Things Matt Harpring does well

In light of yesterday's abortion game, the Harpringsucks staff believes that its time for us to take a break from our normally hard and serious journalism about the the Utah Jazz and do what every local newspaper does instead: run a puff piece!

Some believe we've been unfair in our dealings with Matt Harpring because we spend all of our time talking about his poor play or the ridiculous things he does and we don't devote equal time to his positive contributions. In an effort to silence our critics and maintain our objectivity, we'd like to point out 10 good things that Matt Harpring does.

#10. He makes an excellent caricature.

His "photo" in the Georgia Tech athletic Hall of fame

#9. In all seriousness, Matt Harpring has excellent taste in women. He's married to a doctor that looks like she could be on Grey's Anatomy. Supposedly she looks good enough in person that two different uncles of mine have independently attempted to hit on her at jazz games before learning of her identity. Of course it tells you how delusional they are that they think they have a chance with a woman who's not only 10+ years younger than them but is also attractive enough to be married to a millionaire professional athlete.

#8. His command of the Spanish language is impressive. I saw an interview with him on Telemundo last night after the holocaust game and even though his mouth appeared to be moving normally he spoke wonderful Spanish. He even had a much deeper masculine voice than normal. It's nice that he changed the way he sounds to comport with a different culture's vision of how athletes should sound. That was very culturally sensitive of him.

#7. Matt Harpring makes Kevin O'Connor's job easier. "How's that?" you ask. Well you see, because the Jazz are paying Matt between 6 and 6.5 million dollars a season, we'll be perpetually over the salary cap for the next couple seasons and thus won't have to worry about targeting high value free agents. This sort of front office leadership is something that will surely get Matt Harpring put on my Christmas card list this year.

#6. Matt Harpring is great at selecting role models and then following their examples in his daily life. On Matt Harprings official site, he identifies one of his primary influences:

Favorite athlete in another sport: John McEnroe

While we here at Harpringsucks have made much of Matt's famous "stinkeye," this is really just an extension of John McEnroe's famous "You can't be serious!" tirades. Everytime Matt delivers the stink-eye he's inspiring others to follow in his and McEnroe's footsteps; the footsteps of poor sportsmanship.

#5. Matt has a sense of style that is simultaneously sophisticated and stylish. The picture says it all.

#4. Matt keeps the Salt Lake Valley medical professionals employed with knee and joint problems. There's a reason that his official website contains links to his personal chiropractor: Matt cares about the local economy!

#3. Matt Harpring is instant offense. Opposing players and coaches love watching Matt come into games because it gives them an opportunity to showcase their skills and make their value known. In addition to providing other players with this valuable opportunity (a true example of teamwork!) Harpring will often go the extra mile by making sure to make truly great expressions while opposing players score, adding a scared or stunned face to create a truly impressionistic piece of work and inspire GMs to overpay players in the offseason. Here we see him inflating Luke Walton's value right before Luke scores.

#2. Matt is a sociable guy and looks out for those who would otherwise be ignored. That's why you'll frequently see him hanging out with the floorboards. While it may look to the untrained eye like he is just falling over for no real reason he's just paying homage to the most necessary part of the game: the floor itself.

#1. He's Pretty! Many of the female (and some of the male) jazz fans love the way he looks. And we all know that eye-candy sells.