It… Is… ALIVE

I thought J-dubbs was dead.  Here’s a quote from a recent press conference–

“If throwing a behind the back pass is what’s gonna help my team win that’s what Im gonna do, but if it takes a regular pass that’s what I’ll do too.  I’m all about winning now.”

Yup.  Jason Williams said he was “ALL ABOUT WINNING NOW“.

But there is hope.  Immediately after, he says–

“I’m still a kid at heart.  I still do stupid things at times… when I’m out on the court I’m not worried about what other people are thinking.“

He’s still not worried about what other people are thinking.  Somewhere deep inside him white chocolate still lives.  And that achromatic candy is what will make me watch a billion magic games this season.

And when he’s 75 feet away from the hoop and sees Vince streaking to the basket, he better throw the oop.  He has too.  Unless J-Dubbs is truly gone forever.

Are You F***ing S***ting Me, John Sterling?

From last nights game after the yankees tied the game: “Oh the gutty, gritty yankees!”

Firstly, it’s “gutsy”.

Secondly, the gritty YANKEES?  The Fucking Yankees are gritty now?  They have multiple hall of famers.  Their offense scored 915 runs this year.

I hope the Angels suicide squeeze on them all night.  Or hit weak ground balls to the shortstop that somehow get up the middle.  Seriously, check out that link if you have 15 seconds.  Anecdotally perfect.

Last Post Ever (srsly)

So the blogs over, none of us check it anymore (cept me obvi).  I mildly miss it.  I just wanted to put this somewhere b/c running out into the street and screaming at the top of my lungs seemed strange (but that’s basically what a blog post is).

When a baseball team makes a trade there are two teams involved. Recently a Redsox fan said we should trade Buchholtz and Lugo for Halladay.

Well, while we’re living in deleriumville why don’t we just trade Lugo straight up for Halladay?  Why don’t we just trade Charlie Zink and a can of sumol!

Callers call in to WEEI all the time with their amazing trade ideas, many similar to these.

The Blue Jays actually want some stuff in return.  Here’s a crazy way to look at it, sox fans.  Imagine Halladay was on your team.  What would you want in return? Changes things, eh?!  We can’t turn off the fair trades button in real life!

That is all.  We out.

PS: I made a bunch of text message-like typos in this post, see how many you can spot!

Um, There’s no way Phil Jackson is the best coach of all time

He’s not even the best coach in the NBA right now.  He’s solid, but cmon.  Adrian Wojnaadslkfahrgu at yahoo thinks this win by Phil Jackson “ends the debate.”  Um, between Red Auerbach and Phil Jackson?  Yeah, there is no debate.  Red is better.  That’s just dumb.

Adrian.  Yo Adrian, ya know who is a better coach than Phil Jackson?  Greg Popovich.  That one might be worthy of a debate, but in the end, Greg wins.  Relatively easily I might add.  Winning the championships he did with those players?  Bruce Bowen was never a good player.  Just because Phil Jackson was better than Doug Collins at using Jordan to win games doesn’t mean he’s the greatest coach of all time.

Jerry Sloan is miles ahead of Jackson as well.

Real quick– Red Auerbach was…

-the first coach to start five black players

-the only coach to win eight straight championships

-not the guy who rode Michael Jordan to 6 finals wins (and not the guy who couldn’t win in 1995 with Jordan in the playoffs)

-a man so far ahead of his time (he hated flopping 40 years ago!) it renders this whole argument stupid

I feel I’ve given this topic too much credit by writing this many words.

On a more positive note…

Holy Heroic Homer Batman!

The clutchness… the scrappiness… head… exploding…

I do love that they ended up losing.  I thought Eck was all about winning! Well, I guess not, F that guy

Hey Trevor, How ’bout you play D for once?

I’m not saying the Magic were robbed in that game.  I mean, everything being equal they probably win, but who knows?  That’s not the point here.

Laker textbook defense

The point, or question I guess, is why do the Lakers never play defense, ever?

Other than Lamar Odom (and sort of Bynum, occasionally Bryant), LA never plays defense.  The stuff they get away with is amazing.  They basically just reach, reach, reach, slap, slap, reach, and dare the refs to keep calling it.  That picture to the right is absolutely perfect.

Trevor Ariza, I’m looking at you.  This guy can’t stay in front of his man, but because he complains a lot when refs call him for handchekcing he’s suddenly this super defender?  He’s terrible.  I’d be happy to see him on the court if it wasn’t for the officials giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Who taught this guy defense?  Guys who gamble for steals and slap arms aren’t good defenders.  I’ll even throw Rondo into that group. Play straight up Rajon!  You have the ability!

Ariza certainly didn’t go to UCLA when John Wooden was there.  The same Wooden who once said, “If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?”  Trevor, you need to do it over.

Every guy on the Lakers is just like this.  They do not stay in front of their guys.  They just run near them and slap, slap, slap, it’s so frustrating, I keep waiting for Turkoglu to deck one of them.  They almost deserve it.

Did you see how many times they slapped it away from Dwight Howard in the post?  Did you see how many of those were clean? Did you see Kobe and Fish run into defenders who jumped straight in the air and then see these great defenders be punished for playing defense the right way?  This is why we have a generation of hand checkers.  Jordan used to say, “You reach, I teach.”  Where are you MJ?  We need you.

And of course a couple possessions later, after Kobe picked up two straight phantom calls, Hedo drives into Ariza and Ariza gets out of his way, slaps down on the middle of his arm (surprisingly far from the ball– it looked closer live than it was, I’ll give the refs that) and the ball goes off Hedo’s leg out of bounds.

Great D Trevor!

Woohooo NBA basketball!!

[puts head in oven]

Easily the best thing you’ll read today

CapitalSports has already documented just how awesome Redskins TE Chris Cooley is. His blog is the only pro athlete blog that I subscribe to. It’s not just because I live in DC and am a die-hard Redskins fan, either. His blog is one of the most incredibly entertaining* on the net, sports or otherwise. He’s such a personality.

For example, this account of his experience attending a high school lacrosse game and his thoughts on women’s lacrosse.  How could you read that and not smile the entire time?

 

*though it’s still a few notches behind We Talkin’ ‘Bout Practice

That old debate

If the team you root for is eliminated in the playoffs, do you root for or do you root against the team that eliminated you?

My theory is that you should root for the team that eliminated yours (if you even continue caring — I often don’t). If that team plays a closer match with your team than with any other opponents down the line, then you can argue that your team was the true runner-up.

The biggest exception to this rule is if the team that eliminates you is your team’s rival. If that’s the case, you obviously root for them to be eliminated as soon as possible. Thus, I hope the Penguins are absolutely squashed by the Red Wings. I ****ing hate the mother****ing piece of **** Penguins and hope Sidney Crosby doesn’t score a point all series.

Look at the Momentum!!

Lolz

Congrats, ACC Champions!!!

Congratulations to the Virginia baseball team, unlikely ACC Baseball Champions. And everyone said this was supposed to be a rebuilding year, too. It’s been my pleasure watching you and covering you all season. 

[PS: I know what's coming. Someone's going to criticize this post because it's about college baseball, which most people presume is stupid and unimportant because ESPN doesn't cover it 24/7. Well, how many of you bashers have been to a game? Ever followed a team for a couple weeks or seen every game in a good ACC Baseball series? It works for the same reason college basketball works: It's less about egos and more about teams. Did you know that the greatest Cinderella story in college sports history happened in baseball just last year? I read the Washington Post sports section every day, and the entire series got just a paragraph mention. Ridiculous. College baseball needs more love. I predict that the next MLB commissioner will put in an age limit like the NBA has, and there will be an upswing in interest in the college game.]