Who Wore What To The NBA Draft

The NBA Draft is over and if you want to know who went where you can go here. Let's take a look at what some of the guys were wearing. There were a lot of the basic navy and black ensembles, but I won't bore you with many of those. Here are some of the guys who stood out a bit. My two favorites were DJ Augustin and OJ Mayo.

P.S. Chris Douglas Roberts did not go in the first round. WTF?

My girl Holly Mac was not feeling OJ, but I think he looks handsome other than the shoes. The outfit fits the image he has been projecting. He looks slightly lame, and I like slightly lame guys.

DJ Augustin looks fabulous! I love these colors on him.

Mike Beasley played it safe. He so looks like he knew he'd be going 2nd overall.





Derrick Rose bored me. Is it asking too much to make a statement when you know you're probably going to go #1? Color please!














This suit is adorable just like the man wearing it!

I'm kinda feeling Brandon Rush's ensemble. The colors look good on him.

Eric Gordon looks a little like he was going to the prom when you get a close view of the suit, howeva I'm glad he took a risk. He went there.

This suit kinda bores me.








He cried waaaaay before you should ever start crying in any draft. And, he did it in a boring suit!





I'll end this post with a pic of Darrell Arthur, the last guy in the green room. Awkward.

The NBA Draft I don't have to care about!!!

The NBA Draft is tonight and for the first time in a looooooooooooooooooong time I don't have to care! The Hawks don't have a horse in this race because Phoenix got our pick as part of that Joe Johnson trade that seems like it happened 13 years ago. Seriously though, it shouldn't take 3 years to make good on a deal.
Most "draft prognosticators" (I don't wanna call them experts anymore because they are the same people who said Marvin Williams was the best player in the draft a few years ago) say Derrick Rose is going first to Chicago. Although Chicago clearly needs an inside presence, I think they lost faith in Beasley when he measured out just 3 inches shorter than what they had him listed as in college. I mean really, we all know athletes lie about their height all the time, but you can't give yourself 3 whole inches. That's just wrong. Just because he's barely 6"8 it doesn't mean he can't still play power forward in the NBA. Stranger things have happened.
I'm really interested to see where Chris Douglas Roberts and Jerryd Bayless end up for no other reason than the fact that they're cuties.
The only other reason I have to watch the draft is to see what everyone will be wearing. I'll probably do a best and worst dressed on Draft night blog.
Stay Tuned.

Boston Celtics Win It All!

And the Boston Celtics are your 2007-2008 NBA Champs! They just wanted it more, plain and simple. This series was ugly and not very entertaining, but for a team like the Celtics it had to be just that for them to win. The "Big Three" had their moments (never really on the same night) but it was more about the contributions from guys like James Posey and Eddie House and other bench players. They didn't always have great numbers, but they did the little things that you HAVE to do in order to win a championship. The way the Lakers kept leaving James Posey and Eddie House open was just mind boggling. I swear all of Posey's shots came from the exact same spot. At least that's how it seems.
Before this series started I, like many others thought the Lakers would win. They were playing fantastic in the playoffs while the Celtics were being pushed around by everyone they faced. The Lakers had all the momentum and it translated into exactly nothing.
Boston won the first two games at home, then the Lakers won Game 3, gave up a 24 point lead in Game 4 then barely won Game 5. The Celtics ran them out of the gym in Game 6 and the rest is history.
This series redefined a lot of Celtic's careers.
KG is now a champion. That's deep because I was pretty convinced he'd join the likes of Karl Malone and Charles Barkley by being one of the best players to never win a championship. He no longer has to worry about that. He wasn't great in the Finals by any stretch of the imagination, but he was decent and for the first time in his career that was enough. He also convinced a whole team to play defense. That in and of itself is amazing. When you can get Sam Cassell to give you a solid defensive effort you've done something correct. You could argue that his teammates were afraid he might actually kill them if they didn't play defense, but either way they got it done. Someone better check on KG over the next couple of days because his head might actually explode.
Paul Pierce was the closest thing to amazing the Celtics had all series long. He went from needing reconstructive knee surgery in Game 1, to Finals MVP in Game 6. You couldn't have scripted it any better than that. The Celtics loyalty to him FINALLY paid off. Most teams just don't wait that long. If Paul Pierce had played in any number of other places he probably would have been traded a couple of years ago. They held onto him and after a few years of making him play in a situation where they were sorta kinda rebuilding, Danny Ainge made a couple of big trades and gave him a legitimate chance to win a championship.
Ray Allen doesn't have to become the next Reggie Miller. He even went all "He Got Game" on the Lakers a few times in the series. I guess when the only thing standing between you and the rim is Sasha Vujacic it tends to make you a little more aggressive.
PJ Brown finally got a championship after being in the league for 37 years. Gotta love that.
Sam Cassell bought his way into his 3rd ring. I'm not mad at him though.
I can't say enough about Brian Scalabrine....................
The person I feel happiest for is Doc Rivers. We needed another black coach to have the ultimate success. He pressed all the right buttons throughout this series. He actually out coached Phil Jackson, don't believe anything else. Even if he didn't always have the right lineups out there he at least made damn sure they played hard. That's something Phil was not able to do with the Lakers. Doc said all the right things to the media, but deep down inside I don't think he was worried at all about half of the things he kept harping on. Kobe Bryant in particular. He was determined to not let Kobe beat them and his team got that message loud and clear. He lost his father early in the season so he probably never really had a chance to mourn. The fact that he was able to hold it together for so long in the interest of leading a group of men to accomplish something great is tremendous.

This series also redefined (maybe only temporarily) at least 2 Laker's careers.
Remember that look in Kobe's eyes I told you all about? Well I thought it was fire, but it turns out it was probably just a little touch of pink eye. Hey, they look the same.
Losing this series was not all Kobe's fault. You can never really pin a series loss on one guy, but someone has to take the blame so congratulations Kobe, it's you! No one is going to remember the fact that Lamar Odom didn't decide to join you in the Finals until Game 3 and then shortly after he disappeared again. No one is going to remember Sasha's inability to stop shooting when he was clearly having an off night. We've already tried to pretend like the Chris Mihm experiment never even happened even though you won that game. We'll forget about how clumsy Pau Gasol seemed throughout the series. We'll also forget about Derrick Fisher's ineffectiveness.
No one is going to remember any of that.
All anyone is going to remember is that you lost in back to back trips to the NBA Finals.
You talked about how you gave your teammates some of your DNA, well obviously it didn't take because I didn't see not one Laker other than you who had the look or the effort of a player who did not want to lose. KG was able to instill something real into his teammates, unfortunately you were not.
Will the Lakers be one of the favorites to win it all next season? Sure, but that won't erase the ass whippin you took in Game 6 of the 2008 Finals from anyone's memory. Luckily for you there's still time for you to right this wrong. It's not like you've never won a championship, but since most people try to minimize your role during the championship years of the Lake Show you need to win one without Shaq to convince everyone of how great you really are.
Phil Jackson a.k.a. The Zen Master got out coached by Doc Rivers. Period. He'll have to wait at least another year for that 10th championship ring. He deserves it for coaching this team like it's November when clearly it's June.

The Celtics were the best team all season long and they were rewarded with a championship.
Congratulations Boston.
Party all night.
Set the city on fire.
Literally.

No Boston Love Just Yet!

Lakers won game 5 so I don't have to write that recap for at least another couple of days. Thank goodness for small miracles!

Lakers Are In Trouble (That's An Understatement)

Um, the Lakers blew a 24 point lead and they are now down 3-1. Kobe may as well retire because he will NEVER, EVER live this down. Ever.

But you know what the worst part is? I made a bet with Mike Tillery at TheStartingFive.net that if the Lakers won he'd have to write the recap of this series, but if the Celtics won I'd write the recap. Given my unabashed HATRED for all things Boston, that's going to hurt me tremendously and I don't know if I can recover.

KGjr, NBA Finals, NBA Officials

Wow, it's been a minute since I've blogged. I'm the epitome of laziness right now. I'm back at it though. Here's what I missed in no particular order. Actually I missed a lot, so maybe I need to say here'r a few things that I would have mentioned had I bothered to update this blog over the past week, in no particular order.

Ken Griffey Jr. hit his 600th career home run! That's a big deal considering KG Jr. missed what seems like a thousand games during his wonderful career. He was supposed to be the guy to break Hank Aaron's record. Not to take anything away from Barry Lamar Bonds, but Griffey would probably have about 800 home runs had he not been injured so much. KG Jr. has been great since the beginning and he has the most beautiful swing you'll probably ever see.

And, he's quite handsome.

The Laker's and Celtics are in a heated battle for the NBA title. The Celts won Game 1 without incident unless you classify Paul Pierce being carried off the court and then placed into a wheelchair only to return 3 minutes later an incident.

I mean seriously Paul, I know you heard a pop and you thought "it was all over" but you cannot be carried off the court and placed in a wheelchair then come back 3 minutes later. You just can't. You need to be facing season ending surgery or at the very least you should need surgery as soon as the series is over. At the very, very least you should have missed at least the rest of the quarter if not the whole damn game! At least when D Wade got rolled off for his shoulder injury he didn't come back 3 minutes later to play the role of hero. I'm not saying you faked it, but you damn sure over exaggerated it.

Game 2 was no better for the Lakers. Leon Powe shot more free throws in the 14 minutes he played than the entire Lakers team. That should pretty much tell you all you need to know about that game. Naturally Phil was upset about the free throw disparity and of course he brought it up during his post game interview. I mean, he had to let the refs know that kind of chicanery would not be tolerated as the series headed to The Staples Center. Which brings us to Game 3. The Lakers got the calls they couldn't get in Boston and they won. It was ugly for both teams. Ray Allen is the only player who bothered to show up for Boston and Kobe and Sasha were the only viable Laker threats. I don't know what's going on with Pau and Lamar, but they've been pretty much useless throughout these Finals. Phil needs to consider bringing them off the bench. Lamar has spent most of his time there in foul trouble anyway. PP and KG also played like crap and for whatever reason people think that Boston should be more encouraged than the Lakers. They act like the Lakers gave the Celtics their best shot and just barely won. I guess Pau and Lamar aren't as important to the Lakers as PP and KG are to the Celtics. Anyone who thinks that's true is a flawed individual. I mean, Kobe is good, maybe even good enough to win this series by himself (which he might just have to do) but he still needs at least one of his other starters to give him something. I fully expect the Lakers to play better in Game 4. Phil and I think they've played about as bad as they possibly can already, but at least 3.5 of his 5 starters are hell bent on proving us wrong. I digress.

Tim Donaghy is making noise again. He's alleging the fix was on in the 2002 and 2005 playoffs by the league. Specifically the Lakers/Kings series where the Lakers shot 27 free throws in the 4th quarter of Game 6. He basically said the officials were told to make sure that series went 7. Now to the conspiracy theorists this all makes perfect sense. Honestly when you hear that one team shoots 27 free throws in any quarter your eyebrows have absolutely gotta raise. That's just obscene. I don't know if Timmy is telling the truth because let's face it homeboy is facing a lot of time so he needs to say whatever he needs to say to get a lighter sentence (at least that's what the Commish wants us to believe) howeva, I'm not ready to just disregard what he's saying just because he's a bit unscrupulous. That doesn't mean he's lying. See Canseco, Jose.

Here'r some of his allegations:

"Tim gave information on how top executives of the NBA sought to manipulate games using referees to boost ticket sales and television ratings," the letter reads. "He also described how nepotism played a far greater role than qualifications in a number of referee hirings."
• "Tim explained the league officials would tell referees that they should withhold calling technical fouls on certain star players because doing so would hurt ticket sales and television ratings," the letter adds. "As an example, Tim explained how there were times when a referee supervisor would tell referees that NBA Executive X did not want them to call technical fouls on star players or remove them from the game. In January 2000, Referee D went against these instructions and elected a star player in the first quarter of the game. Referee D later was privately reprimanded by the league for that ejection."
• In addition to game-altering allegations, Donaghy's letter claims that many officials carry on "relationships" with team executives, coaches and players that violate their NBA contracts. For example, it said, referees broke NBA rules by hitting up players for autographs, socializing with coaches, and accepting meals and merchandise from teams.
"Tim described one referee's use of a team's practice facility to exercise and another's frequent tennis matches with a team's coach," the letter says.
• The letter also alleges that during a 2005 playoff series, "Team 3 lost the first two games in the series and Team 3's Owner complained to NBA officials. Team 3's Owner alleged that referees were letting a Team 4 player get away with illegal screens. NBA Executive Y told Referee Supervisor Z that the referees for that game were to enforce the screening rules strictly against that Team 4 player. Referee Supervisor Z informed the referees about his instructions. As an alternate referee for that game, Tim also received these instructions.

Stern needs to address this. Fans have been grumbling about NBA officiating for years. Lord knows I've bitched about it on more than one occasion. Telling us Timmy is just a desperate man and etc. just ain't enough this time. Considering how easily the subjectivity of the officials can change the tone of a game its not completely preposterous that refs other than Timmy could have called things differently to help or hurt a team.

I don't understand why Stern continues to act shocked that fans think officiating is biased. The announcers remind us of it during every game in some way, shape or form. They'll say things like, "he's a superstar so he's going to get that call" or "you're not going to get that call on the road" or "(insert name of role player here) is not going to get that call this late in the game", or "the officials aren't going to make that call at the end of the game". You know, just to name a few things the announcers constantly say. Not to mention every time an ex player gets interviewed about some random game situation, they point out those same types of things. So if the announcers, players and ex players constantly tell the fans about how games are going to be reffed, what are we supposed to think? When the Lakers got hosed by the officials in Game 2 EVERYONE knew they'd get the majority of the calls in Staples Center and they did. I don't know if its bias or predictability, but it's a problem either way.

The only way the league is going to get the fans to get over these conspiracy theories is to make the refs ref the games consistently. The player, time of game, and venue should not dictate when a foul is called or not called for someone. For as long as I can remember it has been a determining factor and that's just unacceptable on so many levels.

Timmy is set to be sentenced in July. Hopefully someone somewhere will put some pressure on Stern to address and fix this problem because even if nothing comes of what Timmy has said, the league still needs to improve the perception the fans have of the officials. For years we've watched Stern fine players and coaches relentlessly whenever they talk recklessly about the officials, if he wants us to believe that they're just human so sometimes they make mistakes then he should let the players and coaches voice their opinions from time to time without having to pay a hefty fine. If an official is having a particularly bad night someone should be able to say so. They basically go unpunished when they have really, really bad nights. What kind of message do you think that sends to players and fans? It basically tells us that the officials are not held accountable for their actions. If they were then there's no way in hell Joey Crawford would have reffed a critical game in the San Antonio/Lakers series. He got suspended because he ejected Duncan for no real reason last season, and this is the guy you put on one of the most important games of the Spurs season? Coincidentally the officials "missed" an obvious foul on Brent Barry by Derrick Fisher. I'll let you guess which official was closest to the play.....

Lakers vs Celtics

Obviously 2 teams won the Conference Finals in my absence. It was the Lakers and the Celtics in case you didn't know. I got the Lakers winning the ship in 5. Read all about it at TheStartingFive.net. Just click on the picture!