And now back to the Odom watch

When I left town on Wednesday I had a strong feeling the Odom situation would be resolved by the time I got back Saturday afternoon. Just a feeling.

Much like the first few rounds of the Lakers playoff run, I no longer will be having any hunches, predictions or feelings about the L.O. situation until it’s finally settled.

Mostly this process has been like listening to an endless loop of “nature sounds and crickets” on one of those noise machines that help you sleep, interrupted by flurries of activity at unpredictable moments.

Saturday’s main developments included a pitch from Miami frontman Dwyane Wade via his Twitter feed which (unlike the bogus Kobe Bryant twitters that have caused some buzz this week, is actually a verified account): “This is for Lamar Odom…come back to where it started for the both of us..the franchise u help build back up wants u to End it all here.”

That preceded by a couple of hours a report from Yahoo’s Adrian Wojnarowski that Odom was “leaning strongly toward accepting” the Heat’s five-year, $34 million offer and leaving the Lakers.

Ira Winderman of the Sun-Sentinel (Fla.) has a nice breakdown of the situation from a South Florida perspective, but doesn’t go out on as long of a limb as Woj.

At this stage in the search though, everyone would be better off hiring `The Mentalist’ or bringing Gil Grissom out of retirement to figure out how this is all going to turn out. Theories and facts change from day to day.

Will Dwyane Wade’s pleas work?

Does Odom just want to feel wanted?

Does the fact that Heat president Pat Riley was heading for Los Angeles mean anything? Or was Riley just heading home?

Odom mentioned during the Finals that he likes humidity… does that mean he likes South Florida better than L.A.?

As you can tell, this whole saga has been dragged out so long even us sportswriters are at a loss for words.