Miami Heat Star's Kid Brings PSP to NBA Finals

Miami Heat star Dwyane Wade brought his son Zaire to last night's NBA finals game between the Lakers and the Celtics. The series was tied 2-2 and the game stayed tight until the final minutes as the league's best two teams fought for the lead. (The Celtics won 92-86, leaving them one game away from the championship.)

Plenty of 8-year-olds would have killed for any seat, let alone center court, a few rows back-but not Zaire Wade, who whiled away the tedious minutes (Dad, not a work thing again, please?) with his hand-held video game. Poor kid. I'm so glad his dad let him bring something to do, aren't you?

Zaire Wade, 8, isn't just another in a long line of overprivileged celebrity kids, dragged unwillingly to events they completely fail to appreciate just so their parents can prove they merited at least one extra seat (I'm thinking preschoolers at Fashion Week, here). He's another of a long line of everybody's kids growing up without being forced to endure even so much of a second of unrest-not when he can be so easily sated by a little hit of video game action. You see them everywhere-restaurants, their siblings' hockey games, doctor's offices, hair salons-accompanied by their portable baby sitters: kids who will, one day, be totally unable to politely sit through anything from a dinner with their boss and her husband to a live Broadway musical with the inevitable slow number. Sure, they're quiet and well-behaved (until the charge runs out). But they're learning nothing about patience (and getting, in my opinion, a good solid lesson in a lack of public civility).

Dwyane Wade himself doesn't appear to have been toting around a portable video game at his son's age. Wade's father was a basketball coach who brought an 8-year-old Dwyane to his team's practices. Wade's older stepbrother was his team's star, and Dwyane watched his brother practice and play for hours. If he'd only had a PSP, he could have spent that time so much more profitably. With all of the juggling multiple information inputs and hand-eye coordination the device requires, he could be an air traffic controller by now.

That's probably enough--but here's more on kids and hand-held video games.