CELEBRITY
GAMING
MOVIESLucky 7! The New Jersey Nets won their 7th game of the season on Saturday night against the also terrible New York Knicks. With a still worst NBA record of 7-55, the Nets actually have a winning streak going, having victories in their last three road games.
You know what’s fun to do between court dates? Schedule more court dates!
This time, they’ve gone too far.Last night, in a home game against the Boston Celtics, the LA Lakers went retro…by wearing the ultra-short, old school, “John Stockton” shorts. Now, I understand the gimmick of wearing ugly, old uniforms so that teams can have another jersey to sell fans and make a buck. But why change a part of the uniform? Do we really need to see Luke Walton’s hairy thighs? The Lakers lost, obviously, because they were playing in boxer briefs. I would expect this out of Duke, but not from any NBA team. Now, I fear other sports trying gimmicks like this one. (NHL teams not wearing helmets, NFL teams wearing leather helmets, LPGA golfers wearing female haircuts).
From Left: An aging Shooter McGavin, NBA Legend Kareem Abdul-Jabaar, and Evil Bald Man all agree: This is disturbing. Even for LA.
In last night’s 122-115 Lakers over Suns victory, the best player on the floor wasn’t two-time MVP Steve Nash or three-time champ Kobe Bryant, but 20 year old Andrew Bynum. Considering his ridiculous ascension and that the best big man in the land is Dwight Howard, can we finally put to rest the argument that high schoolers weren’t ready to jump to the pros? Sure it makes the college game better to have the best players involved, but it’s not like Bynum would have blossomed faster if he was going to class. The only thing players leaving early or forgoing college altogether means is that there are less Criminology, Comm, and Domestic Violence majors…they do offer the latter at Florida State, although they may still be calling it Spousal Abuse Studies. Let me check a syllabus.
As most of you know, Maya Angelou and I tend run in the same circles. We are both North Carolina poets and wordsmiths. We are both held in the highest regards by other esteemed writers and laureates from throughout this great country. From the President of the United States all the way down to the drunken hobos that live behind the Sunoco down the street from my house.
In order to fully prepare for the upcoming NFL season, I asked her to write a few words about the fate of a few of the teams. And here, you lucky Lampoon readers, are her predictions for the 2009-10 NFL Season,
The Cowboys
Romo-thou art not a failure
Fumbulicious, maybe still
Play-offs still haunt your dreams
No longer necessary on special teams 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
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).
The Los Angeles Lakers recently won the NBA Championship and were instantly proclaimed the World Champions. What? Excuse me? The NBA is made up of 29 American teams, and one Canadian team, the Toronto Raptors. And winning this apparently makes someone the champion of the entire world? You know, I once won a ping-pong tournament that had an Estonian kid in it. Does that make me the supreme table tennis victor of the whole universe?
This quandary does not only exist in the NBA. The MLB contains only one Canadian team, the Toronto Blue Jays, and yet their championship is the World Series. World? Really? Really? Considering that Japan has twice won the World Baseball Classic, and our some of our leagues best are Latin Americans, Philadelphia Phillies may not be the best in the entire world. They might not even be the best in Philadelphia.
And then there’s the NFL … well, okay this is legit. We here in America have the only real football teams – not including that “football” crap they play in the World Cup. However, back when there was an NFL Europa, I really would have wanted to see the New England Patriots compete against the Hamburg Sea Devils. But now that NFL Europa is finished, I guess I’m okay with calling the Superbowl winner the world champion.
But L.A. Lakers, you haven’t earned it yet. So congratulations on your national championship. I would even go as far as calling you Can-American Champions. But Kobe Bryant and the Lakers, please don’t be presumptuous and call yourselves the World Champions until you’ve played Dimitris Diamantidis and the Panathinaikos Basketball Club.
I am Kobe Bryant. I just won my fourth NBA championship this past Sunday on ABC. I’m sure you watched. As you know, I am great.
