Image by Steven M. Falk/Philadelphia Daily News/MCT
Andrew Bynum, Philadelphia's $16 million dollar center, has yet to play in an NBA game this season, though there are reports he will start running and shooting in the coming days. In (cautious) celebration, let us relive the entertaining saga of Philadelphia's bigfoot through these (mostly local) news headlines.
It was actually the L.A. Times that set the table in April, when then-Laker Bynum revealed he hoped to have the same German knee procedure Kobe Bryant received.
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August 10th: Undeterred by his mysterious health condition, the Sixers trade away star Andre Iguodala to build around Bynum.
Yahoo's Adrian Wojnarowski reports that the Sacramento Kings are on the verge of being sold to a Seattle-based ownership group, meaning that we could soon see the revival of the SuperSonics.
He also used the phrase “Muchie Peachie,” which apparently means “much appreciated.”
Earlier today Roger Clemens (and Barry Bonds, Mike Piazza, Craig Biggio, and many others) were not elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame as the Baseball Writers Association Of America continued their "stand" against players from the steroid era.
Richard Sherman had some choice words for the Redskins and their fans, and it ended with him getting some physical retribution.
This is Richard Sherman.
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A member of the Seattle Seahawks, Richard Sherman is quickly becoming known as 1) one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL and 2) one of its most prolific, vocal trash-talker/trolls. Earlier in the season, he launched a focused meme-attack at future Hall-of-Famer Tom Brady, and after last weekend's playoff win over the Washington Redskins, Trent Williams punched him in the face. Getting a guy, particularly a 300-plus-pound lineman, to punch you in the face is no small feat, so it begged the question: what did Sherman do?
Image by Dean Rutz/Seattle Times/MCT
Here's the punch. I mean, Williams really knocks him.
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In the live telecast, you can't tell what happened — just that Sherman got hit, and then he waved a mocking goodbye.
The Baseball Writers Association voted on the 2013 class for the HOF and elected…no one. And the Internet's leading Hall of Fame sketch artist wonders who they think they were sticking it to.
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Jeff Bagwell is a Hall of Famer by almost any standard. Despite playing most of his career in the pitcher-friendly Astrodome and being plagued by injuries, he logged 449 home runs, 1529 RBIs, and a .948 on-base plus slugging percentage (the 22nd-highest of all time). He's never been named in any PED reports or called to testify in any Congressional hearings or even had his name tossed around in a steroids discussion by anonymous sources.
Jeff Bagwell — the fourth-greatest first baseman of all time, according to the rankings of the legendary Bill James — didn't get into the Hall of Fame in either of his first two years of eligiblity. He didn't get in this year either.
No one did.
Why? Because many Hall of Fame voters have decided to ignore players from the 1990s, even those who've never been accused of PED use, or even to turn in completely blank ballots this year in protest of the entire steroids era. Their attitude is summed up by what sportswriter Jeff Pearlman wrote about Bagwell in a now-notorious column: that even if Bagwell "didn’t use [he] stood by and watched his sport morph into WWE nonsense." (Bear in mind here that there are more than a hundred Hall of Famers who "stood by" when black people were banned from playing baseball.)
Putting the problem on guys like Bagwell is a terrible solution to the (legitimately difficult) steroids conundrum — even if you accept the dubious premise that voting on individual players is an appropriate place to make a statement about a collective issue.
To understand why, consider the example of Bagwell's teammate, Craig Biggio, who's never been associated with steroids by anyone. He was never that kind of player. He hit home runs, but not at a crazy rate. He never got big. He was never injured, a frequent reason/excuse for using banned substances — he was on the DL once over his entire 19-year-career! He recorded 3,060 hits, joining the elite "3,000 club" — every eligible member of which is in Hall of Fame except for Rafael Palmeiro, who tested positive for steroids days after recording his 3,000th hit. Biggio was a seven-time All-Star, a four-time Gold Glove winner. He is the only player in the history of baseball with more than 3,000 hits, 600 doubles, 400 stolen bases, and 250 home runs. He is, unquestionably a Hall of Famer, and if he had been inducted this year, he would have been the first player to go into the Hall as a Houston Astro.
Biggio got the most votes for the Hall of Fame this year, his first year of eligiblity, but still fell 39 votes short of the total he needed to get in. Whether he gets in next year remains a question mark with an unusually crowded field.
If your goal in voting for the Hall of Fame is to strike a blow against PEDs, what have you done by voting against Biggio? You've given steroids a win they don't deserve. Houston fans — and baseball fans — could have had the chance to celebrate the wonderful things about baseball this year. Even if we can't agree on everything yet, we could at least take the opportunity to agree on the merit of someone like Craig Biggio. Instead, in the absence of fresh inductees, we will spend Hall of Fame induction weekend pouting and sulking about what some guys did wrong 15 years ago. The writers' tantrum, allegedly thrown in the name of ideals, is depriving the fans who care about baseball the most — the geeks who get excited about things like Hall of Fame weekend — one of the few occasions to celebrate those ideals.
I can't pretend to be objective here: I have spent the last two years drawing every member of the Hall of Fame. I plan to be done with the project this year. I thought I'd have a player or two to add to my list, and that I might have the chance to actually draw the uniform of my own beloved Houston Astros. There was ample warning that Biggio might not make it this year, but I allowed myself to believe that the writers might cut the Houston baseball fan base a bit of a break. And according to the strange Hall of Fame phenomenon in which players get more votes the longer they've been retired, Bagwell and Biggio are actually both almost guaranteed entry at some point during their eligibility, which begs the question: what's going to have changed between now and then? Here's one thing: as Dave Cameron of Fangraphs pointed out on Twitter today, "there are aging Astros fans who are going to die before Craig Biggio and Jeff Bagwell get elected."
BBWAA members were supposedly sending a message with their votes this year. The message I got was that they are too bitter and proud of their own moral tenacity to celebrate baseball with the rest of us.
For the first time since 1996, nobody who was nominated got enough votes to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. So rather than write a story about nothing happening, the New York Times slapped three quarters of a page worth of negative space on the front of their sports section and went home.
Jamaal Franklin took the ball, bounced it off the backboard, and slammed it home, like a one-man wrecking crew.
Wednesday night, San Diego State was playing Fresno State in a D-I college basketball state. Whatever else happened is unimportant. All that matters is what's below.
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Jamaal Franklin threw this incredible alley-oop to himself in the flow of play, and unlike most instances of this — which are generally unnecessary and/or counterproductive showboating, a la JaVale McGee — Franklin's feat actually made sense. By tossing it off the backboard, he drew the defenders' attention away and cleared a path toward the hoop; because the pass was on target, he then easily slammed it home.
Here's video of the play. San Diego State won 65-62, and the dunk wasn't the only amazing part of Franklin's game: the junior guard went for 20 points, 18 rebounds, 5 assists, and 3 blocks.
Well, Victor Dukes — looks like you've got competition.
We're 66 days from Selection Sunday. These seven guys will remind you why March can't get here soon enough.
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Image by Mike Stobe / Getty Images
It's that time of the year: When college basketball turns to conference play. No more Tuesday night games versus state schools that aren't states (Kennesaw St., Jackson St., Alcorn St.). No more Thursday nights wishing that ESPN had something better to show than Memphis-Austin Peay.
No, this is it! Conference play! Duke-Carolina! Syracuse-Georgetown! Creighton-Wichita State! In this, the first true week of conference play, there is so much to be excited about. These seven gentlemen of college basketball deserve praise for being particularly badass.
Trey Burke is having himself a very, VERY good year of basketball. The Michigan guard is shooting 39.2% from 3-point range, and he's one of only 11 players in the game averaging more than 7 assists per night.
Also: He tends to make plays like this.
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This is him running full speed up court, then doing the Maverick-in-Top-Gun thing and letting the defender fly by.
The Los Angeles Lakers are in a bit of a tailspin, having lost five games in a row and six of the last seven. The immediate future isn't bright, with Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol out due to injuries. But fear not, Lakers fans! America is here to fix your team.
ESPN got the ball rolling on Twitter, realizing that if Vinny Del Negro can coach the best team in the NBA, average fans might have some good ideas on how to fix the Lakers.
With Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, and Peyton Manning getting off to unremarkable starts, the first half of the NFL season felt like a long-running hit show that had started to lose energy. But during the second half, those old characters were written right back into the script. The Packers and mustache-baron Aaron Rodgers returned to dominating inferior defenses, i.e. every defense; Tom Brady and the Patriots made no mistakes and lost no games, except for that one where they hosted San Francisco, which was the best episode of the season anyway; Peyton Manning played like the Peyton Manning from the Bible. Meanwhile, a few new characters, the Seahawks and Robert Griffin and Andrew Luck, arrived in a big way. It was all a great prologue for some very special episodes of The NFL Playoffs.
Previously On THE NFL PLAYOFFS
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If you're from Washington, D.C., the first week of the NFL playoffs were horrible, just horrible — like, "Drinking yourself to sleep and waking up Monday morning at 10:37 a.m." horrible. Perhaps due to concerns that he'd become overexposed too quickly, Griffin was written out of The Playoffs early and in emphatic fashion — he spent most of the game against the Seahawks limping, then went down in a garish and spectacular heap after a botched snap by his center. While wanting to make room for other characters is a reasonable motivation, I worry that the show's writers may have dismissed RGIII a little too completely — it could be hard for him to stage a convincing comeback next season.
Elsewhere, the quo was status. Adrian Peterson, unquestionably the season's biggest surprise and most likable character, wasn't enough to overcome the Packers. The Texans, probably the least engaging major subplot — basically the NFL's Kim Bauer Mountain Lion — lived to see another day, which is actually kind of all right, because if they hadn't it would mean we'd have to watch the Bengals, who are football's equivalent of a chalkboard. And the Ravens beat the Colts because the Colts, despite being the one heartwarming element of an otherwise dark and violent narrative, just aren't very good, and if they'd gone on another week it would have been just too implausible.
It was a decent episode overall, but I have higher hopes for this week.
Things in Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron's life were moving along pretty swell until this Monday, when ESPN commentator Brent Musburger made his girlfriend, Miss Alabama 2012 Katherine Webb, a national superstar. Webb now has more than 261,000 Twitter followers, has hordes of people searching "Katherine Webb hot" on Google, and may appear in this year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. To make matters worse, a user named "Creepy M" has created an official White House petition to have AJ McCarron deported " Brent Musberger can steal his girlfriend."
If you're unfamiliar with Whitehouse.gov petitions, it's an extension of your first amendment rights as an American. If enough people (25,000) sign a petition over a set period, the petition will be reviewed by White House staff. So far there's only five signatures, but if 24,995 more people sign on, people in Washington will have to discuss the possible deportation of AJ McCarron (which, by law, is impossible given that McCarron is a United States citizen) and issue an official response. Why can't AJ have someone nice in his life, America? Hasn't he earned that?
Memphis Grizzlies star Zach Randolph is one of the NBA's best big men, but that doesn't mean he's above being terrified as he revealed in an interview with ESPN.
New York Knicks swingman J.R. Smith likes to interact with his sizable Twitter following. Unfortunately, this often leads to behavior the Knicks would likely rather not see from J.R. Smith, like the time he tweeted out a photo of semi-nude woman. Today he might have earned himself a Twitter timeout.
Smith first sent out this completely normal tweet.
"Pause" is basically equivalent to saying "no homo." It's meant to clear the air after something might be perceived as homosexual. Here's an example involving Spike Lee.
US Weekly have sources confirming that midway through Beyonce's half-time show Williams and Rowland will appear on-stage. The trio will perform a medley of their greatest hits, along with a new song "Nuclear," which is the first original song the trio has released in almost a decade.
The last time Destiny's Child reunited was in 2006. The trio will be releasing a compliation record of their best songs later in the year.
Did anyone really think Joe Alexander would be a good NBA player? Anyone?
2001: DeSagana Diop, 8th Overall
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OK, so: Diop's a true seven-footer who played at basketball factory Oak Hill. But he had no semblance of an offensive game — not even the kernel of one; it's not that hard to average 14 points a game when you're seven feet tall in high school — and though Diop's put together a career as a pro, he's never been more than a defensive specialist. He's certainly not an offensive specialist — the most points per game he's ever scored in a season was 3.0, in 2007-08. He also did this.
Players who were drafted after Diop: Joe Johnson Richard Jefferson Troy Murphy Zach Randolph Brendan Haywood Gerald Wallace Samuel Dalembert Jamaal Tinsley Tony Parker Gilbert Arenas
Image by Chuck Burton / AP
2002: Nickoloz Tskitishvili, 5th Overall
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Georgian seven-footer Nickoloz Tskitishvili was drafted sixth-overall despite averaging only 6.6 points per game in the Italian league the year before the draft — not exactly a sign of future NBA greatness. Sure enough, the guy shot 30% from the field for his career. (Reminder: HE'S SEVEN FEET TALL.) That would be a terrible number for a volume-shooting guard; for a center, it's abysmal.
Players who were drafted after Diop: Nene Chris Wilcox Amar'e Stoudemire Caron Butler Jared Jeffries Tayshaun Prince John Salmons Roger Mason Carlos Boozer Matt Barnes Luis Scola
Image by Matt York / AP
2003: Darko Milicic, 2nd Overall
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Everyone knows the story of Darko Milicic, and it seems at first glance that maybe he doesn't belong on this list — people though Milicic would be good, right? Sort of. Even at the time, there were serious questions not only about Milicic's game, but also his motor and state of mind, and the latter two concerns especially proved to be millstones that he could never quite get rid of in the following decade. Milicic will forever be notable, though, for the sheer quality of players drafted after him, including Melo, Chris Bosh, and D-Wade, who at the time were all regarded as can't-miss superstars.
Players who were drafted after Diop: Carmelo Anthony Chris Bosh Dwyane Wade Chris Kaman Kirk Hinrich Mickael Pietrus Nick Collison Luke Ridnour David West Boris Diaw Carlos Delfino Kendrick Perkins Leandro Barbosa Josh Howard Jason Kapono Steve Blake Willie Green Zazu Pachulia Matt Bonner Mo Williams James Jones Kyle Korver
Image by Jessica Rinaldi / Reuters
2004: Luke Jackson, 10th Overall
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Despite having a remarkable college career, Jackson's game never seemed like it would translate well to the NBA — you can't be a spot-shooter as a pro unless you're a really great shooter, and Jackson's career average of .357 from three tells you all you need to know about a guy who can't create his own shot. He would only score 252 points over the course of seven seasons.
Players who were drafted after Diop: Andris Biedrins Sebastian Telfair Kris Humphries Al Jefferson Josh Smith JR Smith Dorell Wright Jameer Nelson Delonte West Tony Allen Kevin Martin Beno Udrih Anderson Varejao Chris Duhon Trevor Ariza
