Donté Green cannot do a damn thing wrong this year. We, here and elsewhere, typically expect a lot from our rookies, no matter the age. Kevin Durant went from potential G.O.A.T. to Rashard Lewis based on 82 games at age 19. WHAT? Guilty as charged, we have turned our backs on Spencer Hawes a dozen times by now. This league swallows teenagers whole, and fans have as much blood on their hands as GMs and coaches and analysts do.

Jason Thompson won't get a free pass, just as Hawes did not. Bobby Brown, safe as he wants to be, has to do something to make it to next season. But Donté Greene … he could harvest lint all year long and I'm not going to worry a wink about him. Greene could have an impact immediately, or he might not. He could drop 20 in 10 minutes of garbage time, or he might miss six three-pointers. I don't care. I'm not worried.

The Donté Greene who shows up this season isn't the Donté Greene Geoff Petrie traded for, or Daryl Morey picked (by trade), or Jim Boeheim recruited, or Reggie Theus dreams about. And anyone who says DONTE GREENE will show up in Year Two or Year Three or on January 17, 2011 … that's all bone-throwing. They don't know. I don't know. You don't know.

Donté Greene doesn't know.

Every single one of us — D.G., G.P., R.T., T.Z., S.t.R., Y.M., K.M. — we will all find out at the same moment. Donté Greene will return to this Earth and he will take our breaths away. This is not a specimen to ease into excellence or "develop." This is a full-grown genius who shows up on your doorstep on a normal, unassuming day. He wears a three-piece suit and has a 17-inch fro-hawk. He smiles like a rainbow trout and exchanges foreign currency out of pocket. Euros, yen, Canadian dollars, Australian dollars. He's got that. He's got ev-e-ry-thing.

Consider patience preached ev'ry Sunday til that Day of Revolution comes.