Nate Robinson of the New York Knicks won over NBA fans when, despite standing only 5-foot-9, he won last year's slam dunk contest during All-Star weekend -- his second such title.

Yesterday, if he didn't quite win hearts across the Twitter-sphere, he at least amused a great many people.

It started when he was pulled over in his SUV for having tinted windows. It continued when he was subsequently busted for driving with a suspended license. Neither of these things are amusing by themselves, but the fact that nobody knew about them until Robinson started Tweeting helps out considerably.

Watching his progression of tweets is even better. It starts with indignation, then moves to disbelief. At some point his professional representation gets involved, and before long Robinson is in full spin-control mode, going so far as to send tweets of thanks to the police department -- the same guys he had just finished denigrating -- for a job well done.

It all leads one to wonder what athletes ever did with themselves before Twitter came along.

(Screen grabs from Anyguey.)