20 Year NBA Head Coach of the Utah Jazz, Jerry Sloan is being inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame tonight alongside more worthy Michael Jordan, John Stockton and David Robinson.  Sloan’s career was defined by being just good enough to not get fired.  Amongst Sloan’s career achievements:

• 0 Time NBA Champion
• 0 Time NBA Coach of the Year
• 0 Time Olympian
• 1 out of every 4 years of his coaching career, his team won their division
• Most Consecutive Games Coached With The Same Team (The NBA Equivalent to the High School Perfect Attendance Award)
• Might be Jeff Hornacek’s Dad

Sloan’s induction to the Hall of Fame is a testament to being slightly above average.  Its a rare club of being good enough to get there and succeed, but never getting over the top.  Even Susan Lucci won an award after getting nominated 20 times.  Sloan (pictured below with his NBA Championship Trophies) began his career as a player with the Baltimore Bullets in 1965.

Jerry Sloan and all of his Awards

Jerry enjoyed an average career with the Bullets and Bulls in which he went to 2 All Star Games.  Per wikipedia:

A hard-nosed contract negotiator, Sloan earned a reputation of somewhat of a hustler while playing with the Bulls.

Please note that even wikipedia would only afford Sloan the title of “somewhat of a hustler”.  Maybe if he would have been an all out hustler, he could have won a championship or convinced someone to give him an award of some kind.

In his coaching career, Sloan brought that same mediocrity that she flashed during his playing days.  But he wasn’t without innovation.  While most preached dynamic team defense, Sloan worked the art of flopping.  It slowed down the game, made people despise the Jazz (and possibly the state of Utah, also), but it sort of won them some games.

Not enough to win a championship, but good enough to not get fired.

In case you are not familiar with the only art native to Utah, flopping, here is an examples:

Might be Jerry Sloan's kid.

These Oscar-worthy acting performances were said by some to bastardize the integrity of the sport.  Normally, you think professional athletes would worry about their reputation or ethics being questioned being in a system that was built upon dirty play and flopping.  But that is where the genius… well maybe genius is too strong.. the above average intelligence comes in.  The B- student filled his rosters with people who were set to be totally unlikable anyways.  From the guy who lied to his poor, elderly, blind owner (Carlos Boozer) to the guy who was “hunting for little Mexican girls“(Karl Malone), The Athletes of the Utah Jazz have been the envy of people who contort the rules to get slightly ahead all over the world.

In closing, welcome, Jerry Sloan to the place of champions.  The place of legends.  The place of the greats.

And you.

The Hall of Fame.

Here is a video tribute to the Utah Jazz:

Ricky Rubio, drafted fifth in this year’s NBA draft, has opted not to go to Minneapolis and instead stay in Spain to do his balling. I can’t imagine why.

Exhibit M…

Exhibit S…

Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt is quickly crossing over from the impressive to the ridiculous. Only days after destroying the world record in the 100m dash, Bolt took out the 200m by a tenth of a second. That’s like hitting 90 home runs in a season without any sort of juice. But the most important thing about Bolt is his name. I mean, really. Usain Bolt. That’s like a character name in a Nicholas Cage movie. As amazing as Bolt’s accomplishments are, he can never outdo his name.

Sounds like a list, doesn’t it?

Bates Battaglia: Toronto Maple Leafs Right Wing. Motel proprietor.

Majestic Mapp: UVA Point Guard. Carmen Sandiego Villain. Read More

In international hoops news, a brawl erupted on the court Canada’s men’s national team took on Italy in what was supposed to be a “friendly” exhibition match in preparation for the FIBA Americas Championship.

Americans are shocked and displeased by the incident, mostly because none of them have ever heard of the FIBA Americas Championship or basketball being played outside of the continental US.  However, one man is absolutely furious about it:  Ron Artest is steaming about the blatant amatuerism displayed during the fight. Here’s a statement given to the AP and a guy who sells Affliction shirts:

I am deeply saddened by the current state of in-game fighting within the basketball community.  A pattern has emerged where scrapping has greatly decreased and holding back fighters has greatly increased.  This so called “brawl” was very sparse as far as ass kicking goes. Read More

In a shocking revelation about Lebron James’ past drug use, it appears as though he smoked marijuana repeatedly throughout his junior year of high school.  Never again after that, though.  Especially not when he made millions upon millions of dollars…right.  Is it really surprising that Lebron James smoked (smokes, for people that believe) weed?  Not even the well manicured analysts at ESPN were surprised. 

One on-air personality went on to say, “does it really matter?  It’s kind of like, who cares?”  Indeed, who cares.  Several million respectable Americans smoke weed everyday.  Michael Phelps was revealed as one of these people not so long ago if you do remember.  It was a huge scandle, lost tons of money, people freaked out, and he got his bong taken away.  Why is it that when Michael Phelps smokes pot, its horrible, but if Lebron James smokes pot, its not too shabby.

One could argue the media is telling white kids to not smoke pot by demoralizing their role model, and that they’re telling black kids that it’s alright to smoke pot, as long as you can make a lot of money while doing it.

Footage of Cleveland superstar LeBron James being dunked on by a college player from Xavier has just been leaked onto the internet.  This is the footage that you were never supposed to see.  Visuals too shocking for the public to handle.  A video so gruesome that the CIA tried to hide it in their secret warehouse.  Evidence in direct opposition to The King’s superiority over us all.

Well, not really.

The infamous play where LeBron gets dunked on is not that amazing.  There are two version of the video, one from tmz.com and one from ebaumnation.com.  The tmz.com version makes it look a little bit worse than the ebaumnation one, but neither are Earth shattering and here’s why:

1. LeBron is not one on one with Jordan Crawford.  If LeBron was on Crawford from the moment the ball was in his hands, then it would have been a more impressive drive to the hoop.

2. LeBron came entered the play late.  He may have been tired or just doing your typical “this is my camp, I’m just going to half ass it” thing, but was really just standing around on the block as the play began.  He didn’t have enough time to really contest Crawford as he came off of the pick.

3. LeBron is not head on with Jordan Crawford.  Crawford more or less dunks over the side of him.  It is far from an in your face, humiliation, complete ownage dunk.

If you don’t want to take my word for it, go ahead and look up the video for yourself.  If anything, you will get a little bit of that forbidden video satisfaction we all love (case in point, Erin Andrews).

With today being the eve of the ESPY awards, I feel it’s necessary to rub in everyone’s face what the rich and famous are getting for free. We all know they deserve it, especially during these hard economic times. It’s not like they can afford all these things, right?

Here is a list of what celebrities and “sports personalities” will be receiving just for blocking out about 2 hours of their schedule for some meaningless award show:

Undefeated and EA Sports: Free duffel bags. But wait! If you’re one of the thirty VIPs you get a personalized, laser-engraved PlayStation 3 or PSP, just in case someone loots your house and it ends up in a pawn shop or Ebay.

iHome: Free speakers, Keyboards and wireless laser mouse, and laptop cooling pads. I feel like most sports personalities have a much better system in their homes than iHome speakers. And it’s nice to see they get an icy-hot patch for their computer, since they spend hours and hours on their personal computers. (Anyone else notice the laser trend?)

Simmons Jewelry: Was Jacob the Jeweler not available? Oh wait, he’s in jail isn’t he? Now it makes sense.

NameDrop.com: Free Flip cams. Great, now you’re just encouraging celebrity sex tapes.

Muze Clothing: T-shirts printed with classic movie lines. Why? This is a sports award show. Or are these for those “cross-over” stars?

Skullcandy: Headphones, so they can ignore screaming die-hard fans.

Wynn: VIP cards for the Vegas casino pool. The Wynn has a pool? I doubt it’s better than Rehab.

Marley Coffee: Coffee beans made by the son of a Bob Marley. OK, now it’s just getting ridiculous. I see these being re-gifted to the hired help.

Axe: Body Spray. F*ck the smell of victory, bring on the smell of DOUCHEBAG!

Sentient: Coupons for private jets. Can’t go anywhere without their coups!

Patron: I feel like this goes hand in hand with the Flip cam.

See, doesn’t this make you feel better about being a common folk with nothing grand to add to the world?  I thought so.

It has been announced that Houston Rockets guard Tracy McGrady will be changing his number from 1 to 3.  When asked why, he said it was a move to reflect his status in the league.

“For a while there, I was the best player in the league.  I was the man, everybody knew it, I was number 1.  Unfortunately, that’s not the case any longer, but I’m still pretty damn good.  So now I’m number 3.  If you can’t tell, I am a very tough critic when it comes to my play.  Hopefully Yao Ming is back in time for next season.  If not, my number may be going up to something like 15.”

McGrady made it clear that the switch has nothing to do whatsoever with any sort of charity work he has been doing. Read More

Alleged NBA star Richard Jefferson dumped his New Jersey cheerleader bride the night before his $2 million wedding was to commence. Jefferson continued his streak of chivalry by not notifying his wedding guests that the event was canceled until two hours before it was to begin. According to friends and family, dumped-bride-to-be Kesha Ni’Cole Nichols is “doing just fine” and just wants to “move on”.

I take offense at this whole ordeal! Who in the heck is Richard Jefferson and when did we start calling any ol’ NBA player a “star”? The dude played for the Nets and was traded! That’s like being fired from volunteer work.

And what’s with Kesha’s middle name? Ni’cole? Really? Since when do we start writing speech impediments into our names? And I’m guessing that her parents spelled “Keisha” incorrectly on the birth certificate. Regardless, I may start going by “Kri’s”… I’m kind of liking it.

Anyway, the only good thing that came out of this debacle is that these two rocket scientists aren’t getting married. You can see from the above photo that Kesha is only in it for the money and tanning products, and Jefferson’s eyes betray an affair with a circus midget… oh, sorry–Little Person. Two million dollars saved and two knuckleheads remaining single is great news! And speaking of news, let’s all give Google News a round of applause for placing this in the sports news section!

Ron Artest is coming to Los Angeles, but it doesn’t seem like the Lakers are the only ones who are looking to pick up some muscle.  Local gangs have expressed some extreme interest in the small forward (who towers over the majority of gangbangers at six foot, eight inches).  The two largest, the Crips and the Bloods, are gaining widespread media attention (right now) over these proposed plans.

Speculation from Artest fans as to why this is happening have ranged from his rumored ties with charities that have the capability to transport large amount of product, to his pleasantly shocking outbursts towards fans and players alike.

One fan has stated, “I’ve seen him bonk four, five….even fiddy grown men on the head in one quarter.  It’s no wonder both the Crips and the Bloods keep on truckin’ towards him.”  It really isn’t a wonder, is it.

The Bloods have issued a statement offering Artest quite the hefty membership benefits including round the clock protection from all the other scary large men in his profession, his vintage Bulls jersey would be the gang mandatory decor, and when needed he has access to a small, yet cozy apartment in a not so good part of town.  Just like home.

The Crips are yet to issue any official statement but there are rumblings.  Oh yes, there are rumblings.  I don’t know what they’re saying or what their strategy is, but I do happen to think they may be a better fit for Artest.  They are both very cultured, taking part in our generations favorite art form, rap.  Also of note, both the Crips and Artest use mass amounts of symbolism in their business.  Poetic as hell.

I just hope that Artest at least continues his magnificent performance on the court and his wonderful sportsmanship in general.

Ron Artest has not acknowledged this subject and has not issued any statement regarding it.  Yet.