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BEST HEAT PLAYER

Alonzo Mourning

Anyone who needed proof that Zo is the heart, soul, and muscle of the Miami Heat got it when the most intense center in the NBA was knocked out of most of the 2000 season by a kidney ailment. He returned, half-strength, at the beginning of the 2001 season to a team as shaky as he was. But then the star power came through when a reinvigorated Zo rallied a ragged team in the second half of the season, turning an abysmal losing streak into a real shot at the playoffs. That even made the dour Pat Riley crack a courtside smile.

BEST LOCAL GIRL MADE GOOD

Chef Michelle Bernstein

After working for others and then co-owning a short-lived but ambitious venture (The Strand), Bernstein took a major leap: She left South Beach for Brickell Key and the luxe Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Within a year food critic John Mariani from Esquire named her restaurant, Azul, the best of 2001. The Food TV network hired her to host a series on tropical foods. And the Vita-Prep people picked her to pose with a blender between her legs, an advertisement that numero uno trade mag Food Arts featured prominently. Can any other native make that kind of claim to national fame?

BEST LOCAL BOY MADE GOOD

Ben Greenman

Forgive us our pride. Miami native Greenman worked for New Times after graduating from Palmetto Senior High and Yale University. In his time at the paper he wrote some excellent film and music criticism and several pretty darn funny stories. "Cracking Up" chronicled an experiment in which Greenman followed a mad scientist (the late John Detrick) around downtown Miami on a very hot summer day to see if eggs really would fry on sidewalks. During the 1991 tourism crisis, when violent criminals were targeting rental cars, Greenman produced the "New Times Rental Car Conversion Kit," a handy package of mail-order accessories tourists could use to give their rented vehicles a local look. Now based in New York, Greenman has embarked upon a bona fide literary career. By day he edits the extensive calendar section of The New Yorker magazine, to which he also contributes reviews and other material. In his free time he writes quirky and clever pieces of fiction that regularly appear in McSweeny's, the journal and Website (www.mcsweeneys.net). Last year the McSweeney's publishing imprint released Greenman's debut book, Superbad. According to reader postings on Amazon.com (and quoted by Greenman on his Website, www.bengreenman.com), "Superbad has been described as 'a masterpiece,' a 'piece of garbage,' and 'a book I haven't read yet but which I heard was pretty good in parts if annoying in other parts.'" Author Susan Minot had this to say after reading Superbad: "I don't know what goes on in Ben Greenman's mind, but inside there seems to be a Russian short-story writer, a slapstick gag writer, an art critic, a literary critic, a cultural commentator, a cowboy, a satirist, a scientist, a postmodernist, an anti-postmodernist, a surrealist, a nut, a genius, a stand-up comedian, a child prodigy, a dreamer, and a poet." When Greenman unveiled Superbad recently at Books & Books in Coral Gables, his proud parents invited the entire audience over to their house for coffee and cookies. As Greenman pointed out, this wasn't a take on some classic Andy Kaufman gag. Then again, he admitted, it kind of was.

BEST MARLINS PLAYER

Josh Beckett

On a young team loaded with prospects and emerging pitching talent, we especially like the promise that Beckett holds. The right-handed pitcher from Spring, Texas, was named USA Today's high-school pitcher of the year in 1999. He was also the first prep pitcher drafted by the Marlins in the first round. After starting last season with the AA Portland (Maine) Sea Dogs, Beckett debuted in the major leagues in September. Immediately he proved he belonged, allowing only one hit in six innings in a victory over the Cubs. In four starts Beckett allowed only one-and-a-half earned runs and struck out an average of one batter every inning. That was good enough to be named the team's rookie of the year by area sportswriters. That's no small achievement on this young team. And Beckett is no small talent.

BEST LOCAL GIRL GONE BAD

Miriam Alonso

She was a late entry in this contest, but Alonso decisively swept the field of contenders. At press time the Miami-Dade County Commissioner was facing one misdemeanor charge, three felony charges, and up to five years in prison. More charges are possible. Way back in 1993 New Times devoted 13,000 words to Alonso during her failed campaign to become mayor of Miami. The opus by former staff writer Steven Almond, "Meet Miami's Next Mayor," began with this: "On those days when passions flare, when Miami cannot help revealing its more ominous shadings, half the city seems determined to have Miriam Alonso canonized. And the other half to have her eliminated. There is no middle ground when it comes to the woman who would be Miami's next mayor. She is savior or demagogue, invisible outside extremes, and impossible to ignore." In retrospect the criminal charges shouldn't really surprise anyone. Questions about Alonso's integrity began the moment she arrived in the United States with her husband Leonel, who has been charged with four felonies and faces up to fifty years in prison. What were the circumstances under which they defected from Cuba? When exactly did they arrive in the United States? How had Miriam managed to obtain a Ph.D. in only three years? Why can no professor at Catholic University (Washington, D.C.) recall advising or approving her doctoral thesis? Where did she and her husband acquire the half-million dollars they'd spent by 1979 purchasing Miami real estate? These troubling questions and others remain unanswered. But a Miami judge had a solid answer for her in 1988: He yanked her from her debut race for a seat on the county commission after it was proven she didn't live at the address she listed on her oath of candidacy. If she was willing to cheat in order to run for office, is it such a stretch to imagine her cheating once she gained office? Here's something else to imagine, something even Alonso's sworn enemies must have thought improbable: Miriam behind bars.

BEST RIVALRY

Gwen Cherry Bulls vs. Liberty City Warriors

You know there's something going on when 600 people turn out to watch a football game featuring four-year-olds. Yet that's what happens, dependably, when these two Liberty City parks play each other in Pop Warner football. No matter what the weight class, from the four-year-old pee wees up to the fifteen-year-old midgets, a game between Gwen Cherry and Liberty City generates an astounding amount of community interest. It's not uncommon for dedicated fans to wager a thousand dollars or more on their teams. In the past few seasons Gwen Cherry has held the upper hand, winning most of the games and even winning a national championship last year in the 110-pound weight class. But in Hadley Park, where the Warriors play, they've hardly abandoned hope. "We started the whole thing," one Warriors booster crows. "Our program was the first program in the inner city. Gwen Cherry was a spinoff from us, and they got all the money from the [Greater Miami] Boys and Girls Club and all these grants from the county so now they've got better uniforms and better equipment and that means they're getting better players. But the one thing they don't have, the one thing they'll never have, is Warrior pride. And without that? Shit, man, you don't got nothin'."

BEST BEANBALL

John Henry

After buying the dismantled 1997 World Series champion Marlins from H. Wayne Huizenga, John Henry made lots of promises to South Florida baseball fans, a couple of which he actually kept. In the process he proved the fallacy of the expansion-team philosophy: Add more teams because TV needs more sports and fans will come. He also proved that, these days at least, megamillionaires have a hard time convincing the public of the need to underwrite new sports stadiums, even when they issue threats and plead a kind of rich man's poverty. So Henry sold the Marlins to Jeff Loria for $158.5 million and disappeared from Miami-Dade. But not before plunking down $600 million to purchase the Boston Red Sox.

BEST LOCAL BOY GONE BAD

Demetrio Perez, Jr.

Why do so many sanctimonious people turn out to be wicked? And has there been anyone in public life more sanctimonious than Demetrio Perez? Back in the Eighties, as a Miami City Commissioner, he sought to consecrate the Cuban-exile cause by, among other things, introducing a resolution to have the city honor convicted terrorist Orlando Bosch, handing the violently anti-Castro group Alpha 66 a taxpayer gift of $10,000, and demanding that director Brian De Palma rewrite the script of Scarface to soften its harsh portrayal of Cuban immigrants. Later, as candidates maneuvered for appointment as city manager, he was accused of but never charged with offering to sell his vote for $50,000. As a member of the school board he argued that students should be forced to rise whenever an adult entered their classroom, that the National Guard provide school security, and that uniforms be mandatory at all schools. As a "safety measure" he wanted all students to squeeze through a human cattle chute lined with metal detectors and x-ray machines. Suspension as a form of punishment was ineffective, he argued, and should be replaced with hard labor. All this while lying about where he lived in order to run for his seat on the board. And don't forget his shrill pronouncements against the violence fostered by America's gun culture -- this from a man whose concealed-weapon permit allowed him to pack heat at all times, which he did with relish and without apology. He even was arrested carrying two handguns through a security checkpoint at Miami International Airport. His chain of private Lincoln-Martí schools teach a rigid and hateful form of moral discipline, to which he gleefully subjected little Elian Gonzalez while simultaneously and shamelessly exploiting the boy for publicity purposes. But the end of Perez's long turn on the public stage revealed the depths of his depravity. A rich man, he was caught stealing $18,000 in rent and subsidies from two elderly women who were his tenants. In September he pleaded guilty to five federal criminal charges, but he escaped prison time. Too bad. Some hard labor might have done him good.

BEST RENOVATION

Seymour Hotel

Architect B. Kingston Hall designed the Seymour in 1936 for developer Benjamin London, who named it after his son Seymour. Sixty-six years later the tropical Art Deco jewel still stands, nestled in the center of the nation's only historic district composed entirely of twentieth-century structures. But it lives a new life. In keeping with the Miami Beach Community Development Corporation's mission of illuminating the economic viability of historic preservation, the property, acquired in January 1998, underwent a complete renovation and reopened in August 2001. Currently MBCDC headquarters, it also houses a local office of the Florida Department of Children and Families and a one-stop career center for the Hispanic Community Center, plus it plays host to exhibitions and lectures. The Seymour boasts smart touches, including original color schemes such as a gleaming white exterior and forest-green and deep-burgundy lobby, a restored ziggurat fireplace, and tile-and-wood floors in the exhibition space featuring patterns that outline the original floor plan. An exuberant example of Art Deco, the Seymour also accommodates the Urban Arts Committee, a group of concerned citizens passionate about preserving and promoting midcentury Miami modern architecture (MiMO), the Technicolor splendor of which was evident in the Seymour's inaugural art display: "MiMO -- Miami Modern Architecture, 1945-1972: A Photography Exhibit."

BEST WEATHERCASTER

Don Noe

WPLG-TV (Channel 10)

We like Don Noe for what he is not. He's not a bumbling grandpa bouncing through the low and high temperatures. Nor is he a slinky siren in a miniskirt relaying the boating conditions in a sweater tight enough to impede speech. He's just a no-nonsense guy, friendly enough but with a reliable weather forecast delivered quickly and without pretense. That's all we ask. Noe is no mere weather reader. He's a certified meteorologist, meaning he knows about the science of weather patterns. Armed with this knowledge, he shines brightest when facing a crisis, such as a hurricane, which fortunately we haven't had in a while. When we do, as we inevitably will, we trust Noe to steer us through it calmly, professionally, and capably.

Best Of Miami®

Best Of Miami®

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