trying so, so hard to keep him from hitting a bottom like this. But if this is what needed to happen, then this is what needed to happen.”
Cause you see, this is the moment of truth for Lamar. He’s been fooling around and fooling around and now it’s caught up with him. Although he’s no longer an NBA star, he is still a very public figure largely due to Kardashian Land.
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A court date has been set for Sept. 27. Because the charges are misdemeanors, Odom doesn’t have to show up; he can send his attorney in his place. It would look good, however, if he meets this head-on and appears in court and gives notice that he’s making the most of his bloody rehab. The time comes for every celebrity addict when you’ve got to bite the bullet and take the cure. It helps if you can be reborn into one faith or another but it’s not considered an absolute necessity.