Joakim Noah: Is the Bulls Center "Cowardly and Dirty" or Something Else?

Danny Granger called Joakim Noah "dirty" and "cowardly" after the Bulls knocked the Pacers out of the playoffs.

Granger used the wrong words though, primarily because he's on the other team.

Noah's not "dirty," he's high-def. He's not cowardly, he's indelible. 

So what do I mean by high-def?

First, let me recount my former experiences of high-def TVs. Prior to getting one, I used to admire them in Best Buy and complain to my wife about how they really weren't all that great.

I had to hate the idea of HD because I didn't have one and SD was just so...ordinary! Even the nicest projection SDTVs are nothing compared to the HDTVs. 

Of course, when I finally got one I changed my tune. It's not worth watching in SD anymore. 

People like to say that he's the kind of player who you love when he's on your team and you hate when he's not on your team. It's not quite accurate. You hate him because he's not on your team, and love him because he is on your team. 

Why? Because Noah just has more pixels. When he's on the court, everything looks better, more colorful and more vibrant. The effort and energy he brings to court is infectious and just hits the rest of the team.

Joakim Noah's been back for a while, but High-Def Noah just got back in Game 4. When he's playing in high-def he's everywhere, he's challenging every play, clawing for every loose ball, fighting for every rebound. He puts in so much effort he even makes players like Tyler Hansbrough look like they're playing at 80 percent. 

He causes everyone on his team try harder and that makes everyone on the opposing team aggravated. You can't dig deeper into the well if you're at the bottom of the well.

When it comes to the "effort well," Noah just has a deeper well than anyone.

That tends to get aggravating. Being out-hustled when you're just not trying is embarrassing. Getting out-hustled when you're giving it everything you've got is frustrating.

Frustration makes teams players' see things differently than reality.

For instance take the play where Noah supposedly hit McRoberts in the neck with an elbow. To be honest, he hit him in the neck with a forearm. That's a technicality I know, but it is different in that a forearm doesn't constitute a flagrant and an elbow does. It's the difference between clean and dirty.

Beyond that though there's the fact that on that play Noah was under the rim, squaring for a rebound looking at the rim. McRoberts was three feet out of the lane, bull-rushing Noah, with no eyes on the ball. Noah looked at him and threw his arm up to block him out. 

Look at the 27 second mark of the video to the right and you'll see what I mean. It was evident that McRobert's sole intent there was to hit Noah. Noah's reaction was mostly defensive, but even still it looked like he was still more interested in the ball. McRoberts never even looked for the ball.

After missing on a clean hit the first time McRoberts tried a second time to hit Noah and missed again. Noah was playing hard. McRoberts was playing frustrated. He has the look of someone just tired of getting out-hustled.

That's the high-def effect. 

So what do I mean by indelible? Indelible is "having the quality of being difficult to remove, wash away, blot out or efface; incapable of being canceled, lost or forgotten; incapable of being annulled." 

Whatever you do Noah just don't won't go away. It's insufferable. He just plays so hard that it gets under the other teams skin.  

If you look at the numbers there are a few centers in the NBA that are better than Noah. For sure Howard is better. Andrew Bynum is better when he's healthy. There are a few others you could make an argument for, Andrew Bogut and Al Hoford. Perhaps you could even say Nene, and if you really wanted to be generous, Tyson Chandler is better too. 

How many of those would you rather have on your team though? Arguably none but Howard. Keep in mind that Denver wanted Noah for Carmelo Anthony and Chicago turned them down. That shows the kind of value that NBA GMs put on Noah.  

You ask how I can say that? You could make an argument that Noah is the single most dominant off the ball player in the NBA. What I mean by that is that he effects the game more without having plays designed for him than anyone. 

He defends everyone. At different times he's stopped Deron Williams, LeBron James and Dwight Howard in key moments this season. When he's healthy he's as good a rebounder as anyone in the game not named Kevin Love. He's able to create offense out of nothing, getting 14 percent of his points off of tip ins.

He blocks shots. He gets in lanes. He takes charges. He deflects passes. He gets loose balls. He's the type of player that solicits profanity from opposing players and their fans because it's almost impossible to get a 50/50 ball when he's on the court.

He's just always there!

Wherever the player he's guarding wants to be he's there. Wherever the loose ball is, he's there. He's screaming and hollering and inciting and clapping and generally engaging his teammates. He doesn't really smack talk to his opponent though. He speaks encouragement to his teammates, which of course makes it all the more aggravating. 

He's easy to hate when he's not on your team because he's not on your team. He makes everyone on the other team look so SD. As the will and leader  of the Bulls Rose may be their "head," but Noah is the heart and soul.

He's indelible.

Having him all the way back is a great sign for the Bulls championship hopes and at least one more team, probably more will come to have a passion for Noah equal to Danny Granger's before long.