And what an absolute blessing for the Knickerbockers. What tremendous joy they must feel in knowing that their infectious plague wants to stay forever. Awesome.

“I want to be a Knick, I want to die a Knick. If I ever was to be cremated, I’d want my ashes sprinkled on top of the Garden. Playing here has always been my dream. I want to be in New York more than any place.

“I hope that every player on this team comes back next season. I honestly mean that. Every player. I think we have a great team. I think it will be so much different next year.”

Well, hell… lets make him the GM, too. Clearly, he’s got a handle on things. All that needs to happen in New York is for Starbury to go back to being Starbury, and for the entire overpaid, underproductive, poor attitude roster to return. That’s a recipe for success if I’ve ever heard one. You should all probably play in church shoes, blindfolded, and while being attacked by rabid pit bulls, as well. That’s the only possible thing that could improve that miraculous recipe.

My guess is that the immortal Starbury stays, and Larry Brown goes. And the Knicks will probably improve next year under a different coach. Not that Larry Brown isn’t a good coach, certainly, but if they’d have had no coach at all, they’d have had a better record this year. If any jack-ass went in there and said, “Hey, you know what, just run like hell and shoot the ball like crazy,” the Knicks would’ve had a better record… but no real chance at becoming anything. Larry Brown, on the other hand, tried to teach them things that this particular roster just isn’t capable of learning, and they spent the whole year confused. With that, at least there was a chance for legitimate growth and improvement, even if it would be rough in the beginning.

Anyway, conveniently enough for Starbury, he’s pretty much untradable. Even if they wanted to get rid of him, they probably couldn’t. Of course, he’ll choose to see it as, “They love me, and they believe in the power of Starbury,” much like he honestly believes that he’s the best point guard in the NBA.

Here’s Steelers WR Hines Ward, after being asked about his hectic off-season schedule:

“This is fun. I love the treatment. When you can walk in and see all the players from other teams, there’s nothing they can say to you. You’re on top that whole offseason. I’ve been all over, to L.A., to Vegas, to Miami and seen all the players from all over. Hey, Peyton Manning, I know you’re great and all, but you don’t have a ring. You can be all this, all world, but you don’t have a ring. I have a ring. There’s nothing you can say to me right now.”

Well, that seems a little harsh. I mean, sure, it’s true… and no enjoys a good shot at Peyton Manning more than I do. But that came out of nowhere… a completely unprovoked shot. That was just downright mean. Funny, certainly… but mean. Next, someone asked Hined Ward what he thought about the Steelers chances to repeat. Here’s how the rest of the interview went:

Reporter: Hines, what do you think about the Steelers chances to repeat?
Hines: Well, I think we’ve got the right core in place, and we have some good guys, and you know what? Fuck Dan Marino. That dumb, permed-up son of a bitch can shove his Isotoners right up his ass. I got this ring, BEYAAATCH.
Reporter: Um… I… well, okay. So, Hines, what else are you getting involved in this off-season?
Hines: Well, I’m going to take a little vacation, and then get back to work, hit the gym, and then I thought I’d fly down to Atlanta and smack Charles Barkley in his big fat mouth. He never won a ring. HINES WARD’S GOT A RING! LOOK AT MY RING! FUCK YOU IF YOU DON’T HAVE ONE!
Reporter: This is– Hines, I don’t know what– this just seems weird, man.
Hines: KARL MALONE CAN GO HELL. DO YOU HEAR ME? KARL MALONE CAN GO STRAIGHT TO HELL.

Dirk Nowitzki said after Game One that he wouldn’t be able to score more than 20 points against Bruce Bowen. So head coach Avery Johnson, sensing that his superstar was in need of a tampon change, pretty much wrote him out of the gameplan. He basically said, “Alright, fine, stick Bruce Bowen on Dirk Nowtizki, and we’ll forget about Dirk Nowitzki. You can win that one. But we’re going to put two or three other speedy little guys on the floor, and they’re going to attack the rim as violently and frequently as Reggie Evans at a gay orgy.” And it worked.

Dirk, though he was very efficient with his shooting, took just 11 shots. Josh Howard, Jason Terry, Devin Harris, and Jerry Stackhouse all took more shots than Dirk. Devin Harris in particular was outstanding… he’s going to be some kind of player, especially in that system. Dallas ran a lot of pick-and-rolls, a lot of pick-and-pops, some drive-and-kicks, and they really got whatever shot they wanted.

And the Spurs can be taken advantage of a little bit around the rim, especially if it gets Tim Duncan in foul trouble like it did tonight. Robert Horry is certainly not a rim-protector. Nazr Mohammed is not playing well. And Rasho Nesterovic is still, quite unfortunately, Rasho Nesterovic.

That’s the move that Avery Johnson made, so Gregg Popovich has got to come up with something now, something to keep the Mavs from getting to the rim so easily. And he’ll figure something out… great coaches and great teams adjust. There are major problems for the Spurs in this series, though. Manu Ginobili is not himself… he’s been playing like Vin Baker. Tony Parker’s banged up, Tim Duncan is banged up, and their bench is not that good.

The advantage has shifted to the Mavericks, without question. I’m not saying that the Spurs have to win Game Three, but they do have to show that they’ve figured some things out. And they’ve got to show that someone can help take the load off of Tim Duncan offensively… which is more difficult now that the Mavericks play some nice defense.

“We are all witnessin’ somethin’. We’re witnessin’ an asskickin’.”
- Charles Barkley

Not really a lot to say about this one. The one positive for the Cavs is that they were able to make the game somewhat close at the end, which will hopefully build a little confidence for them in Game Three. The other good news is that they’ve got a few days to rest, change up the gameplan, find different ways to get LeBron involved… The bad news is that none of that is going to matter, because they still have to play the Detroit Pistons, and they aren’t good enough to beat them.

Apparently, it was this:

Typical of their dysfunctional relationship was Marbury’s session with the media Thursday. He said that “Larry Brown made me a better man,” but then gave a “No comment” when asked if Brown was the right coach for the team.

Oh, that’s sweet. He makes you want to be a better man. I think he was trying to make you a better point guard, but that didn’t work out so well. I think Larry and Stephon should hop in Cuba Gooding Jr.’s convertible and drive Greg Kinnear to Baltimore and learn some life lessons along the way.

And I might as well mention, while I’m on the subject, that Larry Brown did indeed confirm that he’s coming back next year. Someone asked him if his health issues could cause him to leave New York, like they kinda/sorta/didn’t cause him to leave Detroit.

“I wasn’t in control of that,” he said of the Detroit situation. “I want to return here. I want to fulfill my contract and I want to stay involved as long as they’ll have me.”

Not to nitpick, Larry, but you could’ve been in control of that last year. At the end of the season, it was, “Hey, I wanna come back, but who knows if my health will let me?” which left the Pistons in a situation where there options were to wait around for a decision, letting every decent coaching candidate get hired somewhere else, and just pray that you decided to return, or to let you walk and find someone who could actually commit to the job. This year, it’s “Hey, I’m coming back! I’m coming back!” I just wanted to note the differences.

News has surfaced today that the Knicks have taken out an insurance policy on Larry Brown’s contract, should health issues force him to quit. This means, of course, that on your chalkboard at home, under the column labeled “Smart Things Isiah Thomas Has Done,” you can mark a one.

A friend asked me yesterday if I thought that Larry’s recent health crisis was the beginning of the end of his time in New York. I said, perhaps naively, that no, I didn’t think he was quitting. For some reason, I can’t shake this fondness I have for Larry Brown. Maybe it’s because I just think so much of him as a coach, that I let it cloud my judgement elsewhere… but I don’t think he’s quitting in New York. I think it’s important to him to see it out, and not leave the franchise in the state it is right now.

And I’m going to go ahead and predict right now that the Knicks will make the playoffs next year. And the thing about that that makes me uncomfortable is not the amount of faith I have to have in Larry Brown, but the faith I have to have in Isiah Thomas. I have zero faith in Stephon Marbury, of course, but that should be fine… because he has to go, right? I mean, he has to. No decision in sports has ever been more clear.

If he isn’t moved or dropped or cut or somehow otherwise removed from the Knicks roster this off-season, it’s about the equivalent of a patient saying to a doctor, “Oh, what’s that? I have cancer, and it’s life threatening? Fuck, that’s terrible. Wait, but it’s treatable, and you can remove it right now? Hm. Ah, you know what? Fuck it. Let’s leave it there. I wanna take my chances with it.”

And I really believe that would be enough to vastly improve the Knicks and push them into contention for a playoff spot. It’s not just that he doesn’t get it on the court, it’s the attitude he brings, the distraction, the drama, plus the fact that his teammates seem to all kinda hate him, too… the Knicks can’t move on until they drop him.

Don’t worry about getting value for him in a trade, don’t worry about getting 50 cents on the dollar… 3 or 4 cents would be fine. A 3rd round draft pick would do. He just has to fucking go… even if you have to outright cut him. No one should have to explain this to Isiah Thomas.

I’m not saying Marbury is solely responsible for the Knicks on-court problems this year… just like 96% of it. I’ll give 2% to Eddy Curry’s work ethic, 1.5% to the inexperience of Channing Frye, and .5% to Steve Francis, just for being there.

Anyway… you know, when I started this post, I had no intention of even mentioning Stephon Marbury. I just wanted to say that I think Larry Brown will be back, and that yes, I think he is the right coach to improve the Knicks. But that’s how strongly I feel that the guy is a complete dickwad. My fingers typed this words, completely independent of my brain. It was involuntary. You’d be surprised at how often that happens. Anyway, yeah… I think Larry Brown will be back.

I’m a couple days late on this, but I did want to mention Roger Clemens’ unusual pregame habit of smearing Icy Hot on his junk. If you missed it, The Rocket amazed his Team USA teammates by slathering Icy Hot on his upper thighs and all over his manbag before starting. He says he doesn’t like to get comfortable on the mound.

And that’s a pretty good way to accomplish discomfort. Now, for those of you who have never had Icy Hot or a similar substance on your genitals, and you heard about what Clemens did and you thought, “That’s gotta be uncomfortable,” you have no idea. You really have no idea.

Once, through a set of odd circumstances that I’ll spare you, I inadvertently rubbed some Bayer pain relieving cream south of the border and into surrounding areas. I think the Bayer cream and Icy Hot have the same active ingredient, but I’m pretty sure that the Bayer is significantly stronger. I might be wrong about that. I know that Bayer is the strongest one I’ve ever tried.

Anyway, at first, it burned as you’d expect it to. Then, the burn began to intensify and I started to realize just how sensitive the skin is on certain parts of the body. A minute later, I was thinking, “Jesus, this is intense.” A minute later, it was, “Alright, this is not motherfucking normal.” Another minute, and it feels like someone is extinguishing a cigar on my taint and I’m wondering if I’ll ever get an erection again. And a minute later, I’ve got the affected area uncovered and exposed to air, and I’m fanning it and praying out loud. A minute after that, I’m thinking that the cream may have done some permanent damage and a visit to the emergency room is not out of the question.

So yeah… Roger Clemens is a crazy Texan fuck. And while doing some research for this post, I found that there are apparently people out there, more than just a couple of them, who at various times have thought it would be a good idea to jerk off with Icy Hot. There are tales here, and here. I had no idea this was so prevalant.

Hello everyone. I’m MJD. Perhaps you remember me.

Anyway, sorry for the hiatus. I have been, as you may have guessed, ball-deep in a college basketball orgy. It’s about all I’ve done over the past three days. And if I’ve learned one thing, it’s this: I am tired of hearing about your fucking bracket.

You are not the first person to ever fill one out.  You are not special or unique.  My enjoyment of this sporting event does not hinge on how many first round matchups you won or lost.
I just don’t care. I find it despicable that you’re rooting for a 3-seed over 14-seed because you’ve got the 3-seed winning it all. The tournament is about upsets, it’s about fun, it’s about great basketball and contrasting styles and David kicking Goliath in his steroid-shrunken balls… and it irks me to no end that people will root against historic upsets because of a tournament pool that they’re not going to win anyway. I’m sure there are those of you who feel differently.

Of course, I’m on Deadspin this weekend, and I’ll be back with you here on Monday… I hope you’re enjoying the tournament.

You know, it probably wasn’t easy for Louis DiTrapano. He was probably sitting around one night, thinking to himself, “Hm. What could I do to help improve my client Randy Moss’s image? I wish there was a way that I could contrast his behavior with someone else’s, so people would see that he’s not a bad guy.”

And then it hit him. He would get arrested with his wife for possession of crack.

That’s what happened yesterday in St. Petersburg, Florida. DiTrapano, his wife, and three other people were arrested at a hotel for possession of the rock after someone complained about a disturbance. Officers report finding evidence of crack in the rooms “and on DiTrapano’s person.”

That’s not good. I mean, there are a lot of agents out there to choose from. It seems like you could find one who isn’t a crackhead. Drew Rosenhaus, for all of his faults, probably does not smoke his breakfast. Master P, despite negotiating the worst contract in the history of sports, does not list crack among his favorite food groups. It just seems like there were better choices to be made here.

Anyway… I’m trying not to presume guilt. The three people he was arrested with have long drug histories, maybe it was all theirs. Or maybe Randy Moss hired Tyrone Biggums to be his agent. Best of luck to all involved.

Chest pound to the sancarloskid of The Sports Frog’s Swamp, the finest message board of its kind.

Order some turquoise pants with a disproportionately large ass… Daunte Culpepper is now a Dolphin. The Fish have decided to give up a 2nd round pick for Culpepper after they couldn’t come to terms with Drew Brees.

I know I’ve been critical of Culpepper, but I really think this is going to work for the Fish. Daunte is reunited with Scott Linehan, his offensive coordinator for Minnesota when Culpepper was putting up huge numbers. I don’t know what they tried to do with him in Minnesota last year, but it didn’t work… he needs to get back to the old style. He’ll have a passable Randy Moss impersonator at WR in Chris Chambers… and the Dolphins could still be one of the teams to take a chance on Terrell Owens.

And now, it looks like Drew Brees is going to be Saintly… and hey, I wish him the best. I’ve liked Drew Brees since the Chargers drafted him. He works as hard as anyone in the league, he’s a good leader, and he’s a competitor. I’ll miss him, I’ll miss that weird birthmark, and I wish the Chargers would have kept him. I sound very gay.

But I just don’t see this working out well for him. I mean, he’s getting his money, so that’s good for him, but… it’s hard to see the Saints being a great team anytime soon. I could be wrong… if McAllister’s healthy, they’ve got good receivers, they can draft defense now (or trade down and acquire more picks), so the pieces are in place. But the whole situation still feels unstable. I was behind the Saints last year, and I will be even moreso now, but… I dunno. It just doesn’t seem like an ideal situation for free agents. I hope I’m wrong.

And there are rumblings that Drew’s shoulder was not as close to healthy as Team Brees would have you believe. Some say he might not even play this year… and the Saints just gave him a ton of guaranteed money. We’ll see.

A family in a remote corner of Turkey walks on all fours. They do so not by choice, but naturally… they can stand up for short periods of time, but their natural condition is to walk on the feet and with their palms. Scientists believe that whatever’s going on there can provide a previously unknown insight into human evolution.

What’s this have to do with sports? Probably nothing. But I was thinking - and I know this makes me a terrible person - that they’d make tremendous defensive linemen. Low center-of-gravity… and since they’ve been doing it all their lives, they’re probably much quicker and shiftier in a four-point stance than most traditional human beings. Let’s get them into the weight room and see what Mel Kiper thinks. Forget about their insight into human evolution… let’s get their insight on collapsing the pocket. The dude in front in the red looks unblockable.

MLB apparently has itself confused with GNC. The league and the players association have hired a company to certify that certain products are clean, and then the teams will be selling those supplements themselves to the players.

This is like the parents that think they’re really hip, so they buy their kids a case of beer so they drink safely at home, and not out at some party. Ultimately, I don’t see how this helps a whole lot. Why not just publish a list of things that are safe? If a guy tests positive now, he can say, “Hey, I just use what MLB sells me,” and it calls the whole thing into question.

And if they do say that certain supplements are safe and fine… what’s that tell the little leaguers out there? “Hey, Daddy, Bud Selig says it’s cool to use Mass Stack, so I’m going to need a few of those before my next at-bat, okay?” I dunno. It seems very weird to me. I don’t see a lot of positives here for MLB.

Well, not just yet. Just as I started to write this, and this is a beautiful coincidence, Stephen A. Smith just appeared on my television talking about how Quentin Richardson had to be physically restrained from beating the hell out of Stephon Marbury the other day. Let’s just quote Stephen A.:

Right or wrong, I don’t know what has happened, I’m not blaming Stephon Marbury for anything, but I can tell you since I have spoken personally to several Knicks inside the locker room: nobody likes him. Not his teammates. They cannot stand Stephon Marbury. And I don’t know how that happened, I don’t know what transpired, but I’ll tell you this: Q Richardson had to be restrained a few weeks ago because he refused to leave practice facilities unless he had the opportunity to put his hands on Stephon Marbury, and his sister had to call him and make him leave so he would not do physical harm to Stephon Marbury. That’s how bad it has gotten in New York City.

That’s awesome. Quentin Richardson just went up a few notches in my book, although I don’t really like his sister.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand… Larry Brown is an excellent coach. One of the best who’s ever lived. It seems like a popular time to bash him right now, since the Knicks are terrible and the 2004 Olympics have been a topic of conversation. But I just want to say that Larry Brown can still be a great coach and not have been the right guy for either of those situations.

If you want someone to take a group of guys and do all he can for them in the short term, in terms of devising a strategy, maximizing talents, putting guys in the best possible situation, and getting the most out of a situation in the short term… Larry Brown is not your guy. That’s not what he does. With Larry, it’s almost a get-worse-before-you-get-better situation, because he’s going to break you down, make you unlearn a lot of things, and get you to play basketball the way he wants it to be played… regardless of what you’ve done in the past.

He’s a teacher. In his mind, there is one right way to play basketball, and he’s going to teach it, no matter if that takes 2 months or two years. And with the roster that the Knicks have assembled, 2 years is a conservative estimate. You couldn’t put together a group of guys who are more poorly-suited to play for Larry Brown if you fucking tried.

And Stephon Marbury and Steve Francis are not the end of the problem. The Knicks frontcourt is just as troubled as the backcourt. Channing Frye has an excuse… he’s a rookie. He can score, and he’ll pull down a few boards, but at just about everything else… he is terrible. Defense, passing, all the little things… atrocious. He’s a talented guy and he’ll learn. Eddy Curry is just… there. He’s got the physical talent of Moses Malone, but the drive and ambition of Brad Pitt’s character in True Romance. For right now, the Knicks two best frontcourt players are Malik Rose and Maurice Taylor.

The thing is… all these guys, if they played under Larry Brown for two years, would be far better basketball players at the end of it. But it takes time to break down selfish attitudes, teach fundamental things, and install a system… particularly with today’s player, those things aren’t done overnight.

I guess my point is just that Larry Brown is a great coach. There have been a lot of little shots taken at him recently, and believe me, I find the New York Knicks situation as amusing as anyone else does, but I don’t think the shots are fair. He’s been perhaps ill-suited for situations that he’s been in recently, but still beyond reproach as a basketball teacher.

ESPN.com’s Chris Sheridan has compiled a list of guys who he can confirm have been invited to Team USA’s training camp. There are 22 players on the list, with three more to be added later (likely J.J. Redick, Adam Morrison, and Greg Oden).

The list looks a lot like the list from any other Olympic NBA team anyone else has put together, except it has Shane Battier, Bruce Bowen, Josh Howard and Luke Ridnour. I guess all that talk about changing the way the team is going to be built was just that - talk. Adding two roleplayers does not a sweeping change in philosophy make.

So the approach to player selection appears to be nearly identical to past efforts. If the approach to practice time and team cohesiveness is also the same, we will not win gold. I really think the problems here are bigger and deeper than anyone involved with the team seems to grasp. We didn’t fail because we picked the wrong group of NBA players. We failed because we took a group of guys who didn’t have enough time together to actually become a team, and even if hey had, still wouldn’t have been ready to score against and defend the vastly differen international style of play.

I hate getting into this, because I have to fight like hell to stop myself from just blathering about 10,000 words on the subject. I’m stopping here. If we do end up winning gold, it will be because either 1) Shaq decided to play, or 2) Mike Krzyzewski is a great coach and leaned heavily on assistant coach Mike D’Antoni.

Okay, I changed my mind, I’m not stopping there. Just one more quick thing… leaving Allen Iverson off the invite list is flat-out wrong. He gets labeled as someone who plays selfishly, and that’s certainly fair, considering his work with the 76ers. But he does not play selfishly in international competition, he is a good passer when he has that mindset, and he’s one of the few guys who has always wanted to be a part of Team USA. If Team USA is still going the NBA route, Allen Iverson should absolutely be a part of it.

There’s got to be more than this than we know. That’s what it has to be. I have heard rumors that the Knicks would flip Steve Francis as soon as today, and I’m thinking that has to be the case. I don’t even think Isiah Thomas is foolish enough to believe that a starting backcourt of Steve Francis and Stephon Marbury is a good idea.

So either Francis going to be shipped somewhere else by this afternoon, or they’re going to move him the summer as part of a larger package… I don’t know. What I’m doing here is not giving Isiah Thomas the benefit of the doubt. What I’m doing is refusing to believe that any one human being is that fucking ignorant. It’s a basic faith in humanity. I have to believe that no one could possibly think that playing Stephon Marbury and Steve Francis together is a viable, long-term solution for a basketball team. If I can’t believe that, then I’m not sure I want to be a part of humanity any longer.

And hey, don’t get me wrong… in the short term, the Knicks actually might get a little better. They will have more talent on the floor, and they can potentially become more difficult to guard. If they don’t pawn Francis off on someone else today, it will probably result in a few more wins for them. But they’re still not making the playoffs, and there’s still no nope of building a team around the pieces they have in place right now.

As for the Magic… this is brilliance. If, in five years, the Magic aren’t one of the league’s best teams, that probably means they hired Isiah Thomas as their general manager. In 5 years, Dwight Howard is likely to be one of the best 2 big men in the game. Jameer Nelson will be an excellent guard. And if Darko Milicic and Fran Vaseuz turn into anything at all, the Magic should have a great core. Plus, Penny’s expiring contract sets them up to be well under the cap in the summer of 2007 when there should be some quality players available.

I’ve seen people looking at this trade as the Magic getting almost nothing in return for Tracy McGrady… and I guess that’s true, but what did they expect, that Steve Francis going to win them a title? Why look at it like that? Just accept that trading for Steve Francis was dumb, be glad that the Knicks exist as the corrector of all league contract mistakes, and look at the future. Orlando’s in a great position, and that’s more than most of the mediocre teams in the league can say.