Author: clay

Categories
NBA General

Around the Rim: The West is almost set


1. No Mailman needed for this West finals delivery
The best story in the NBA postseason is finally over as the Jazz put together a late run and sent the league’s version of Cinderella packing for the offseason with a 100-87 victory in Game 5, but, more importantly, the win put Utah into the Western Conference finals for the first time since 1998. But just because Golden State is out of the picture doesn’t mean that there are no true heroes left. At least that’s what the media keeps shoving down our throat about Derek Fisher. Handling the rock in all the critical moments and knocking down his shots with a sharpshooters’ precision (7-10 FG, 4-5 3FG), Fisher left his fingerprints all over this game. Now the Jazz are left to practice, watch, wait and repeat until the dramatics over in the other half of the West bracket finally get hashed out. But GS can still be proud of what they did this year and how they played. Unfortunately, they were just a bit too raw for the refined playoffs and while it was rabid emotion that carried the Warriors over the Mavericks, it was that same enthusiasm which would eventually be their downfall. There was a whirlwind of whistles directed at The City ballers toward the end of the third quarter and the Warriors just began to slowly unravel over the final 12 minutes. We all knew that the Golden State run would eventually end but it still doesn’t make it any easier to say goodbye to Jessica Alba.

2. Who’s getting Bull-ied around now?

Two games ago, the Bulls were beaten up, thrown around and left for dead on the side of the road after falling down 3-0 to Detroit. But unlike those bloated deer that get blasted by speeding SUVs on streets across the nation, these guys rose from the dead to win two consecutive games against the Pistons. Never seen road kill do that before. Ben Gordon was obviously alive and well as he scored a game-high 28 points on 10-of-16 shooting from the field that included a 5-of-6 performance from behind the arc. Kirk Hinrich didn’t resemble a dead armadillo or opossum either as he dished out 13 helpers to go with 17 points in the 108-92 Chicago victory. The Pistons are known for blowing comfy leads in the postseason but they are also known for winning the games that they have to have. But if they want to end this series quickly they are going to have to take care of business on the road. And Chicago is where Ben Wallace has had his biggest games of the series. In the two games in Chi-Town, Big Ben has pulled down 29 rebound while he only has 20 boards in the three Detroit contests.

3. The commish shows no love for Amare
We all knew that there would probably be suspensions handed out by David Stern after Robert Horry sent Steve Nash flopping flying into the scorer’s table. The incident had Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw hopping mad, and unfortunately for the Suns they hopped off the bench and onto the court which earned each of them a game suspension. Guess the whole “I was checking into the game” strategy didn’t work out for Amare. On the other side of the series, Horry’s actions earned him a two game suspension. It would seem that the Suns just lost Game 5 but now there is a ton of extra pressure on the Spurs as the suspensions have put them in a must-win situation that they must capitalize on. But, hell, we think it’s pretty safe to say that any coach in the league would rather be in Gregg Popovich‘s loafers instead of Mike D’Antoni‘s in this pivotal Game 5.

Tuesday’s Player of the Day: Andrei Kirilenko vs. Utah 34 min, 21 pts (FG: 8-12, FT: 5-5), 15 reb, 1 ast, 3 stl

Buzzer Beater: Dwyane Wade had to be feeling like a total idiot as he started putting on that stupid paper garment before going under the knife to repair both knee and shoulder. This was a surgery that he could have done back in February but instead opted to skip the procedure and rehab his way back into shape for the playoffs. And we think everybody knows how productive that decision turned out to be for Flash. Turns out that Dwyane’s pains were primarily coming from his knee and not the shoulder that sent him sobbing from the arena in a wheelchair. The recovery will probably take the entire offseason and possibly longer. Unfortunately, for Miami the “jumper’s knee” condition is nothing new to the franchise. Jason Williams had a similar operation performed last July and he was still in pain for half of the season.

Categories
Dallas Mavericks

Mark Cuban turns into a sniveling little girl when it comes to his MVP

Today was supposed to be Dirk Nowitzki’s big day as he received the franchise’s first ever MVP award from David Stern. But, then again, this was supposed to be happening during the pregame festivities of a playoff game and not from inside a conference room in Dallas. So, what should have been a celebration for the Mavericks organization felt an awful lot like a funeral. Here’s Mark Cuban delivering the eulogy.

Geez, Mark; guess it’s pretty tough to see your little boy all grown up, ain’t it? We haven’t seen a sadder owner since Roy Jackson had to put Barbaro down. And while the clip ends a bit prematurely, in typical Maverick style for the year, there was an incredibly awkward hug between the owner and his star after Cubes left the podium. In fact, Cuban looked like he was going to melt away into Dirk’s giant arms. We’re actually pretty surprised that Mark didn’t go for the double-underhook hug on his man crush. But wipe away those tears, baby boy, and turn that frown upside down; you’re starting to make Andrei Kirilenko, Dick Vermeil and Emmitt Smith feel a bit uncomfortable.

Categories
Oakland Raiders

Raiders fans are some douche bags, ya heard?

We all know that Raiders fans are a bunch of whackos that are one chromosome short of becoming full fledged human beings. So, it’s not really fair to put these mutants up against their rivals, 49ers fan, in a fist fight. Everyone knows that the brute physical strength would give those meatheads a decided advantage over the flower smelling hippies in San Francisco. What is fair, however, is to give Raider fan an opponent of equal mental capacity; like a 49er helmet for example.

First off, here’s a little insight from an outsiders perspective: you guys aren’t black! What’s with all the Ebonics? But that’s beside the point. We love how these guys think that a firecracker is just going to blow the helmet to smithereens. You gotta give these douches an “A” for effort though, but eventually even a Raider fan was able to figure out that no firecrackers, samurai sword, scooter, gun or blow darts can compete with a good ol’ fashioned smackin’ from a nine iron. Ya’ know what I mean, kid?

Keep an eye out for our favorite moment of dialogue when one of the dumbasses looks into the camera and says “I’ll shoot your motherfuckin’ ass with a blowdart, dawg.”

Links:

[49ersNews.com]: Video: Why Raider Fans Shouldn’t Inbreed

Categories
Jacksonville Jaguars

Fred Taylor almost went sky diving without a parachute



Wonder if these guys were piloting
at the time?

Do you hate flying as much as we do? After experiencing some seriously disturbing in-air disturbances while visiting Africa, we’re guessing that Jaguars running back Fred Taylor does.

Taylor had been touring Zambia and Zimbabwe and all those other Z-countries in South Africa with his wife and his buddies Samari Rolle, Lito Sheppard and their lil’ ladies. Everything had been going swimmingly for group of tourists until the dreaded “Samari safari.” On the way back from checking out the wildlife, the 15-seat, single-propeller plane’s door flew open at about 6,000 feet and caused a panic amongst the normally cool pro ballers.

I thought that was it,” Taylor said Monday following the final day of Jacksonville’s three-day minicamp. “I put my head down and started praying. The runway was about two miles away, but it seemed like it took 10 or 15 minutes to get there.”

Taylor joked that it was the first time he felt like he was near death “since I was playing for (coach Tom) Coughlin.

Maybe Taylor should spring for a little safer accommodation on his next journey to a third world country. After all, it’s not like the guy can’t travel in style; the Jaguars just gave him a three-year extension worth $23 million. But things could have been much worse; what if there had been a bunch of killer snakes on the plane?

Links:

[CBS Sportsline]: Jaguars’ Taylor Gets Scare In Africa
[Gainesville.com]: Ex-Gators get scare during Africa trip

Categories
NBA General

Around the Rim: Spurs and Suns get even more physical



Nash is mad as hell and he’s not
gonna take it anymore!

1. Wait; who won that game?
If you decided to turn in early last night and skip out on the end of Game 4 between San Antonio and Phoenix then shame on you. The Spurs were in control for almost the entire game, but almost was just enough space that the Suns needed and they put together a late surge that closed an 11 point gap and gave Phoenix a 104-98 victory that tied up the series at two games apiece. It was a stunning turn of events in SA as it looked like the Spurs were ready to take a commanding 3-1 advantage but it quickly fell apart as Tim Duncan got nailed to the bench with his fifth foul. As the game was coming to an end tempers began to flare as Robert Horry delivered a hard forearm shot that sent Steve Nash flying into the scorers’ table. A brief melee broke out with Horry, Nash and Raja Bell but the situation was quickly diffused as Horry was ejected from the game. However, what could prove to be quite costly was Amare Stoudemire‘s and possibly Boris Diaw‘s decisions to leave the bench area when the scuffle broke out. If David Stern decides to go by the book then their actions are worthy of an automatic one game suspension.

2. Cavs advance; well, almost

The Nets stuck around until the final buzzer but when the horn sounded it was Cleveland who had grabbed a 3-1 lead in the series and put themselves in an excellent position to finish this thing off at home on Wednesday. LeBron James is just one little victory away from etching his name into Cavaliers history by taking the team to their third conference finals ever. It has been 17 long, long, long years since the Cavs last made an appearance in Eastern Conference’s big show. And New Jersey made it a lot easier than it should have been as the Nets’ big three just couldn’t get anything going offensively because they combined for a pathetic 11-of-48 from the field. Sorry, Jay-Z, but that’s just not gonna cut it when King James is exploding for 30 points, nine rebounds and seven assists. Cleveland fans finally have some positive postseason memories to hold on to; hopefully Michael Jordan’s runner over Craig Ehlo hasn’t been too damaging over the years.

3. Could Larry Brown and Greg Oden be a package deal?
It looks like Larry Brow is the top candidate for the open head coaching gig with the Grizzlies, but in typical Larry Brown fashion he’s not making any decisions until he’s sure he’s going to get exactly what he wants. And apparently what Brown wants is the same thing that every coach is desires, Greg Oden. The draft lottery will be held on May 22 which means that we should know exactly where the ol’ ball coach stands by the time the last logo gets pulled from its oversized envelope. Memphis has a great chance of grabbing the top pick which would give the Grizz a solid core for the Yoda-like guru to mentor into young Jedi masters. But the journeyman doesn’t have the patience these days to groom some stick figure into the defensive stopper that his systems so desperately require. It’s an all or nothing situation for Memphis in this year’s lottery. But, then again, we can’t imagine the Grizzlies being too disappointed if Kevin Durant falls into their laps.

Monday’s Player of the Day: Steve Nash @ San Antonio 41 min, 24 pts (FG: 8-12, 3FG: 2-3, FT: 6-8), 2 reb, 15 ast

Buzzer Beater: After two long years of singing the praises of Steve Nash, today we finally usher in a new era of elite as Dirk Nowitzki dons the MVP crown and reduces Nash from “reigning” to “former” MVP. Dirk will probably be so stoked during his press conference that he starts doing his best impersonation of German sensation David Hasselhoff during his acceptance speech. Not! But if Dirk started mumbling while picking at a plate of food with his shirt off, you’d have to admit that it would make for some entertaining television. Hell, we couldn’t really blame the guy if he did show up to the ceremony in a drunken stooper just like his childhood hero. It’s gotta be rough when your best friend and the previous MVP is still ballin while you’re having to pretend to be happy and smile for the cameras when all Dirk really wants to do is hide under a rock until training camp begins.

Categories
General Sports

Mr. President, sir, your problems in Iraq are over. O.J. Simpson is on the case, sir.

Have you seen the television series starring O.J. Simpson? No, not the one where he pretends to be Ashton Kutcher as he attempts to sell unsuspecting car buyers his infamous white Bronco; we’re talking about The O.J. Simpsons.

Broadcaster.com has released a series of animated briefs that parody FOX’s The Simpsons but instead of Homer eating doughnuts, mmmm doughnuts, you get the Juice licking blood off a butcher’s knife. Apparently FOX isn’t too happy about the mockery of their famous animated family and wants all the cartoons removed. Good luck with that.

Here’s a look at an episode entitled “Warzone.”

Don’t worry, there’s more where that came from. After the jump, you can see O.J. explain what happened to mommy to the Simpson kids in “If I Did It” and then enjoy the antics of the Juice and his buddies Mel Gibson and Michael Richards as they celebrate the holidays in “Black and White Christmas.”

Links:

[CNN.com]: `O.J. Simpsons’ parody earns Fox’s ire
[Ad Freak]: Fox unamused by `O.J. Simpsons’ parody

Continue reading “Mr. President, sir, your problems in Iraq are over. O.J. Simpson is on the case, sir.”

Categories
Tennessee Titans

If you can dodge traffic, you can dodge a ball!


Considering that Vince Young is the next Madden cover boy and all (check out the commercial, rooks), you’d think that the Titans would want to boost his game sells by giving him some big-time weapons to throw to. Well, let’s see; Tennessee hasn’t made any offseason moves for a wide receiver, they didn’t select a WR with their first pick in the draft and now we find out that the coaches are throwing bricks at the receivers they do have.

Fred Graves is the new wide receivers coach for the Titans and his sure fire technique for getting his players to keep their eye on the ball and follow it all the way into their body is to occasionally throw bricks at the guys. Now, if an ACME brick to the chest doesn’t get your attention then nothing will.

If I toss you a football and you drop it, no big deal unless I am yelling at you as a coach,” Graves said. “But if I toss you a brick, without you sidestepping it, you’re going to look at it with your hands and eyes. You won’t just throw your hands out there because of the consequences. Everybody knows, ‘Hey, this thing will hurt.’

This sounds like a drill that the Cowboys should start using. After all, Terrell Owens had so many balls pass through his hands last season that he looked like Paris Hilton in pads. And anyways, if he doesn’t reel `em in then he takes a brick to the head; what’s the big deal? Hopefully he’s not wearing a helmet at the time. That just might be the only way to knock some sense into that guy.

Links:

[WBIR.com]: Titans coach throws bricks to make point

Categories
NBA General

Charles Barkley is really Spidey!?!?

We love what we do here at Sportscolumn but don’t be fooled; bloggin’ ain’t easy. So, needless to say, we don’t get out much. And even though we’re pimple-faced, comic book reading dorks at heart; we still haven’t made it out of apartment and into to the light to take in the latest Spider-Man flick. Luckily we have our good friends at Inside the NBA to tell us that we’re not missing much.

Wow, Charles, you weren’t kidding; that movie does look crappy. We didn’t know it was going to be set in an elementary school assembly hall. And since when did they start letting Tobey Maguire do his own stunts? But we were ecstatic to see that Peter Parker slipped the crew an interesting photo that solved the controversy surrounding the identity of everybody’s favorite web head once and for all. And now you know why Spider-Man and Sir Charles have never been seen together.

Categories
NBA General

Around the Rim: Now that was some smooth Jazz styling



Carlos Boozer is at the edge of his
first conference finals appearance.

1. The City is becoming a ghost town
After the Warriors eliminated the Mavericks from the playoffs, the Golden State faithful celebrated to a point that even Joakim Noah thought was a bit over the top. Well, after the Warriors lost Game 4 to fall down 3-1 against the Jazz, the largest crowd to ever see a basketball game in the state of California (20,679 to be exact) reacted as if they had just seen their precious Warriors for the last time this season. And they were right. Golden State is a completely different team at home than they are on the road and in Game 5 the supportive sea of yellow that cheers insistently for the Warriors’ excessively ridiculous 3-point attempts will now become a baby blue lagoon of venom and hate for any and all outsiders. Especially Jason Richardson after he delivered a hard, flagrant foul to Mehmet Okur in the late moments of the game that got him sent to the showers a bit early. But it didn’t really matter at that point; Utah already had the game well in hand and J-Rich was having a horrendous shooting game (3-12 FG) anyways. And after mesmerizing the nation with a dunk of John Starks over Michael Jordan or Kevin Johnson over Hakeem Olajuwon proportions, Baron Davis also struggled (6-16 FG) when it came time to draw the series even. Guess the motivation of having Jessica Alba in the crowd has to wear off at some point.

2. No mo’ “fo’ fo’ fo'”

Remember the Luol Deng that exploded onto the postseason scene during Chicago’s first round sweep of the defending champion Heat? Well, after virtually disappearing in the first two games of the Pistons/Bulls series, it seems safe to say that Deng is back on track and Chicago can finally remember how it feels to win because of it. After putting up 21 points and 14 rebounds in Game 3, Deng had another outstanding performance with a game-high 25 points to go along with a baker’s dozen off the glass. That’s 13 for all you non-pastry chefs out there. But Detroit still has a 3-1 advantage in the series and it is doubtful that starters Rasheed Wallace, Chauncey Billups, Chris Webber and Richard Hamilton have a repeat of their pitiful shooting performance (13-of-45 FG) when Game 5 takes this rivalry back to the hardwood at The Palace of Auburn Hills.

3. Spurs/Suns saddle-up for Game 4
After Game 1, Steve Nash had a gash on his nose and Tony Parker had a bump on his noggin. After Game 2, Amare Stoudemire called Bruce Bowen “dirty” because he says that Bowen tried to purposely injure him. That’s about as physical as it can get, right? Wrong, because in Game 3 Manu Ginobili got a nice sized mouse under his left eye thanks to an inadvertent Shawn Marion poke and Nash took a knee right to the jewels when he tried to guard Bowen a bit too tight. But in the end it was San Antonio who grabbed a 108-101 victory in the game and a 2-1 advantage in the series. Phoenix is now facing, for all intensive purposes, a must-win situation for Monday’s Game 4 in SA because the Suns do not want to be looking at a scenario in which they must win three straight against a team as good as the Spurs. Put your mouthpieces in because this series is turning out to be the championship caliber slugfest that we never got to see between Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather.

Sunday’s Player of the Day: Carlos Boozer @ Golden State 44 min, 34 pts (FG: 13-19, FT: 8-11), 12 reb, 2 ast, 1 stl, 1 blk

Buzzer Beater: The Cleveland Cavaliers had been quietly and effortlessly making their way through the playoffs until New Jersey finally knocked them off their high horse and handed the Cavs their first loss of the postseason. In a statistical abnormality, the Nets were led in scoring by not one, not two, but three players who finished the game with 23 points apiece. Oddly enough, Vince Carter, Richard Jefferson and Jason Kidd weren’t the only players to finish with 23 points as Larry Hughes racked up the night’s magic number as well. LeBron James finished the contest with just 18 points even though he’s got the number 23 on his jersey. Oh, well, it’s not like it would have mattered; the Cavs would have still lost by six points even if James had reached the 23 point plateau.

Categories
Dallas Mavericks

Dirk is the regular season MVP; key words "regular season"



An MVP has never felt so sad.

According to reports, Dirk Nowitzki will be named the NBA’s MVP sometime next week and despite his team going down in flames to the Warriors in the first round it was the right choice. After all, this is the regular season MVP, isn’t it?

Sure, Nowitzki choked like no MVP should ever gag in a must win Game 6 against eighth seeded Golden State by producing just eight points on 2-of-13 shooting, but that’s the postseason. And there is already an award designated for the best player in the playoffs, it’s called the Finals MVP. During the 82 games leading up to Dallas’ monumental collapse, Nowitzki was undoubtedly the top dog in the league. He averaged 24.6 points, 8.9 boards and 3.4 assists to go along with shooting percentages that were out of this world (FG-50%, 3FG-42%, FT-90%). And he did all this while leading his team to a league best 67-15 record.

Plenty of people out there will argue that Steve Nash should be considered for the award now that the Mavericks have been sent packing but it would be nothing less than a farce for Nash to get his third consecutive trophy based on Dallas’ loss. Anyways, Nash isn’t even the best player on his own team and the guy already has more MVPs (2) than some of the greatest players to ever step on the hardwood (Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Barkley, David Robinson, Allen Iverson, Kevin Garnett, John Stockton and Patrick Ewing to name a few), which is a shame in itself.

But Nash isn’t to blame for his achievements, the media is. The voters almost always give this award to the best player on the best team that year, which is why we knew long ago that Kobe Bryant wouldn’t even sniff the MVP. This year, however, the formula happened to be correct with Nowitzki. There’s no real argument that he wasn’t the regular season MVP, but that’s not going to make the press conference any less awkward for Dirk, and the MVP isn’t going to clear his name as a postseason gag artist.

I understand the business by now. If you play well and you win, you’re the greatest,” said Nowitzki. “And if you lose, you’re the worst player in the league.

And now Nowitzki can join Moses Malone and Wes Unseld as the “worst players” to ever win the MVP and get bumped in the first round, but, hey, he can take comfort in the fact that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won the award in 1976 and didn’t even make the playoffs. But at least none of those guys were humiliated at the hands a team that hadn’t made the playoffs for 13 years!

From being up 2-0 in the Finals, only to get swept in the next four; to having the best record in the league; to becoming the victims of the biggest upset in postseason history; to winning the MVP. Dirk Nowitzki is now the official poster boy of the term “bittersweet.”

Links:

[SlamOnline.com]: Dirk Nowitzki’s the MVP and You’re Not.
[ABC12.com]: Mavs’ Nowitzki will be named NBA MVP next week