Magic trick Green; headlines reign supreme

I’ve been a bad sports fan this past week. The NBA and NHL are playing thrilling playoffs, baseball is just starting to heat up, and college lacrosse playoffs are on TV, yet I’ve probably only watched an hour of sports in the past seven days. Even ESPN Classic, my favorite boredom buster, has received little love from me.

I don’t have any substantial input to make right now, but saying nothing this morning would be a shame, considering the Celtics were eliminated last night, so I’ll just discuss one fringe benefit of the game last night: reading a cornucopia of ridiculous headlines from the clever to the painful. When you have a reigning champion, big-time program, lose to a team named The Magic, headline-smiths around the world get excited.  Here are a few column and article headlines:

• Celtics disappear
• Cruel trick
• Turkoglu reappears just in time for Magic
• Green done in by lanky point forward
• Helpless against this firing squad
• Alpha-Bits and empty tanks
• Stars not aligned for C’s this time around
• No. 18 will have to wait
• Orlando Magic make history with rout of Boston Celtics
• In game 7, Celtics run out of Magic
• Van Gundy, Magic make naysayers disappear
• Magic show: C’s run finished
• Hounded by Magic defense, Pierce is unable to deliver
• Celtics fall for Magic tricks
• Two of Big Three not enough
• Superman Dwight Howard comes to Magic’s rescue
• Allen gave it his best shot

But, once I saw the Yahoo Sports headline, I knew we had a winner:

• Magic to appear at King’s court

Congrats, Yahoo! Your prize is being an increasingly irrelevant Internet corporation.

AHHH PLAYOFFS!

Sorry for this post to shammgod (the 11-5 pats should be good enough for playoffs, and matt cassel’s 57 yard punt in the wind was epic) and capitalsports (maybe next year? naaah…probably not for the redskins), but the eagles and the chargers somehow made the playoffs!

IIGGGLEEEES!!!

The eagles needed tampa bay to lose to the awful oakland raiders. Oakland was also traveling  to raymond james stadium, and tampa bay was 13 pt (i think) favorites in this game. TB eveneven pulled ahead of the raiders 24-14. Somehow jamarcus russel (well..it was really michael bush) led the raiders back and they stunned the bucanners.

The eagles then needed either the vikings or the bears to lose. The giants’ backups held things down for a while (although i think tavaris jackson did a pretty good job of that for them) but the vikings eked out a 20-19  win). I think that had some of the worst clock management I’ve ever seen…and naturally, it came from brad childress, a disciple of andy reid. The vikings converted a third down with over a minute. Even though the vikings had 1 timeout remaining, they failed to advance the ball any further, and let their division title, and playoff hopes rest on a 50 yard field goal attempt. Granted, ryan longwell is pretty good, and the vikings play in a dome, but settling for a 50 yard field goal attempt? Weeeeaaaaak.

The bears came through though with a loss to the houston texans. Andre Johnson absolutely beasted with 10 receptions, 148 yards, and 2 touchdowns. Too bad he did nothing for me last week in my fantasy championship game. Garbage.

Capital talked a little bit about the absolute beatdown the eagles laid on the cowboys. Everything was clicking for the eagles, and the crowd was in a frenzy after fans learned that this game was suddenly a playoff play-in game. The eagles d forced 5 turnovers, harrasing tony romo all day. Brian Dawkins, all 35 years of him, had a beastly game, forcing 2 fumbles that were both returned for touchdowns. Mad props for weapon x, who came out ready to play and really iced the game for philly.Thanks to that beatdown, the eagles are somehow in the nfl playoffs, despite sitting at 5-5-1 following a loss to baltimore and mcnabb’s halftime benching. That tie ended up being great for the eagles – a loss to the bengals would have instead given the last playoff spot to tampa bay.

The chargers managed to be in an even worse spot when they were sitting at 4-8. Denver pretty much had the divison locked up. Yet, a timely run by the chargers and some disappointing losses for the broncos resulted in a play-in game on sunday night. The chargers came through with their own blowout win, demolishing the broncos. Phillip Rivers outplayed his new rival Jay Cutler. LT looked like the LT of old and Sproles and Hester chipped in with their own touchdowns. A trendy preseason pick to represent the afc in the superbowl, the chargers sneaked in to the  last spot, and will now host the colts next weekend.

And I gotta close with this video, in case you didn’t see any of the highlights of the eagles’ huge win.

Quick Notes from Celtics/Cavs

1) Paul Pierce is really, really good. His 41 points lifted the celtics to a huge win over the cavs. KG seemed very willing to let Pierce carry the celtics during crunch time. Pierce also attempted to play some pretty solid D on Lebron, although it didn’t really stop LBJ. I’ve never really considered Pierce as one of the very elite superstars in this league, but his performance this season has helped change my mind. A lot of critics have noted KG’s unwanted unselfishness in the waning moments of close games, and it seemed especially pronounced in this game (although you can’t really blame him when Pierce was having such an awesome game).

2) Talk about huge for PJ Brown. His jumper in the late stages of the game was absolutely clutch. He scored 10 points in game 7 of the 2nd round of the playoffs, higher than his entire season total. Definitely an interesting decision by Doc, throwing out Brown at the end of the biggest game of the Celtics’ season, but guess it worked out.

3) Cavs’ coach Mike Brown hasn’t exactly been the most popular coach because of his …erm…well..”predictable” offensive strategies. It’s hard to argue with the results given the lack of help for Lebron though. The Cavaliers roster isn’t exactly bursting with talent, although it definitely has quality players. Brown’s emphasis on defense has helped the Cavaliers thrive in shutting down opponents, and with Lebron, they always have a chance at the end of games.

4) This isn’t related to Game 7 but…talk about a major reversal of public statement. Although the Lakers definitely backed off from their early optimism regarding Bynum’s return following his injury, he will now have surgery on his injured left knee