Shadenfreude, thy name is Dirk Nowitzki.

By now, I’m sure most of you have heard the saga of Dallas’ biggest Hasselhoff fan getting hoodwinked by professional scam artist (allegedly) and Jerry Stackhouse lookalike, Cristal Taylor. For those not living in the plasticized land of big hair and fake tits, and for those who eschew sports coverage outside of football season, here’s a brief , high-level recap:

Dirk got drunk one night. Dirk suffered a lapse in judgement worse than admitting he hums Hoff tunes at the free throw line. Dirk lets said blackmailer Stack-twin live in his Dallas home.

Soon, sane people around Dirk begin realizing this chick might be a little off, so maybe he ought to have her checked out. Bip, bam, boom … the FBI is hauling Taylor off and renditioning her back to SE Texas where she’s wanted by her P.O. for violating probation while using one of many aliases.

Der Hoff ist sehr gut, ya.

Shortly thereafter, we find out that Tony Banks, one of the greatest NFL fumblers of all-time, also had a run-in with Taylor while he was taking St. Louis for a ride to into Hell quarterbacking the Rams. When Banks, of all people, figured out the bitch was cray-cray and broke it off, she did the things we’d expect from a psycho hosebeast: camping out on his doorstep and calling Dick Vermeil.

As if all that weren’t enough, the “water is wet” news finally came out today: Taylor is pregnant with Dirk’s liebe-kind. Natch, Taylor says it’s just all a misunderstanding and now she’s broke, destitute and has no idea how she’s going to pay for that berlinerbolle in the oven since Dirk was “her only source of income.” That might be the first true thing she’s said in years.

Bigger irony: Dirk wasted or a Mavs shirt that says "Champions?"

So as to not appear hypocritical or naïve to the beer goggles scene, I feel somewhat qualified to give Dirk some advice here:

1. You’re Dirk freaking Nowitzski, for chrissakes, and you play in Dallas. Surely there’s a blonde, silicone-enhanced, money-grubbing, HOT chick somewhere in that town.
2. You’re Dirk freaking Nowitzski, for chrissakes. Hire a sober handler who can pull you away from the gorilla cage when you’ve had enough.
3. Actually, don’t change a thing. You’re like a wet dream to us bloggers.

For a guy on a team whose fans act like they’ve actually won something when in actuality the number of Mavericks titles is approximately zero, maybe this is par for the course: Dirk picks up some ugly skank, takes her home and thinks he got over on people like Tony Banks. I doubt it will shut up the shrill, popped-collar, nouveau Mavs fans, though. In fact, I know it won’t.

I will give Dirk this, though: since all of this has been going on, I started humming “Oooga-Chaka” to block everything out at the free throw line in my pickup games. It works.