Defensive-minded swingman Jared Jeffries is now a New York Knick, after the Wizards declined to match Isiah’s $30 million offer and picked up DeShawn Stevenson instead. Not exactly what you’d call a silver bullet (6.1 points, 4.8 boards), and we almost definitely overpaid…still, it’ll be nice to have at least one player on the floor who plays D and doesn’t require the ball all the time.
Category: Sports
The Round Mound is Sound.
“The word conservative means discriminatory practically. It’s a form of political discrimination. What do the Republicans run on? Against gay marriage and for a war that makes no sense. A war that was based on faulty intelligence. That’s all they ever talk about. That and immigration. Another discriminatory argument for political gain.” Basketball legend Charles Barkley sets the story straight about his political affiliation: “I was a Republican – until they lost their minds.” (Via Now This.)
Arena’s Empty.
In soccer news, after an eight-year stint, Bruce Arena is out as coach of the national team. “Speculation will center on Jurgen Klinsmann, who coached the German national team to a third-place finish in this month’s World Cup. Klinsmann, who lives in California with his family, stepped down from the German post earlier this week, saying he felt, ‘burnt out.’” And, hey, Larry Brown is looking for work…
Viva Italia!
A belated congrats to Italy on winning the 2006 World Cup. I was rooting for France, and a PK shootout is a truly terrible way to choose the Cup champion, but — after headbuttgate and the Baggio mishap in 1994 — Italy seemed karmically due. At any rate, see y’all in 2010. And, now, alas, we’ve hit the sports dead zone until September…perhaps it’s time to give MLS another go, what with Red Bull United now on the pitch… Update: Zidane speaks.
Off the Charts.
For any sports gambling aficionados (or stock market junkies) out there who happen to venture by the site, a very good friend of mine from college has just started MLBcharts.com (although he also covers the NBA, NHL, NCAA, and soccer therein.) Basically, he’s been applying stock market valuation principles to sports gambling, with positive results (for him, anyway — a few March Madness games notwithstanding, I’ve been watching his success from afar.) At any rate, go check it out!
Dolan’s Land.
“He has one year, one season to do that. At this time next year Isiah will be with us if we can all sit here and say that this team has made significant progress towards its goal of eventually becoming an NBA champion. If we can’t say that, Isiah will not be here.” More post-Larry fallout: The Knicks’ freakshow owner, James Dolan, badmouths Brown and lays down the law with Isiah for next year.
Brownout.
At long last, it’s official: After a nightmare 23-59 season and several weeks of “dead man walking,” Hall of Famer Larry Brown has finally been fired from the Knicks. (In fact, the team isn’t even planning to pay out his contract, although Brown may be able to pay the bills in Charlotte in short order.) Worse still, in his place the team’s woefully inept owner, James Dolan, has — Oh No! — put the even more woefully inept GM, Isiah Thomas, in charge of the bench. Ok, Larry clearly wasn’t meshing with the ghastly hydra-headed line-up of shoot-first, one-dimensional, no-d-playing guards Thomas has constructed…still, I have to think we were probably a better team with him at the Garden. And with Isaiah in charge now, hoo boy. It’s gonna get ugly at MSG next year.
The Win Done Ghana.
Well, that’s that, then. Ghana knocks the US out of the Cup with a 2-1 victory that may have hinged partly on a questionable PK. (Being in research mode, I didn’t see the game — Still, it seems like a lot of the games this Cup have swung on bad calls, and we needed a win, not a tie, regardless.) Oh well, there’s always 2010, I guess. At any rate, congrats to Ghana on getting through, and here’s hoping the Togo Sparrow Hawks can play spoiler to France tomorrow…
The Heat is Rising.
A hearty congrats to the Miami Heat on the completion of their forceful comeback over the flailing Dallas Mavericks last night. (Can you hear that? Somewhere, Kobe is seething.) A few years ago, at the height of the Knicks-Heat rivalry, I’d have hated to see this outfit win a championship. But these days, I have to admit, it’s kinda nice to aging stars Gary Payton and Alonzo Mourning (who had a monster Game 6) get rings, to say nothing of J-Dub, ‘Toine, and, of course, the league’s new #1 guy, Dwyane Wade. As for Dallas, it looks like they — and particularly Nowitzki — basically just lost their nerve. As their dive deepened after the Game 3 collapse, they all looked more and more stressed (Avery Johnson’s aggro coaching style probably didn’t help), and nobody ever stepped up thereafter to get ’em out of their tailspin. Still, don’t fret, Mr. Cuban: there’s always next year (In fact, it’s already begun: the Spurs just dumped Nesterovich to Toronto for cap room…) And, now, my full sports attention (research time notwithstanding) goes to the World Cup…
Czech yourself, soccer fans.
Ugh. And I thought Miami’s performance last night was bad: America’s hopes for this Cup pretty much wither away entirely after an egregious 3-0 loss to the Czech Republic this morning. The US now must beat — or maybe tie — Italy this Saturday to have any chance of moving on to the second round…It’s not looking good.