The Top 5 Funniest Things about the 2009 NBA Season so far

2009 is only a few weeks old but already NBA fans have been treated to more than our fair share of side splitting moments. The NBA: Where Unintentional Comedy Happens. Here is my top 5 in reverse order.

5) Watching Shaq try to play defense- Come on Shaq, do you really want to be remembered as the guy who couldn’t guard Andrea Bargnani? Shaq was never exactly a defensive stalwart, but watching this guy stumble around defending pick and rolls is sad . . . or hilarious if you’re a Celtics/Magic/Spurs/Lakers fan.

4) Brandon Jennings dropping 55 points on the Warriors- 55 points!?! Really? Shouldn’t Monta Ellis be fined for allowing this to happen? A 19 year old rookie point guard (the hardest NBA position to adjust to) who skips college and rides the pine in Europe for the year puts up 55 points in November in a regulation game against a guy who makes $11 million a year? Tell me again why Don Nelson won’t start Anthony Randolph?

3) Josh McRoberts’ Hair- Front view, back view. Excellent, Josh you bring honor to your clan. Assuming your clan is Amish, and not people who keep mirrors and grooming products in their house.

2) Ron Artest Throwing Away Trevor Ariza’s Shoe and Nailing a 3- Here is the video in case you missed it. Yes Ron-Ron, thank you, this goes down as one of the most brilliant moves in NBA history. What are the odds that Artest starts stepping on heels trying to dislodge shoes on a regular basis now? I mean this worked out so well, what’s stopping him? I can’t think of a single player in the league who would get in his face about it. Stern would have to get involved and create some hilariously asinine rule banning the dislodging and discarding of another player’s clothing. Keep it up Ron I’m itching to write another installment of Bringing the Crazy.

1) Stephen Jackson’s Face after learning he was traded to the Bobcats- I imagine it looked something like the face you make when someone farts in the car while you're driving home from the grocery store. As soon as the smell hits your nose your lips curl up and your brow furrows while you look around furiously searching for someone to blame. Finally your face relaxes and settles into a quizzical expression while you contemplate whether the stench will spoil the milk. Yeah, Cap’t Jack and Larry Brown, I’m sure they’ll get along just great. I bet playing with Boris Diaw will be just as much fun as playing with LeBron would be. As a Celtics fan I feel like I owe Danny Ferry a “thank you” card for not pulling the trigger on this.

-Jesse

The Reggie Miller All-Stars

Lists! Everyone loves lists! The roster of the Reggie Miller All-Stars is composed of the 9 players who I personally find to be the most annoying players in the game. What does it take to tickle my irrational hate bone? Well, it could be anything; flopping, complaining, lack of hustle, annoying facial tics, or maybe I just don’t like their face. Who knows, the point is I won’t be able to sleep until these players are given the comeuppance that only my sweet Internet justice can supply. Please note that coming off the bench for the RMAS doesn’t make you any less annoying, it just means you’re also not a very good player.

Power Forward: Rasheed Wallace- There is still something about watching Sheed argue with refs that makes me want to scream, “enough all ready we get it.” The fact that he’s usually right can only go so far to mitigate his annoying outbursts, put your hands down Sheed, and close you enormous mouth, the refs aren’t getting any better. Plus he has pointy teeth.

Center: Shaquille O’Neal- Everyone has now officially noticed that Shaq is a terrible basketball player, right? Being a huge celebrity doesn’t win NBA championships, yet somehow Shaq going to the Cavs still lands him on the cover of Sports Illustrated. The guy is a backup center at best. Also can we just stop talking about how Shaq wants to be cop? OMG can you imagine being pulled over by Shaq? LOL. Shut up.

Small Forward: James Posey- Watching James during the 2007-2008 Celtics run was both an exhilarating and frustrating experience. On one hand we had the clutch 3s and on the other hand we had the shameless flopping masquerading as shut down defense. Now that Posey has moved on to the Hornets I feel no such conflict. Posey’s patented move is the old “set the block to block screen, and then dive on the floor and yell as soon as I make contact with the defender.” Ughh.

Shooting Guard: Kobe Bryant- There are thousands of reasons why Kobe should make this list, but I’m going to choose just one. I hate, hate, hate watching an interview with Kobe because of the way he licks his lips after every sentence. If your lips are so dry go buy some freaking chapstick, just stop subjecting me to your annoying unconscious tics. I can’t be the only one who’s noticed this right?

Point Guard: Chris Paul- Did everyone who is in love with CP3 forget that he took a shot at Julius Hodge’s baby maker while the two were in the ACC? Sure Paul is a great player, but he’s also a flopper and a cheap shot artist. His patented move in the league has been to blow by his defender off the dribble, then slow down in front of them, and flop when the defender runs into his back. Plus as my friend Bill recently pointed out he looks exactly like a skinny Carlton Banks.

Bench: Joakim Noah- I just want to hold Joakim down and shave his head. How could the son of a professional tennis player and model turn out so screwy? Also there is the whole playing up to crowds on the road and swinging at cheerleaders thing.

Bench: Sasha Vujacic- At least Sasha finally got a haircut but this flopping, complaining, shoulder shrugging ninny is beyond frustrating to watch. Ray Allen lighting him on fire during the 2008 NBA Finals was one of the most satisfying moments of my basketball fandom.

Bench: Reggie Evans- Our second testicle related player! Trying to castrate Chris Kaman is enough to make this list for the rest of your life. I have nothing else to say.

Bench: Brad Miller- Miller’s face just drives me crazy. He plays the entire game with a look that is half incredulous and half holding back tears. Brad also has the stupidest tattoos in the entire league. And-1 indeed Brad.

-Jesse

A Collection of Random Observations From Opening Night in the NBA

Now in convenient bullet form!

• Manu Ginobli's head now reflects light with more radiance than the moon.
• Umm, the Magic are really freaking good. Even with Rashard Lewis suspended for the start of the season Orlando is legitimately 10 deep, no seriously they are. Brandon Bass, Jason Williams, Marcin Gortat, J.J. Reddick, and Matt Barnes all came off the pine last night. Once Lewis is back you can add Ryan Anderson to that group. The Magic's bench could be the 8th seed in the East.
• It only took 2 games for the Celtics to become bored with the regular season.
• Someone (Chris Mullin) needs to fire Don Nelson immediately, he has two of the most exciting young scorers in the NBA, and he's decided to bring them off the bench. The Anthonies (Morrow and Randolph) both absolutely set the Summer League on fire and need to start and play 40 minutes a night. Sit down Cap't Jack and Turiaf and allow the kids to shoot you in and out of every game. The Warriors aren't making the playoffs either way, they might as well trot out the most explosive offensive lineup they have and keep the fans entertained.
• Shaq's plus/minus rating against the Raptors last night in 25 minutes on the floor was -25. Teams with a pick and pop big man like Andrea Bargnani are going to kill the Cavs all year.
• With all the talent consolidated at the top of the East this year, LeBron going 1 on 5 every possession isn't going to win Cleveland a championship. The clock has now started on Mike Brown's career.
• Rasheed Wallace has now officially entered the old man "F U" mode of his career. Through two games Sheed has attempted 17 field goals, 14 of which have been 3-pointers. He's like that old guy who still plays men's league but is too old and lazy to do anything but drift around the perimeter and chuck up 3s. Anyone who thinks he is somehow a suitable replacement in the event that KG's knees fail him again is crazy. Sheed is past the point where he can be counted on as a starter on a championship contender.
• NBA refs are back! Ughh.

-Jesse

A Quick Note on the NBA Ref Strike

In the entire history of organized labor has there ever been an organization with less bargaining power than the NBA referee union? Last night as I watched the Jazz and Bulls playing a preseason game in London, I was struck by the fluidity of a game that wasn’t bogged down by constant whistles. The new refs were letting touch fouls, and a lot of body-to-body contact go, essentially forcing players to earn their buckets, instead of promoting flopping, acting and complaining like their whistle happy predecessors. The level of competence displayed by most NBA refs in the past few years has hovered somewhere between what you should expect in a JV girls game and the over 40 league at your local YMCA. Minimum wage would be too much to pay these guys.

On-court deficiencies aside, the old guard of NBA refs have also been marred by the Tim Donaghy scandal, Joey Crawford’s Tim Duncan outburst, and Dick Bavetta’s kissing bandit routine. Listen Dick, just because we let Isiah and Magic get away with this routine for so long, doesn’t mean I want to spend an entire All-Star weekend watching you awkwardly try to wrap your crusty old man lips around everyone within arm’s reach. Plus how does a "professional" referee lose a foot race to Chuck? But seriously the NBA’s on-court product has often compromised by their official’s incompetence. This strike is a chance to wipe the slate/roster clean and start fresh.

-Jesse

Bringing the Crazy Volume I: DeShawn Stevenson

In what will undoubtedly become a running feature on this site, “Bringing the Crazy” will examine a player or coach who’s doing all he can to publicly bring to shame his family. Today we’ll see how this off-season has treated DeShawn Stevenson. You may know Stevenson as the average shooting guard on the Wizards with a penchant for bad facial hair and doing that John Cena “You Can’t See Me” hand over the face every time he lucks into a good play.

Now dear reader, you might wonder what a man who once pled no contest to statutory rape could have done this off season to be worthy of such recognition. Two words my friend, facial tattoos. Ever since Mike Tyson introduced the world to the next level of insanity, bad facial tattoos have represented the holy grail of crazy. This off-season Stevenson took that leap in a big way.

From the Washington Times:

Stevenson is again sporting his beard, but vows to "keep it clean for the Wizards." He had a close cut, but had a rat-tail. He also is sporting new ink. On his right temple, along his hairline is etched LONDYN, his 1-year-old son's name. On his left cheek bone is inked the Pitsburgh Pirate's 'P', "for the Pittsburgh, that's my favorite team. Barry Bonds, when he first started." The thing about the P is, however, that it's backwards and looks more like a 9. DeShawn tried to explain, "No, if you're standing where Dom's standing and looking at me, it looks like a P." Dominic McGuire was standing directly in front of him about 10 yards away, but it still looked like a 9. I think DeShawn meant to say, "when I look in the mirror it looks like a P." The final new tat is a crack on the left side of Stevenson's forehead. He said it's because "I don't crack. I feel like people always try to break me, but I don't crack. So, I put that there."

The rat-tail alone would have been enough to announce to the world that you aren’t operating with a full deck, but a backwards P, his son’s name along his scalp and the crack in his head? Are you kidding me? That’s fantastic. What’re the odds that DeShawn never figured out that images in a mirror are reversed? Has Vegas taken that off the board yet?

DeShawn is right about one thing though, he doesn’t crack. Cracking would be too easy, you can fix cracks, cracking is for quitters. Forget cracking, if you’re going to break you might as well go for broke and split completely in half. Kudos DeShawn, the bar for crazy has been set. Who’s willing to step up? Steven Jackson the ball is in your court. How will you respond?

-Jesse

Tweet, Tweet Part II

Back at the end of June I penned a blog entry wondering why more professional athletes didn’t have someone to manage their Twitter accounts for them? With the amount of embarrassing revelations, and lack of grammar springing forth every day from Twitter it seemed like a no-brainer for busy athletes to employ a ghost-writer amongst their entourage. Apparently Nate Robinson saw my blog and took this advice to heart, or at least his lawyers did.

Nate is one of the great serial tweeters(twats?) in professional sports. Followers of nate_robinson get everything from real time updates of the score in his game of Madden, to promotion for his basketball camp, all floating in a haze on incomprehensible Internet speak. Recently Nate got in trouble with the NYPD for driving with a suspended license, and used his Twitter account to apologize to his fans, family and organization, while also thanking the officer who arrested him. However after a quick comparison of the syntax used in the apology posts with Nate’s normal Twitter fare it is painfully obvious that the apology was penned by an intern at Robinson’s lawyer’s office. This is disgraceful. I can’t believe Nate is paying these people $350 an hour to make him look less than genuine in his public apologies. Therefore being the enterprising young man that I am, I’m going to throw my hat in the ring and apply to be Vice President In Charge of Fake Online Apologies at Nate Robinson, Inc. I consider myself an expert on all things Internet (I have a blog, they don’t just give those things out to anyone) and am well versed in the lingo kids are throwing around these days. In addition to a cover letter, resume, and references (all impeccable,) I plan on submitting this writing sample based on how I would have made Mr. Robinson seem more authentic.

Actual Apology Post # 1:

I apologize to the Knicks, my family and fans.

8:14 PM Aug 18th from web

My Version:

I serry 2 evry1, fer realz.

8:14 PM Aug 18th from web

Actual Apology Post #2:

I promise to get this all cleared up.

8:15 PM Aug 18th from web

My Version:

shake n bake baby, i bet dhowerd dont need no licenz. ;) lolz

8:15 PM Aug 18th from web

Actual Apology Post #3:

Well lessonlearned pay all tix tweetpeople aight Shot out to my boy twill ves and dhud, stood by my side the whole time!!

9:11 PM Aug 18th from UberTwitter

My Version:

Well, no actually it looks like Nate was back at the helm on that one.

As you can plainly see my skills are sorely needed in the Robinson camp. Wish me luck.

-Jesse

The NBA and the Economy Volume III

Well two columns in a week sure didn’t last long. Anyway getting back at it, today I’ll look at two small market teams with very different ideas on what it means to be an NBA franchise.

The San Antonio Spurs

Off-Season Moves- The Spurs did some serious moving and shaking this off-season, and have reloaded for the last few years of Tim Duncan’s prime. Their biggest splash was rescuing Richard Jefferson from oblivion, but the Spurs also picked up Theo Ratliff, Antonio McDyess, and drafted Dejuan Blair to shore up the frontcourt. San Antonio has pushed all their chips into the middle of the table for next year, and committed over $80 million to their payroll for next season while maintaining some significant flexibility for the summer of 2010 when it drops down around to the $55 million range.

Projected Lineup

PG- Tony Parker

SG- Roger Mason

SF- Richard Jefferson

PF- Tim Duncan

C- Theo Ratliff

Bench- Manu Ginobli, McDyess, Blair, George Hill

What This Means For The Fans- The Spurs have tons of options for mixing and matching their lineups. They can go small with T.D. at center, Parker and Ginobli in the backcourt with Mason and Jefferson on the wings. Or they can go big and hammer teams on the boards with Blair, McDyess and Ratliff. Either ways Spurs fans are going to be treated to a competitive and deep team. The biggest problem for the Spurs has always been injuries, if they have their big 3 healthy, they win, a lot, if they only have a big 2, they struggle. Jefferson solves this problem by adding an insurance policy for the inevitable Ginobli or Parker injury.

Manu comes off the books this year along with most of their role players like Mike Finley and NH’s own Matt Bonner. Which means that the small market Spurs should be able to continue to compete with the big boys out West, and have the option of retooling next summer to find new running mates for Duncan.

Verdict- It’s refreshing to see a small market team understand the window they have and aggressively pursue a championship. After the disappointment of the last two seasons it would have been easy for the Spurs to slash payroll and trade off Manu and Mr. Longoria, wasting the last few years of Duncan’s career. Instead they took on payroll in a tough economy and served notice to the rest of the League that come June they’ll be in contention.

The Milwaukee Bucks

Off-Season Moves- The Bucks have been losing players left and right this summer. Villanueva took off for the Bulls, and Jefferson went to the Spurs. Other than that there really isn’t much to discuss, they drafted Brandon Jennings, and signed Hakim Warrick. Does that excite anyone? They also picked up Jodie Meeks in the 2^nd round.

Projected Lineup

PG- Luke Ridnour

SG- Michael Redd

SF- Joe Alexander

PF- Amir Johnson

C- Andrew Bogut

Bench- Luc Mbah a Moute, Brandon Jennings, Jody Meeks

What This Means For The Fans- Why would anyone watch this team? They aren’t going anywhere this year, and probably won’t be players in the free agent market next year. I mean its Milwaukee. Like the rest of the country I have never seen Jennings play, but statistically he struggled mightily in Europe last year. The Jody Meeks pick was a steal in the 2^nd round, but his upside is the 6^th or 7^th guy on a good team. I just don’t understand what the Bucks’ philosophy is. Bogut isn’t really the type of player you build around, and Redd hasn’t been healthy in years. Villanueva was a nice piece for them last year, and they had the right to make him a restricted agent this year. Instead they declined to tender him an offer and allowed the Bulls to sign him. Had they submitted an offer to Villanueva they could have lowered his price and potentially kept him, or worked out a sign-and-trade with Chicago. But that would have meant taking on payroll, a move the Bucks are clearly against. I don’t see the formation of any sort of plan to become competitive again. If Rick Pitino was the coach of this squad he would summarize the situation as follows. “GLEN ROBINSON IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR! SAM CASSELL IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR! RAY ALLEN IS NOT WALKING THROUGH THAT DOOR! THE ATTITUDE IN THIS TOWN SUCKS.”

Verdict- Bratwurst and alcohol in lethal quantities.

-Jesse