Please, just stop

The Herald isn't the only paper to commit this sin:

In a basketball arena that was a cauldron of hatred toward James on Thursday night, the NBA’s MVP was big enough and strong enough to lift a city 1,500 miles away, and to carry his team all the way back home — still alive, still chasing a championship.
 
... but a flip through the archives suggests that it's a persistent offender at this time of year:

This is why we invest and care and cry and scream and get angry -- for the one breathtaking moment that Landon Donovan gave us Wednesday, when a little balding guy summoned the strength to lift our big country and give the United States a 1-0 victory against Algeria to advance in the World Cup.

With each ebb and flow of this turbulent playoff riptide, Heat fans have been caught in an emotional tempest, flying high with every win, and burning with anger upon every defeat.

Sports hyperbole is rarely fun to read and frequently painful when taken as an evidence-based statement about the world -- right, Nation's Newspaper of Record?

“All I can think of is how this incredible group of young men has unified this city and this state as never before,” said Clay Bennett, the owner who brought them here.

Do you figure he's heard of the other game they play in Oklahoma? The one with the punkin  and the cow pasture and the convicts?

On those grounds alone, please feel empowered to challenge breathless claims about supernatural feats and historical precedents. Let readers enjoy sports as they see fit.