Fuck You NBA and Possibly Fox Sports Net Too

Today during one of the first 28 Home runs that Josh Hamilton hit I realized that tonight was the Wolves first summer league game. Then Bez informed me that I could watch the game for free on NBA.com as IT WOULD NOT BE BROADCAST IN THE TWIN CITIES.

After signing up for the service and telling them the truth about who I am and where I'm from I was informed that:

This live webcast is not available in your area. Please check your local tv listings for broadcast info on this game.

Uhh, Fuck you NBA. Who in their right minds wants to watch a shittier version of the wolves except for maybe me and 3 other dudes? And who told you that this game was being broadcast somewhere where it was definitely not. All I want to do is take a look at what Kevin Love can do against bad compatition and get a feel for who our next back-up PG is going to be. (I'm afraid Bassy is so gonzo that even Hunter S. Thompson can't understand)

What can I watch instead of my beloved and shitty Wolves? O.J. fucking Mayo and the Memphis Grizzlies play the Fake Lakers. Thats some shitty shit, man. Did you plan this? Are you mocking me assholes? Whats the deal with letting me watch the player I wanted play for the wrong team but not the right team with the wrong player?
I hate everyone responsible for what occured tonight. I even tried to pretend I was from Idaho even though I knew it was a feutal attempt to see my team.

P.S. Kevin Love had 16 pts and 11 rebounds last time I looked which doesn't mean shit.

P.P.S. Amazingly Justin Morneau won the home run derby by some loophole in the rules where the man with the best proformance doesn't always get to win. Congratulations of the money and the car if you got one, but we both know Hamilton got robbed. He put on a crazy show that put my jaw on the floor for what felt like a good half hour.

The Twins have a decision to make...

... And I think it's a pretty easy one. Right now the Twins have 13 pitchers on their 25 man roster. They'll also be starting their inter-league play in one week meaning there will be a lot more substitutions in the games and an absolute need for another bench player..

We've already run into trouble with the bench. in the final game against Baltimore Kevin Slowey had to pinch run for Mike Redmond so that Gardenhire's bench was intact for the final inning. Mauer had to come in as catcher for Redmond and because of that we lost our DH. Had Alexi Casilla not ended the game with a strike out Jessie Crain would have gotten an at-bat. The reason they have 13 pitchers right now is because Brandon Bass, Boof Bonser and Juan Rincon will have to pass through waivers if they're sent to Rochester.

Its obvious that Rincon should be the odd man out in this situation. For one thing he has absolutely no B's in his name... a necessity for long relief, which BB squared is capable of doing. The other reason is that Rincon hasn't been the same since he stopped hittin' the juice. Chalk Rincon's career up to the steroid era, maybe try to trade him for a couple of nice bats and move on.

Rincon was one of the best set up men in baseball. His ERA was 2.63 in 2004 and 2.46 in 2005. In May of 2005 he was suspended for steroids and his ERA began to creep up. 2006 wasn't horrible- his ERA was 2.91 but last year it skyrocketed to 5.13 and this year its hovering close to that. He gave up a home run against the Sox tonight and has been no help to his team... one hold in 26 innings just doesn't cut it.

I'm not entirely clear on the waiver process, but I believe that Rincon's veteran status will make it a bit more difficult to send him down and may force the Twins to pay the difference between the contract he signed with the Twins for 2.47 million and the contract that his new team would offer him but we've just got to eat it and move on. Rincon and Jesse Crain are the weakest pitchers in the bullpen according to Aaron Gleeman's adjusted WPA but Crain has a much better ERA and doesn't have that black mark on his record.

It's time to bring in a bat.

Vikings now convinced that Erasmus James sucks too

The Vikings waived Erasmus James today. This makes myself and about 5 million others very happy. I didn't want Brian Robison and Ray Edwards losing playing time because James was once a first round pick and the team thought he'd be fully recovered one day. Maybe he can con Mike Tice into clearing a spot on the Jags roster for him right next to our OTHER first round draft pick from 2005.

Lets review... the pro-bowlers we could have selected instead of Williamson are Shawne Merriman, Jammal Brown or Demarcus Ware. We also could have selected Mark Clayton or Reggie Brown if you want to stick with Wide Receivers. The pro-bowlers we could have selected instead of James are Logan Mankins, Lofa Tatupu, Justin Miller, Frank Gore, Marrion Barber the III (home town!), Trent Cole (DE!) or Derrick Anderson. I also would have much rather had Justin Tuck, who will shortly become a pro-bowler as my Defensive End.

I understand that hindsight is 20/20 but this just helps underline the previous administration's ineptitude. Head over to the Daily Norseman to look at the list of all the Vikings drafted in 2005 and their lack lack of starting jobs. Having Cole/Tuck and Clayton/Brown instead of Erasmus James and Troy Williamson would have been way better. At least the new administration has given us hope for this and future vikings draft classes after only two drafts.

Tales From Behind The Bars

It's always unfortunate when sports and prison intertwine. It's also inevitable. Like Big Poppa said, "Mo Money, Mo problems." Today there are two Minnesota sports/jail stories. Both are no surprise, but sad none the less.

Isaiah "J.R." Rider, inventor of the east bay funk dunk and 5th overall pick by the Minnesota Timberwolves in the 1993 draft is once again in jail. This time he is accused of auto theft after being arrested early Saturday morning in the skid row district of Los Angeles. He has since been released on bail to await trial.

Rider has had a history of law trouble that dates back to his college days when he was arrested for throwing a milkshake through the drive-through window of a Jack-in-the-box. During the 95-96 season Rider was convicted of 5th degree assault after kicking the manager of a sports bar. Rider had a few more brushes with the law during his playing years, none worse than possession of Marijuana and possession of an illegal cell phone, but once his career was over the real trouble started. In January of 2006 he was charged with kidnapping and domestic assault. In February of 2007 he plead guilty to felony cocaine possession and evading an officer. In January of this year Rider was charged with unlawful Firearm possession after getting into an argument with a taxi driver.

The other sports related jailing is not about an actual athlete. Souksangouane Phengsene was jailed Sunday night for suspicion of DWI. Most people don't remember that name, let alone have the skill to properly pronounce it, but Phengsene was the man who killed Malik Sealy in 2000 on his way home from Kevin Garnett's birthday party. Souk was drunk that night as well and was charged with criminal vehicular homicide. When he crashed into Sealy Phengsene was driving the wrong way down highway 100.

In 1997 he was charged with drunken driving in Des Moines and again in 2006 in Crystal. Unfortunately, since he plead guilty to vehicular homicide and not DWI in the Sealy crash the 2006 charge was not enhanced. Hopefully the judge will take a good long look at this man's driving record, throw him in jail for a while and rip up his license forever.

Stephen Curry will murdalize your bracket.

The sophmore from Davidson went off for 30 points, 25 of them in the second half to come back from 17 points down to upset Georgetown. Georgetown shot 63.4 percent from the field and still lost! The Hoyas had this game if they hadn't turned it over 20 times.

This Curry kid's draft stock just went through the roof... he's played two games in this tournament and has 70 points. He gave Adam Morrison another reason to cry when he went off for 30 points in the second half against Gonzaga.

Pappa Curry, also known as former NBA sharp shooter Dell Curry, must be proud of the way his son has performed in the tourney. Dell was the 1993-1994 sixth man of the year, ranks 17th all-time in 3-pointers made and is the all-time leading scored for the Charlotte Hornets, but his son seems to have a real shot at surpassing those accomplishments if his college career is any indication. He was second in scoring among freshmen right behind a guy by the name of Kevin Durrant last season and this season he dropped 24 on UNC, 20 on Duke, 29 against NC State and 15 against UCLA.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that Cinderella is named Davidson this year. Forget Nova or Western Kentucky... Davidson has a real shot to beat Wisconsin. Georgetown only allowed 57.6 points per game, a mere 3 points more than the Badger's best in the nation 54.3 ppg. Obviously Davidson can handle defensive teams.

Why is it that I never know this shit prior to writing up my brackets?

Sell the Team you F-ing Headcase

I am done with Glen Taylor. I vow to never go to a game or purchase Wolves gear while he owns the team. I've always thought that Taylor had a screw loose but the comments he made yesterday have cemented that opinion. K.G. tanked the season? That man has the heart of a lion, his pride wouldn't allow him to tank even a single game. If he lost his leg in some freak accident he'd be out on the floor on crutches and still dominate on D. Just a couple days ago I saw him bashing the ball against his head for missing the first free throw. Thats not something new, that not something he picked up in Boston... he transformed their team with his competitive spirit, turned them into a defensive machine.

K.G. never worried about draft position, thats something that owners and VPs of basketball operations worry about. I think my 5 year old neighbor has more basketball knowledge, and shes a baseball kind of girl. First with the stupid handshake agreement that ruins my life every summer, then the Joe Smith debacle, then firing Flip, then Dwayne Casey now badmouthing the best player ever to wear your uniform? And on the day he took down the second longest consecutive win streak in the history of the NBA. Garnett doesn't want to address that situation after an important game like that. He wants to say "Luis Scola had a good game, but we knew this had to come to an end some time and we wanted to do it ourselves," or, "Powe played great tonight, this was a playoff atmosphere type game against the best team in the west and he stepped up, we all stepped up," not, "That's not my character. I'll let him speak if he wants to."

Get off my team, Taylor. You are quickly becoming the bane of my existence. Go ruin a team in another state.

Nascar is a Joke

And here is Josh Sneed to tell said joke.


When I fist saw this I figured that he had to have been making the chicken bucket thing up. Never-the-less I did some detective work and sure as shit I found 'em. If for some silly reason you want to own these I've found them for sale on E-bay here.

I don't know why, (probably because the All-star game wasn't on yet) but I actually watched the last 10 laps of the Daytona 500. Dale Ernhardt Jr. didn't win and Tony Stewart didn't win and I consider that a loss for everybody because I think those are about the only drivers I recognize.

Livan Hernandez is a Twin

The Twins added some experience to their starting rotation today when Livan Hernandez signed a one-year deal worth about 5 million dollars. Whether or not this turns out to be another waste of money like Ramon Ortiz and Sidney Ponson is yet to be determined. Hernandez went 11-11 with a 4.93 ERA with Arizona last year which is already a slight step up from Ortiz' 11-16 with a 5.57 ERA with Washington the year before signing with the Twins.

The opening day starter is still unclear, but if I had to guess I'd say that Hernandez would be given the job because of his veteran status. He's definitely not Santana and may only be on par with Carlos Silva, but the one thing he does that this team desperately needs is eat up innings. He has thrown at least 199 innings since 1998, hopefully that trend will continue and the bullpen will know that at the very least they'll have one day to rest during the rotation.

The pitchers set to start the year off looks to be Hernandez, Scott Baker, Boof Bonser, Kevin Slowey and a fight between a healing Fransisco Liriano, Nick Blackburn and the newly acquired Phil Humber. If this team has any hope of staying in the race for the central pennant we’re going to need Liriano to show up like he did in his rookie season, Hernandez to pitch more like he did in 2000 or 2003 and Delmon Young to do his best Frank Robinson impression.

God, I hope this pans out.

Get Off My Team

The season is over for the Minnesota Vikings and now its time for the coaching staff evaluate each of the players and make some decisions about who should stay and who should go. As a professional know nothing I've decided to do my own evaluating. The Star Tribune has a list of all the Vikings free agents which could come in handy for those of you following along.

The first person I want off my team is TROY WILLIAMSON. I've seen blind guys with better hands than this waste of space... I'm so glad we traded the best wide receiver still playing for Williamson and Napoleon Harris cause that totally worked in our favor. Red McCombs is getting a shank in the side if I ever run into him. Robert Ferguson is a free agent and though I'm not a huge fan of Ferguson I'd rather resign him and drop Williamson and look for an actual number one receiver. Free agents to look into are Andre Davis, Bernard Berrian, that's about it since Patrick Crayton signed his contract.


Up next is Brooks Bollinger and Kelly Holcomb. I want them both gone, I want someone who can actually compete with Tarvaris Jackson for the number one spot (Quinn Gray? Cleo "Fucking" Lemon?) and I want to use a fourth - Sixth round pick on a QB. Lets draft our own Tom Brady or Tony Romo.
Dwight Smith must also leave. he can't tackle Clinton Portis, he can't keep his thing in his pants and he can't wait until the offseason to smoke copious amounts of ganja. Take note current Vikings players the off season and the comfort of your own home is the ideal place to get high. I don't care if it helps with pain, its against the law for some reason and we can't be busting players out of jail on Saturday nights so they can play the next morning. Re-sign Tank Williams and get another safety through the draft or try to pick up someone like Gibril Wilson

Ryan Cook. God Damn Retard.
Erasmus James. Play a game. 5 sacks and 30 tackles in 23 games is no good and he's played 8 games in the last two seasons. I hate the fact that Childress favors James above Ray Edwards and Brian Robinson.

People I will miss.
Meweldi Moore is almost certainly gone, but I think hes one hell of a football player who found himself in an unfavorable position.
Spencer Johnson will most likely find a new home this off season but he is the man that gives the Willaims boys breaks without anybody noticing it.

Shit, this bandwagon is getting full.

So before this NFL season began, I made a bet with a guy from work for the small amount of $20. I bet him that the Vikings would not make the playoffs, ho hum. Easy enough one would think, but no. Welcome to the Unpredictable Football League (as I write this I realize this may be my first post ever on NFL football, weird). The Vikings are now 7-6 and set up to get a Wild-card. Their up coming schedule even looks good. I guess it did last year too before they lost a bunch in a row. I feel I am going to be saying so-long to my $20 fairly soon, oh well.

I didn't think I would be able to say this this year, but this team is actually fun to watch at times. And it's not only purple fans who are noticing this. With NBC moving the Vikings game against the Redskins on Sunday the December 23rd from a noon start to night game, they will have two prime time games, two weeks in a row. Also, that Sunday night game is the day before Christmas Eve, so many people have the next day off, which should translate into fairly good ratings. It's been a while since the Vikings have people outside of this market wanting to watch them. I even went to one half of a game this year, the 1st half of AP's 296 yd rushing game. Too bad I only stayed for the 1st half, well it wasn't too bad, the 2nd half I ended up at the strip club getting lap dances.

It's kind of odd having a team, besides the Twins, in Minnesota that have playoff chances. This has, as they say, always been a football town, and I guess it's good to see them do well. I don't know where this post came from, and I know it blows, but maybe it will get me doing this more often. Get on this bandwagon before it gets too full.

We’ve been duped… Bamboozled!

We’ve been sold expensive diet water. Brad Childress came to Minnesota under the guise of an offensive guru. I’ve watched 20 games led by the ‘stache and I can’t think of a single offensive outburst. How many times in the last 20 games do you think we’ve scored 24 points or more? 5… Brad Childress’ “Kick-Ass Offence” scores 24 or more points 25 percent of the time. We’re 5 for 5 in those games but first we have to get to 24. That’s 3 TDs and a field goal… not too much to ask considering the defense provides one of those touchdowns on a regular basis and tends to put the offense in good position to score most of the time.

Did you know that Visanthe Shaincoe was the leading receiver versus the Chiefs? When the tight end leads all receivers that is a bad sign. That is a combination of checkdowns and a leader who refuses to take chances. Childress’ offense is horrible, no matter what quarterback he puts out there they end up looking like Linus from peanuts sucking their thumb and grasping onto their blanket for dear life. That card he holds over his face during a game is actually only empty tick-tack-toe boards which he and Darrell Bevell fill out during the game

The team seems afraid to commit to Tarvaris Jackson and I wonder how bad his injury really is. Jackson and those receivers had better lock themselves away in the confines of Winter park and develop some sort of rapport. My suggestion is that Jackson focus on Bobby Wade and Sidney Rice. If Jackson and those receivers run routes until they’ve burned a path in the turf (ala Peyton and his guys) they might be able to find each other on game day. I don’t want to see Kelly Holcolm any more this year barring an injury… let Jackson throw his interceptions, take his hits and lose some games because he will be better for it.

I faintly remember a Vikings team that stretched the field a few years back. I know that team had Randy Moss and Daunte Culpepper, but you don’t need players of that caliber in order to stretch the field. I saw Dwayne Bowe and Damon Huard do it just the other week. I doesn’t take pro-bowl players, it takes a game plan and, maybe even more important, a willingness to deviate from the game plan when it falls apart. Look, I’m not being a delusional Homer here, I know that my team is bad but these last three losses don’t feel like they were inevitable. In each one you can point to one or two things that could have led to a win had they gone differently.

If the run game works why doesn’t the play action? If Adrian Peterson AKA Purple Jesus goes off for 100 yards in the first half why give him two carries in the second… and if you think he’s fragile because of the collarbone then why in the hell is he returning kicks? Are you going to throw to a gamecock? Why not Sidney Rice? He seems pretty good at an endzone jump ball and if I remember correctly that was his bread and butter in South Carolina.

I’ve got a great idea for you- lets put Troy Williamson at Cornerback… that way we won’t get burned by whoever Cedric Griffin is covering and it a plus when Williamson catches the ball instead of a prayer answered. Any one of these suggestions would be helpful if it were not for Childress. Childress is Mchale’s love of Boston and inking big deals for mediocre players. Childress is Carl Pohlad’s billions of dollars never to be spent on the Twins. In a nutshell Childress is Minnesota sports. Expect him to be around for far too long.

It's like Christmas morning

If you're not hyped up yet the following videos should help.









Enjoy. Go Hawks.

All you have to do is catch a ball

Some days like today it is really obvious that catching footballs doesn't take the brightest human being. Dominique Douglas and Anthony Bowman, WR for Iowa, were suspended today by Coach Ferentz, after being arrested on Sunday for racking up over $2000 on a stolen credit card. To make it worse they stole hats and shoes. They play for a D-1 football program, don’t they get enough free stuff, and it’s not like they decided to buy a big TV or something actually cool with the stolen card.

For DD, a kid who was known as one of the best freshmen WR in the country last season, to buy hats and shoes with a stolen credit card is beyond dumb. He may not be in the same circumstances that one Pierre Pierce was in, but it has its similarities. He was set to make millions in the NFL in the near future, like Pierce in the NBA; all he had to do was make it through college with out being injured, or do something stupid. Then they both do something completely dumb and short sighted. Now he may struggle to get noticed, like Pierce who's trying to lobby is way in to the NBA probably as you read this.

If this all comes out to be true, which it seems like it easily could be I hope these two are far from the team. I know this will hurt the team but they don’t deserve the opportunity they just gave up. At least they’ll look cool all of there hats and shoes.

Well that's about all I have, now I'm going to go cross DD off the 2007 Iowa Football calender/poster my brother sent me today. It's a damn shame.

These guys might have a better take then me.

Press Citizen : Two Hawkeyes suspended indefinitely

The Hawkeye Compulsion : Things just got Real

EDSBS : Fulmer Cupdate :Iowa Shopping Trip Edition