Link-O-Rama
FoxSports.com ran an article last week that carried one of the funniest headlines I've seen this year: "Vince Carter warns kids: Don't be like Kobe Bryant." Now, if Carter wanted to get into Bryant's off-court issues, he'd certainly be on the right track. However, the focus of the article is Carter's thoughts on Bryant's 81-point game, which means he's sticking strictly to on-court matters. And in that case, Carter should really shut the hell up before someone from Canada hunts him down and beats him to death with a Charlie Villanueva bobble-head doll.
You know how sometimes you see a person and think, "Geez, they've gotta be on some kind of drugs." Well, occasionally you're right.
A few readers e-mailed me an interesting article from the St. Paul Pioneer Press that ran the day before the Wolves' seven-player trade with the Celtics. Some of the highlights:
Whether it's a psychological ploy or a statement of the organization's thought process, Timberwolves coach Dwane Casey said Wednesday night the team isn't making any trades.
[...]
"Like I told the guys, I believe in those guys that are here," Casey said. "We're looking over our shoulders, seeing who's going to be here, who's not going to be here. This is us. It's not changing. Nobody else is coming into this locker room."
So yeah, either the front office keeps Dwane Casey completely out of the loop or he has absolutely no problem lying to reporters and/or his players. The former is probably a much bigger deal than the latter, I suppose.
In what has to be the least-surprising sports story in quite a while, former Wolves pain-in-the-ass Isaiah Rider made a court appearance last month to face kidnapping and battery charges. I was 10 years old when the Wolves drafted Rider out of UNLV, and he was my very first "favorite player." I not only had his jersey and saw him win the slam-dunk contest in person, I used to mimic his unique routine at the free throw line.
I've seen Rider referred to as one of the biggest wastes of talent in NBA history, but that's actually far from the truth. He was a huge jerk and his actions eventually led to an early retirement, but he still managed to score nearly 10,000 points while playing eight full seasons. And this has little to do with anything, but I've referred to Rider as "Isaiah Junior J.R. Rider" for at least the past five years, despite being the only person I've ever met who finds it even mildly amusing.
I'm not the world's biggest J.J. Redick fan, but I've got to admit that his boxscore line from Duke's win over Virginia last week is one of the most impressive I've ever seen:
MIN FGM-A FTM-A PTS
J.J. Redick 34 11-13 10-11 40
Forty points on 13 shots is pretty ridiculous.
Denny Neagle was a good pitcher, but he's remarkably horrible at picking out prostitutes.
I fail to see how anything could ever be better than this clip.
A recent poll found that "more guys want Jessica Alba for their girlfriend than any other woman." Not surprising considering her long reign as the Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com, and I'm actually proud to say that I was one of the first people to get onboard the Alba bandwagon. Of course, it doesn't exactly take an amazing eye for talent to spot someone who looks like this.
Last week Buck Harvey of the San Antonio Express-News tackled a subject I've been harping on for a while now, writing that it's unfair to compare Kevin Garnett to Tim Duncan as long as Duncan's teammates are so much better. It's a good article, and especially interesting coming from Duncan's hometown newspaper.
The man behind Dead Spin, Will Leitch, was recently featured in the New York Times. That's pretty cool, although sadly he couldn't avoid being put into the typical "dorky guy on a laptop" pose for the picture accompanying the article. Has there been a blogger featured in a newspaper, anywhere, who avoided that pose?
Former NBA bench-warmer and current ESPN.com columnist Paul Shirley has had his blog turned into a Fox television pilot. That means there's still hope for The Incredibly Boring Life of Gleeman, Tuesdays at seven on NBC.
Fellow THT writer Maury Brown recently started up a blog covering the business of baseball. There's some really interesting stuff on it already, including links to his many interviews with guys like Chipper Jones, Rob Neyer, Fay Vincent, Marvin Miller, and Bob Costas. Stop by and say hello.
Not that anyone really cares, but here's my pick for the Super Bowl: Seattle 24, Pittsburgh 20.
