Black Athletes Come Together To Celebrate Irish Heritage

HOLLYWOOD - The “luck o’ the Irish” fell on Tinseltown’s Coco Bongo Club Saturday night, as the biggest Irish stars in America flew in to show their Celtic pride, holding a St. Patrick’s Day party “strictly for the brothers” at Fitzgerald’s.

Dubbed a “hip-hop fusion of Guinness, red-headed strippers, and the like,” emcee Donovan McNabb credited the event for bringing together his “Irish peeps” in a long overdue recognition of collective struggle.

“This is for all my laddies who never made it out of Dublin,” McNabb said during a somber moment, pouring a dab of Irish whiskey onto the floor. “The potato famine struck too many of us down.”

Festivities stalled abruptly at 11 pm when Houston Rockets Forward Tracy McGrady interrupted to lead the club in a rousing chorus of “Finnegan’s Wake,” an Irish ballad dating back to 1850s Kilkenny. Frothy green beer spilled over mugs as the nation’s Irish elite drunkenly embraced each other.

“It’s just something you gotta do, man,” mumbled a tearful Shaquille O’Neill over the roar of the ballad. “If you’re Irish, you just gotta drop what you’re doin’ today and show some love for St. P.”

The party was a celebratory occasion for Shaquille O’Neill, though, as the Suns’ center took the opportunity to recall his heritage.

“Ever since Grandpa O’Neill told me bedtime stories about gettin’ drunk on malt liquor and ‘giving the handle to’ his wife, I’ve had the ‘Rish blood in me.”

O’Neill, who brought along his kids Jamal, Moesha, Rwanda, and Paddy, said he was hoping “to have the luck of the Irish at the poker table.”

The party, although accepting of all black athletes with Irish-sounding names, was not without its discriminations. Terrell Owens, for one, couldn’t get past the bouncer.

“He spelled his name O’wens on his name-tag, but we all knew he wasn’t really Irish,” McNabb said. “That man is a nigga through and through.”

Proceeds from the event went to support Los Angeles’ own St. Patrick’s County Hospital Youth Rehabilitation Center, which offers counseling and rehabilitation services to impoverished children and their families.

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