timbersfan's WunderBlog

Who is your American Player of the Year?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:12 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

As the calendar gets set to turn to 2012, it's an obvious time to reflect and look back at the year that was for U.S. Soccer.

While the year provided the ushering in of a new coaching era, a 6-8-3 international record and a breakout stage for a number of players, it also saw some of the more familiar names rise to the occasion on both the club and international levels.

Clint Dempsey exemplifies that, as he continues to get even better while playing for Fulham, and he was a standout performer for the United States during its Gold Cup run and in the subsequent friendlies as well.

Playing in a roving supporting forward/attacking midfield role, Dempsey broke the record for all-time goals in the Premier League by an American and has nine goals in all competitions for the Cottagers this season. He also found the net a U.S.-best five times in international play this year, including a decisive finish in the Gold Cup semifinal against Panama.

Then there's goalkeeper Tim Howard, who continues to be a steady anchor in the back for both Everton and the national team. His shot-stopping ability preserved results for the United States on a number of occasions in both friendlies and the Gold Cup, and it also prevented other games from getting out of hand. With a revolving crew of defenders in front of him, the 32-year-old Howard continues to be the constant presence in the back.

It wasn't a traditional dominant year for Landon Donovan, certainly not for the national team, where his absences were more notable than most of his performances save for his goal against Mexico in the Gold Cup final.

Even so, the MLS Cup MVP played through various injuries to score 12 goals this season and lead the Galaxy to the promised land, and he is headed back to the Premier League for two months to try and reprise his role as Everton savior. Five months into Jurgen Klinsmann's tenure as head coach, we still have yet to see how Donovan and Dempsey work together under the new system, and all eyes will be on that dynamic going forward.

For Jozy Altidore, 2011 presented a year of opportunity. Finally receiving consistent time as a starter for AZ Alkmaar in the Netherlands, Altidore's game has improved, and he has become a valuable scoring threat on the club level, where he has managed nine goals in all competitions this season.

He's still not scoring at a prolific rate for the national team, though he tallied three times in 2011 including a cracker of a finish against Guadeloupe in the Gold Cup. His improved touch and finishing accuracy has left the door open for a big 2012.

As for Michael Bradley, his place in the national team's starting lineup is no longer a given, but there's no questioning his continued productivity and growth. Playing in his fourth major European league at age 24, Bradley has become a fixture on the right for Chievo Verona in Serie A, helping the team to a mid-table standing.

He also managed to score his third-career goal against Mexico, giving the United States an early lead in the Gold Cup final. All of that combined with his play in recent U.S. friendlies lends reason to believe he'll be back in the starting XI when the U.S. games start to matter again in the coming months.

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Rounding up the MLS comings and goings: Western Conference

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:10 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

For a team coming off of a championship run, the Los Angeles Galaxy have had plenty of major moving parts over recent weeks.

Between Landon Donovan going back to Everton on a short-term loan, Juninho returning to Sao Paulo, Donovan Ricketts being dealt to the Montreal Impact, Sean Franklin re-signing and David Beckham, well, still making a decision, the Galaxy remain the talk of MLS deep into the offseason.

Other teams in the Western Conference are positioning themselves for improvement while trying to catch Los Angeles, though, as teams that missed out on the postseason last year -- specifically San Jose, Vancouver and Portland -- have all added integral pieces ahead of their early selections in next month's SuperDraft.

Here is a look at the comings and goings in the entire Western Conference to date (and for a look at the Eastern Conference, read on here):

CHIVAS USA
The most head-scratching offseason belongs to the Goats, who actively shipped out young building blocks Zarek Valentin and Justin Braun. Montreal snatched the surprisingly unprotected Valentin in the expansion draft and then traded James Riley to Chivas for Braun and Gerson Mayen.

Chivas did restructure its midfield by acquiring Ryan Smith from Sporting Kansas City and signing Ecuadorian Oswaldo Minda. The club also took a pricey gamble by going after Arturo Alvarez in the first stage of the re-entry draft -- meaning it would be on the hook for about $200,000 if he signed -- but the player is still said to be exploring his options abroad.

Coach Robin Fraser has other holes to fill on his roster after losing the likes of Paulo Nagamura, Andrew Boyens, Simon Elliott and Zach Thornton.

COLORADO RAPIDS

The Rapids have probably been affected more from a technical staff standpoint then a player personnel one this offseason. Coach Gary Smith is out, as is former general manager Jeff Plush. The team still hasn't hired a coach with the MLS Combine and SuperDraft around the corner and is lacking direction.

On the player end of things, the Rapids picked up Baggio Husidic and Hunter Freeman in the re-entry draft only to have Husidic spurn an offer to stay in MLS and instead head to Sweden's Hammarby, where he'll play for Gregg Berhalter. Freeman has yet to sign with the club, which managed to keep Brian Mullan on a new multi-year deal.

The biggest loss comes on the wing, where Colorado lost Sanna Nyassi in the expansion draft.

FC DALLAS

We're still waiting on FC Dallas to bring in some new blood. The team traded away productive winger Marvin Chavez for allocation money and Jeremy Hall for a draft pick and declined options for Maicon Santos and Maykel Galindo.

Aside from that, FCD is entering the new year with the same roster that burned out toward the end of the season and eventually succumbed in the wildcard round of the postseason. Add in the fact that the club lost its stadium sponsor as well, and it hasn't been the most productive of offseasons so far in Big D.

LOS ANGELES GALAXY

Following Landon Donovan securing a short-term loan to Everton and Donovan Ricketts being traded to Montreal, all eyes remain fixed on David Beckham, and until he finally inks a deal with Paris-St. Germain, there's still a chance he returns to Los Angeles.

While that sideshow has been taking place, though, the Galaxy lost a major piece of its central midfield with Juninho returning to Sao Paulo after two years on loan in Los Angeles. As pre-emptive cover for that loss, the club signed Alajuelense's Brazilian midfielder Marcelo Sarvas. Perhaps more importantly, the club signed a new deal with Sean Franklin, whose presence on the right side has been a big part of the Galaxy's success. Being able to sign U.S. youth international Jose Villarreal to a Homegrown Player deal was a major coup for Bruce Arena's side, also.

The Galaxy went nuts at the re-entry draft as well, making four selections in the second phase to add depth for what will be a packed 2012 schedule. The club brought in Boyens, Pat Noonan, Chris Leitch and Jon Conway while also retaining the rights to Frankie Hejduk and Dasan Robinson.

PORTLAND TIMBERS

The Timbers have only made one acquisition, but it was a major one. Using the new rules for signing young Designated Players to their advantage, the Timbers tapped into the Colombian pipeline again to sign emerging 20-year-old forward Jose Adolfo Valencia. Between El Trencito, Jorge Perlaza and Diego Chara, Portland has a young Colombian nucleus to build around in its second year in MLS.

In terms of losses, Portland declined options on backup pieces Ryan Pore, Adin Brown, Peter Lowry, Brian Umony and Rodrigo Lopez.

REAL SALT LAKE

Like FC Dallas, RSL has quietly been waiting in the wings while losing a bunch of its depth. The most notable losses were Andy Williams (retired), Collen Warner (expansion draft) and Robbie Russell (trade to D.C. United), three solid contributors for Jason Kreis.

On the plus side, the starting lineup remains intact as the club gears up for another run in the CONCACAF Champions League. Even so, the club remains tasked with filling out the roster with the caliber of depth that has been a hallmark of the team for the last three years.

SAN JOSE EARTHQUAKES

It's hard not to like what San Jose has done so far this offseason. The club brought in two Honduran internationals, trading for Chavez with FC Dallas to add a new element to the wing and take some of the offensive pressure off Chris Wondolowski and signing centerback Victor Bernardez to be a presence along the back line.

The club also traded for Shea Salinas and Jean Alexandre, who can supply depth in the midfield and make up for the losses of Bobby Convey and Jacob Peterson, who were part of the bunch that left Buck Shaw Stadium along with Bobby Burling, Scott Sealy and Leitch.

SEATTLE SOUNDERS

The largest tasks the Sounders had this offseason were locking up Mauro Rosales to a multi-year deal and finding a replacment for Kasey Keller in goal.

Seattle accomplished both of those, by securing Rosales for the long haul and signing Austrian goalkeeper Michael Gspurning to take over between the pipes at CenturyLink Field.

After losing plenty of depth through the expansion and re-entry drafts (Riley, Noonan, Tyson Wahl and Nate Jaqua are all elsewhere), seeing Erik Friberg return to Sweden and having Terry Boss and Taylor Graham join Keller among the ranks of the retired, Seattle has started to fill those vacant roster spots. The club traded up in the second phase of the re-entry draft to take former D.C. United left back Marc Burch.

The Sounders also have turned to the international market, reportedly coming to terms with Swedish right back Adam Johansson and Danish winger Christian Sivebaek.

VANCOUVER WHITECAPS

The Whitecaps have dumped a lot of complementary parts and picked up two potential key contributors as they look to make headway in their second season.

Between signing South Korean fullback Lee Young-Pyo and winning the lottery for attacking midfielder Lee Nguyen, new coach Martin Rennie has some interesting pieces to work into his lineup.

Looking longer term, the team secured a Homegrown Player deal for up-and-coming, 17-year-old Canadian midfielder Bryce Alderson.

In terms of who left BC Place, the Caps lost Jeb Brovsky in the expansion draft, traded away goalkeeper Jay Nolly and midfielder Shea Salinas, waived Nizar Khalfan and declined options on Pete Vagenas, Greg Janicki and Jonathan Leathers.

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Prem's All-Disappointment team (so far)

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:08 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

This is not a list of players who are awful. If that were the case, we'd post the entire Blackburn team sheet. (Seriously, how can Steve Kean still have a job? He must have incriminating photos of the Venky's boys dressed up as Japanese schoolgirls -- just a theory.) Rather, here's a roll call of the players for whom the gap between expectations and results this season has been wider than Gervinho's forehead. (You can also check out our best starting XI.)

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Patrik Stollarz/Getty Images
It's a bird, it's a plane ... no, it's just Petr Cech, who seems low on confidence this season.
Keeper: Petr Cech, Chelsea

The EPL's mask-wearing, nose-shielded Czech looks like a demented version of Batman -- without the superhero performance. He's two thigh pads away from looking like Patrick Roy. Nineteen goals conceded in 16 games might not seem terrible -- especially when various pratfalls by John Terry, Ashley Cole and David Luiz have left Cech more exposed than Lindsay Lohan -- but recording only four clean sheets is unacceptable for a keeper who has long prided himself on the spotlessness of his linens. His most recent gaffe -- spilling Hugo Rodallega's soft 88th-minute shot into the path of Wigan's ambling Jordi Gomez for an easy equalizer -- was the tentative mistake of a man whose self-belief tank looks to be running on empty.

Defender: David Luiz, Chelsea

The distance from cult to clown can be measured in months at The Bridge. Not long after arriving at the club from Benfica in January, Luiz rifled in an elegant game-winner against Manchester United, an effort that vaulted him to instant icon status. Yet his big hair can't hide his wildly inconsistent play. Yes, he's only 24 years old, but his $25 million price tag shows what a bargain Sir Alex secured in Phil Jones, a player five years younger. Tellingly, Luiz has featured in just six Prem games this season, which speaks Fernando volumes as to the level of trust AVB has in his precocious Brazilian. When he does get on the field, he has picked up cards at a Cattermolian pace, with bookings in four outings. With JT's advancing age and rapidly filling court docket, Chelsea cannot afford a long-term work in progress.

Defender: Nemanja Vidic, Manchester United

Vidic may seem like an unfair choice, because it's not that he's played poorly this season, he's been injured. But we threw him in here because he's the great Nemanja Vidic, damn it! He's not supposed to get injured. He's from Serbia, remember? He's supposed to "murder ya"! How's he going to do that if he's suddenly developed a skeletal and ligamental system made of the finest van Persie glass? Coupled with the rapidly aging Rio Ferdinand, Vidic's frailities give all non-United fans hope. We also pray that he doesn't recover quickly, track us down and murder us.

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Gary Cahill has marshaled a defense that has leaked 41 goals in 18 games, the worst mark in the league.
Defender: Gary Cahill, Bolton

Twenty-five million dollars for Cahill? Hard to believe that Bolton almost suckered a certain French manager into paying that ransom. The key word is "almost." In a season to forget for Owen Coyle, not pulling the trigger on a Cahill transfer deal over the summer will probably go down as his biggest misstep. Cahill has marshaled a defense that has leaked 41 goals in 18 games, the worst mark in the league. Luckily for Owen and Gary, Chelsea seems happy to ignore his current form (even though they dropped five on Cahill & Co. on Oct. 2) and has agreed to sign the player for a reported 7 million pound transfer fee (though they have yet to agree to personal terms).

Defender: Roger Johnson, Wolverhampton Wanderers

For those of you who missed it, Wolves are still in the top flight. Mick McCarthy thought he'd found his defensive talisman when he bought the Birmingham City center back for around $10 million in July. Though Johnson had overseen the Brummies' relegation last season, he was recognized for his poise and influence in a defense that conceded 47 in 38 games in 2009-10, when Alex "Yawn" McLeish's side had finished an eye-opening ninth. Despite being handed the captain's armband, Johnson has been a horror show in gold and black. It's true that he's played out of position at right back several times, and shuffled around to fit Wanderers' needs, but as the supposed linchpin of the Prem's fourth-worst defense (32 goals in 17 games), he's failed to live up to even the most modest of expectations. And Wolves defines the very meaning of "modest."

Midfielder: Stewart Downing, Liverpool

Though the ex-Villa midfielder has played well in stretches under Kenny Dalglish, the fact remains that he has four more assists for England in 2011 than he does for Liverpool. Or, to put it another way, he's racked up zero for the Reds. Not a great return on an initial investment of $28 million. Jordan Henderson's performances have been equally fitful, but given the 27-year-old Downing's experience and established pedigree at Middlesbrough and Villa, King Kenny expected a more immediate impact from his new wide man. And now that Luis Suarez is facing a nine-game ban -- eight for the Patrice Evra incident, and one for flipping the bird to Fulham fans that he'll serve Friday when the Reds face Newcastle -- Liverpool will need Downing more than ever. In other words, they're in trouble.

Midfielder: Adel Taarabt, QPR

While it's not Adel's fault that his name looks like a really bad Scrabble rack, he is to blame for almost everything else. Such was his influence and artistry in helping the West London club get back to the Prem (19 goals, 16 assists and 144 shots in 43 league games) that QPR fans were dismayed this summer when Neil Warnock openly offered last season's League One MVP to Paris Saint-Germain. And yet, Taarabt's 2011 has been so full of arrogance and disinterest -- as club captain Shaun Derry calls it, "wasting talent" -- that it's easy to see why Harry Redknapp jettisoned the ex-Spurs prodigy back in 2008-09. His conduct with QPR this season has regressed to the point that, after being subbed off against Fulham in the middle of the 6-0 humiliation, Taarabt took the bus home instead of gutting it out with his teammates. As it turned out, catching that bus was the Moroccan's only successful link-up of the season.

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Stuart MacFarlane/Getty Images
What happened to the Andrei Arshavin of Euro 2008?
Midfielder: Andrei Arshavin, Arsenal

You know an Arshavin cameo when you see it: 15 minutes of tricky through balls, three should-have-been-on-target-but-ended-up-closer-to- the-corner-flag shots from the edge of the box, and 20 minutes of aimless meandering punctuated by a shrug of the shoulders when he's dispossessed. Lately, Arsene Wenger has tried him as an impact sub, though his only impact has been to make the fourth official lift the illuminated board above his head, signaling his exit from the game. It's not even that Wenger broke his hermetically sealed piggy bank to sign him after Arshavin lit up Euro 2008. Heck, Arsenal supporters just want to see him score more than a single goal in a calendar year. For these pathetic efforts, we are honoring the diminutive Russian by making him captain of the All-Disappointment team. It may be the one thing he's earned this season, other than the continued derision of the Gooner faithful.

Midfielder: Charles N'Zogbia, Aston Villa

Apparently the French for "Arshavin" is "N'Zogbia." How McLeish could not love this guy is beyond us, as he's a perfect fit in the Scot's sparkle-free style of play. Zero goals and one assist in 16 Prem games have been McLeish's reward since he signed the Frenchman from Wigan for $15 million, and the media's already comparing him to one of Villa's worst-ever players after six months. On Tyneside, he was nicknamed "Charles Insomnia" by Joe Kinnear, but perhaps the former Magpies manager was a bit confused. N'Zogbia doesn't stay awake; he puts his teammates to sleep.

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Forward: Fernandy Carroll, Chelsea/Liverpool

Let's see: $130 million, 27 games, four goals, two assists. We repeat: $130 million, 27 games, four goals, two assists.

Forward: Hugo Rodallega, Wigan

Yet to score in 13 Prem appearances, he spent the past three games as an unused bench-warmer (aka "pulling a Torres"). You know it's not good when you can't even hold down a regular spot for one of the worst teams in the league, but Rodallega, long thought to be the one shining hope for the Latics (19 goals over his past two Prem seasons), simply isn't cutting the mustard any more. Hell, he's not even making a dent in the ketchup. Which makes Roberto Martinez's vehemence that the Colombian won't be sold in January even more puzzling. Still, Martinez is a bit of a mad genius, so maybe Rodallega and his glorious cornrows will suddenly start lighting it up in the new year.

Forward: Carlos Tevez, Manchester City

Sadly, one of the most electrifying Prem players of the past few seasons has devolved into a Pampas parody in which the off-field sulking and whining have eclipsed any of the breathtaking goals or MVP-worthy effort that he put in for both sides of Manchester. Roberto Mancini is sitting on a world-class talent so insufferable that nobody else wants him. Even though Milan and PSG have kicked the tires on the Argie bulldog, would anyone be surprised if Tevez ends his season much like it has been thus far: three Prem games, zero goals, zero assists, six shots and 10,000 tabloid headlines?

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Breaking Down Week 17

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:07 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

Kudos to the National Football League for fixing the whole "How do we make as many Week 17 games matter as possible?" dilemma. Sure, it took us a few extra decades to figure out (a) the last week should be reserved for divisional matchups only; (b) if there's a chance a team might not try because their fate was decided by an earlier game, remove that chance by scheduling those games at the same time; and (c) Sunday night's game should always have the highest cut-and-dry stakes (even if it means deciding that game at the last minute). But whatever. Now we can gamble in peace. Of our sixteen Week 17 games, thirteen matter in some way. That's pretty good.

For anyone expecting 4,000 words of poor gambling advice, semi-competent football observations and hit-or-miss jokes, I have some bad news: There's a chance I might rest my starters this week. I haven't decided yet. Stay tuned. In the meantime, let's bang out some Week 17 picks. As a special New Year's gift to you, I'm guaranteeing an 11-5-or-better week or your money back.

(Home teams in caps)

NOTHING WHATSOEVER AT STAKE

VIKINGS (-1.5) over Bears
It's the Prozac Bowl! The poor Bears fans are finishing off consecutive "What if Cutler hadn't gotten hurt?" seasons. Meanwhile, here were your past 23 months as a Vikings fan: an iconic stomach-punch playoff loss to New Orleans (one first down from the Super Bowl); the "Is Favre coming back or isn't he?" saga, followed by Favre's sexting scandal; the Kevin/Pat Williams Star Caps suspension; Brad Childress' creepy final season; the 2010 Vikes turning things around just enough down the stretch to screw themselves out of a top-five draft pick; Christian Ponder over Andy Dalton; the ongoing threat of the Vikes moving to L.A.; the Donovan McNabb era; their best cornerback (Chris Cook) getting knocked out for the season by an ugly domestic violence incident; a 2-12 start in 2011 highlighted by a story that Minnesota's defensive players were ignoring their coordinator; the whole "Wait, Joe Webb is better than Ponder, what the hell do we do now?" issue; then Adrian Peterson's blowing out his knee during the same Week 16 victory that cost them the Andrew Luck Sweepstakes. The good news? The Vikings figured out their stadium issues, which means I don't have to get any more e-mails like these …

From Andrew in St. Paul: "If the Vikings move to L.A. I'm going to sit in my bathtub and listen to Against All Odds by Phil Collins for a week."

From Matt in Minneapolis: "You a-holes in L.A. can have the Vikings. We don't care enough to pay for a stadium, so you can assume the worst roster in the league with $100 million devoted to a running back. I'll also sell you my 1999 Ford Ranger with 200,000 miles on it for $40,000.

"Sincerely,
"Guy who would rather stay home and watch games on TV with my whiskey that doesn't include a 10% sales tax for another stadium for a shitty team."

Seahawks (+3) over CARDINALS
Big doings in the NFC West this season: It shed the "worst division in football" label (congrats to the AFC South, our new nadir!), gave us three quality home-field advantage teams (as well as a legitimate contender), submitted a few genuinely entertaining games and made us say things like, "You know, Tarvaris Jackson is actually decent!" and "Is it just me or is John Skelton the right-handed, not-as-religious, non-virgin, non-polarizing Tim Tebow?" I don't know who's winning this game, just that they will win by either one or two points.

EAGLES (-8.5) over Redskins
Lessons we learned from these two teams: Don't refer to yourself as the "Dream Team" … assistant coaches apparently matter … don't ever say the words "I think John Beck gives us the best chance to win" … don't give someone a $100 million extension until he proves he can play 12 games in a row … if you're a receiver looking for a contract extension, and you don't get it, acting erratically, skipping meetings and quitting on balls over the middle won't make you more money … it's possible to fail 10 NFL drug tests and keep playing … don't build both of your fantasy teams around Michael Vick (much less one of them) … even if Mike Shanahan has won only 35 of his past 79 games, we're not allowed to mention this, and we need to keep referring to him as a good coach.

SOMETHING AT STAKE (JUST NOT OUR ATTENTION)

FALCONS (-11.5) Bucs
Lions (-3) over PACKERS

We know Green Bay's second string will put up a token fight, scare the Lions fans for about an hour and ultimately fall apart. We also know the Falcons (a classic "We look awesome against crappy teams!" team) will beat up the pathetic Bucs so badly that you'll see Raheem Morris working on his résumé in the second half. Final tally: Detroit ends up with the no. 5 seed; Atlanta ends up with the no. 6 seed; everyone who throws Atlanta, New England and San Francisco in a three-team, 10-point tease cruises to an easy holiday win.

Speaking of cruising, make sure you cruise through Grantland's "Looking Back at 2011" features for the year in music, movies, television, sports and porn, as well as who won 2011 and predictions for 2012.1 They banned me from appearing in the Year in Music piece because of some obscure "You're over 40, you have two kids, you're still on AOL and you use a BlackBerry Bold" rule, as well as the fact that I once mistakenly called Jay-Z and Kanye's collaboration album Use The Throne.2 Apparently there was a staff vote and everything. But they can't stop me from making 2012 predictions.

My big prediction: I predict that a well-known athlete will reveal that he's gay,3 followed by a couple of days of crazed stories/columns/TV arguments about what a big deal this is (only it isn't), followed by people eventually realizing that nobody cares and someone should have done this four years ago, followed by that same athlete inking a huge book deal and picking up more endorsements than he had before he came out. Barnwell said it's 50/50; I'm going with 90/10. I also predict that Spain will shock the United States for the 2012 Olympic hoops gold medal, David Stern will not retire (but U2 WILL retire), the podcast format is going to jump a level because cars will start having a wireless Internet signal, Steve Nash will get traded to the Portland Trail Blazers, ESPN will launch a second 30 for 30 documentary series in October, and Floyd Mayweather will finally fight Manny Pacquiao (and beat him). So there you go.

DOLPHINS (-3) over Jets
We'll remember the 2011 Dolphins fondly for becoming this year's "Sneaky-Decent Down The Stretch" team, covering eight of their past nine (and winning five outright) with two different coaches, reviving Reggie Bush's career, proving that Brandon Marshall could slap four relatively sane months together, and securing Matt Moore's "Everything That Ryan Fitzpatrick Gives You, Only Without the $59 Million Extension" status. Other things we'll remember fondly: Those two years when we mistakenly thought Rex Ryan was a good coach; those three years when we thought a team led by Mark Sanchez could make the Super Bowl; that Week 17 in 2011 when people stupidly believed that the Jets could sneak into the playoffs if three other teams lost (which allowed us to bet on a superior Dolphins team giving less than a field goal); these last 19 months before Rex Ryan replaces Warren Sapp on Inside the NFL and ruins that show.

TEXANS (+3) over Titans
I know, I know … Tennessee needs to win (and needs Cincy, the Jets and either Denver or Oakland to lose) to make the playoffs, and Houston already locked up a no. 3 seed. But if you're the Texans, do you really want to limp into the playoffs having lost three straight and having failed to crack 20 points since Week 10? Don't you HAVE to try, if only for momentum's sake? Besides, are you really willing to accept a world in which this lousy Titans team sneaks into the playoffs? I'm grabbing the three points despite the fact that a banged-up T.J. Yates looked shaky enough these past two weeks that "Should we start Jake Delhomme?" actually became a sports radio topic in Houston. God, remember the days when people like Victor in Oregon sent me e-mails like this?

"Can't you see TJ Yates having a similar career to Tom Brady? Both had unspectacular careers in college, were drafted in the late rounds (Yates in the 5th, Brady in the 6th), and weren't expected to do anything in the NFL. Brady got his chance when Drew Bledsoe (a talented-but-flawed QB) had a season-ending injury. Brady then led his team to a Super Bowl victory and became one of the best QBs ever. Yates became QB because a talented-but-flawed QB (Matt Schaub) ahead of him had a season-ending injury. Both Brady and Yates inherited good teams who nobody believed in after their first-string QB went down. If Yates leads his team to a Super Bowl victory this year and becomes one of the best of all time, don't say I didn't tell you so."

(Sure thing, Victor.)

PLAYOFF SEEDING AT STAKE (BUT MORE IMPORTANT, THREE-TEAM TEASERS AND DRAFT-ORDER STATUS)

Bills (+11) over PATRIOTS
49ers (-10.5) over RAMS
The Pats wrap up a no. 1 seed with a win (I'm predicting a textbook Milton Berle "Pulling out just enough to win" performance); the Niners wrap up a no. 2 seed with a win (lock it down); and the Rams lock up "We'll get the no. 1 pick if Indy is dumb enough to win" status with a loss (and they'll lose). Consider it a one-week respite before you start getting hammered by questions like "How can the Patriots possibly make the Super Bowl with that defense?" and "Can the Niners really make the Super Bowl with Alex Smith and below-average receivers?"

That reminds me, I enjoyed this e-mail from Clayton in San Luis Obispo, Calif.: "I was listening to a White Stripes album with my buddy the other day when he made the comment that Meg White is a bad drummer. But if you ask anyone, they'll say that the White Stripes are a great band. Meg White never said she was a great drummer, however, she gets the job done. She is supposed to just lay a simple beat for Jack White and let him do the work. As long as she doesn't get in the way, the White Stripes are going to be doing well. It's the same way with Alex Smith and the Niners. He's not a great quarterback, but he's good enough to not screw up. He understands that the Niners defense is the key to San Francisco's success and all he has to do is keep it easy on them. He's not flashy, he's not supernatural, but he gets the job done."

(So if you're scoring at home, your second-best case for the 2011 Niners making the Super Bowl is that Alex Smith is the Meg White of drummers. Your best case? That they have a superb defense, superb special teams and a superb coach … and if you're "superb" in three of the four relevant football categories, you always have a chance. To be continued.)

NOTHING MUCH AT STAKE (BUT A REALLY FUN GAME)

Panthers (+7.5) over SAINTS
My prediction for this one: The Saints go hard for a half and get everyone lathered up for the "Brees vs. Cam!" second-half showdown … but with the Niners trouncing the Rams at the same time, New Orleans comes to its senses, resigns itself to the no. 3 seed and rests everyone in the second half. Good news for Cam's "Rookie of the Year" campaign, good news for Panthers +7.5, bad news for what could have been a fantastic game.

That reminds me …

1. Sorry, Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers … I will remember the 2011 season for Cam and Tebow before anyone else. How great was Cam? He single-handedly made a forgettable/lousy franchise relevant/decent, swung about five million fantasy leagues,4 cruised to Rookie of the Year, revived Steve Smith's career, made those Wired for Sound NFL Films spots about 15.4 percent better and gave the NFL a young megastar with NBA-level charisma (wouldn't you put him up there with Durant, Rose and Griffin?). The best thing you could say about Cam: If you were watching football at a sports bar with tons of televisions, or visiting someone's house who had multiple TVs, Cam always seemed to end up on one of the prominent TVs no matter who he was playing. I love watching that guy.

2. Was it right that I didn't get excited about Drew Brees' new passing yards record? It reminds me of Oscar Robertson averaging a triple-double, or any of the Bonds/McGwire home run records; it's impossible to separate the era from the accomplishment itself. When Dan Marino threw for 5,084 yards in 1984, you were allowed to (a) pummel the QB every chance you had, (b) dive at the QB's knees as he was throwing the ball, (c) crush any receiver coming over the middle, and (d) jam receivers at the line by any means necessary, even if you had to use a crowbar or a chainsaw. It was impossible to throw for 5,000 yards back then. Only two other 1984 QBs cracked 4,000 yards (Neil Lomax and Phil Simms); nobody else cracked 3,800 yards; and only five guys even attempted 500+ passes (Marino's 564 was the highest). In 2011? Ten QBs will crack 4,000 yards; six will crack 4,500 yards; two (including Tom Brady) will crack 5,000 yards. Heading into Week 17, ten 2011 QBs have already thrown more than 500+ passes, with Brees leading the way with 622. It's a totally different game. Heading forward, we're going to see multiple QBs throw for 5,000 yards every season … right?

STRANGELY, SHOCKINGLY MEANINGFUL

Colts (+3.5) over JAGUARS
I loved what happened with the Colts this month: They respect Peyton Manning so much that they're willfully killing any chance of the Andrew Luck era by winning these last three games. Even better, their fans are totally fine with it. How can you not root for this? Had the 1990 Celtics had a chance to lose enough games to land the no. 1 overall pick and some killer scoring forward, only we would have had to trade Larry Bird if we got that pick, you know what I would have done? Rooted for them to keep winning so Bird didn't go anywhere.

What's the point of sports, anyway? If someone like Bird or Manning passes through your life — something that might happen for a fan two or three times TOTAL in a lifetime — doesn't loyalty trump everything else? I never, ever, in a million years, would have wanted to watch Larry Legend play for someone else. It would have killed me. I'm sure Colts fans feel the same way about Manning, as do his teammates, which is why they are going to win this game. You watch.

RELATIVELY BIG STAKES

BROWNS (+4) over Steelers
BENGALS (+2) over Ravens
The stakes: If the Ravens win, they're a no. 2 seed; if the Steelers win and the Ravens lose, the Steelers are the no. 2 seed; if the Bengals win, they're the no. 6 seed, if the Bengals lose, they might end up being the no. 6 seed anyway. You're right, this is confusing. But it's a fascinating spot for the banged-up Steelers, who have the following two choices …

1. Rest everybody, take the 5-seed, play in Oakland or Denver in Round 1 (two fairly easy games), and probably, in New England in Round 2 (a great matchup for them, and a team they already crushed this season).

2. Go all-out, try to win the game. If Baltimore wins, too, suddenly you blew your chance for a week of rest and the previous paragraph plays out anyway. If you get the no. 2 seed, you get a week off, then you host either Houston or Baltimore/Denver/Oakland in Round 2, followed by a road trip to New England (probably) in Round 3.

The Steelers CLAIM they're playing everybody. I think it's a smoke screen. If you can grab a week of guaranteed rest, you do it now. Of course, I think the Bengals are going to beat the Ravens (who have been frauds on the road all season), which means — if they rest everyone this week — Pittsburgh will be blowing a no. 2 seed. See, this is why it's confusing.5

RAIDERS (-3) over Chargers
Like everyone else, I'm rooting for the Raiders to somehow win the AFC West (they'd need to win here, then Denver would have to lose), then somehow win a home playoff game (couldn't you see Joe Flacco falling apart in Oakland?) and getting blown out in New England in Round 2 … but not before giving up their 2013 no. 1 pick because of that "If Oakland wins one 2011 playoff game, Cincy gets a second first-round pick as part of Oakland's idiotic Carson Palmer trade" clause. This would be the funniest thing that happened this season, with the possible exception of every Caleb Hanie pass and Takeo Spikes somehow ending up on another losing team.6

Meanwhile, if Jon Gruden was ever coming back to coach, wouldn't it be for that Chargers job? Phil Rivers, Malcolm Floyd and Vincent Jackson as deep threats, Ryan Mathews as the Brian Westbrook-type back … it's like a West Coast offense/warm-weather nirvana, and if that's not enough, he gets to live in San Diego, the most beautiful city in America. I can't handle San Diego — every time I'm there, I go into a deep funk and question every choice I ever made in my life. Why didn't I go to the University of San Diego for college or grad school? Why didn't I move there after college? Why don't I live there now? Why didn't anyone even tell me this stuff before I turned 30? San Diego is like the Fight Club of cities — everyone who lives there makes a pact not to tell anyone else how great it is so they can keep the housing costs down. (Note: Didn't work. It's superexpensive.) If San Diego got an NBA team, I would move there tomorrow and that would be that.7 How can Gruden resist that job?

Here's how this needs to play out: Norv Turner becomes the Jets' offensive coordinator; Gruden grabs the Chargers job; Ray Lewis retires after an emotionally scarring playoff loss in Oakland that also netted Cincy a second first-round pick from what was already one of the best trades of the past 20 years; ESPN's new Monday Night Football team becomes Mike Tirico, Ron Jaworski and Ray Lewis; everybody wins. Well, except Raiders fans.

BIG STAKES

BRONCOS (-3) over Chiefs
There's only one problem with the "Couldn't you see Kyle Orton getting his revenge against Tebow and the Broncos and knocking them out of the playoffs?" scenario. Hold on, I'll let you think about it. Mull it over. I bet you get it.

(Giving you a couple of extra seconds.)

(Twiddling my thumbs.)

And … time!

OK, here's the problem: HE'S KYLE FUCKING ORTON! Have you watched him play????? You've watched him, right? He won six of his past twenty-seven games as Denver's starter. He's the master of the "Just when I thought we had some momentum, I can't believe Kyle threw that pick into triple coverage in the end zone" play. Now he's suddenly Liam Neeson flying to Europe to find his abducted daughter in Taken? We owe the word "revenge" an apology for daring to include it in the same sentence as Kyle Orton. Besides, in the words of Paul Crewe, we've come too far with this Tebow thing to stop now. For Granny, for Nate … for Jesus … let's do it.

MASSIVE STAKES

GIANTS (-3) over Cowboys
I have this ranked over Broncos-Chiefs because of the history (Giants! Cowboys!), the time (Sunday night!), the quarterbacks (Eli and Romo!), the stakes (winner takes the NFC East, loser goes home and probably either fires its coach or shoots him behind the stadium) and the accumulated trauma from the 2011 season (it's almost a foregone conclusion that someone is losing on Sunday night in the most agonizing way possible).8 Which fan base is more likely to be traumatized on Sunday night? Well …

• The Giants blew three seemingly easy 2011 home games in gut-wrenching, I-can't-believe-I-care-about-these-idiots fashion (Philly, Washington and Seattle). Their fans were also absolutely, 100 percent convinced that (a) their team had quit on their coach as recently as six days ago, and (b) these guys were total frauds.

• The Cowboys choked five different times (Jets, Lions, Patriots, Cards, Giants) in brutal defeats that elicited emotions ranging from "I knew we'd blow that game, but it still ruined my weekend" to "I'm starting to understand the chain of events that leads someone to try heroin."

Here's why I am grabbing the Giants: They do two things (throw the ball, rush the passer) better than Dallas does anything; Dallas beat San Fran in Week 2 and hasn't beaten a team better than .500 since; Felix Jones, Terence Newman and Jason Garrett are prominently involved; and finally, if your life depended on this game, do you really want to back Tony Romo's injured throwing hand outdoors, in cold weather, on the road, when it's attached to Tony Romo's body? That sounds more than a little risky to me. I'm laying the 3.

(And yes, I ended up playing my starters this week. Enjoy the New Year.)

Last Week: 6-9-1
Season: 116-117-1

Permalink | A A A

Who Won 2011?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:06 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

In past brackets I've completed, the hardest part has never been picking the winner. Sure, who comes out on top is the lasting image, but nothing has proven to be more important and difficult than narrowing down the field, be it the initial 64 ("Best Outkast Song") or 16 ("Best Commercial featuring Rappers"). In this, the "#Winning 2011" bracket, nothing was further from the truth. In a year in which everyone seemed to lose at an alarming rate, the most difficult aspect of this project was identifying anyone who happened to find success and then keep it.

It wasn't until I attempted to fill a draw of 64, and got stuck at 7, did I realize what a huge year this was for losers. If you weren't getting financially screwed over, you were probably getting divorced, locked up, or pepper sprayed. That's how I'll always remember 2011. With that said, I was still determined to identify and either celebrate or hate on the winners of 2011. After days of Googling "best _____ of 2011" and "who still has a credit score going into 2012", a draw of 32 was completed, with people, innovations, events, and other assorted nouns spread over four categories: sports, celebrities, technology, and movements/phenomena.

Before displaying the bracket, there are a few things I should just throw out there from the jump:

The Deceased: Not included. I'm mainly talking about Steve Jobs and Amy Winehouse. Although their untimely deaths did create a boost in their popularity and influence, they did die, which just can't be called a win.

The Minaj: Not included. Her November 2010 release of Pink Friday (much like Kanye's November 2010 release of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy) did remain popular throughout 2011, but I still consider her year of "winning" to be 2010. This is not a bracket of "Who rode their 2010 wave the best." If it were, there would be no reason to have a bracket, because she would win in a landslide.

The Sheen: Not included. Yes, the term "winning" existed before 2011, but Charlie Sheen made it a catch-all phrase with his antics in the early half of the year. One would think the "#Winning 2011" bracket would have to include him for that very reason, but it doesn't. You can't end the year a bi-loser, get replaced by Ashton Kutcher, and expect a seat at the table, brother of Estevez. Bye.

The Friday: Sort of included, but not really. I know 14-year-old Rebecca Black was the most Googled person in 2011, but she still would make the Elite Eight of my "Who Lost 2011." When you are irrationally despised by hundreds of thousands of people and you haven't even taken the PSAT, that's not a great year. Trust me. I'm 14.

The Biebs: Not included. Canadian male heartthrob quota already filled.

The Obamas: Not included. Nuclear Black family quota already filled.

The Cut Missers: The aforementioned individuals weren't really that close to making the cut. Those who were: Kemba Walker, Kristen Wiig, The Conspiracy Theory That Beyoncé Was Faking Her Pregnancy, Louis CK, Big Ghostfase, GIFs, Bert Blyleven, and Detroit (it's all relative).

The Seedings: Objectively Subjective. How so? Seedings were based on number of Twitter followers — objective. If an entry did not have a verified Twitter account, however, I gave m'self the freedom to pick any semi-related account to determine their placement — subjective. Sometimes this rewarded the entrant, but more often than not it's a much-deserved punishment.

OK, no more disclaimers. Time to man up. On to the winners.

Categories (Twitter stats as of the morning of 12/19/11)

Sports

Tim Tebow: QB, Denver Broncos. @TimTebow. 711,935 Followers.
David Freese: Third Basemen, St. Louis Cardinals. @Dfreese23. 95,588 Followers.
Aaron Rodgers: QB, Green Bay Packers. @AaronRodgers12. 428,693 Followers.
Novak Djokovic: Professional Tennis Player. @DjokerNole. 463,037 Followers.
Dirk Nowitzki: Power Forward, Dallas Mavericks. @Swish41. 364,806 Followers.
Abby Wambach: Forward, U.S. Women's Soccer. @AbbyWambach. 97,342 Followers.
Tony Stewart: NASCAR Driver. @Tonystewart. 43,391 Followers.
David Stern: NBA Commissioner. @Fake_DavidStern + @DavidSternaHoe. 2,487 Followers.

Celebrities

Adele: Singer. @OfficialAdele. 2,740,421 Followers.
Ryan Gosling: Actor. @RyanGosling. 229,829 Followers.
Trey Parker/Matt Stone: Writers. @BookOfMormonBWY. 20,212 Followers.
Kate Upton: Model. @KateUpton. 143,111 Followers.
Michael Fassbender: Actor. @Fassbender_Way. 3,476 Followers.
Pippa Middleton: Sister. @MiddletonPippa + @pippasass. 21,615 Followers.
Chris Brown: Guy. @ChrisBrown. 6,265,967 Followers.
The Knowles-Throne Family: Blacks on Blacks on Blacks. @Beyonce + @Kanyewest + @S_C_. 8,917,325 Followers.

Movements/Phenomena

Occupy: The 99 percent. @OccupyWallSt. 140,566 Followers.
Swag: Noun, Verb, Adjective, Interjection. @souljaboy + @fucktyler + @LILBTHEBASEDGOD + @_ASAProcky. 4,241,995 Followers.
Music Festivals: The great outdoors. @sxsw + @coachella + @lollapalooza. 343,138 Followers.
P90X: The awkward indoors. @P90X. 32,798 Followers.
The Buildup and DROP: 2011's Musical MVP. @skrillex + @LMFAO. 1,800,396 Followers.
Posing: Recurring nightmare. @PlankSociety + @Tebowing + @LeisureDive. 7,327 Followers.
NBA-Hogwarts: Team full of Urkels. @Amareisreal + @DwyaneWade + @KingJames + @KDTrey5 + @DwightHoward. 9,281,791 Followers
Newt 2012: The South will Rise Again. @NewtGingrich. 1,381,203 Followers

Technology

Tumblr: Bloggin'. @tumblr. 197,136 Followers.
Twitter: Chattin'. @Twitter. 7,092,119 Followers.
Invite-Only Internet Fun: Joinin'. @Spotify + @GiltGroupe + @LearnGooglePlus. 379,566 Followers.
Siri: Talkin'. @iphone_dev + @StuffSiriSaid. 387,466 Followers.
Live Streams: Watchin'. @Livestream. 182,010 Followers.
Angry Birds: Slangin'. @AngryBirds. 321,781 Followers.
Instagram: Emo Shootin'. @Instagram. 900,244 Followers.
Call of Duty: Real Shootin'. @CallofDuty. 277,433 Followers.

In the words of Songz, Trey: LEHHHH GO. Proceed, won't you?

ROUND OF 32
Thursday Region

NBA Hogwarts (1) vs. Trey Parker/Matt Stone (8): They say you never forget your first time. They also say you never forget your first time seeing Amar'e Stoudemire sit next to Anna Wintour in the front seat of a fashion show. While this event took place in Fall 2010, it set the stage for a 2011 full of large cardigans and even larger humans squeezing into them. The preppy, "NBA Nerd" starting five for 2011 was Kevin Durant, Dwight Howard, Dwyane Wade, LeBron James, and Amar'e Stoudemire, and while this trend picked up steam during the 2011 playoffs, it became one of the few positives to emerge from that whole NBA lockout thing. Battling these big nerds are two smaller geniuses, Trey Parker and Matt Stone. If you would have told me five years ago that the creators of South Park and Team America: World Police would eventually win nine Tony Awards, including "Best Musical" with a show called The Book of Mormon, my one word answer would have been: "Duh." For unapologetically dominating the theatre world, Parker and Stone win this one easily. Sorry hoopers, but as they say: "Too many Urkels on your team, that's why your wins-low." Too many Urkels, indeed.

Tumblr (5) vs. Invite-Only Internet Fun (4): I've realized that you know a technological product is winning when the comically uneducated can figure out how to use it. By this definition, Tumblr (along with Twitter and sexting) has found great success in 2011. Some of the year's great Internet memes were via Tumblogs (Texts From Bennett, Awesome People Hanging Out Together) and even I, a huge WordPress fan, have been forced to acknowledge how much cooler the platform is than almost anything else on the Internet. Unlike Tumblr, where you can join and post GIFs of two Basketball Wives fighting in a matter of minutes, the Internet also has some mediums with barriers to entry. Enter the worlds of Spotify, Google+, Gilt Groupe, and the hundreds of sites that are mirroring Gilt's exact formula. When each launched, the only way you could join was if someone invited you. Talk about hip. Talk about exclusive. Talk about rude. Even though invitation-based shopping and an unlimited music platform have more than made up for the M.C. Escher-esque maze that is Google+, there's no way they can hang with the free, simplistic, addictive beauty that is Tumblr. On to the Sweet 16, Papa Karp.

Abby Wambach (6) vs. Tim Tebow (3): Abby Wambach is an American hero. What she did in this year's World Cup is the stuff of legends, with her aerial domination of the sport serving as the soccer equivalent of Kareem's skyhook. Not only did she have perhaps the play of the year with a game-saving, stoppage-time header versus Brazil, but in the demoralizing championship loss to Japan, she was the only one to convert a penalty kick. What a baller. Speaking of American heroes, the person who stands in Abby's way is another newly minted legend, Tim Tebow. This guy is something else. If there was one person I did not expect to be on this list 12 months ago, it was Tim Tebow. He wasn't supposed to lead game-winning drives. He wasn't supposed to have seven wins as an NFL starter. He wasn't supposed to be a cultural phenomenon. He was simply supposed to be the guy who loves Jesus more than you. So, due to Tim's emergence as an off-the-field phenomenon, something Abby never really capitalized on, I have to give the edge to Tebow (which is scary for the competition, because it's not even Tebow Time).

Tony Stewart (7) vs. The Build Up and DROP (2): Even if you know very little about NASCAR, you probably know of a guy named Jimmy Johnson who seems to always win. 2006-2010 were all about JJ. Finally, in 2011, someone got the best of him, with Stewart needing to win the year's final race at Homestead-Miami to claim the Sprint Cup Series championship. And then he did, because that's what winners do. To change speeds shift gears mix it up a li'l bit, probably the opposite of a NASCAR race is the "Build Up & Drop." You might not be familiar with that phrase, seeing as that I just made it up, but if you listened to music this year, you've heard it over and over again. You know, the part of the song when the crescendo grows and grows, pauses for half of a second, a phrase is potentially uttered over the silence, and then BOOM MUSICAL CONFETTI EXPLOSION [See: LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem" (2:23), Pitbull/Ne-Yo's "Give Me Everything" (0:43), Big Sean's "Dance (Ass)" (0:12), Skrillex's "First of the Year (Equinox)" (1:25), Britney Spears' "'Till The World Ends" (0:54), Rihanna's "We Found Love" (1:58)] The fact that this musical trick escaped the techno and dubstep worlds and dominated a variety of genres gives this a pretty easy victory over Tony. Sorry man. Who knows, maybe you should work on driving the no. 8 Beats By Dre car next year and your fortunes might turn up.

Friday Region

The Knowles-Throne Family (1) vs. Posing (8): In 2011, Kanye West, Jay-Z, and Beyoncé officially became a package deal. Their careers, relationships, and social circles became so intertwined, when one of them does something, the other two will undoubtedly be impacted. Because of this, there's really no point in referring to them as individuals. You may think the real connections are Jay/Kanye (Watch The Throne) and Jay/Beyoncé (marriage, soon-to-be parents), but lest we forget that Kanye's most infamous moment, the Taylor Swift incident, came when Mr. West stormed the stage to defend whose honor? Answer = Beyoncé. These three are the epitome of cray, they consistently drip swagoo, and they couldn't have had a bigger year. While The Family has been around for a while, their first-round opponents are a series of fads I've lumped into a category called "posing." First there was "planking," hugely popular for a few months, especially among NBA athletes on summer vacation. Then there was the less popular (but much funnier and more creative) "leisure diving," big among Princeton legacies with Hamptons time-shares. And then most recently, "Tebowing," the kneel-and-pray pose made accidentally popular by Mr. Sweet 16 himself, Tim Tebow. While all of these things arrived, were great for a solid Facebook album, and then left, they can't even begin to touch the Knowles-Thrones. They are the opposite of a fad; they are the establishment.

Call of Duty (5) vs. Music Festivals (4): I don't play video games anymore. I want to, but I can't afford to lose months off my life and 75 percent of my social skills like I used to with Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2. I bring this up, because I have no real concept about what's hot and what's not in the video-game world, except for Call of Duty. This game is so big, even I have played it. Two games in the series, Modern Warfare 3 and Black Ops were on 2011's Top 10 Best-Selling Video Games list, with the former being the highest-selling game of the year. Whereas Call of Duty is an antisocial indoor activity (I know it has headsets, chill out nerds), the ever-growing outdoor phenomenon of music festivals took over 2011 in a very different way. Partly because festivals have become the new, recession-friendly vacation destinations for twentysomethings, and partly because artists have to tour to break even; SoCal's Coachella, Austin's South By Southwest, Chicago's Lollapalooza, The Gathering of the Juggalos, Tennessee's Bonnarroo, and San Francisco's Outside Lands provided the year with some of its most memorable live performances. There's no denying the impact Call of Duty is having on the video-game world, but people aren't already planning their entire 2012s around the next Call of Duty release like they are next year's music festivals. Nice effort, Call of Duty, but this time peace and love > war and headsets.

Kate Upton (6) vs. Instagram (3): This is a funny matchup, because it happens to be one of my favorite things of 2011 vs. one of my most despised things of 2011. Getting taught the Dougie by model Kate Upton was the highlight of my YouTube year, without question. Hearing my friends argue about the coolest setting on Instagram has consistently been my least favorite conversation to overhear. Seeing one of my favorite pairs of Jordans on the feet of Kate Upton furthered my belief that there's nothing more attractive than a beautiful woman in fly kicks. Watching my friends convince themselves that they're real photographers because of their Instagram skills makes me never want to take a picture again. To be completely honest, the only thing that I really wouldn't mind seeing in Instagram is a photo of Kate Upton getting her eagle on in a pair of Concords. Even though in my heart Kate Upton gets a bye into the Final 4 of this bracket, Instagram solidified the transition of smart phone from occasional image-taker to full-time digital camera. As dumb as the pictures are, I can't deny its influence. Sorry Mama Upton, but you're out. When it's time for you first legal drink 18 months from now, Michelob Ultra's on your boy all night.

Pippa Middleton (7) vs. Adele (2): So let's be real, there's no way Adele loses in the first round. Whereas Pippa is simply some girl's fly sister, Adele is the only one human in the world who hasn't gotten the memo about not going 5x Platinum. I could go back and forth to hammer down this point, but it's pretty obvious. Seeing as that I don't even know what Pippa Minaj's voice sounds like, simply making the bracket should be seen as an accomplishment. Adele, congrats on the Sweet 16. This bracket could be very good to you in the upcoming rounds, but if I was a betting man, I'd guess you'd get far, it would get your hopes up, and then tragically let you down at the end. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I want 23 to be about me.

Saturday Region

Twitter (1) vs. Michael Fassbender (8): Twitter is amazing, for all the dumb reasons and important ones. I love the fact that, on the same platform, I can get a full breakdown of The Real Housewives of Atlanta one night and then later get by-the-minute updates on overseas revolutions hours before the major news outlets report on it. I love the fact that, on the same platform, I can find out how my friends feel about Kanye West and how Kanye West feels about Givenchy Couture. I love the fact that a year ago, I was a giant skeptic, and now I can't imagine my life without it. Speaking of being a skeptic a year ago, that's about the time I became a skeptic of Michael Fassbender. After winning me over in Inglourious Basterds, he thought it'd be a great idea to take part in the train wreck that was Jonah Hex. Luckily for the world, 2010 ended and 2011 began, which meant it was time for him to dominate the film industry. In one calendar year, he played four characters I'm very familiar with: Mr. Rochester (Jane Eyre), Carl Jung (A Dangerous Method), Magneto (X-Men: First Class), and a New Yorker who can have naked sex with everyone (Shame). The guy is fantastic. Unfortunately for him, he didn't go up against Pippa, or he'd easily be in the next round. This is Twitter we're talking about. Twitter. So yeah, see you next year Fassbender. Unless you decide to take part in Jonah Hex 2, you're pretty much a shoo-in.

Angry Birds (5) vs. Dirk Nowitzki (4): There was a long period of time when I didn't download Angry Birds (or any other games) on my phone, because games are for children and I stay all about my business. Then one day I was in a bathroom and I heard a guy obviously playing a game while sitting on the toilet. A few minutes later, I saw him as he walked out of the bathroom, creepily walked behind him, peeked over his shoulder, and recognized that he was playing Angry Birds. After a quick survey of some of my friends, I realized Angry Birds is the must-have phone application for bathroom-stall chill sessions. You have to respect the niche the game has carved out for itself in the past year. While Angry Birds comes to us from Finland, another fantastic import, Dirk Nowitzki, comes to us from Germany. Between finally winning a ring, receiving the Finals MVP, having one of the greatest shooting performances in NBA playoff history, and hanging out with Lil Wayne in Miami, post-championship, it's a no brainer that 2011 was the highlight of Dirk's career. After their win, Dirk and the Mavericks were supposed to be the talk of the sports world until the moment the next season started, when the conversation would only intensify. Instead, that lockout happened, which completely stole all of Dirk's shine. The lockout put a real sour note on everyone's 2011, even Dirk's. With this lack of basketball for the latter part of 2011, all that meant for many of us was more time to play Angry Birds. For that reason, in addition to the fact that everyone in the NBA sort of lost in 2011, the slingshot iPhone game pushes past the 7-foot German. Not even I saw that one coming, and I'm the one making every decision. Go figure.

Occupy (6) vs. Novak Djokovic (3): Another great matchup, because more often than not I'm beefing with both of these entities. While some of the "Occupy ________" made me proud of my angsty generation, namely the ones with any sort of game plan, the vast majority I thought were silly, seeing as that it was just a group of smelly-looking individuals taking turns making outlandish demands over a megaphone. No, Occupy San Jose, I won't support your fight for five-hour lunch breaks. Sorry, Occupy Atlanta, I'm not marching to rename "Peachtree" to "Ludatree." I'm just not. Going against the Occupy movement is perhaps my least favorite champion, Novak Djokovic. I respect the fact that in 2011, he posted one of the greatest singles seasons in professional tennis history (70-6: 10 tournament wins, three of which were Grand Slams, and a 43-match winning streak). I can't look at those numbers and say he isn't good. I simply dislike watching him succeed. On-court grace isn't his thing, something I got used to while watching Federer, so it makes it very hard to root for him. In this, the battle of the beef, it really comes down to (1) who was more dominant and (2) who do I beef with the least. Both answers fall in favor of the Occupy movement. Sorry Novak, but seeing as this bracket is an actual event, you're now 70-7. I'm happy to have not helped.

P90X (7) vs. Newt 2012 (2): There are quite a few things in this draw of 32 that I did not use, but were massively successful in 2011. Like Instagram, P90X falls into this category, but unlike Instagram I don't dislike P90X. I don't use it, because my definition of working out is less burning calories in my living room and more taunting big dogs in my neighborhood and having them chase me for seven to eight miles. For the first three months of hearing about P90X, I had no idea what it was, and initially assumed it was some sort of drug. Because of this, I got worried because everyone around me seemed to be doing it. Confused on why no one would ever talk to me directly about it, I just assumed it was because I'm not cool enough. Later, once I got the scoop, it was simply because everyone knows I would never join them for a living room workout. Another guy who would never join anyone for a P90X workout is Newt Gingrich. Newt is having an unreal 2011 because a year ago no one thought he would actually run for president. After surveying the field and realizing how much smarter he was than his Republican counterparts, he entered the race and is now the front-runner. I don't think Newt is going to have a great 2012, because at some point we will all Google "Newt Gingrich's Past" and he will lose, but he was briefly, shockingly the front-runner. Because Newt probably has the authority to deem P90X unconstitutional act of treason, he wins. Easily.

Sunday Region

Chris Brown (1) vs. David Stern (8): I feel like these two would have a lot to talk about. Both men know what it's like to be liked, and both know what it's like to be hated with a passion. As much as it pains me to say it, Chris Breezy had a huge year. I despise pretty much everything about him, but there's no denying the fact that his 2011 release F.A.M.E. had six singles, one of which was the banger "Look At Me Now." This was probably my second-most viewed video of the year, behind Rihanna's "We Found Love," which also features a waifish, fair-skinned black man with blond hair who repeatedly lovehatebeats RiRi, a la Chris Brown. While Chris Brown popularity re-rose and he fell back in favor with a portion of the country, NBA commissioner Stern lost any fans he had in 2011. If anyone thought they could intimidate David Stern or make him cave in any way, they learned that wasn't true this year. Stern is truly the biggest boss I've seen thus far, and although his late-2011 power trip may have gotten his name crossed off of some NYE 2011 party invite lists, he got what he wanted, and now that the season's here, we've almost forgotten it all. These two punks had big years, but if it weren't for Stern, there would be no LOB CITY. STERN WINS, STERN WINS.

Ryan Gosling (5) vs. Siri (4): Siri, the sassy little lady inside of the iPhone4s, is awesome. On my first try with her, she accurately told me where the nearest Applebee's was, something I needed to know that very moment. I can never thank her enough for that. Siri had a big year, not only because she's linked to the popular phone, but also because she became a mini-phenomenon on the Internet, with Tumblrs popping up with her occasionally awesome answers to absurd questions. Note that I said "mini-phenomenon," because that's a phrase that would be a drastic understatement when referring to the combination of Ryan Gosling, the Internet, and 2011. Fuck Yeah Ryan Gosling and Feminist Ryan Gosling only begin to scratch the surface that is the percentage of the blogosphere that is dedicated to this man. How did he do it? No one knows. While Siri is filled with attitude toward common folk like you and me, if Ryan asked her "Where can I find a roll of triple-ply toilet tissue? This lamb vindaloo is not sitting right," she would probably faint and respond with "RYAN OMG JUST TAKE ME WITH YOU." For the ability to arouse a robot, Gosling takes the easy win.

Live Streams (6) vs. Aaron Rodgers (3): 2011 was a big year for capturing things in real time. First there was the move by YouTube to start live-streaming events like Coachella through its platform, which simultaneously made me happy and depressed, as I watched Kanye West's epic performance from the library stacks of Columbia University. Then there were the occupiers, who used the live stream to broadcast their movements in real time across the world. With the live stream, the people on the ground could tell their own stories instead of relying on media outlets to report on them six to seven hours later. Music festivals and Occupy Wall Street aren't exactly two places I would expect to see Packers QB Aaron Rodgers, but that's mainly because he's too occupied with winning all of the time. He's 19-1 in 2011, won the Super Bowl MVP last season, is about to win the regular-season MVP this season, is the AP Male Athlete of the Year, and, most important, has completely made us forget that dude in Wranglers who was such a drag. With all of these accolades, if this was a bracket of "2011's Most Underrated," he'd probably squeak out the title from Kelly Rowland. He's the best, but we still don't fully realize it yet. For athletically dominating 2011 and almost being perfect, Aaron gets in the Sweet 16.

David Freese (7) vs. SWAG (2): If I were David Freese, I would have retired after the 2011 postseason, after hitting 21 RBIs, 5 HRs, winning the NLCS MVP, World Series MVP, Babe Ruth Award, this moment, and this moment, and run for governor of Missouri. Not only did he achieve all of this, transforming from a regular baseball player to a mythical creature in a month, but he did it with a level of cool that almost leaves him peerless. When I saw him circle third, head home, and spike his helmet between his legs after the Game 6 walk-off, all I remember saying was "swag." I said "swag" because it was pretty much the only descriptive word I used all year. The shortening of swagger has long been attempting to make its major splash on our culture, but a variety of things made 2011 its year of lexicon domination. I mean, there's was the February Mos Def moment when he ran in front of the camera, post Odd Future performance, screaming "SWAG, SWAG, SWAG." Then there was the May P. Diddy moment when he changed his name to "Swag" for one week. And then, just when you thought it was all hip-hop, there was the December Prince William moment when he busted out his "Swag Dance." The word completely dominated the year, at times completely replacing "yes," "wow," "absolutely," "fair enough," and "just enough seasoning." Only something that completely took over the cultural landscape could give Freese a first-round exit, but unfortunately for David, Swag is that something. SWAG.

SWEET 16
Thursday Region

Trey Parker/Matt Stone (8) vs. Tumblr (5): Having the hottest show on Broadway, in some ways, is a gift and a curse. The gift is that people can't stop talking about it and the buzz is, at times, almost uncontrollable. The curse (more so with theater than almost any other medium) is that the run-of-the-mill fan has to commit a felony to acquire a ticket. While Parker and Stone should be ecstatic that their show is so popular, SVU-esque crimes are taking place to get tickets, choosing theater to be their next conquest after TV and film does have its limits with regard to viewership and access. From the "refined" world of theater to the abyss that is the Internet, going against the Mormon men is Tumblr. Outside of the Internet meme culture that Tumblr has become a part of, the other way it became an influential medium in 2011 is the ease of building a personal website. Most people don't know the process of getting a domain name and building a website, but with Tumblr, people can have a sleek website in about twenty minutes and have the luxury of being part of the share-friendly Tumblr community. That's a game changer. Yes, Parker and Stone definitely won in the eyes of a slither of the population, but their reach is often financially and geographically constrained. Tumblr could not be more different. For that, it moves on.

Tim Tebow (3) vs. The Build Up and DROP (2): The Denver Broncos, with Tim Tebow at the helm, have lost their last two games. For that reason alone, one might think his time in the bracket has expired. Unfortunately for the haters, there's no way to ignore the fact that the Broncos were 1-5 before Tebow and now that he's become a starter they are four quarters away from winning the AFC West crown. Will they do it, who knows, but guess what? That game takes place on January 1, 2012. Even though he might start the year a huge loser, his 2011 must be looked at as a net win. Such a net win, in fact, I don't even think The Build Up and Drop musical tactic that ruled the airwaves really stands a chance. I mean, even though I do love that part when Ne-Yo goes "Grab somebody sexy, tell 'em HEY", and that time LMFAO goes "Everyday I'm shufflin'", the trend became so popular in 2011, it began to sound like a cheap way to crank out a jam without really trying. I'll be the first to say if I hear any songs that employ this tactic on NYE 2011, I'm jumping on someone's back and dislocating my shoulder with my fist-pump, but the trend isn't all good for the music world. For that reason, its run is over. Tebow to the Elite 8 (which is scary, because it's STILL not even Tebow Time).

Friday Region

The Knowles-Throne Family (1) vs. Music Festivals (4): One of the most buzzed about events to take place at a music festival was at Coachella 2010. Between images of Jay-Z and Beyonce hanging around the grounds, drinking beers while jamming out and the couple's surprise duet to "Forever Young", they were truly the talk of the weekend. After that, Coachella's second most culturally-impacting moment was the closing act in 2011, Kanye West, giving perhaps his greatest performance and orchestrating perhaps the most theatrical hip-hop set in history. This is just Coachella, but there's really no telling where music festivals would be without The Knowles-Thrones. Yes, music festivals were the thing to do this summer, but My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, Watch The Throne, and 4 had January through December in a full nelson. These three aren't going anywhere, sorry music festivals.

Instagram (3) vs. Adele (2): This is a battle of new school vs. old school. On one side there's Instagram, the app that took cues from Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr and finally figured out how to perfect image sharing. On the other side, there's Adele. She couldn't be less technological. All she can do is sang. Unreal years had by both, but there's one glaring difference between the two. Instagram is thriving in a market (app downloading) that is thriving. Adele, on the other hand, is thriving in a market (album purchasing) that is almost extinct. Case in point, I bought the Adele album for my mom for Christmas. I don't know why I did it, seeing as that I could have easily downloaded it illegally and burned it on a CD, but I didn't and I still don't know why. The last album I purchased in a store? Young Jeezy's Thug Motivation 101 -- Six years ago. I say that, fully aware that 21 was the first album purchase in years for a lot of people in 2011. That's how you go 5x Platinum. That's also how you ride the fog into the Elite 8 without breaking a sweat.

Saturday Region

Twitter (1) vs. Angry Birds (5): I won't disrespect Jack by spending 200 words explaining why Twitter won in 2011 more than game about slingshotting unhappy birds at wobbly structures. I'll say it now, a piece of technology is not besting Twitter. So yeah, bye Angry Birds. A seat at the big kids table will have to wait another year.

Occupy (6) vs. Newt 2012 (2): This isn't just bracket beef, this is real life drama. If there's a man who would get booed for days in Zuccotti Park, it's Newt Gingrich, and if there's a group of individuals that Newt wants shipped out of America, it's the smelly Occupy crowd. There's no arguing that the two movements have made waves in 2011, but the cadre of individuals behind Newt can't really stand up to the NYC, American, or international Occupy movement. As mentioned earlier, there's no way of knowing how both of these movements will fare in 2012, but in 2011 it's clear that when it comes to a large-scale, worldwide impact, few things had more of an impact than all things Occupy. With an Elite 8 appearance, the 99% has just become the 12.5%.

Sunday Region

David Stern (8) vs. Ryan Gosling (5): These two are anomalies in this competition. First, there's Stern, who is winning despite his exponentially decreasing popularity, simply by sticking to his guns and being a tyrant. And then there's Gosling, who doesn't actively attempt to win, which in turn, makes him win even more. Also, even though both men have occupations, they seemed to really win in 2011 when they weren't doing their jobs. Stern's dictatorship of the league took place when there wasn't an NBA season to rule over, and Gosling domination of pop culture happened more often when he was seen crossing a street than when he was promoting his own movie. These two guys had weird 2011s, but both came out on top. Unfortunately for Stern, there is something to be said for having people like you. David, people don't like you. You know who people like? Ryan Gosling. So yeah, if the tiebreaker is friends, Ryan gets the nod to the Elite 8 (Because David Stern has no friends).

Aaron Rodgers (3) vs. SWAG (2): In the first round, SWAG took out the kid who could only hit homers, David Freese. In this round, SWAG goes up against the leader of the team that couldn't lose, Aaron Rodgers. While Aaron had a more complete 2011, by displaying excellence for a full calendar year instead of a month in the postseason, he's still going up against SWAG, easily 2011's word of the year. On the field, Aaron definitely won, but off the field he's surprisingly not winning as much as one would expect. If he wins the Super Bowl in 2012, we will be forced to finally put him in the category of the great quarterbacks and at that point, he will get the off-field love he deserves. Unfortunately for him, this is a measure of winning in 2011 and he just didn't have enough swag to out-swag SWAG. As someone who fully expects him to be on this list in 2012, for now I'm forced to bid adieu, Aaron. The SWAG train takes no prisoners. SWAG.

ELITE EIGHT
Thursday Region

Tumblr (5) vs. Tim Tebow (3): Tumblr vs. Tebow. Wow, this is hard. They've both become the talk of their respective mediums (blogging and football), and once each got popular there was seemingly no slowing down their influence. Interestingly, despite their massive popularity, both are quite simple when it comes down to it. Tebow might overtly express his faith, but when it comes down to it, all he wants to do is play football and love Jesus. That's all. As for Tumblr, even though it has dominated the blogosphere in 2011, as a platform it's a pretty basic little tool. There's only so much one can do with a Tumblr, which is where most of its beauty lies. So what/who will represent the Thursday Region in the Final Four? Answer = Tim Tebow, for two main reasons. One, while both Tumblr and Tebow are the talk of their mediums, only Tebow has become a phenomenon outside of the medium, be it Tebowing, being parodied on SNL, or being the unintentional centerpiece of a controversy. Second, IT'S FINALLY TEBOWTIME. FINAL FOUR, BABY. LORD, I LIFT YOUR NAME ON HIGH. BYAHHHHH.

Friday Region

The Knowles-Throne Family (1) vs. Adele (2): Three vs. one seems unfair, but it's not. That's how awesome Adele is. In 2011, Adele outsold the entire Knowles-Throne clan, which is unreal when you remind yourself that we're talking about Adele vs. Beyoncé and Jay-Z and Kanye West. That's got to be a point of embarrassment for the family. But, never to be fully outshined, where record sales lagged, they made up for in 2011 with the reemergence of the music video. They were out of control in 2011 when it came to visually expressing their music. Proof: February — "All of the Lights"; May — "Run the World (Girls)"; July — "Best Thing I Never Had"; August — "Otis," "1+1"; October — "Countdown," "Love On Top," "Party." And these aren't normal music videos either, these are year-defining spectacles, especially in the cases of "All of the Lights, "Otis", and "Countdown." When each much-hyped video was released, they were the main topics of conversation for a good 10 days. The Knowles-Thrones don't really need the money that comes from album sales, they just want to constantly remind you, through their mastery of the visual, how much cooler they are than you. They did that for all of 2011, and for that they pull off what I might call the upset of the tournament, thus far. I know Adele's lyrics and vocals don't really call for productions like the threesome, but there's something to be said for having a song be as magical to watch performed as it is listened to. Adele, I told you earlier I was going to let you down, but I was really expecting it to be in the final. For not getting your hopes up too much, you're welcome. I just really hope I caused enough heartbreak to get one song about me next album. Or maybe even a verse or simply a passive-aggressive shout out. Really anything will do. Thanks.

Saturday Region

Twitter (1) vs. Occupy (6): So this is sort of a legendary matchup, but when you think about it there's a clear winner. Occupy used two technological tools to its advantage in 2011, live streams and Twitter. While I did spend some time watching these feeds, 95 percent of the "in the moment" information I gathered about the movement was through Twitter. If there's no Twitter, there's no Occupy. If there's no Twitter, I'm stuck waiting for CNN to tell me a story eight hours after it takes place. But since there is Twitter, I find out who's injusticing whom in real time. Yes, one of the reasons Twitter had such big year was because of the Occupy movement, and it definitely would have been a less influential platform without its presence, but even if it never existed, Twitter is making the Elite Eight. Without Twitter, Occupy doesn't even make the initial brainstorm. Twitter. #FinalFour

Sunday Region

Ryan Gosling (5) vs. SWAG (2): If you're a famous white guy, SWAG is in the business of trouncing you in this bracket. Luckily for Ryan Gosling, he's not a famous white guy. He's Ryan Gosling. Gosling in 2011 might be more swag than SWAG is swag. You follow me, right? No? OK, what I mean is that "Gosling" isn't really a term the way "SWAG" is, but if you were to refer to something as "Gosling," you'd know exactly what I meant and would probably reply with "SWAG." Still not following me? Hmm. How about this. One of the biggest reasons "SWAG" caught on in 2011 is the fact that we, as a culture, needed a word to accurately describe Ryan Gosling. You get it now? Good. Seeing as this is true, only a man like Gosling could take down the SWAG monster. If SWAG proceeds to the next round, we lose Ryan Gosling, but if Gosling proceeds, seeing as Gosling = SWAG, in a weird way they both are making it to the Final Four. If I have now re-confused you, just know this: Ryan Gosling may have had the best single year of any human, ever. First he seduces a robot (Siri), then he out-charms a tyrant (Stern), and now he out-movements a movement (SWAG). The kid's got skills. Let's see how much farther it takes him.

FINAL FOUR
And then there were four. You've made it this far, kudos to you for properly hydrating. You're so close, don't give up now.

Tim Tebow (3) vs. Twitter (1)

I previously said that no technological advancement would stand in the way of Twitter. I misspoke. What I meant to say was "no technological advancement or single human" could stand in the way of Twitter. Yes, it's rude, but Twitter could not care less about Tebow Time. Twitter doesn't even know what Tebow Time is. In my mind, Twitter has one concern, beating Facebook, and in 2011 it started its first real surge at doing that. 2011 was the first year that Twitter received more media coverage than Facebook. That's big. Personally, I'm on year six of Facebook and am looking for reasons not to use it, so Twitter has become my best friend. Has this conversation gotten away from the issue of Tebow vs. Twitter? Yes, because these two just aren't on the same level. Tebow had a phenomenal year, but it's been a bumpy road. Twitter, on the other hand, absorbs bumps flawlessly and continues to crush everything in its path. Although I'm a huge fan of Tebow and what he means for the sport and society as a whole, there's no way that his year outmatches the year of the Twittersphere. #ChampionshipBound #TebowTimeIsOver

The Knowles-Throne Family (1) vs. Ryan Gosling (5)

When discussing the Knowles-Thrones, there's been one thing I've barely alluded to. This thing was huge in 2011, and will probably be the story of 2012: THE KNOWLES-THRONES ARE HAVING A BABY. Yes, Gosling perfected the swag that Jay-Z claims to have invented, but not even he can touch a Power Baby. This mythical creature hasn't even been birthed yet, but the way the world found out about her existence was classic Knowles-Throne. Beyoncé on stage, rubbing her belly, while Papa Jay and God Papa Kanye celebrate in the audience. I don't think I've ever smiled harder than I did watching this take place. THE KNOWLES-THRONES ARE HAVING A BABY. Throughout this competition, a threesome has been defeating anyone or anything that stood in its way, but to be expected, it took a fourth family member to overtake the legend that is Ryan Gosling. Dude, I'll be honest, you were my pre-bracket favorite to go all the way. Sorry, man. THE KNOWLES-THRONES ARE HAVING A BABY. If they win the bracket, I hope they name her "Bracket Knowles-Throne."

CHAMPIONSHIP
Twitter (1) vs. The Knowles-Throne Family (1)

The Winner

Here's Why:

There's nothing The Knowles-Thrones or anything/anyone else could do to beat Twitter in 2011. A few years ago, the platform was new. Then it became fun. Then it became addictive. In 2011, it simply became important. Yes, the platform is a one-stop shop for pretty much anything you want (or don't want), but there's no glossing over the fact that some of the year's biggest events would be drastically different if Twitter did not exist. Between the Osama bin Laden raid (accidentally live-tweeted by Sohaib Athar), the Japan Tsunami (with Twitter serving as a primary form of communication between survivors and the world), and the Tunisian Revolution (citizens Tweeting anything from the location of snipers to places to get medical attention), the platform truly became the medium for communication in 2011.

Another major thing that happened in 2011 is the gap it has created with itself and Facebook. In years past, when public figures would encourage individuals to keep tabs on them, the script would sound something like "Become a fan on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, check me out on MySpace," and maybe a few other completely insignificant platforms. The MySpace line has thankfully almost been phased out, but the same is beginning to happen with Facebook. One of my most frequented sights of the past year is seeing someone on television and having their name displayed with their Twitter handle directly under it. And that's it. Hell, sometimes the person's name isn't even there. That's how much Twitter has impacted our society.

Shockingly, I don't think it has peaked yet. I think it might have a "#Winning 2012" and "#Winning 2013" title in its future, so I might have to go TRL/"Tearin' Up My Heart" on it and retire it so other things can have a shot. That will be decided on in the future, but for now, congrats Twitter, you deserve this.

Speaking of other things, a few early predictions of what might make the bracket in 2012:

Square (mobile payment system), Barack Obama (basketball player/president), fear (a tool used to scare people), Tiger Woods (Comeback Human of the Year), Channing Tatum (five films, three of which could be epic), and Detroit (it's still all relative).

Until then, Happy Holidays.

Permalink | A A A

Fearless (But Not Insane) Predictions for 2012

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:05 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

Twelve From Chuck Klosterman …

1. Something "mysterious" will happen to Mikhail Prokhorov just days before the Russian election, ensuring Putin the victory.
2. Peyton Manning will make a complete recovery and throw for over 4,000 yards.
3. Barack Obama will win the 2012 presidential election without winning the popular vote.
4. A seemingly untouchable artist within the classic rock canon will experience a stunning fall from grace.
5. Near the very end of 2012, China will initiate a new space race.
6. For the first time since the '90s, heroin reemerges as the "hot" drug in artistic circles, particularly in hip-hop and the visual arts.
7. A popular trend story in the mainstream media becomes coverage of "Gen Y Luddites" — teenagers who consciously disdain social networking and technology.
8. The Smiths reunite and perform before 100,000 fans in a Mexico City soccer stadium.
9. The year's biggest movie is P.T. Anderson's THE MASTER.
10. Unconfirmed tabloid rumors suggest a fleeting summer romance between Drake and Taylor Swift.
11. Prolonged, unseasonably cold weather drives produce prices through the roof.
12. Usain Bolt is shockingly upset at the 2012 Olympics.

… And Two From Jay Caspian Kang

1. Manny Pacquiao beats Floyd Mayweather in a controversial split decision after which Floyd launches into an epithet-laden tirade, which, of course, is followed up with a dis track titled, "Fuck Bob Arum." Things that rhyme with Arum: "Chair 'em," "Dare' em," "Share 'em."
2. Jimmer puts up 14 a game for the Kings. John Hollinger adjusts the bottom end of PER as a result.

Urban Meyer Will End Up Coaching the Denver Broncos

In his first season at Ohio State, Urban Meyer will go 11-1, win the Big Ten championship, and defeat Michigan. Meanwhile, after Tim Tebow breaks his femur diving for a first down, the Denver Broncos will lose their final five games of the 2012 season, leading to the firing of John Fox. Meyer will insist repeatedly that he is not interested in the job, and then after the Buckeyes' Rose Bowl victory over Oregon, he will take the job. In his second season in Denver, he will coach Tebow to a Super Bowl victory over the Chicago Bears, and then retire from coaching the following year after suffering a massive anxiety attack on the sideline of a preseason game.

Six months later, he will replace Mack Brown as the head coach at the University of Texas.
— Michael Weinreb

Our First Major Active Athlete Will Come Out

An active player in one of the four major American sports will come out of the closet. The odds are 50/50. Maybe better.
— Bill Barnwell

Advertising Gets Good (Seriously)

2012 will be the beginning of a new era of advertising (she wrote hopefully). Besides the Orkin and Dos Equis "Most Interesting" men, the past few years in commercials has been a mostly plain-yogurt flavored bowl of offerings peppered with occasionally offensive gender stereotyping and the same five white guys who live in an apartment and keep getting intruded on by spokespeople summoned by sound effects. No longer! We should prepare to be offended and excited, and then further excited by how offended we are, and then even more offended by how excited we were to be offended in the first place (this will be a completely modern emotion; side effects will include an immediate sensation of sinus decongestion). The advertising arena will become more competitive (so I won't have to spend an hour trying to find a screen-grab of the L'Oréal makeup advertisement misstep, "Now up to ten years disappear in a single stroke" — no thanks, I'll keep the ten years and spend them in South Beach — other advertisers will have preserved it forever to degrade whatever agency was responsible), more artful, more interesting. Somewhere, a young Don Draper is out-Drapering the master. His time is nigh.
— Tess Lynch

The Glazers Will Sell Manchester United

Pretend, for a moment, that you're a greed-maddened Florida shopping-mall magnate with a penchant for acquiring sports teams you can't afford. Through some ingenious accounting tricks, you've managed to "buy" the most successful club in the history of English soccer. (What you've actually done is borrow several hundred million dollars to pay for the club, then foist the debt back onto the club, a practice known in business as a "leveraged buyout" and in everyday English as "bullshit.") You devise a business model that depends on the club pulling down massive revenues in order to stay ahead of the very large interest payments it owes just for having you as an owner. To make enough money to stave off the creditors, your club has to maintain a ferociously high standard of success — kids in Hong Kong aren't shelling out for a fifth-place jersey. Fortunately, you have a brilliant coach (who just happens to be 70 years old), and your first few years, you absolutely nail it.1

Here's the question, though. Are you in this for the long haul? Or are you just trying to stay ahead of the crash and make a buck on the way out? The despised Glazer family2 has, since taking over Manchester United in 2005, turned the club's 300-million-odd worldwide fans into a gold-plated revenue machine — $160 million in commercial income last year, and that doesn't include match-day intake or TV rights. The club is as shiny an investment target as it's likely to be for a long time, something the Glazers, who have been plotting to sell a minority stake through an IPO in Singapore, obviously recognize. At the same time, though, the team has started to lag on the pitch. United did an early pratfall out of the Champions League, have dropped behind their rivals Manchester City in the Premier League table, and haven't turned up viable replacements for some of the great players of their recent past.

And then there's Alex Ferguson, who's not getting any younger. If he were to look at the cards and decide to retire, if the club couldn't find a way to compete with Man City, and if the money dried up, things could get really bad for the owners. The Glazers have supposedly turned down a one-and-a-half-billion-pound offer from the royal family of Qatar, but that was before the Champions League collapse. If I'm them, and another oil lord offers me a string of zeroes, I might think twice before I turn him down.
— Brian Phillips

10 Things Into Which Bradley Cooper Will Stick His Thing

1. Rooney Mara
2. Jessica Chastain
3. A Bottle of Self-Tanner
4. A Homemade Egg-White Omelet
5. Chris Pine
6. His Own Mouth
7. The Hangover Monkey But As a Joke
8. The Business Section of Le Monde
9. One of His Old Wigs
10. Olivia Munn's Emmy
— Max Silvestri

Zen and the Art of Knickerbockers Maintenance: The Return of Phil Jackson to NYC

The Knicks remain one-dimensional with their loaded frontcourt and inexperienced backcourt. They limp to a sixth seed in the Eastern Conference's playoffs. The Boston Celtics again end their season, paving the way for Mike D'Antoni's exit. Phil Jackson, fresh from a year's sojourn, graciously accepts the Knicks' coaching gig. He calls it his dream job. The Triangle falls apart when Carmelo and Amar'e refuse to pass the ball to anyone else. Jackson is gone in less than a year and performs roadside interviews while doing mescaline.
— Jonathan Abrams

The Name of Beyoncé and Jay-Z's Daughter Will Be Somehow Related to Beyoncé's Life

4/1 - Sasha Knowles-Carter
7/1 - Carmen Knowles-Carter
10/1 - Houston Knowles-Carter
25/1 - Dereón Knowles-Carter
50/1 - House of Dereón
100/1 - Beyoncé II
— Rembert Browne

The Black Eyed Peas Will Release the Most Insane Album Ever

The Black Eyed Peas will release an eleven-song acoustic album featuring a different guest artist on each track. Fergie will sing tasteful harmony for most of the album. Mike D of the Beastie Boys will take on primary percussion responsibilities and Bob Power and Rick Rubin will be recruited to produce.

GUEST: DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE
This song will be boring and undeniably earnest, with an impossibly drawn-out opening, rendering it the precise opposite of most Peas offerings. Will.I.Am will pitch in with a whistling solo. When played in public, people will appear pleased to hear this song, humming and holding significant looks on their faces, but no one will ever play it while alone. Ever.

GUEST: CAKE
This track will contribute a sense of thoughtful whimsy to the album, as it muses on the following question: Why do all parties seem unique as they're happening, but when one looks back, sober, they all seem the same, and is this something to be sad about or only a comment on the flaws of human memory? Cake front man John McCrea again proves he can bring sneaky gravitas to any premise.

GUEST: BILLY JOEL
A forgettable ballad. The noteworthy upshot here is that during recording, which will take place at Jermaine Dupri's aviary on the Outer Banks, Billy Joel and the members of the Black Eyes Peas will suffer simultaneous epiphanies, both realizing all they ever wanted to do was make the music the other made. Tears will be shed. Everyone in the room will reach the beautiful realization that underneath it all they have the same motivation and duty: to help white people have fun.

GUEST: EVERLAST
This track will never be released, as during the session — about fifteen minutes in — Everlast will beat up each Black Eyed Pea and also unlucky members of their entourage. The audio of the beatdown will be leaked and will draw one trillion listens within the first 30 days.

GUEST: BECK
Beck will harness the exuberant energy of his hosts and add a touch of retro absurdity and some new-millennium Southwestern swerve. Beck and the Peas will manage to honor the genres the Peas normally parody. This song will win a Grammy.

GUEST: MARC MARON
Mike D provides a strong but unobtrusive beat (no rim shots here) over which Maron, the only voice on the track, will unleash a blistering four minutes of mockery aimed directly at the Peas.

GUEST: SLASH
Who knew apl.de.ap could play harmonica like that?

GUEST: LIL' KIM
In the only song that includes rapping, the Queen Bee will challenge Fergie to find her inner gangster, the counterpart to what Fergie had already found in spades, her outer Walmart poster sexpot. Fergie will hold her own, surprising even herself, trading her usual thin metaphors and wordplay in for anatomically specific direct orders, and insuring in the process a PARENTAL ADVISORY sticker for the album.

GUEST: ROBERT SMITH
On this dark, soul-searching track, Taboo will explore his Native American heritage. Equal parts exploration, lament, and, yes, celebration, this track comes alive halfway through with Smith and Taboo crooning their guts out over Smith's stripped-down but still brooding guitar.

GUEST: RANDY TRAVIS
The title is enough: Everything I Ever Done Was Right (Until I Was Wrong for You) (a.k.a.: Booty Blitz Ballin')
— John Brandon

You Will Pad Evan Morganstein's Pockets, Somehow

2012 may be the year of a U.S. presidential election, but I prefer to get my fill of sinister marketing ploys for and by corrupt institutions via girls in leotards and men in Speedos. Which is why I'm beside myself with excitement for the 2012 Olympics. No one will be immune to the "we need this" forced smiles; the aggressive "official _____ of London 2012" sponsored-bys; the articles about condom shortages in the Olympic villages and the subsequent takedowns of such thinly sourced trope; and the women's gymnastics team. This is all great news for Evan Morganstein, the super-agent who is sure to be one of the Games' biggest winners, no matter which sport you choose to develop a brief but authoritative interest in next summer.

For some basics on Morganstein, check out this piece on him in the New York Times Magazine from the weeks leading up to the Olympics (and then add the epilogue that his prize client, Nastia Liukin, ended up with the all-around gold). In addition to gymnasts, Morganstein manages many swimmers — including Amanda Beard, whose racy and druggy memoir, a "three-year project" with Morganstein, will be published to coincide with Beard's attempted comeback in the pool. Most excitingly, Morganstein (whosays that he "owes almost everything" to ... Charles Smith; I'll wait for that to sink in) has taken on as a client USA Synchro, the governing body of synchronized swimming. Expect nose plugs in your Wheaties sometime next year.
— Katie Baker

There Will Be a Reality Show Near-Homicide

Someone on a reality competition show will be arrested for attempted murder committed during the competition itself, and you will have to read dozens of boring think pieces about whether the episode should air. Which it will.
— Mark Harris

The Official Sarah Larimer Safe Bets for 2012

We will all get sick of Tim Tebow by February. We will learn that Fidel Castro is totally dead. A gymnast and/or a swimmer will capture America's hearts in the London games. We will forget his or her name by October. A Kardashian will get divorced. Or engaged. Or have a vow-renewal ceremony . Things will get pretty weird with Kobe Bryant . Things will get even weirder for the Republican presidential nominee.

Honestly, the only one of these I feel good about is Castro. And, really, he's probably been dead for years, right?
— Sarah Larimer

One of These Movies Will Win the "Best Picture" Oscar:

World War Z
Starring: Brad Pitt, Mireille Enos, James Badge Dale, Lucy Aharish
Director: Marc Forster (Monster's Ball; Finding Neverland)
Release Date: December 21, 2012
The 411: Brooding, postapocalyptic zombie tale with philosophical bent and $125 million budget.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 4-to-1

Django Unchained
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Leonardo DiCaprio, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Kerry Washington
Director: Quentin Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs; Inglourious Basterds)
Release Date: December 25, 2012
The 411: An escaped slave (Foxx) fights to free his wife from a sadistic plantation owner (DiCaprio) in what Tarantino is describing as a Spaghetti Western set in the South.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 3-to-1

The Dark Knight Rises
Starring: Christian Bale, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Gary Oldman
Director: Christopher Nolan (The Prestige; Inception)
Release Date: July 20, 2012
The 411: Eight years after The Dark Knight, Hathaway, as Catwoman, helps Bale's Batman repel a terrorist threat.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 2-to-1

The Great Gatsby
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan, Tobey Maguire, Joel Edgerton, Isla Fisher
Director: Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge; Australia)
Release Date: December 25, 2012
The 411: DiCaprio updates Jay Gatsby in this promising remake.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 3-to-2

Lincoln
Starring: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tommy Lee Jones
Director: Steven Spielberg (E.T.; The Color Purple)
Release Date: December, 2012
The 411: Day-Lewis plays Honest Abe in Spielberg's adaptation of Doris Kearns Goodwin's biography Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 8-to-5
— Davy Rothbart

Team USA Will Dominate the 2012 Olympics in Basketball So Badly That History Will Look Back on Them As Being Better Than the Original Dream Team

Here's the Dream Team roster, which consisted of 11 Hall of Famers:
PGs — John Stockton, Magic Johnson (who was retired from the NBA)
SGs — Michael Jordan, Clyde Drexler, Chris Mullin
SFs — Scottie Pippen, Larry Bird (retired from NBA right before Olympics)
PFs — Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Christian Laettner
Cs — Patrick Ewing, David Robinson

And here's an idea of what the 2012 team's roster might look like:
PGs — Chris Paul, Derrick Rose, Deron Williams
SGs — Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade
SFs — LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant
PFs — Amar'e Stoudemire, Blake Griffin, Kevin Love
C — Dwight Howard

Because the rest of the world is much better at basketball than it was in 1992, the 2012 team isn't going to touch the Dream Team's record of a 44-point average margin of victory in the Olympics. I'm not denying that. All I'm saying is that when NBA 2k29 comes out and it has the option of playing with some of the game's greatest all-time teams, all the cool kids are going to want to play with the 2012 team over the Dream Team because the 2012 team will be considered the best basketball team ever assembled.
— Mark Titus

The Dark Knight Will Be Recast

In response to pressure from Internet commenters demanding that new The Dark Knight Rises villain Bane be rerecorded so that he can be understood more easily, a defiant Christopher Nolan overdubs him with audio of Colin Farrell brushing his teeth.
— Mark Lisanti

Manny Pacquiao. Floyd Mayweather. Inside the Same Ring. Throwing Punches at Each Other ... in a Prison

Floyd Mayweather Jr. will finally agree to fight Manny Pacquiao, but only after Manny agrees to drain all the blood in his body for HGH testing. The fight will take place next November in a jail cell at the Clark County Detention Center, as that will be Floyd's permanent place of residence after being convicted of breaking into the display case at the Mirage and drunkenly beating a white tiger to death with his fists. Pacquiao will win the fight by unanimous decision. A humiliated Mayweather will then suffocate himself by stuffing hundred-dollar bills down his own throat. I'll be happy if only the last part of this bizarre scenario comes to fruition.
— Cousin Sal

The Hunger Games Will Surpass Twilight

Hello, my name is Alisha and I'm a 27-year-old Twi-hard. I own all the books and all the movies and have pictures of dreamy bloodsuckers on my cubicle wall. (I know, I'm really boosting my chances at finding a suitable boyfriend in 2012 right now.) But something else is competing for my affection … The Hunger Games.

Like Twilight, The Hunger Games is a tween/teen fantasy/drama series that has caught on with an older audience. But there is one major difference: Guys actually like The Hunger Games. A lot. In the past month, I've had one guy tell me he was really excited for the March 2012 movie and had two others ask to borrow my books. (David Bier, who works for office co-habitant ESPN Deportes L.A., is currently begging me to finish the third book so he can borrow it. Don't tell him I told you that.) The other factor here is that The Hunger Games is super-violent and gory, as kids fight each other literally to the death, which are far more useful characteristics in movie adaptation terms than blueish vampires looking sad all the time. Even though the book sales weren't as insane as Twilight's, I don't know any dudes who were jumping to see Edward and Bella on the big screen after watching a Twilight trailer, but I know plenty on the edge of their seats for March 23 to roll around. And so, I predict The Hunger Games will outgross the first Twilight film in box-office sales. Now excuse me while I start working on my Team Gale/Team Peeta T-shirt designs.
— Alisha Ricardi

The year of Robin Haase

Yes, the FedExpress appears ready to roll back to the top of men's tennis, and Rafael Nadal has vowed to get back his groove. But to both gentlemen, I say: "Look out for Robin Haase!" Do I know what I'm talking about? I honestly don't. Haase is the 45th-ranked player in the world, but his refurbished and remixed McEnroe-era attire is no. 1 with me. He has Gustavo Kuerten's ropy carriage and bouncing curls and a rich boyfriend's way with a polo shirt. He's playing tennis, sure. Yet couldn't he be steering the family yacht, too? Maybe he'll win nothing in 2012, but as long as he keeps his shorts short and shirts crisply tailored, he'll look as if he's already won everything.
— Wesley Morris

Andre 300 Will Return

Andre 3000 will return for real. No "occasional guest verse" return: the actual, full-on, solo album and/or Outkast album ON WHICH HE IS RAPPING return. Why? Well, it has to happen eventually, right? Being a hermit has to get boring at some point? His relationship with Big Boi might suffer? Also, I checked his IMDb page and the only thing lined up is a voice role in Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted.
— Amos Barshad

The Phelps Flop

Michael Phelps will flop. I love America, domination and a chiseled torso as much as the next girl, but methinks this great country's favorite merman will fail to capture our attention and gold medals in London like he did in China. Counrtyman Ryan Lochte has quietly made their rivalry less one-sided since Phelps won eight gold medals in China, and the intensity of the media spotlight on Phelps will allow Lochte to come out from the shadows and emerge as America's favorite bespeedo'ed athlete. Some of Lochte's quotes hint that he sees a new landscape in American swimming after London — "I'm worrying about myself and what I've got to do in order to become great. They can say all they want, but people won't talk until after the Olympics, when it's all said and done." When it is all said and done, and if in fact Lochte does become great, I hope he upholds the great American swimming tradition of capping off his gold medal haul with a couple bong rips.
— David Jacoby

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The Year in Music

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:04 GMT le 31 décembre 2011

Adele, "Someone Like You" — 21

I'm sure people will assume I'm being sarcastic when I make this selection, because "Someone Like You" doesn't seem like a song that anyone still considers a song. It's now more like a prop for SNL skits and rom-coms and irony mavens, almost like a modern incarnation of "Forever Young" or "Sailing." But I bet "Someone Like You" will be the only song from 2011 I still like in 2021. This was a down year for pop music; most of the critical darlings will not be memorable, even by next summer. Adele is the exception, and particularly this song. Her voice is like driving through Montana. The lyrics are sad and (seemingly) quite real. The music is simple, so it will age well. My only real quibble with the track involves a homonym: When I first heard the chorus, I thought Adele was singing, "I wish nothing but the best for you two," which made me think she was so open-hearted that she wanted to express sincere optimism to both her ex-boyfriend and his new wife. Upon further review, I've come to realize the lyric is technically, "I wish nothing but the best for you, too." Oh well. There are strings attached to every single lover, but still they can't tether us together.
— Chuck Klosterman

Megafaun, "Real Slow" — Megafaun

I listened to this hippie jam at least 27 times while sitting on a beach in Greece, reading Part 2 of James Ellroy's Underworld USA trilogy. It evokes placid memories of Feta cheese, Metaxa, and violent conspiracies involving Cuban exiles and J. Edgar Hoover.
— Michael Weinreb

Wounded Lion, "Oh, Jim" — IVXLCDM

This is a cover of a Lou Reed song from Berlin (itself a cover of a Velvet Underground outtake, "Oh, Gin"). That's great because I like to think about Berlin (concept rock opera!), but I don't actually like to listen to it. It's too depressing (Wounded Lion's album isn't depressing: It contains a song called "Black Ops"). The year 2011 was almost like a cover of a more depressing prior year: still a bummer at its core, but with the addition of a musician playing the triangle or Adam Levine's whistling from "Moves Like Jagger" played backward, Autotune, and stuck in as a bridge. Playing this song at a high volume feels like stomping on Goombas.
— Tess Lynch

Juicy J & Lex Luger feat. Project Pat, "Pills, Weed, and Pussy" — Rubber Band Business 2

Some background: I went to Virginia this spring to interview Lex Luger, the producer of this song and most of the Juicy J mixtape it appears on, Rubber Band Business 2. Most of my time in Virginia was spent loitering in recording studios or riding around in a Ford Expedition watching Luger roll blunt after blunt while listening to his own music. One afternoon I told Lex that my favorite song on Rubber Band Business 2 was "Pills, Weed, and Pussy," which it is — I love the way Juicy's old Three 6 Mafia partner Project Pat intones the title phrase, and the way the horror-movie Theremin fillip in the beat nods to Juicy and Pat's death-rap roots (although I guess most of the songs on this record do that, to some extent, because they're mostly about mixing substances that will kill you. It's a psych-rock record about attaining some kind of beans-n'-lean-aided samsara). And the video — three dudes getting bent like the 13th Floor Elevators in a motel room with a stocked medicine cabinet, filmed in solarized Predator-vision — is maybe the third-best Juicy J-related clip of the year, after the one for "Stoner's Night" with the mature white lady in the robe as Juicy's weed-grinding love interest and the one for Project Pat's "Kelly Green," where Juicy delivers all his raps while ironing (rubber band stage-business!).

Later that night I was in the Expedition with Lex and two of the guys in his orbit, Black and Jay. The windows were down; the moon hung fat and orange. Lex told Black and Jay that "Pills, Weed, and Pussy" was my favorite song on the record. They thought this was a hilarious thing for me to like, which it is. (But it's my shit! I luhhhh this shit! Sometimes this summer I'd walk to pick my daughter up from day care while listening to this shit and wonder if the day-care ladies would let me leave with a child if they knew what I'd been listening to!) Black cued "Pills, Weed, and Pussy" on the car stereo and turned it up loud. Sometimes hip-hop can still sound like the only music in the world worth paying attention to. This is obviously a contextual illusion, but so is all music — it should crowd everything else out of the frame when you're listening to it or else it's worthless. And this music is hip-hop designed to crowd other hip-hop out of the frame. For the length of the car ride back to my hotel, even when the bass got so loud it made the CD skip, I was convinced that Juicy J and Project Pat and Lex Luger were all geniuses and that in a world where this music existed, anyone who still chose to listen to the Fleet Foxes harmonizing about dust motes in a sunbeam probably deserved to be bored.
— Alex Pappademas

Frank Ocean, "Thinking About You"

What a perfect name "Frank Ocean" is. It sounds like cheap luxury: glass diamonds, drugstore cologne, a New Year's Eve banquet at a Las Vegas steakhouse. The seedy/classy Rat Pack crooner connotations of "Frank" (the flatness of morning light and old champagne) balanced out with poetic heft by "Ocean" (in tradition of evocative noun surnames: Billy Ocean, Fiona Apple, John Cougar). Frank Ocean is Christopher Breaux, a 24-year-old songwriter from New Orleans who evacuated to Los Angeles post-Katrina, becoming affiliated with the OFWGKTA crew. His mixtape Nostalgia, Ultra came out in February to critical acclaim. "Thinking About You," which leaked in July, has floated around the web since then and been covered by Justin Bieber.

While mainstream R&B mostly fell down the Handbag house K-hole to hell (cruise director: David Guetta), alternative R&B swam laps around it on the web. Like all of the new home-studio stars, Ocean is an ambitious songwriter with wide-ranging influences (he recently tweeted about listening to John Mayer's "Slow Dancing in a Burning Room") and seemingly endless reserves of soft-pink bedroom songs that are more reminiscent of early (first three albums) Prince than those The Dream songs that aim to sound exactly like Prince songs (although those are great too).

With Justin Timberlake on movie-star strike, Drake still waffling hard on whether he's a baller or a romantic, and Robin Thicke doing crazy interviews about how he gives his wife, Paula Patton, double-digit orgasms (EVERY TIME?), the soulful falsetto jam arena was wide open and primed for a rookie like Ocean to hose it down. The analog organ loop in "Thinking About You" is tinged with wedding chapel turned funeral home "November Rain" video melancholy. Ocean's vocals are like a particularly intimate e-mail or cornered-at-a-party conversation; a dialogue between the play-it-cool-in-public voice and a pleading upper-register subtext. Like a Leonard Cohen song, a hypnotic secret message meant for one specific person is transmuted into a universal hymn to absent lovers. Ocean digs a heart-shaped grave and fills it up with tears.
— Molly Lambert

Stalley, "Hercules" — Lincoln Way Nights (Intelligent Trunk Music)

Stalley doesn't sound like any other rapper. His cadence is weird, he looks like the coolest homeless person to ever ask for change, and his album Lincoln Way Nights is one of the best releases of the year. Stalley has no gimmick; he isn't trying to create a new genre, shock you, or tell you how much money he has. He is just a dude from Ohio, and there is something really refreshing about that. Also, he has a silky 15-foot jump shot, can get to the rim, and may or may not have been on my basketball team for two years. What do you mean biased?
— David Jacoby

M83, "Midnight City" — Hurry Up, We're Dreaming

Everyone has their own personal vision of Los Angeles, nearly all of them preferable to the real thing. Some dream about rubbing elbows with A-listers at the Ivy, while others pine for ambling hikes in Griffith Park, an outdoorsy existence in which it's possible to have both a dog and strongly held opinions about avocados. Me, I've always been partial to an imaginary, icy '80s dreamscape distilled from Bret Easton Ellis novels, Giorgio Moroder soundtracks, and objectively terrible Jeff Bridges flicks. In my L.A., the hairstyles are always feathered, the vodka is always chilled, and there's a coyote lurking behind every palm tree.

I have no way of knowing for sure, but I'm fairly certain that French fabulist Anthony Gonzalez agrees with me. Gonzalez is the one-homme band known as M83; he recorded "Midnight City" while living in southern California. It's the perfect soundtrack for moonlight driving in an impossible metropolis filled with nothing places: twisty exit ramps from freeways onto other freeways, that quiet part of Sunset where it suddenly comes alive and splits into four other streets like a self-flagellating hydra or a Diablo Cody sitcom. Gonzalez seems to have made the same faux pas as all temporary transplants, mixing up his own imagination with reality and somehow thinking the city is a "church" — or even that it's a real city at all. Lost in his jet-lag smear, he keeps waiting for someone to pick him up (even though no one comes downtown after 9 p.m. and, really, you can't exactly drink if you're going to be driving, and, besides, wouldn't it be nicer to finish that bottle of Syrah right here on the couch?) and forgetting that saxophone solos haven't sounded this invigorating since the Getty moved to Brentwood.

It's been 26 years and people are still afraid to merge on the freeways in Los Angeles. But at least they're willing to get behind the wheel.
— Andy Greenwald

Holy Ghost! feat. Michael McDonald, "Some Children" — Holy Ghost!

Holy Ghost!'s self-titled album contains plenty of high-end electro, modern disco, and/or dance jams. In my opinion, they have outperformed Cut Copy as the most accessible gateway indie electro band in 2011. The song "Some Children" is a must-listen because it features the vocal stylings of Michael McDonald. Although I'm sure Motown and Christmas albums pay the bills for Michael McDonald, it is good to hear his voice utilized in a progressive context.
— Carles

The Decemberists, "Don't Carry It All" — The King Is Dead

I am not cool. I do not write about music. I'm so unqualified to tell people what they should listen to. So, yeah — sorry, America. When we got this assignment, I totally wussed out and asked my friends what their top jams of 2011 were. Then two of my buddies suggested a song off one of my favorite albums from this past year. So I went with that one.

Someone who actually gets paid to write about this stuff called "The King Is Dead" "rustic," which is accurate. The Decemberists' album, and its first track, "Don't Carry It All," is also charming. And a little head-bounce-y. It also kinda makes me want to play the harmonica again, and that hasn't happened since I was about 8 years old.

I'm not going to drone on about how this song reminds me of growing up in the Midwest (which it does), or spend a lot of time talking about how it now brings back fond memories of my friends who suggested it for this post. (Hi, Matt and Amy!) So I'll just say this: When I like a song, I tend to listen to it on repeat until I get bored. After I moved "Don't Carry It All" to my iPod, I played it on repeat for three days straight.

There. Can I go back to editing quarterback jokes now?
— Sarah Larimer

Clams Casino, "Motivation" — Instrumental Mixtape

Starting with Lil B, it seemed like every new-wave hip-hop weirdo was trying to get on a Clams beat. For the most part, though, they were wasting their time. The accidental genius (his sample-digging process: "I used to just type a random word — like 'blue' or 'cold' — into LimeWire or BearShare and download the first 10 results. I had no idea who the artists were or anything") makes music that doesn't need an extra anything to sound complete. I'm already on the record as declaring that the lush punch of "Motivation" is perfect for drinking three beers real fast and then zoning out while riding the bus, and I still think that's true. But with an exponentially increasing number of spins, I now realize that "Motivation" is also perfect for soundtracking pretty much anything else awesome you might feel like doing.
— Amos Barshad

Jay-Z & Kanye West, "Ni--as in Paris" — Watch the Throne

The most important line from the song is one that defines an album that talks about a lot of obnoxiously rich-guy stuff in the midst of a depression. Jay-Z slips in, halfway through the first verse, "If you escaped what I escaped, you'd be in Paris gettin' fucked up too." So really, it's all about this: You have two guys who overcame two very different, for lack of a better word, plights of modern urban culture (for Jay, a life of selling drugs; for Kanye, never completely fitting in on the streets or in education or the arts), and now are all about celebrating themselves for not having to curb what they want to do to what anyone expects them to do. If you accept this as the thesis for Watch the Throne, then most of the album and tour makes sense. (Except for "Lift Off," because there's no excuse for that shit.)

Even the title of the song, which very well could have been called "Ball So Hard" (which Jay-Z had even lobbied for), was left as "N--as in Paris" because Kanye felt so strongly that the whole point of the song was that they were being unabashedly who they were, while in, you guessed it, Paris (where they had originally recorded the song). The fact that they would later go on to perform this song six, then seven, then eight, and eventually 11 times in a row while on the Watch the Throne tour (and while Kanye would scream, "THIS HAS NEVER BEEN DONE BEFORE, NO ONE EVER PLAYS A SONG TEN TIMES IN A ROW IN A CONCERT"), was just icing on the "We'll do whatever we want" cake.

So here's the thing: The song itself is pretty great, and while it's not necessarily even close to being the best from either artist, and even though there's a lot of weird shit going on (like sound clips from Blades of Glory), what it ends up standing for is something pretty significant that, in a lot of ways, encapsulates everything that Watch the Throne was meant to be.
— David Cho

DJ Khaled feat. Drake, Rick Ross, & Lil Wayne, "I'm On One" — We the Best Forever

I'll be honest, Klosterman and I had the same favorite song, with Adele's "Someone Like You," but after comparing our prose, his read like an adult talking about an instant classic and mine sounded like a 12-year-old girl trying to describe her love for Justin Bieber. So, for my second favorite, my choice happens to be the exact opposite of Adele, "I'm On One," the hands-down hip-hop collabo of the year (sorry, "Huzzah"). On the surface, I want to hate on this song because it's so irresponsible. Each rapper delivers one line that could turn a straight-edge kid from a high-achieving teenager to a dropout drug dealer with one listen. Drake: "All I care about is money and the city where I'm from." Ross: "Ever made love to the woman of your dreams in a room full of money out in London and she screams." Wayne: "I walk around the club, fuck everybody." I hear this and am so thankful I'm 24 and not 15, because were the opposite true, my life would only revolve around sexing rich girls from Atlanta in London nightclubs while we threw stacks of unmarked bills at each other. But since I am a "grown-up," I hear this song and, much like my reaction to Watch the Throne, I want everything they have. Everything. Each rapper brings their A-game in the track, and the end result is an exercise in flaunting short-term success. In this, the year of introspective, emotional rap (with Drake as a leader of this movement), this song is a nice reminder of what rap can be: just the rudest, most arrogant medium to ever exist.
— Rembert Browne

Destroyer, "Kaputt" — Kaputt

In the early '80s, when whatever rebellion that surrounded new wave had evaporated into a neon fragrance, when English New Romantics trimmed their billowy sleeves and got soul, when jackets were required, when the only difference between Steely Dan and Bryan Ferry was their disparate uses for mirrors (snorting vs. gazing) — that is the moment of "Kaputt," six minutes of yacht-pop bliss from Destroyer. "Wasting your day chasing some girls all right chasing cocaine through the backrooms of the world all night," Dan Bejar sings in the very first line, languidly suspended in the gap between irony and ecstasy, where this song does its contempo-casual business.

Bejar is best known as the tweaky voiced Bowie-freak in the New Pornographers, but he's been making his own changeable, troubadour-tinged albums for over a decade. Kaputt, his ninth, was a tire-screeching whip-around into synthy smoothness that had a few people wondering if it was just a spoof on Bowie's celebrated "chameleonic" career moves. It is, sort of, but it's also a great pop record. I've been waiting for this song to reveal itself as pretentious and blanched and terrible all year long, and it just keeps revealing itself as pretentious and blanched and awesome. Dig, if you will, that doctor's waiting room disco groove, those melodies as cool and soft as the Santa Anna winds in Steely Dan's "Babylon Sisters," the Miami Vice sex-scene sax magic, the stemwear-Succubi backup singers. I'd love to argue that he somehow "humanizes" all that sophisti-cheese but it's beside the point: this is a private world of resplendent loneliness, of a mythic European disco where no one talks or dances, of austere chill as soul bunker. Of a distant memory: it's after school in 1982, and there's You confronted with a mildly arty and meditative early MTV video where a boy playing Sinatra wanders the forlorn 3 A.M. of a soundstage back alley past a long-haired man playing a double-breasted horn solo; there's an empty bar that's like a turquoise legwarmer vision of an Edward Hopper painting where he suavely finds a seat and stares down the camera's eye over the bartender's shoulder until he creeps you out with such severe style you can still kinda feel it oozing up your spine thirty years later. 1982 You really really just wishes this would all be over and they'd show John Taylor again. And they will, baby, just be cool.
— Jon Dolan

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Pressure is on Andy Carroll

Posted by: timbersfan, 15:34 GMT le 30 décembre 2011

It wasn't supposed to be this way for Newcastle. A year ago, Andy Carroll was the new Geordie hero, a local boy playing up front for a club that reveres the No. 9 shirt more than any other. On Friday night, the few thousand Newcastle fans at Anfield will doubtless boo his every touch as punishment for leaving in January.

But that was all expected when he left. The problem is, it wasn't supposed to be this way for Liverpool, either. In seeking an instant replacement for Fernando Torres, it panic-bought Carroll -- and he's managed to disappoint two sets of fans within one calendar year.

Darren Walsh/Getty Images
Liverpool tends to rely too much on Andy Carroll's aerial ability.
The worst part of Carroll's decline over the past 12 months is that he has regressed to stereotype. When he enjoyed a good few opening months in the Premier League last year, those who recognized only his supreme aerial ability dismissed him as a target man -- a static figure for long balls and crosses. The truth was that he had so much more. Carroll was quick across the ground and able to work the channels. The inevitable comparisons to Alan Shearer were more apt when likening him to the all-rounder Shearer of the mid-90s, before knee injuries robbed him of pace and forced him to become a more basic player in his later years.

If any incarnation of Shearer seems appropriate for a comparison now, it's his current guise as a television pundit: dull, predictable and bringing the rest of the side down.

Aptly named for this time of year, Carroll's final game of 2011 will be his most important. Luis Suarez is suspended for the Newcastle game after he admitted to making an obscene gesture at Fulham fans earlier this month, so Carroll will start against his former club for the first time.

That's the emblematic, newsworthy story; even Kenny Dalglish admitted that, while he didn't quite understand why Carroll was getting so much criticism, the meeting with his former side was a fair reason for attention. However, this game is more important in relation to the rest of Liverpool's season. This is a taster of what it will be like once Suarez starts his probable eight-game ban for racially abusing Patrice Evra, which may be reduced on appeal, but could also be increased.

A side issue for Liverpool is the form of Stewart Downing, who was signed in the summer to provide the crosses for Carroll to thrive on. The form of the two is inextricably linked, and with Downing yet to provide either a goal or an assist for Liverpool this season, it's a combined 50 million pounds that has so far yielded few results.

It's the price tag that is the main problem. Carroll is only being judged in relation to the amount of money spent on him -- something he had no control over -- rather than in relation to the stage of his career. This is a player who has started only 38 Premier League games, the length of one complete season. For purposes of comparison, Jordan Henderson has started nearly twice as many, 74.

[+] Enlarge
Clive Rose/Getty Images
The main beneficiary of Luis Suarez's looming ban probably won't be Carroll but Craig Bellamy, who has impressed this season.
Besides, Carroll's goal-scoring record isn't too bad: four goals from his 14 starts at Liverpool, a decent return, and one that compares favorably with Suarez's record when starting, which stands at six goals from 29.

But Suarez provides more than just goals -- he seems to improve others. His link-up play is slick; his movement is excellent. Fitting Carroll into the side is a difficult balancing act. He clearly provides a more direct option for Liverpool, and attacking variety is generally the key to a potent side. Like many tall strikers, though, he often seems to prompt a reliance upon long balls, which means bypassing the midfield, the zone Liverpool spent a lot of money strengthening in the summer.

Such qualities habitually lead to being used as a late-game impact player at big clubs, and Carroll often hasn't had long enough to impress. In the 1-1 draw with Norwich, he came on in the 80th minute; in the 1-1 draw with City he arrived in the 84th; and in the stalemate with Wigan he only appeared in the 87th. He needs more playing time.

With all eyes on Carroll, another ex-Newcastle player might shine. Craig Bellamy cost Liverpool nothing in the summer but has been an excellent signing, and has proved capable in a number of roles. He'd love a start up front, though, and with Dirk Kuyt not enjoying a particularly fruitful campaign, the Welshman seems the obvious choice to replace Suarez's qualities.

It's doubtful that Dalglish would use Carroll as the sole forward -- in a 4-5-1, for example -- for fear of attacks being too predictable. He needs pace and mobility up front, and therefore it's Bellamy, not Carroll, who might gain most from Suarez's absence.

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But this is surely the season to give Carroll plenty of games. 2011-12 is essentially a "free" season for Dalglish and Liverpool. There isn't a need for instant improvement; consolidating last season's sixth place would be enough to keep Dalglish in a job, and anything else would be a nice extra. Now is the time to build a team for long-term success. Carroll is presumably a key part of that -- if not, he'll go down as one of the worst panic buys in football history.

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Fearless (But Not Insane) Predictions for 2012

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:22 GMT le 29 décembre 2011

Twelve From Chuck Klosterman …

1. Something "mysterious" will happen to Mikhail Prokhorov just days before the Russian election, ensuring Putin the victory.
2. Peyton Manning will make a complete recovery and throw for over 4,000 yards.
3. Barack Obama will win the 2012 presidential election without winning the popular vote.
4. A seemingly untouchable artist within the classic rock canon will experience a stunning fall from grace.
5. Near the very end of 2012, China will initiate a new space race.
6. For the first time since the '90s, heroin reemerges as the "hot" drug in artistic circles, particularly in hip-hop and the visual arts.
7. A popular trend story in the mainstream media becomes coverage of "Gen Y Luddites" — teenagers who consciously disdain social networking and technology.
8. The Smiths reunite and perform before 100,000 fans in a Mexico City soccer stadium.
9. The year's biggest movie is P.T. Anderson's THE MASTER.
10. Unconfirmed tabloid rumors suggest a fleeting summer romance between Drake and Taylor Swift.
11. Prolonged, unseasonably cold weather drives produce prices through the roof.
12. Usain Bolt is shockingly upset at the 2012 Olympics.

… And Three From Jay Caspian Kang

1. The Charlotte Bobcats will make the playoffs, but Bismack Miyombo will average less than eight minutes a game. Kemba will enrage stat-heads with largely inefficient play, but will win rookie of the year honors for leading the Bobcats to a 34-32 record and the seven seed in the East. Gerald Henderson puts up 15 a game and signs a five-year, $60 million extension, good for the worst contract in the league.
2. Manny Pacquiao beats Floyd Mayweather in a controversial split decision after which Floyd launches into an epithet-laden tirade, which, of course, is followed up with a dis track titled, "Fuck Bob Arum." Things that rhyme with Arum: "Chair 'em," "Dare' em," "Share 'em."
3. Jimmer puts up 14 a game for the Kings. John Hollinger adjusts the bottom end of PER as a result.

Urban Meyer Will End Up Coaching the Denver Broncos

In his first season at Ohio State, Urban Meyer will go 11-1, win the Big Ten championship, and defeat Michigan. Meanwhile, after Tim Tebow breaks his femur diving for a first down, the Denver Broncos will lose their final five games of the 2012 season, leading to the firing of John Fox. Meyer will insist repeatedly that he is not interested in the job, and then after the Buckeyes' Rose Bowl victory over Oregon, he will take the job. In his second season in Denver, he will coach Tebow to a Super Bowl victory over the Chicago Bears, and then retire from coaching the following year after suffering a massive anxiety attack on the sideline of a preseason game.

Six months later, he will replace Mack Brown as the head coach at the University of Texas.
— Michael Weinreb

Our First Major Active Athlete Will Come Out

An active player in one of the four major American sports will come out of the closet. The odds are 50/50. Maybe better.
— Bill Barnwell

Advertising Gets Good (Seriously)

2012 will be the beginning of a new era of advertising (she wrote hopefully). Besides the Orkin and Dos Equis "Most Interesting" men, the past few years in commercials has been a mostly plain-yogurt flavored bowl of offerings peppered with occasionally offensive gender stereotyping and the same five white guys who live in an apartment and keep getting intruded on by spokespeople summoned by sound effects. No longer! We should prepare to be offended and excited, and then further excited by how offended we are, and then even more offended by how excited we were to be offended in the first place (this will be a completely modern emotion; side effects will include an immediate sensation of sinus decongestion). The advertising arena will become more competitive (so I won't have to spend an hour trying to find a screen-grab of the L'Oréal makeup advertisement misstep, "Now up to ten years disappear in a single stroke" — no thanks, I'll keep the ten years and spend them in South Beach — other advertisers will have preserved it forever to degrade whatever agency was responsible), more artful, more interesting. Somewhere, a young Don Draper is out-Drapering the master. His time is nigh.
— Tess Lynch

The Glazers Will Sell Manchester United

Pretend, for a moment, that you're a greed-maddened Florida shopping-mall magnate with a penchant for acquiring sports teams you can't afford. Through some ingenious accounting tricks, you've managed to "buy" the most successful club in the history of English soccer. (What you've actually done is borrow several hundred million dollars to pay for the club, then foist the debt back onto the club, a practice known in business as a "leveraged buyout" and in everyday English as "bullshit.") You devise a business model that depends on the club pulling down massive revenues in order to stay ahead of the very large interest payments it owes just for having you as an owner. To make enough money to stave off the creditors, your club has to maintain a ferociously high standard of success — kids in Hong Kong aren't shelling out for a fifth-place jersey. Fortunately, you have a brilliant coach (who just happens to be 70 years old), and your first few years, you absolutely nail it.1

Here's the question, though. Are you in this for the long haul? Or are you just trying to stay ahead of the crash and make a buck on the way out? The despised Glazer family2 has, since taking over Manchester United in 2005, turned the club's 300-million-odd worldwide fans into a gold-plated revenue machine — $160 million in commercial income last year, and that doesn't include match-day intake or TV rights. The club is as shiny an investment target as it's likely to be for a long time, something the Glazers, who have been plotting to sell a minority stake through an IPO in Singapore, obviously recognize. At the same time, though, the team has started to lag on the pitch. United did an early pratfall out of the Champions League, have dropped behind their rivals Manchester City in the Premier League table, and haven't turned up viable replacements for some of the great players of their recent past.

And then there's Alex Ferguson, who's not getting any younger. If he were to look at the cards and decide to retire, if the club couldn't find a way to compete with Man City, and if the money dried up, things could get really bad for the owners. The Glazers have supposedly turned down a one-and-a-half-billion-pound offer from the royal family of Qatar, but that was before the Champions League collapse. If I'm them, and another oil lord offers me a string of zeroes, I might think twice before I turn him down.
— Brian Phillips

10 Things Into Which Bradley Cooper Will Stick His Thing

1. Rooney Mara
2. Jessica Chastain
3. A Bottle of Self-Tanner
4. A Homemade Egg-White Omelet
5. Chris Pine
6. His Own Mouth
7. The Hangover Monkey But As a Joke
8. The Business Section of Le Monde
9. One of His Old Wigs
10. Olivia Munn's Emmy
— Max Silvestri

Zen and the Art of Knickerbockers Maintenance: The Return of Phil Jackson to NYC

The Knicks remain one-dimensional with their loaded frontcourt and inexperienced backcourt. They limp to a sixth seed in the Eastern Conference's playoffs. The Boston Celtics again end their season, paving the way for Mike D'Antoni's exit. Phil Jackson, fresh from a year's sojourn, graciously accepts the Knicks' coaching gig. He calls it his dream job. The Triangle falls apart when Carmelo and Amar'e refuse to pass the ball to anyone else. Jackson is gone in less than a year and performs roadside interviews while doing mescaline.
— Jonathan Abrams

The Name of Beyoncé and Jay-Z's Daughter Will Be Somehow Related to Beyoncé's Life

4/1 - Sasha Knowles-Carter
7/1 - Carmen Knowles-Carter
10/1 - Houston Knowles-Carter
25/1 - Dereón Knowles-Carter
50/1 - House of Dereón
100/1 - Beyoncé II
— Rembert Browne

The Black Eyed Peas Will Release the Most Insane Album Ever

The Black Eyed Peas will release an eleven-song acoustic album featuring a different guest artist on each track. Fergie will sing tasteful harmony for most of the album. Mike D of the Beastie Boys will take on primary percussion responsibilities and Bob Power and Rick Rubin will be recruited to produce.

GUEST: DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE
This song will be boring and undeniably earnest, with an impossibly drawn-out opening, rendering it the precise opposite of most Peas offerings. Will.I.Am will pitch in with a whistling solo. When played in public, people will appear pleased to hear this song, humming and holding significant looks on their faces, but no one will ever play it while alone. Ever.

GUEST: CAKE
This track will contribute a sense of thoughtful whimsy to the album, as it muses on the following question: Why do all parties seem unique as they're happening, but when one looks back, sober, they all seem the same, and is this something to be sad about or only a comment on the flaws of human memory? Cake front man John McCrea again proves he can bring sneaky gravitas to any premise.

GUEST: BILLY JOEL
A forgettable ballad. The noteworthy upshot here is that during recording, which will take place at Jermaine Dupri's aviary on the Outer Banks, Billy Joel and the members of the Black Eyes Peas will suffer simultaneous epiphanies, both realizing all they ever wanted to do was make the music the other made. Tears will be shed. Everyone in the room will reach the beautiful realization that underneath it all they have the same motivation and duty: to help white people have fun.

GUEST: EVERLAST
This track will never be released, as during the session — about fifteen minutes in — Everlast will beat up each Black Eyed Pea and also unlucky members of their entourage. The audio of the beatdown will be leaked and will draw one trillion listens within the first 30 days.

GUEST: BECK
Beck will harness the exuberant energy of his hosts and add a touch of retro absurdity and some new-millennium Southwestern swerve. Beck and the Peas will manage to honor the genres the Peas normally parody. This song will win a Grammy.

GUEST: MARC MARON
Mike D provides a strong but unobtrusive beat (no rim shots here) over which Maron, the only voice on the track, will unleash a blistering four minutes of mockery aimed directly at the Peas.

GUEST: SLASH
Who knew apl.de.ap could play harmonica like that?

GUEST: LIL' KIM
In the only song that includes rapping, the Queen Bee will challenge Fergie to find her inner gangster, the counterpart to what Fergie had already found in spades, her outer Walmart poster sexpot. Fergie will hold her own, surprising even herself, trading her usual thin metaphors and wordplay in for anatomically specific direct orders, and insuring in the process a PARENTAL ADVISORY sticker for the album.

GUEST: ROBERT SMITH
On this dark, soul-searching track, Taboo will explore his Native American heritage. Equal parts exploration, lament, and, yes, celebration, this track comes alive halfway through with Smith and Taboo crooning their guts out over Smith's stripped-down but still brooding guitar.

GUEST: RANDY TRAVIS
The title is enough: Everything I Ever Done Was Right (Until I Was Wrong for You) (a.k.a.: Booty Blitz Ballin')
— John Brandon

You Will Pad Evan Morganstein's Pockets, Somehow

2012 may be the year of a U.S. presidential election, but I prefer to get my fill of sinister marketing ploys for and by corrupt institutions via girls in leotards and men in Speedos. Which is why I'm beside myself with excitement for the 2012 Olympics. No one will be immune to the "we need this" forced smiles; the aggressive "official _____ of London 2012" sponsored-bys; the articles about condom shortages in the Olympic villages and the subsequent takedowns of such thinly sourced trope; and the women's gymnastics team. This is all great news for Evan Morganstein, the super-agent who is sure to be one of the Games' biggest winners, no matter which sport you choose to develop a brief but authoritative interest in next summer.

For some basics on Morganstein, check out this piece on him in the New York Times Magazine from the weeks leading up to the Olympics (and then add the epilogue that his prize client, Nastia Liukin, ended up with the all-around gold). In addition to gymnasts, Morganstein manages many swimmers — including Amanda Beard, whose racy and druggy memoir, a "three-year project" with Morganstein, will be published to coincide with Beard's attempted comeback in the pool. Most excitingly, Morganstein (whosays that he "owes almost everything" to ... Charles Smith; I'll wait for that to sink in) has taken on as a client USA Synchro, the governing body of synchronized swimming. Expect nose plugs in your Wheaties sometime next year.
— Katie Baker

There Will Be a Reality Show Near-Homicide

Someone on a reality competition show will be arrested for attempted murder committed during the competition itself, and you will have to read dozens of boring think pieces about whether the episode should air. Which it will.
— Mark Harris

The Official Sarah Larimer Safe Bets for 2012

We will all get sick of Tim Tebow by February. We will learn that Fidel Castro is totally dead. A gymnast and/or a swimmer will capture America's hearts in the London games. We will forget his or her name by October. A Kardashian will get divorced. Or engaged. Or have a vow-renewal ceremony . Things will get pretty weird with Kobe Bryant . Things will get even weirder for the Republican presidential nominee.

Honestly, the only one of these I feel good about is Castro. And, really, he's probably been dead for years, right?
— Sarah Larimer

One of These Movies Will Win the "Best Picture" Oscar:

World War Z
Starring: Brad Pitt, Mireille Enos, James Badge Dale, Lucy Aharish
Director: Marc Forster (Monster's Ball; Finding Neverland)
Release Date: December 21, 2012
The 411: Brooding, postapocalyptic zombie tale with philosophical bent and $125 million budget.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 4-to-1

Django Unchained
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Leonardo DiCaprio, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Kerry Washington
Director: Quentin Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs; Inglourious Basterds)
Release Date: December 25, 2012
The 411: An escaped slave (Foxx) fights to free his wife from a sadistic plantation owner (DiCaprio) in what Tarantino is describing as a Spaghetti Western set in the South.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 3-to-1

The Dark Knight Rises
Starring: Christian Bale, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Gary Oldman
Director: Christopher Nolan (The Prestige; Inception)
Release Date: July 20, 2012
The 411: Eight years after The Dark Knight, Hathaway, as Catwoman, helps Bale's Batman repel a terrorist threat.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 2-to-1

The Great Gatsby
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan, Tobey Maguire, Joel Edgerton, Isla Fisher
Director: Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge; Australia)
Release Date: December 25, 2012
The 411: DiCaprio updates Jay Gatsby in this promising remake.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 3-to-2

Lincoln
Starring: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tommy Lee Jones
Director: Steven Spielberg (E.T.; The Color Purple)
Release Date: December, 2012
The 411: Day-Lewis plays Honest Abe in Spielberg's adaptation of Doris Kearns Goodwin's biography Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.
Best Picture Nomination Odds: 8-to-5
— Davy Rothbart

Team USA Will Dominate the 2012 Olympics in Basketball So Badly That History Will Look Back on Them As Being Better Than the Original Dream Team

Here's the Dream Team roster, which consisted of 11 Hall of Famers:
PGs — John Stockton, Magic Johnson (who was retired from the NBA)
SGs — Michael Jordan, Clyde Drexler, Chris Mullin
SFs — Scottie Pippen, Larry Bird (retired from NBA right before Olympics)
PFs — Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Christian Laettner
Cs — Patrick Ewing, David Robinson

And here's an idea of what the 2012 team's roster might look like:
PGs — Chris Paul, Derrick Rose, Deron Williams
SGs — Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade
SFs — LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant
PFs — Amar'e Stoudemire, Blake Griffin, Kevin Love
C — Dwight Howard

Because the rest of the world is much better at basketball than it was in 1992, the 2012 team isn't going to touch the Dream Team's record of a 44-point average margin of victory in the Olympics. I'm not denying that. All I'm saying is that when NBA 2k29 comes out and it has the option of playing with some of the game's greatest all-time teams, all the cool kids are going to want to play with the 2012 team over the Dream Team because the 2012 team will be considered the best basketball team ever assembled.
— Mark Titus

The Dark Knight Will Be Recast

In response to pressure from Internet commenters demanding that new The Dark Knight Rises villain Bane be rerecorded so that he can be understood more easily, a defiant Christopher Nolan overdubs him with audio of Colin Farrell brushing his teeth.
— Mark Lisanti

Manny Pacquiao. Floyd Mayweather. Inside the Same Ring. Throwing Punches at Each Other ... in a Prison

Floyd Mayweather Jr. will finally agree to fight Manny Pacquiao, but only after Manny agrees to drain all the blood in his body for HGH testing. The fight will take place next November in a jail cell at the Clark County Detention Center, as that will be Floyd's permanent place of residence after being convicted of breaking into the display case at the Mirage and drunkenly beating a white tiger to death with his fists. Pacquiao will win the fight by unanimous decision. A humiliated Mayweather will then suffocate himself by stuffing hundred-dollar bills down his own throat. I'll be happy if only the last part of this bizarre scenario comes to fruition.
— Cousin Sal

The Hunger Games Will Surpass Twilight

Hello, my name is Alisha and I'm a 27-year-old Twi-hard. I own all the books and all the movies and have pictures of dreamy bloodsuckers on my cubicle wall. (I know, I'm really boosting my chances at finding a suitable boyfriend in 2012 right now.) But something else is competing for my affection … The Hunger Games.

Like Twilight, The Hunger Games is a tween/teen fantasy/drama series that has caught on with an older audience. But there is one major difference: Guys actually like The Hunger Games. A lot. In the past month, I've had one guy tell me he was really excited for the March 2012 movie and had two others ask to borrow my books. (David Bier, who works for office co-habitant ESPN Deportes L.A., is currently begging me to finish the third book so he can borrow it. Don't tell him I told you that.) The other factor here is that The Hunger Games is super-violent and gory, as kids fight each other literally to the death, which are far more useful characteristics in movie adaptation terms than blueish vampires looking sad all the time. Even though the book sales weren't as insane as Twilight's, I don't know any dudes who were jumping to see Edward and Bella on the big screen after watching a Twilight trailer, but I know plenty on the edge of their seats for March 23 to roll around. And so, I predict The Hunger Games will outgross the first Twilight film in box-office sales. Now excuse me while I start working on my Team Gale/Team Peeta T-shirt designs.
— Alisha Ricardi

The year of Robin Haase

Yes, the FedExpress appears ready to roll back to the top of men's tennis, and Rafael Nadal has vowed to get back his groove. But to both gentlemen, I say: "Look out for Robin Haase!" Do I know what I'm talking about? I honestly don't. Haase is the 45th-ranked player in the world, but his refurbished and remixed McEnroe-era attire is no. 1 with me. He has Gustavo Kuerten's ropy carriage and bouncing curls and a rich boyfriend's way with a polo shirt. He's playing tennis, sure. Yet couldn't he be steering the family yacht, too? Maybe he'll win nothing in 2012, but as long as he keeps his shorts short and shirts crisply tailored, he'll look as if he's already won everything.
— Wesley Morris

Andre 300 Will Return

Andre 3000 will return for real. No "occasional guest verse" return: the actual, full-on, solo album and/or Outkast album ON WHICH HE IS RAPPING return. Why? Well, it has to happen eventually, right? Being a hermit has to get boring at some point? His relationship with Big Boi might suffer? Also, I checked his IMDb page and the only thing lined up is a voice role in Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted.
— Amos Barshad

The Phelps Flop

Michael Phelps will flop. I love America, domination and a chiseled torso as much as the next girl, but methinks this great country's favorite merman will fail to capture our attention and gold medals in London like he did in China. Counrtyman Ryan Lochte has quietly made their rivalry less one-sided since Phelps won eight gold medals in China, and the intensity of the media spotlight on Phelps will allow Lochte to come out from the shadows and emerge as America's favorite bespeedo'ed athlete. Some of Lochte's quotes hint that he sees a new landscape in American swimming after London — "I'm worrying about myself and what I've got to do in order to become great. They can say all they want, but people won't talk until after the Olympics, when it's all said and done." When it is all said and done, and if in fact Lochte does become great, I hope he upholds the great American swimming tradition of capping off his gold medal haul with a couple bong rips.
— David Jacoby

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Lletget ready to take next step in development

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:07 GMT le 29 décembre 2011

By FRANCO PANIZO

SARASOTA, Fla. -- Sebastian Lletget hasn't had the easiest of times since signing with West Ham United on his 18th birthday, but things are starting to look up for the U.S. Under-23 men's national team midfielder.

After a rough first season in England which was plagued by pesky injuries, Lletget is beginning to find his stride at both the club and international level. The 19-year old has been called into both U.S. U-23 team camps since Caleb Porter was appointed head coach, and Lletget believes he is on the brink of taking the next step in his development by dressing for the Hammers for the first time in his career.

"I've been there a while and things are coming around," said Lletget, who prefers his last name to be pronounced leh-JET. "I just have got to make one last step before I make myself an established professional.

"I believe I'm ready. I've been working really hard these past six months since preseason, and I think I'll get my chance."

A San Francisco native born to Argentine parents, Lletget has recovered from the multiple muscular injuries which hampered his chances of breaking into West Ham's lineup last campaign. Add in the fact the Hammers are now playing in the Championship instead of the Premiership, and Lletget's chances of playing have increased over the past year.

As much as those are reasons as to why Lletget could soon see the field, what if he doesn't? What if he remains a spectator for the club? Would a loan be in the works for Lletget?

"To be honest, I truly believe that it will happen," said Lletget of his chances of breaking into the club's rotation of players. "I'm patient and at the moment my future is at West Ham. That's all I'm concentrated on."

With a clean slate of health, Lletget has been able to train regularly with the club. That has translated over to the international level, where he was a regular part of Thomas Rongen's U.S. U-20 men's national team side earlier this year and where he's fighting for a spot on Porter's Olympic qualifying team.

Lletget describes himself as a technical player who relies on his vision and passing to counteract his lack of pace. He believes he is a good fit in Porter's preferred 4-3-3 formation, which focuses on possession and high-pressure defense.

"I really like it. He has that sort of Dutch, more Spanish sort of mentality and philosophy and it suits midfielders such as me and Jared Jeffrey and (Mikkel) Diskerud," said Lletget. "It suits us a lot because we like to play with the ball on the ground and we like to move it quick. When we don't have it, the most important thing is to pressure and that's exactly what (Porter) wants us to do and he really emphasizes it."

Lletget did well in that system during the U.S. U-23 team's second intra-squad scrimmage this past week, serving as an integral part to the White Team's attack by playing atop the midfield triangle.

Lletget misplaced passes on a few occasions, but overall he was very active in helping his team post a 2-0 victory by serving as a primary link between the defense and the attack.

He even scored a late insurance goal in the match when he realized he had space and hit a well-placed shot from just inside the penalty area past a helpless Zac MacMath.

"He's a sweet player, good feet, very nice player," said Porter. "His touch, it fits the way we play. We need guys in the center of the park that are comfortable on the ball, that want the ball, can spray it around and obviously, we need guys that can finish the play, too, in the final third, score goals, create goals."

Lletget will be hoping to continue to make strides in his games to the point where he makes the U.S. U-23 team that will attempt to qualify for the Olympics in March.

Assuming Lletget stays injury-free and makes it the Olympic qualifying roster for the United States, the playmaker is adamant on helping his team avoid a repeat showing of the U-20 side's performance from this past spring, when it failed to qualify for the U-20 World Cup.

"Obviously we didn't do (well) in Guatemala with the U-20 qualifying for the World Cup, but I recovered from that," said Lletget, who started and went the distance in the decisive 2-1 loss to the tournament hosts in April. "It was a big blow emotionally and I really felt bad because I'm probably not going to see a lot of those teammates that I had, and obviously the coach, Thomas Rongen, he was great but we couldn't do it for him at the end. It was a big blow."

Even with that disappointment, Lletget considers 2011 to be a good year for him and his development. He trained consistently at the club level for the first time in his career, and believes he has learned from even the worst experiences, including the heart-breaking loss to Guatemala.

"I'm glad I have that experience because I know the feeling and I know what I have to do if I get selected when the time comes," said Lletget. "I'll know how to prepare myself mentally. It's very important. It's no joke. It's the Olympics and people's jobs are on the line, but I'm sure we will deliver."

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Rounding up the MLS comings and goings: Eastern Conference

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:06 GMT le 29 décembre 2011

With the MLS Eastern Conference as wide open as it was down the stretch last season, a roster tweak in the right direction could be all it takes to separate certain clubs from the pack.

In the opening month of the offseason, no teams did more to augment their rosters than the Philadelphia Union and Sporting Kansas City, two clubs that felt they had what it took to win the conference crown last season before ultimately losing out to the Houston Dynamo.

With SKC adding Bobby Convey to the fold and Philadelphia tapping into the international market to add talent from Costa Rica and Panama, the two teams figure to be very much in the mix yet again in 2012.

Then there's the expansion Montreal Impact, whose calculated roster construction makes it seem like the club won't be a typical expansion pushover in its inaugural MLS year.

While those three clubs have been the most active during the offseason, here is a look at the comings and goings in the entire conference to date:

CHICAGO FIRE
Not much in the way of headline news has come out of the Windy City, where the Fire's only adds so far have been adding complementary pieces in former Vancouver goalkeeper Jay Nolly and New England forward Kheli Dube.

The club cut ties with Colombian import Cristian Nazarit and former U.S. Under-20 striker Gabriel Ferrari, who is in the process of recovering from ACL reconstruction.

The Fire also lost two players in the re-entry draft, as Baggio Husidic and Jon Conway were both selected in the second phase of the draft.

Chicago did secure the services of forward Orr Barouch, purchasing his rights from Tigres after having him on loan in 2011.

COLUMBUS CREW

Another offseason, another roster purge by the Crew. Granted, this season's edition is hardly as drastic as last year's, but Designated Player (and the team's leading goal scorer) Andres Mendoza is gone, as is MLS all-time leading goal scorer Jeff Cunningham. Robbie Rogers could very well be the next big name to bolt Crew Stadium, as he is out of contract and has been rumored to be making a move overseas.

Talented left back Josh Gardner was picked in the expansion draft, and midfielders Kevin Burns and Santiago Prim and defender Dejan Rusmir were ushered out of town as well.

The Crew did sign their second-ever Homegrown Player in goalkeeper Matt Lampson, and they brought in former New York Red Bulls defender Carlos Mendes through the re-entry draft to provide cover in the back.

D.C. UNITED

There's a bit of a changing of the guard going on in D.C., with veterans Santino Quaranta, Clyde Simms, Marc Burch and Devon McTavish all gone. Brandon Barklage, Steve Cronin, Joseph Ngwenya and Jed Zayner all had their contract options declined as well, meaning that D.C. has plenty of holes to fill on its roster.

The biggest item to emanate from the bowels of RFK Stadium was the club passing on its option to purchase Charlie Davies' contract from Sochaux and ending his up-and-down tenure with the club.

Veteran defender Robbie Russell was brought in from RSL to stabilize things across the back line, and he is the first of what should be quite a few new faces in the United locker room come 2012.

HOUSTON DYNAMO

Aside from purchasing the full rights to midseason midfield pickup Luiz Camargo, Houston has been rather dormant since reaching the MLS Cup final, but that doesn't mean that Dom Kinnear and his staff won't make some noise before the offseason is up.

The first item on the docket is finding a way to re-acquire Brian Ching, whom the club left unprotected for the expansion draft. Despite making threats he would retire if selected, Ching was taken by the Montreal Impact, putting Houston in a position to make a trade if it wants its captain back.

Hunter Freeman never made the impact expected upon his return to MLS and was subjected to the re-entry draft, where he was picked up by Colorado. Carlo Costly had his loan with the club expire without a new deal, and he returned to Atlas in Mexico, leaving room on the club's depth chart at forward.

Homegrown Player Francisco Navas Cobo was also shown the door, as were Jason Garey, Eddie Robinson and third-string goalkeeper Evan Newton.

MONTREAL IMPACT

Montreal hasn't entered the league silently, making a splash by taking Ching with its opening pick of the expansion draft.

From that point, it's seemingly been notable move after notable move for Jesse Marsch and his staff, who have integrated the likes of Donovan Ricketts, Zarek Valentin, Justin Braun, Bryan Arguez, Davy Arnaud and Patrice Bernier into the squad while also having a go at Chelsea's Nicolas Anelka before losing out in the bidding process.

The Impact began the roster-building process with the acquisition of former Inter Milan defender Nelson Rivas and Brazilian midfielder Felipe Martins, as well as NASL holdovers Ian Westlake, Sinisa Ubiparipovic and Hassoun Camara.

With the first pick in the upcoming MLS SuperDraft in tow, Montreal's offseason and roster construction are far from being completed.

NEW ENGLAND REVOLUTION

The biggest moves the Revolution made this offseason were swapping out coach Steve Nicol for Jay Heaps and securing captain Shalrie Joseph to a Designated Player deal.

Aside from that, the Revs used the re-entry draft to their advantage, plucking Danleigh Borman, Nate Jaqua and Simms off the scrap heap. Borman and Jaqua have yet to sign with the club, though.

Among the names leaving New England include veteran defender Ryan Cochrane, midfielder Pat Phelan and forwards Rajko Lekic and Dube. 2011 imports Monsef Zerka and Milton Caraglio also look unlikely to return to Gillette Stadium.

NEW YORK RED BULLS

The Red Bulls have been awfully silent for a team accustomed to making the headlines. Perhaps the biggest moves have yet to be made, though. Despite claims from GM Erik Soler that neither Tim Ream nor Thierry Henry would be leaving the club, even for a loan, reports have both players making potential moves to the Premier League.

The Bolton-Ream link won't go away, nor will the buzz about Henry making a return to the Emirates to play for Arsenal on a short-term loan.

As far as the moves that have been made, the Red Bulls signed St. John's centerback Connor Lade to a Homegrown Player deal and cut ties with a number of players, including John Rooney, Chris Albright and Bouna Coundoul.

Plenty of question marks remain, including just who will be in goal considering German goalkeeper Frank Rost wasn't being brought back, and whether Rafa Marquez will return or be sold this winter.

PHILADELPHIA UNION

Philadelphia hit the CONCACAF market hard, going after Costa Rican up-and-coming forward Josue Martinez and left back Porfirio Lopez in addition to Panamanian central midfielder Gabriel Gomez.

Philadelphia also managed to secure high-energy midfielder Nizar Khalfan in the waiver draft and signed Jimmy McLoughlin to a Homegrown Player deal.

The biggest losses for the Union came in the midfield, where Justin Mapp and Stefani Miglioranzi have left town, but the recent signings should certainly cover up for those departures.

SPORTING KANSAS CITY

If the Union or Impact haven't had the most newsworthy offseason so far in the conference, then Sporting KC has. The club brought in veterans Paulo Nagamura and Bobby Convey to change the culture of the midfield and re-acquired the services to left back Seth Sinovic after initially losing him in the expansion draft.

In order to get Sinovic back, SKC dealt captain Davy Arnaud to Montreal. Two Designated Player spots on the roster opened up as well, as Omar Bravo returned to Mexico with Cruz Azul, and Jeferson's loan from Vasco de Gama expired. Left winger Ryan Smith, who took a leave of absence from the club early last season, was dealt to Chivas USA.

TORONTO FC

Aside from trading for Jeremy Hall and signing Bermudan international winger Reggie Lambe, it's been a pretty quiet offseason for the Reds, who did most of their roster shuffling throughout the 2011 season.

The club parted ways with the likes of Javier Martina and Gianluca Zavarise, while losing Borman in the re-entry draft, but manager Aron Winter has a solid core of players who came together late last season in preparation for a run to the club's first postseason berth in 2012.

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Mid-Day Ticker: Suarez suspended again, City making play for Hazard and more

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:05 GMT le 29 décembre 2011

Luis Suarez might as well be on the FA's speed dial these days.

In the aftermath of receiving an eight-game ban and hefty fine from England's ruling body, the Liverpool striker was given his second punishment after being found guilty of misconduct for flipping the middle finger to Fulham fans at Craven Cottage following a match earlier in December.

Suarez was suspended for a game and fined £20,000 for the gesture, which he admitted to doing. As a result, he'll sit out Liverpool's match against Newcastle on Friday.

Suarez and Liverpool have yet to lodge an appeal for the other ban, one that would prevent him from playing in almost half of the club's remaining matches this season if upheld.

Here are a few more stories from around the soccer world:

CITY MAKING PLAY FOR HAZARD
Manchester City's embarrassment of riches could be growing even more.

According to reports, the club is making a bid for Belgian playmaker Eden Hazard, one of the most sought-after names on the European transfer market.

Hazard's agent claims that in order to secure Hazard's rights as soon as possible, City will make a £25 million bid for the player, whom the club would then loan back to Lille for the remainder of this season under the terms of the deal.

Real Madrid is rumored to be Hazard's first-choice destination.

FORLAN FIT AFTER HAMSTRING INJURY

Inter Milan striker Diego Forlan is finally set to return to action after a hamstring injury has kept him out of the lineup for the last two months.

Forlan has hardly made the impact expected of him since joining Inter from Atletico Madrid. He has scored just one goal -- back in September -- and the club struggled to an atrocious start to the season despite his presence.

Inter has since found its form, climbing into fifth place in the Serie A table after winning its last four games. The club trails first-place teams AC Milan and Juventus by eight points as Forlan returns from the injury, which he suffered while on international duty for Uruguay on Oct. 11.

EUSEBIO SET TO LEAVE HOSPITAL

Former Portugal great Eusebio is on the verge of being discharged from a hospital after a week-long stay.

The 69-year-old Eusebio was admitted into Lisbon's Hospital da Luz last Wednesday with infections in both of his lungs that caused double pneumonia. He was reportedly in the hospital's intensive care unit through the weekend.

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Zimmerman blasts national team set-up

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:04 GMT le 29 décembre 2011

One-time U.S. youth international Preston Zimmerman doesn't have a single cap for the senior U.S. national team, and while it wasn't likely that he'd be receiving his first call-up sometime soon anyway based on his current level of play and club standing, he didn't do himself any favors by using social media to voice his opinion about the current U.S. set-up.

Zimmerman, a 23-year-old Washington native currently playing for German third-division side SV Darmstadt 98, went off on Jurgen Klinsmann and the state of the U.S. program via his Twitter feed on Wednesday, centering his argument on the fact that all of the dual-nationality, German-American call-ups on the national team take away from the genuine, American aspect of the team.

In a series of consecutive tweets Zimmerman wrote:

"I thought it would be cool getting Klinsmann as US National team coach, but I think it's actually worse than when Bradley was coach....

"Requirements to get on US National team under Klinsmann: Be a fake American, be born outside the US, have one US distant relative

"I see the team is calling in guys who are really germans who know they've got no chance of playing for germany so they'll settle with the US

"Thats embarrassing when a good friend of mine says he met one of the guys @ the airport & he couldnt reply back in English as US Natl player

"I try my hardest not to tweet US soccer stuff but there are some stuff out there that drive me crazy

"Don't mistake any of my tweets for jealousy, I never expect to be called in or involved with anything and it doesn't hurt my feelings

"I would just like to see true, real Americans who would live and die for this country representing our country

"But when the olympic team holds mini-camps in Germany with all 'european players' then something is wrong

"The kids in college are just as good, if not better, than some of the kids from the reserve teams getting invited to camp

"But the college kids don't speak German and they don't have ties outside the US so they don't qualify for the US under Klinsmann

"Am I the only one here who thinks this or are there others? People have to speak up when they don't like what's going on

"If Klinsmann was winning and very successful with his approach then my words would carry no weight, but I don't see any success

"squeaking out 1-0 wins against CONCACAF villages isn't success.....

"People can bash me for whatever reason, but I hate seeing my country's national team being misused and disrespected

"I know plenty of guys who are in the MLS and know what it's like to play for their country who deserve a look for the US team

"I hope the US team wins and dominates just as much as anybody else because it's my country and I want my country to be #1 and dominate

"Don't want anybody to take my tweets negatively or as criticism to make somebody look bad, I just have passion and interest in the US team"

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The Year in Movies

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:32 GMT le 28 décembre 2011

hen it came to looking back at the movies of 2011, we didn't want to take a page from the musical Rent and ponder for an entire song how to measure a year. So we did what anyone else would do; we got three staff members whose priorities are as follows: movies, then everything else, and asked them 10 simple questions.

Successful movies we will be embarrassed that we liked in five years

Katie Baker: After seeing in person all the people camped out for nearly a week for the The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 1 movie — not even to see the movie, mind you, but to get a spot near the red carpet — I've got to go with that one. I don't need to see the movie to know.

Amos Barshad: It's Malick so no one will actually turn on it, but I nominate The Tree of Life. At some point in the middle of this (was it the 100th shot of Brad Pitt clenching his handsome jaw? The 1,000th of sunlight breaking out from behind leaves? Maybe just that one of Jessica Chastain floating?) I had resigned myself to the fact that this movie would never end, that I would live out the rest of my life in that theater, watching pretty scene after pretty scene that I did not understand. More dinosaurs plz.

Dan Silver: It has to be Moneyball. This one's more for you (the general public) than me. I have nothing to be embarrassed about, I thought Moneyball was lousy. The film was a not-so-subtle and failed attempt to draft off the success of The Social Network. But the filmmakers associated with TSN understood that to make their film interesting to a wide audience, they needed to create an underlying metaphor that played out parallel to the surface-level narrative. Simply, the film was about Facebook, but also not about Facebook, as it utilized the "concept" of Facebook as an allegory to larger themes. This is ultimately where Moneyball fails, and fails huge. It never successfully establishes a deeper human meaning for Beane's "stats," and instead takes the easy way out and devolves into a formulaic sports movie. Complete with heavy-handed flashbacks and "By God! We're Playing Better" musical montages. This is best illustrated in the dramatic weight director Bennet Miller places on the 2002 19-game win streak. Scott Hatteberg's game-winning home run is treated as a rousing emotional moment, but the problem is it comes with 20 minutes left in the film. He positions the homer as the film's climax and thusly wastes any/all of the emotional equity he'd built with the audience. So by the time, the true culmination of the film comes around 10 minutes later with the Red Sox-interview scene, the audience is already detached and ready to go home. The box-office success (more than $100 million worldwide), the accolades, and award nominations Moneyball has received continues to shock me. And the only thing keeping this film from turning into a Forrest Gump-like cinematic cold sore is my belief that you … the moviegoing public … will one day see how flawed the film truly is.

Failed movies we will pretend we always liked in five years

Baker: Country Strong. (I'm counting this as a 2011 movie since that's when the wide theatrical release was.) Catchy music, drunken Gwyneth Paltrow, a subplot involving a baby bird … I will never not drink a bottle of wine and watch this movie when it comes on TNT and/or Oxygen.

Barshad: Nothing in 2011 cinema made me sadder than Your Highness failing. I saw an early screening, died laughing, then waited for the rest of the world to declare this an instant comedy classic. instead, I had to have a string of soul-crushing conversations with people more or less trying to keep their lunch down while they asked me, "Wait, you actually liked it?" To all the haters, I say, [Insert crass choking-the-chicken gesture] .

Silver: Going strictly by box-office numbers, 50/50 massively underperformed (even though it did make money) and Cedar Rapids was a failure. But when I look back at 2011 in my little black notebook (which does exist), both of these films will clearly be highlighted as two of the year's best. The films' leads — Joseph Gordon-Levitt in 50/50 and Ed Helms in Cedar Rapids — deliver the best performances of their careers, and dissuade any doubts as to their "above the title" worthiness (Hangover success aside, I believe Helms won The Office boss job based on his work in Cedar Rapids). And each film's the supporting players are equally as good. John C. Reilly, Anne Heche, and Isiah Whitlock Jr. are hilarious as the supportive and yet pathetic clique of insurance salesmen who take the rookie Helms under their wing. And in 50/50, Seth Rogen reminds us how great he can be, dramatically and comically, when he's given a supporting role with meat on it.

And it's not just the performances, these are two films filled with pathos, which play out on a razor edge between comedy and drama. 50/50 even contains my single favorite cinema moment of the year. After finding out he has terminal cancer, Gordon-Levitt's character becomes emotionally detached as a defense mechanism. Knowing he has little time left, he makes it clear that he has no desire to make or sustain connections with anyone. He's particularly dismissive of his loving but overbearing mother. Laying on a gurney in the surgical prep room with his mom, waiting to go into a surgery that could either put him on the road to recovery or kill him, he finally breaks down. He leans forward, and just says, "Mommy." His mother comforts him, as he buries his head in her shoulder. The scene is treated with such care by both the directors and actors that it resonates on a truly human level.

I don't know of a single person who's seen these two films and did not enjoy them. So my hope is that over time, when box-office results don't matter anymore, both Cedar Rapids and 50/50 will be found and fully appreciated.

Movies we wish we thought of

Baker: I wish I'd thought to round up the funding/experience/equipment/network/understanding of the film industry to do something like The Ordinary Skier, a kickass documentary on Seth Morrison, one of the giants of the professional big-mountain circuit. It raises some of the same great, unanswerable questions that one of my favorite 30 for 30s did.

Barshad: Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. I'd be so loaded right now!

Silver: Let me first make this clear, wishing I'd thought of Bridesmaids is much different than saying that I think I could have made Bridesmaids the utterly hilarious film it turned out being. I'm well aware that the film's success was due in large part to Kristin Wiig and Annie Mumolo's script, a solid director, a talented producer, a killer cast, and a whole lot of kindness from the Cinema Gods. But those who have praised this film as one that redefined genre cinema as we know it (a la The Matrix) are just plain wrong. What was really taken away from Bridesmaids that we didn't already know or hadn't already seen? Women are funny? We knew that. Women interact with each other differently than men? We knew that as well. Women can be just as crude and/or gross as men? If Chelsea Handler hasn't made this one obvious, then I don't know what would have. Wiig and Mumolo's concept has been done before and will continue to be done, both poorly and proficiently with men, women, aliens, or Keebler Elves, just as long as there are people willing to pony up their hard-earned dough to see it. What makes me jealous is the simplicity of the female-centric twist on the genre. I just wish I'd thought of it and then had the brilliant thought of hiring Kristen Wiig, Annie Mumolo, Judd Apatow, Paul Fieg, and the entire cast. If only I were that clever.

Greatest fall in 2011

Baker: Ashton Kutcher. I don't care about what or whom he did, but his whole appeal was always that he was the silly and easygoing and Labrador-cute guy who everyone knew in high school. Now he's just … Trip McNeely. Those camera commercials he's in? They used to be normal, even slightly dorky ads, but now when I watch them I see a lurid gleam in his eye as he shoots photos of hot girls. I'm not judging, it's just … I think I now know too much.

Barshad: The Hangover franchise took a mighty hit with its second installment, which brainlessly repeated the formula from the magical first go-around but made sure to suck anything joyful out. The sad thing is they're making a third one, and there's almost no way I'm going to be able to resist paying for it.

Silver: Adam Sandler is the easy answer here; in 2011 he shoved two cinematic turds on the ticket-buying public (Just Got With It and Jack and Jill). My selection is much more of an unknown, but in his own way was the perpetrator of crimes equal to Sandler's. I'm saying director David Gordon Green has had the greatest fall of 2011. In the early aughts, after writing/directing films such as George Washington (2000), All the Real Girls (2003), and Snow Angels (2007), Green was dubbed the wunderkind of the independent film scene. He received numerous awards and nominations from critics and highly respected film festivals. Snow Angels was the film all the hip critics liked to say was snubbed when Oscar time rolled around. Then in 2008, he got his first commercial success with Pineapple Express. His fans justified his move to the studio system by saying that at its core, Pineapple shared similar subversive themes to Green's previous work. So how did Green parlay that success in 2011? Did he take his newfound clout to make his (publically stated) dream project, a low-budget remake of Dario Argento's 1977 Suspiria? No. He went further into the mainstream middle and released two huge stinkers — this past April's Your Highness and this month's The Sitter. Both box office and critical failures. But what's worse, in both films there's no sign of the David Gordon Green who once made deeply personal and raw human narratives. As a fan of his earlier work, my hope is that Green got served a big slice of Humble Pie at his holiday dinner and decides to raise some non-studio cash and find his voice again.

Greatest rise in 2011

Baker: It's not like he was some unknown heading into this year, but I do feel like roughly 70 percent of the movies that were out this fall, in particular, all involved Ryan Gosling. (Not to mention the novelty Tumblrs.) Now I just want him to get back together with Rachel McAdams and all will be right with the universe.

Barshad: Ryan Gosling. No other answer is acceptable.

Silver: Ryan Gosling owned 2011. He starred in three hit films (I'm defining a hit film here as one that made money): Crazy, Stupid Love, the mass appeal rom-com; Ides of March, the respectable, star-filled political drama; and Drive, the critical indie darling. In both Crazy and Ides, Gosling not only holds his own, but also out-acts such performers as George Clooney, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, Julianne Moore, and Steve Carell. But in Drive, Gosling gives probably his best performance of the year. His character inhabits every single scene of the film, and he speaks (maybe) 60 lines of dialogue. The bulk of his performance is delivered in silence, or with a stare or a blink. It's really quite remarkable. I'd go so far as to argue that there have been very few performers who, in one year, have created and embodied three fully formed characters, in three films, from three different genres. After having solid outings in films like Half Nelson (for which he received an Oscar nomination) and Blue Valentine, Gosling didn't need a year like 2011 to show us all he was a true talent.

Two quick side notes:

1. Another obvious choice here would have been Melissa McCarthy for just making both Bridesmaids and SNL her bitches. But the true runner-up, and the dude in 2011 who almost "Out Gosling-ed" Gosling, was Michael Fassbender, who, like Ryan, gave three excellent performances in three excellent films (A Dangerous Method, Shame, X-Men: First Class). I ultimately chose Gosling because there were too many similarities between Fassbender's performances in A Dangerous Method and Shame.

2. I can tell you all now that the person who'll have the greatest rise in 2012 will be Jeremy Renner. The dude is on the precipice of becoming this generation's Harrison Ford. Performers work their entire career to be involved in a single blockbuster franchise (Ford obviously had Star Wars, and the Indiana Jones and Jack Ryan films), and by the end of Summer 2012, Renner will have taken over or will have been a part of his own three — Mission: Impossible, The Avengers, and the Bourne reboot. So ya'll better get ready for Renner.

Terrible movie that will be remade into a great one in 30 years

Baker: In Time.

Barshad: They're actually remaking Source Code into a TV show right now, but I feel like we're too close to the crappy original to work the basic viable concept — a dude has a repeating eight-minute span in which to time travel for the good of humanity — into something good.

Silver: J. Edgar, directed by Clint Eastwood. J. Edgar is the filmic equivalent of a street-vendor pretzel. From afar it looks and smells delicious (Clint Eastwood, Leonardo DiCaprio, Dustin Lance Black), but once you've forked over the money and have taken a bite, the pretzel is cold and bland. Instead of choosing one or two moments from Hoover's life, meticulously explore him as a character, the filmmakers take the path of least resistance and instead string together a series of moments from Hoover's life, all framed by an elder Edgar dictating his memoirs. Because of this all-encompassing approach, each moment cover feels rushed and superficial. As a result, the film lacks focus and ends only skimming the surface. So it's pretty simple. Speculations/confirmations about his private life aside, J. Edgar Hoover is a national hero who's professional career is chock full of drama ripe for cinematic interpretation. And one day someone is going to figure out how to focus the narrative into an engaging film.

Great movie that will be remade into a terrible one in 30 years

Baker: Lion King 3D.

Barshad: The greatest thing about Rise of the Planet of the Apes was going into the theater with the most minute of expectations, and then having that one final moment — maybe when all the apes start massing for the bridge crossing? — of conclusive realization: Holy shit, this was dope. The worst thing about Rise of the Planet of the Apes is its success means we're due for just decades more of potentially horrendous Apes movies.

Silver: Thirty years is way too long, I'd be shocked if the subpar remake of Attack the Block wasn't already in development somewhere. So I'm saying five to six years max. Written and directed by Joe Cornish (a protégé of Edgar Wright, who's also an executive producer of the film), Attack the Block is a sci-fi action-comedy about a teenage gang from South London who attempt to protect their urban housing complex from an alien invasion. The film shares similar DNA to Sam Raimi's Evil Dead films and Wright's own Shaun of the Dead. It's a bit more straightforward than Dead and Shaun, and does not contain nearly as many winks/references/indicators to the genre or form, but is still a thoroughly entertaining and expertly crafted wall-to-wall action and comedy film. For an American studio, the youthful, central characters, the simple transition from a South London block to "Any City, USA," and of course the ultra-violent sci-fi/action angle make the film a perfect candidate for a remake. But unless Cornish and/or Wright have a meaningful hand in it, I guarantee there's no way Cornish's humor or distinctive hyperkinetic style will be captured. Regardless, I know I'll be sitting in the theater at midnight on opening night, and I'll do my best to convince myself that what I'm seeing is just as good as the original … but will inevitably and ultimately be disappointed. (Wait … did I just foretell my experience at The Evil Dead remake? Please, don't let it be so!)

Most cringe-worthy scene

Baker: All the ones from Horrible Bosses that involve Jennifer Aniston.

Barshad: Really, any random chunk of The Future would work, but I'll go with that excruciating scene in which Miranda July climbs inside her T-shirt.

My internal monologue: "No! Stop it! Stop it!

Stop it! No!"

Silver: Keira Knightley's first therapy session with Carl Jung in A Dangerous Method, and Hilary Swank's public address in New Year's Eve.
Why a tie? Because scenes can be cringe-worthy for two reasons; first, because the subject matter and visuals in a given moment are disturbing (for good or bad), and second, because a scene can just be plain bad.

In A Dangerous Method, Keira Knightley plays Sabina Spielrein, a deeply troubled Russian girl who was one of the first psychoanalysis patients under Carl Jung (played by Michael Fassbender). She was also rumored to be Jung's lover, and later went on to be a brilliant psychoanalyst herself. Knightley's performance in Sabina's first therapy session with Jung is remarkable. This happens right at the start of the film, when Sabina is at her most disturbed. Knightley's entire body strains as she tries to force out even the simplest words. Her eyes are like doll eyes, black and unmoving, transfixed on a point in the middle-distance. She spits and convulses as she recounts her sexual arousal from being beaten by her father. It's extremely hard to watch. And if internalized the wrong way by an audience member, it could be a moment so unsettling that it could overshadow the rest of the film. All because of Knightley's brilliant performance.

And then there's New Year's Eve.

Before I begin, let me state that by choosing a moment from New Year's Eve I am indeed admitting that I've seen this absolutely awful and unredeemable piece of Bantha fodder. I am eternally ashamed. (Does it help that I didn't pay for my ticket? No, probably not.)

So, there's a moment in the film when the Times Square New Year's ball loses power and gets jammed as it's being hoisted into position. A huge tumult ensues because there's a real concern that New Year's will be ruined if the ball doesn't get fixed and drop on time (I just choked back some vomit). Amid the chaos, Hilary Swank (who plays some rookie something-or-other from the Time Square Commission and is in charge of the New Year's festivities) steps up to a podium, and in front of what seems like every news camera in New York City, gives an impassioned speech about how the spirit of New Year's is in all of us, and how it's about human connection, and blah … blah … blah.

As Swank lays the sentimentality on thick, and does her best to not get her two Oscars repossessed, director Garry Marshall (who's, like, 157 years old) executes the obligatory cut-aways to silent and stoic people watching/listening and being moved by Swank's speech.

As the cut-aways started I had a vision, a vision of a potential moment so abhorrent and sappy that it could exist in this film. I put my head in my hands and watched the scene through my fingers, hoping and praying that Marshall wasn't dumb enough to use it.

There's Seth Meyers and Jessica Biel in the maternity ward watching the speech on TV. OK, I'm good.

The nameless cab driver stuck in traffic listening on the radio. Still OK.

Katherine Heigl and Sofia Vergara watching it in their catering kitchen. Maybe I'll get out of this.

The multiple mega-screens in Times Square airing the speech. Oh no, I feel it coming.

Then it happened … the crowd of ONE MILLION people in Times Square standing still, silent, and giving their full attention to Swank. Ah CRAP! There it is!!!

Come on! Really?! This moment is the moronic equivalent of shooting a sports film about the Liverpool and Manchester United soccer rivalry and having a scene in which the captain of Liverpool stands in front of the Old Trafford (Man U's stadium) crowd and kindly asks them to quiet down before his penalty kick … and they do it. It's just absurd and would never happen.

There is not a single crowd that size, that drunk, and that preoccupied that would ever become that docile. Much less the group of drunken serfs who inhabit the pit that is Times Square on New Year's Eve. I'm willing to suspend some disbelief with these sentimental romcoms, and even would have been OK with a cut-away to one or two people paying attention in a sea of crazy revelers, but even people who are not New Yorkers (like me) know this would never happen.

Great achievements in nudity (male)

Baker: I got so used to the anthropomorphized ape in Rise of the Planet of the Apes that when they made him take off his people clothes, I felt like I should be looking away to give him some privacy! BTW, did you know the same guy who played Gollum played Caesar? I like that résumé.

Barshad: Jon Hamm and Kristen Wiig, for Bridesmaids. "Soup's done! … No it's not."

Silver: Michael Fassbender for Shame and A Dangerous Method. There are no "outside the box" candidates here. It's Michael Fassbender. In 2011, his (well-endowed) penis has more theatrical screen time than Lindsay Lohan. And between Shame and A Dangerous Method, his ass should be considered for a SAG Award. Why consider anyone else?

Great achievements in nudity (female)

Baker: I don't know if I saw any memorable female nudity in 2011? (I wish Splice came out this year, because I could have answered it for every single category on this list.) I'm going through this website to see if I did in fact witness any great achievements in naked ladies, and oh man … this website is the best. I may never go to a theater again when I can just read these synopses. They're dirtier than the movies themselves!! (Sample, from X-Men: First Class: "We see a brief flash of a woman's underwear as she is running and her dress lifts slightly in the front." I'm too scared to even click on the description of Shame, but be my guest.)

Barshad: One more time … Jon Hamm and Kristen Wiig, for Bridesmaids. "Soup's done! … No it's not."

Silver: Leslie Mann has played a lot of sexy and sexual characters (the former Hooters waitress in Big Daddy, and the aggressive, sloppy drunk in The 40-Year-Old Virgin to name a few), but outside of a potential nipple slip in 1996's Last Man Standing, I don't think she's gone "sincerely" nude in a film. But in the (underrated) film The Change-Up, not only do her breasts and behind make regular appearances on screen, they do so in often unbecoming and sometimes private situations — breast feeding and getting explosive diarrhea. Within the context of the film, these scenes actually make sense; she's only ever naked in her bedroom and in front of a man who she thinks is her husband (but it's not really her husband because he's switched bodies with his best friend … ha ha ha). In each situation in which Mann's nude, it is used as the catalyst for a humorous reaction or piece of business. It's incredibly brave to see an actress not only give her all in moments like these, but do so fully exposed. And her performance in the film is much more than the typical wife role. In all the most revealing moments she owns the nudity and plays it as blasé as any wife would if she were naked in front of her husband. And she looked mighty good doing it. So let's give uber-props to the 39-year-old Mrs. Apatow.

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The Year in Sports

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:31 GMT le 28 décembre 2011

January 31
The Best of Green Bay

The new year came with snow and ice to Green Bay, and I slowed down to look at the addresses on ranch houses just outside of town. I was searching for 667 Sunset Circle.

This was a week before the Super Bowl, and, like a college town with a dominant team, everything revolved around the game. Old women wore Packers broaches. The men drinking coffee after morning Mass huddled over the team's chances. If you're making a sports bucket list, being in Green Bay in the shadow of a Packers Super Bowl appearance should be on it.

I pulled into the drive of Katie Gehring, then 84, who bought this house from Vince and Marie Lombardi. Katie's son, Andy, had moved back home recently to take care of her. He took me down the stairs into the coach's famous basement, where Lombardi watched film and hosted parties after every Packers game. The green beer opener Lombardi installed was still attached to the bar.

"Friday, I opened up a few on that bad boy," Andy said, grinning.

The bar stools were the same. So was the old-school fridge. Across the room, Andy had a Beatles poster and a vivid purple drum set, but here, in the corner, nothing had changed. "It's awful quiet down there!" Katie yelled from the kitchen. "I hope you're not into the sauce!"

The photographer did his work, snapping around the house, and for a moment, I got to just stand there, behind the bar. I stared at the beer opener, with the veins of rust around the screws. The town felt energized by the Packers' success, and this basement felt like home to the purest distillation of that energy. That game was just a few days away, and though the win would bring joy to Green Bay, the anticipation brought something better: a brief window into the best of a place.
— Wright Thompson

March 18
The (Futile) Quest for Perfection

Nothing is more tantalizing than the prospect of picking a perfect March Madness bracket. But I'm only a half-idiot; I know I'll ever nail the entire first round, or even call a flawless Sweet 16. Still, I held out hope that a perfect day was possible on the opening Thursday or Friday. I nurtured the bone-deep feeling that someday I'd approach my 16-for-16 dream.

Knowledge of the game doesn't help; in fact, it seems to make things worse. For several years in a row, my trademark was losing an Elite Eight or Final Four team in the first set of Thursday games. The first and last time I won a pool was in 2004, when I was the only coward among a group of Duke students to pick UConn to beat the Devils in the Final Four.

So it wasn't a surprise last year when I went 9-for-16 on Thursday — a slightly better rate than you might expect from a flipped nickel. But Friday was different. It started out perfectly, 4-for-4. In the second set, I called Florida State in the 10-7 upset over Texas A&M. Eight-for-eight. Night rolled around, and I hit Marquette in the 11-6 upset over Xavier. With just the late games left, I was a jittery 12-for-12. This was the year.

But as midnight arrived, a nagging score wouldn't stop flashing in the upper right corner. Virginia Commonwealth was routing Georgetown. I prayed for the Hoyas to claw back, but my prayers were in vain. I finished 15-for-16, and Shaka Smart's Rams began the improbable run that would carry them to the Final Four. I was an innocent casualty of the Year of the Underdog, and the dream of perfection was deferred.
— Shane Ryan

April 4
March Gets Madder

The best sports moment of 2011 is the same as the best sports moment every year, and technically shouldn't qualify for this since it's actually an event more than a moment. I'm of course talking about March Madness. Its name alone implies that crazy things are guaranteed to happen, but in 2011, March got madder than ever before, as upsets were more plentiful than usual and six NCAA tournament records were either tied or broken:

First time three double-digit seeds from the same region advanced to the Sweet 16 (10th-seeded Florida State, 11th-seeded VCU, and 12th-seeded Richmond in the Southwest region)
First Final Four without a single 1- or 2-seed
Highest combined seed number in Final Four history (26 — VCU was an 11-seed, Butler was an 8-seed, Kentucky was a four-seed, and Connecticut was a three-seed)
The Final Four game between VCU and Butler achieved the highest combined seed number (19) of any Final Four matchup
VCU tied the record for lowest seed to make the Final Four (LSU in 1986 and George Mason in 2006)
Butler tied the record for lowest seed to make the championship game (UCLA in 1980 and Villanova in 1985)
Intuition would tell you that we'll never see an NCAA tournament with as many upsets and Cinderella stories as the 2011 tournament ever again, but intuition doesn't account for the fact that when the calendar turns to March, there's no telling what will happen in the world of college basketball.
— Mark Titus

May 8
The Fall of the Lakers

I have a confession to make. As much as I love the excitement of a close game that comes down to the wire and gets decided in the last few seconds, I might love the meaningful playoff blowout even more. Game 7 of the 2004 ALCS is the perfect example; after three straight nail-biters, the Red Sox dropped six runs on the Yankees in the first two innings and the rest of the game amounted to a two-hour vanquishing party.

With that in mind, my favorite sports moment — well, my favorite game — of 2011 was on May 8, when the Mavericks blew out the Lakers by 36 points to sweep the defending champions and send Phil Jackson into a retirement of car commercials.

Now, admittedly, this wasn't a Game 7, so the drama wasn't quite as high as it might have been. But the narrative heading into the game seemed to lean toward the Lakers winning one; after all, having gone down 3-0, how unlikely could it be that the Mavericks would actually sweep the Lakers? Despite those three straight wins and the presence of the game in Dallas, the Lakers were just one-point underdogs in Vegas at tip-off, with all the betting action coming in on Los Angeles. People might have believed that the Lakers were going to lose the series (well, not Kobe), but it sure seemed like they were going to step up and win a game for their legendary coach before Jackson left Los Angeles for the second (and final) time.

Instead, we got one of the most raucous blowouts in recent memory. The Mavericks were only up four heading into the second quarter, but that quarter is essentially pornography for Laker haters. Dallas took eight 3-pointers and made seven of them, with Jason Terry going 5-for-6 by himself. The Mavericks outscored the Lakers by 20 points.

Of course, it was more than that. We often talk about teams that choke under the pressure of the playoffs, and how veteran teams with that extra experience just know how to pick themselves up and win in key games. Here, though, was a veteran team with all the experience in the world almost literally falling apart in front of our eyes. With their season finished in the fourth quarter, the Lakers gave up and turned into bullies. Lamar Odom decided to deliver a forearm shiver to a screening Dirk Nowitzki, and 45 seconds later Andrew Bynum laid out a defenseless J.J. Barea with an elbow of his own. They collapsed the way the villainous team in a kids sports movie would have; it might as well have been Lane Smith or Ed O'Neill retiring at the end of the game.

I think that, as sports fans, we all want to believe that we're watching something meaningful and transcendent, that it's not just dudes in shorts playing kids' games for embarrassing amounts of money. I know I do. Nothing felt more meaningful and transcendent to me in sports this past year than the night the Lakers went down in Dallas.
— Bill Barnwell

May 21
The Executioner Goes All the Way

For a lot of guys in their mid-40s, doing five pushups is, all by itself, a major undertaking. When 46-year-old Bernard Hopkins dropped and banged out five after having already endured 18 draining minutes of a world championship boxing match against 28-year-old Jean Pascal in Montreal on May 21, he was well on his way to rewriting the history books on middle-aged athletic achievement. Those pushups represented the signature, never-seen-that-before moment of the year for a sport that, like "The Executioner" himself, has been written off countless times and refuses to go quietly. By stopping to tone his pecs and triceps at the start of the seventh round, Hopkins made the ultimate statement to his latest exasperated and amazed opponent: I might be 46, but I can keep this up all night long, son. In a thoroughly entertaining fight (particularly by Hopkins' standards), Hard 'Nard reclaimed the legitimate light heavyweight championship of the world, becoming the oldest boxer ever to win a major title. Pascal was Hopkins' footnote; the pushups spelled that out for him. And for me, as a beaten-down Philadelphia sports fan who would, a few months later, sit dejected in Citizens Bank Park for Game 5 against the Cards as Ryan Howard and the regular season's best baseball team came up lame in literal and figurative ways, Hopkins served as a comforting reminder that, yes, there are some Philly sports stars who can go all the way.
— Eric Raskin

May 28
The Beautiful Game's Beautiful Team

With all due respect to the collected e-mails of Dan Gilbert, the anti-Barcelona backlash of 2011 has been one of the dumbest sports phenomena I've ever come across. You mean … you mean Barca players sometimes dive (like every other soccer player on earth ) … or foul (like every other soccer player on earth)? You mean the club makes and spends money? YOU MEAN XAVI ISN'T ACTUALLY A FAIRY? No one ever said that Barcelona were morally flawless — for god's sake, they're fielding Sergio Busquets and Dani Alves at the same time, which makes them roughly as pure as a church choir starring R. Kelly and a coked-out rhinoceros. They're not angels. What they are is a team whose fluid and intricate passing-and-pressing game has been (a) the most effective soccer tactic, in terms of winning trophies at a high level, of the past five years, (b) the most distinctive style of play over the same period, to the point that it's largely defined the era even while looking totally unique, and (c) something that, to millions of fans, has been totally breathtaking to watch. This year's Champions League final (Barcelona 3 — Manchester United 1) may have been the high point. Barca did whatever it wanted against the second- or third-best team on earth — 67 percent of the first-half possession, 12 shots on target to Manchester United's 1, three goals scored by strikers from open play with midfielders getting assists. It was a fast, fun match, with no annoying controversies, and the most exhilarating team in the game staked its claim to greatness. There's a word for that. It was beautiful.
— Brian Phillips

June 2
Defining the Finals

Let's look back and remember how this game set the tone for the rest of the series. No one offered Dallas much of a chance to win the Finals, and, for the first time, most had started crediting LeBron James for his decision to join Miami, which, it seemed, had already been crowned as the champion. The Heat had just easily shrugged off the Bulls, who had MVP Derrick Rose and the league's best regular-season record. Miami entered the second game of the series up 1-0, victor of nine straight playoff games at AmericanAirlines Arena and now faced the Mavericks and Dirk Nowitzki, who had a torn tendon in the middle finger of his off hand. Miami led by 15 points in the fourth quarter and danced and preened on the court. Nowitzki ignited a comeback and scored Dallas' final nine points, including the deciding final two, a layup against Chris Bosh with his injured hand. We all know the rest. Dallas wins three of the next four games, James disappears, and Mark Cuban celebrates. But it was the second game that initiated the series win and defined the Finals.
— Jonathan Abrams

June 5, June 7, and June 9
Three Nights in Dallas

One hundred hours, one city, three Finals games. Everything blends together. I had the same seat every time: a few rows behind the Mavericks bench, dead-even with the 3-point line, surrounded by people in blue. I watched fans keep believing when there was nothing left to believe. I watched basketball history get rewritten on the fly. I watched the title switch hands. It's just that I can't remember what happened. Too much happened.

Did Wade yell at LeBron in Game 3 or Game 4? Was Dirk sick for Game 4 or Game 5? What about Jason Terry catching fire and submitting an "Irrational Confidence" performance for the ages? When was that? Game 5? What about that specific moment when the Heat were leading by eight (or was it 10?) with nine minutes to play (or was it seven?) and seemed headed for the title in Game 4 (or was it Game 5?), and the Mavericks called timeout, and their heads were hanging on the bench, and I would have bet anything they were done... and somehow they came charging back? What about a weakened-by-illness Dirk working the clock for a game-winning shot, then suddenly bursting to the rim for a layup before Miami's defense had a chance to adjust? That was Game 4, right? When did I officially give up on LeBron ever becoming the greatest player of all-time? Game 4? Game 5?

Everything blends together. And you know what? I kind of like it that way. I haven't watched those games since. I only remember the absolutes. I remember Wade prancing around like a man in Game 3, playing with a chip on his shoulder, unleashing one of the most ferocious performances I have ever seen. I remember Dirk finally reaching that "I know this guy is coming through, I would bet anything" level. I remember Chandler using everything except a gun to protect the rim. I remember LeBron shrinking from the moment, everyone sensing it, everyone whispering about it. You could see it. I remember the drama more than anything — feeling like something substantial was happening. I remember driving to Game 5 thinking there was nowhere I would rather be.

Six months later, Miami blew Dallas out of that same building on Christmas Day. There's only one lousy thing about winning a title — the year after, that moment when you know it's not happening again, when you know your team changed a little too much. I think that happened to Dallas. I'm not sure it matters.
— Bill Simmons

Robert Michael/AFP/Getty Images
July 10
Abby Wambach, Concussions and the Loss of Sports-Watching Innocence

My favorite moment of 2011 was also the one I wish I could forget. The improbable header by Abby Wambach that tied the Women's World Cup quarterfinal against Brazil was one of the most electrifying sights I've ever seen. But as I watched the replays of Wambach hurtling headlong through the air toward the net, heedless of the charging defender and goalie, there was something about the slight jerk of Wambach's neck that made me wince. I was worried about her brain.

The moment that will define 2011 for me is the moment that it became impossible for me to watch any sport and remain innocent of the threat of concussions. Don't get me wrong. You've got to love a player who will sit there calmly as someone staples her scalp back together after a collision. But it's harder to see what's happening inside her skull. The problem isn't limited to sports in which big men try to beat each other up; repeated incidental contact can be just as damaging. One recent study of high school athletes found that female soccer players have the second-highest rate of concussions, after football players (hockey wasn't part of the study).

This is the thing about the concussion crisis: It's actually an existential crisis. The only real way to avoid it is to not play, which makes the threat of brain injury seem like some kind of weird original sin. It turns out that athletes aren't some special category of human gods! They're hurting their brains. So is it worth it? I don't know. I replayed the replay: Rapinoe's tremendous cross; Wambach's aerial daring; the long odds; the sound of the crowd … and then I replayed it again, and again.
— Louisa Thomas

August 17
The Georgetown Basketball Brawl and the Shifting Dreams of Sports' Global Stage

Each year someone does something like this or this, and depending on your allegiance, it seems the most vital symbol of what life might promise. Empires will fall, youngsters will be anointed before their time has come, and someone will change how their respective game is played with a casual, inevitable genius. Among these moments, I will remember a brawl. The year Yao Ming, that unfailingly affable transpacific bridge of a man, retired and the year NBA players began considering overseas contracts not merely because their careers were on the wane, the Georgetown men's basketball team traveled to China, and, during their "friendship" game with the Bayi Military Rockets, experienced the exact opposite of friendship. It was terrible to watch, obviously — the way any lapse of sports into violence reveals the true nature of competition. But more broadly: We've grown so accustomed to seeing American athletes treated with some measure of deference abroad, particularly in places where the level of play might not be up to the standard of the American ideal. As I watched the brawl, it felt like something was changing: Maybe they no longer aspired to be versions of our stars. It's impossible to disentangle the factors that resulted in the melee, whether it had to do with slack refereeing or China's recent generations of treasured "only children" or maybe the aggressive, chippy play that has, in recent years, become the Chinese style. It's hard to ignore the larger backdrop, this shifting balance of global power, the realities that link the front page to the sports section. We still have the stars, but the money is elsewhere. Geographies are global now. It troubles our stable sense of lineage — the common, generational mythologies and legible, cross-town battle lines, our sense of who seeks approval from whom. Not everyone aspires to Springfield, Canton, or Cooperstown, and maybe a "love of the game" is no longer what unites us. The Brooklyn Nets might be a Russian billionaire's plaything; they might exist, in his mind, only to make him sufficiently famous so that he won't be assassinated. Striker Samuel Eto'o, a champion with both Barcelona and Inter Milan, relocated to Anzhi Makhachkala, in Dagestan, to become one of the best-paid athletes in the world. He flies 1,200 miles to home games. Playing for the Bayi Military Rockets might be the sum of one's dreams.
— Hua Hsu

September 7
Finding Solace in the Routine

Hockey is a sport of routines, and all the usual ones were unfolding on the afternoon of September 7. Players woke up flushed and refreshed from their daily catnaps, stretching and checking their watches. Team massage therapists folded up and stacked their portable tables. Wives and children were kissed, electronics were tucked into carry-ons, and more than two dozen huge, bulky hockey bags were heaved up onto the plane that was to take Lokomotiv Yaroslavl to Minsk, Belarus, for its first game of the new KHL season. But the also-familiar routines of the cockpit somehow went awry, and the plane failed to properly lift off. When rescue crews arrived at the riverbank crash scene about a mile from the runway, they found only two survivors out of the 45 players, coaches, equipment managers, and airline employees who had been on the flight.

On the plane were three Stanley Cup champions, four World Champions, and an Olympic gold medalist from Team Sweden. Those with NHL ties ranged from the old-time to the hopeful, from Brad McCrimmon, the 52-year old NHL veteran and Detroit Red Wings assistant who had gone to Russia to pursue his head-coaching dream, to Daniil Sobchenko, a 20-year-old prospect in San Jose's system. Teams around the NHL held tributes; many continue to wear commemorative patches.

But as much as the tragedy tugged at hockey's tight international web, it threatened to all but unravel the one in the Russian city of Yaroslavl, where a number of the team's locally grown players and coaches once began their careers as little children learning to skate. One of the crash's two survivors, Alexander Galimov, had trained in Yaroslavl since age 5; when he ultimately passed away from his injuries after a passionate, city-wide, five-day vigil, it was a particularly cruel blow to an already devastated community.

Out of respect for the city, KHL and Lokomotiv officials opted to cancel this season rather than cobble together an interim team out of other KHL players. Instead, the hope is that Lokomotiv can rise from within, beginning next season with skaters from its in-house development team, known as Loko, which recently played its way into a higher junior league within the Russian hockey circuit. Captained by 20-year-old Maksim Zyuzyakin (who had been slated to be on the Lokomotiv roster, and the plane, before being sent down to juniors hours earlier), Loko faces a heavy task with heavier hearts. And so there's not much else to do than lace up the skates, set the lines, wrap the tape — relying on routine to help cope with the September day that was so heartbreakingly not.
— Katie Baker

September 10
Going Djokovic

Perhaps the single greatest aspect of tennis is that, more than anything, fans want to see a good match. Yes, we all have our favorites, but when it comes down to it, we'd probably prefer our favorite player to lose in five legendary sets than to win in 90 minutes. This was the exact scenario for me with the U.S. Open semifinal between Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic. Novak already collected the 2011 Australian Open and Wimbledon crowns, and had lost only two matches in 2011, one of them being to Roger. On the other hand, Roger was Grand Slam-less in 2011, and the last time he went a calendar year without collecting one was 2002. Those facts, plus my very real obsession with Roger and dislike of Novak, made Roger's 2-0 set lead over Djokovic a thing to celebrate.

Then something happened. Something horrible and something beautiful. Novak found a way to turn the match around and win the next two sets 6-3, 6-2. I was furious, but for the first time I had to at least give NoDjo some credit for being a fighter. Convinced that Federer was incapable of losing when two sets up, I was hoping he'd hurry and put Novak away so he'd have some gas left for Nadal. Unfortunately for Roger, Novak wasn't having it. He wouldn't go away. Although I was still on Team Roger, Novak's will to win was infectious. And then, with a Federer match point, the unthinkable happened. Djokovic returned Federer's serve with a ferocious cross-court winner and I audibly cheered for Novak. I couldn't believe it. The true tennis fan had finally reared its beautiful head. I wanted whatever outcome it took for this match to never end.
— Rembert Browne

September 28
Baseball's Big Night

Game 162 — all of them, unfolding simultaneously — was the greatest night of regular-season sports in my lifetime. But the best of it was that rain-soaked game between the collapsing Boston Red Sox and the less dramatically but more consistently miserable Baltimore Orioles. Tampa Bay's ridiculous 8-7 comeback win over the New York Yankees was awesome, too, but cynics could (rightly) argue that the Rays benefited from Joe Girardi's use of 37 different pitchers, including at least two janitors and a plumber. It was an impure spectacle. And the St. Louis Cardinals and the Atlanta Braves didn't matter as much, because neither of them was going to win the World Series anyway. (Wait. WHAT?) The Red Sox and the Orioles played an actual game, incredibly meaningful, strung out in its agonizing entirety, and with so many what-ifs and should-have-beens it risked keeping the insufferable Red Sox Nation gnashing its collective teeth forever, which did amazing things for my black, black heart. It was so good because it was so close and so terrible. Jonathan Papelbon is one pitch away, then back-to-back doubles, and then Robert Andino's flaming-arrow squib to left, Carl Crawford's sliding trap, and finally — bedlam.

The Orioles started that night 29 games out of first place. They were playing for absolutely nothing, except they were playing for absolutely everything. In that way, for once, North American sports were reminiscent of the far superior English soccer system of promotion and relegation, in which there is no such thing as playing out the string. Every game counts. For one night, at least, it felt that way here. It felt as though everything boiled down to this singular moment, and now there were the Orioles, 69-93, piled up on each other, rolling around the wet grass, and there were the Red Sox, 90-72, walking out of the dugout and down the tunnel, and only three minutes later it was decided: All of them were going home.
— Chris Jones

September 28
The Great Pumpkin, the Collapse of the Sox, and how the Impossible Became Inevitable

The most dramatic moments are the ones you never see coming. As late as mid-September, the prospect of any meaningful games on the final day of baseball's regular season seemed remote. But the Red Sox started their collapse early, and the Braves accelerated their collapse late, and we went to Game 162 with both wild-card spots very much up for grabs.

Even then, the prospect of a historic finish seemed dispelled early when the Yankees jumped out to a 5-0 lead on Tampa Bay after two innings, and led 7-0 after five. The Red Sox were beating the hapless Orioles, the Cardinals were blasting the Astros 8-0, and the only drama involved whether the Braves could beat the Phillies to force a tiebreaker game.

And then things got weird, in a way they only can in baseball, where there is no clock and no lead is theoretically unassailable. Down seven with six outs to go, the Rays scored six runs in the eighth, the last three on a two-out, three-run homer by Evan Longoria. The Red Sox led Baltimore 3-2, but their inevitable victory was put on hold by a rain delay.

And then came the moment that reverberated around Twitter and set up the wildest dual finish in regular-season history. With the Rays down to their final out, manager Joe Maddon called on Dan Johnson, The Great Pumpkin himself, to pinch-hit. Johnson was hitting .108 on the season (9 for 83), and hadn't had a base hit in the majors since April.

With Tampa Bay one strike away from defeat, Johnson lined Cory Wade's pitch down the right-field line, just fair and just over the fence, and rational discourse momentarily became impossible. I think I spoke for everyone when I tweeted, "HOLY EFFING EFF." Baseball, it seemed, was just showing off.

Everything that came after was just gravy. With one game on my TV, another on my computer, and a third on my iPad, I watched as the Braves blew a ninth-inning lead to Philadelphia. I watched the Red Sox get runners thrown out at the plate in both the eighth and ninth innings. Atlanta gave up the go-ahead run to the Phillies in the 13th, and then Freddie Freeman grounded into a game-ending and season-ending double play minutes later. The previously unflappable Jonathan Papelbon got two quick outs for the Red Sox in the ninth before surrendering a first-pitch double, a two-strike game-tying double, and finally a walk-off single to left field that Carl Crawford probably should have caught. And inevitably, Longoria hit the walk-off homer in the 12th inning that sent the Rays to a postseason that they were all but eliminated from two hours earlier.

But it was Johnson's home run that crystallized the greatest night of regular-season baseball ever. Going forward, Major League Baseball has added a pair of playoff teams, pitting two wild-card teams from each league against each other in a one-game, winner-take-all death match. In theory, it will guarantee the kind of breathless drama we saw this year every year.

In reality, the most dramatic moments are the ones you never see coming, and the contrived drama of a one-game play-in round can never match the completely unscripted soap opera that was the night of September 28. Then again, nothing else can either.
— Rany Jazayerli

October 9
Tiger and the Epic Hot Dog

I've never played golf, and I've never watched a golf tournament on TV. I have standing orders from my father to shoot him if he ever takes up the sport. Something "courageous and epic" would have to happen on a golf course for it to register as my most memorable sports moment of 2011. Well, it happened: Brandon Kelly of Petaluma, Calif., ran onto the green at the Frys.com Open and chucked a hot dog at Tiger Woods, who was about to putt. "I threw the hot dog toward Tiger Woods because I was inspired by the movie Drive," Kelly explained. "As soon as the movie ended, I thought to myself, 'I have to do something courageous and epic. I have to throw a hot dog on the green in front of Tiger.'" Bless you, Brandon, brave soul that you are.
— Rafe Bartholomew

AP Photo/Eric Gay
October 22
The Stolen Moments of College Football

The thing about watching a Hail Mary pass is that it's a little bit like a near-death experience: It affords you precious seconds to contemplate life while the ball hurtles through the troposphere. On a Saturday evening in October, when Kirk Cousins heaved a football into the East Lansing sky, I was standing in a hotel room in Freeport, Maine, having rushed back from a wedding reception (at which I had spent a good deal of time tracking the Penn State-Northwestern score on my cell phone) to catch this ending. Undefeated Wisconsin, the most fearsome Big Ten team in at least a decade, was on the verge of losing to an enigmatic Michigan State squad, and I could not quite believe it had come to this, and yet I could, because this is college football, and insane stuff happens all the time. And so when the ball caromed off a helmet into Keith Nichol's hands at the 1-yard line, and Nichol wrestled the ball over the goal line, and Kirk Herbstreit actually starting laughing like a schoolboy in the broadcast booth during the replay review, I texted a couple of friends some inane, half-drunk comment about how I loved this game despite all its systemic flaws and peccadilloes.

That moment now feels distant and removed, as if it took place in some bygone era. Two weeks after the Hail Mary, my alma mater, Penn State, crumbled to pieces amid one of the worst scandals in the history of college sports. And I looked back on all those Saturdays spent stealing moments and began to wonder if I'd been chasing the wrong things.
— Michael Weinreb

October 27
David Freese: Hometown Hero

I still cry when I watch it.

We're two months past one of the most surreal baseball games of our lifetimes. I have not a shred of allegiance toward either of the two teams that battled through a Game 6 for the ages. I am 37 years old. And tears still stream down my face every time I crank up the clips.

The Cardinals were down to their last strike. The only man who could save them was hometown boy David Freese, the guy who'd come out of nowhere and dominated the postseason. This was a team that had no business even making the playoffs, a team that pulled off the second-greatest September comeback of all time. And yet, one more strike from Neftali Feliz and the ride would be over.

Then Freese smashed an outside-corner fastball deep to right, over Nelson Cruz's head and into history. Tie game. I watch the play and get emotional, even now.

Two innings later, it's Freese again, launching another fastball high and deep to center. Gone. Joe Buck makes a great call, aping his dad's famous capper in Game 6 of the '91 World Series with a simple, "We will see you tomorrow night." After a minute-plus of silence, taking in the sight of 47,325 fans gripped by ecstasy, Tim McCarver one-ups his broadcast partner: "How did this happen?"

I watch that homer sail into the night, listen to that incredulous reaction, and cry like a baby.

I'll spare you the flowery words about Game 6 making it all worth it, how a sports year that brought some of the most despicable headlines you'll ever read was somehow redeemed because a dude made a baseball go boom.

But it was unbelievably fun, and affecting, to watch. Then, now, and probably 100 years from now.
— Jonah Keri

November 5
Beautiful Brutality in Tuscaloosa

The Eric Reid interception on the goal line in Tuscaloosa. Ripping the ball away from a bigger man midair. Don't blame the tight end; there was no way he could've been prepared for that. It had never happened to him before, not at practice and not in high school and never even in the street or parking lot as a kid. The final score of the game was 9-6, so the big play wasn't going to come on offense. But it almost did. Michael Williams almost caught the ball. I felt elated after that play, elated that one team had done something to distinguish itself from the other, but I also felt grief for Saban and Jim McElwain. The first time all day they show some daring, and they get burnt for it. They blinked, I suppose. Fear of the futility of running normal plays against LSU coupled with fear of your kicker's ineptitude. The Alabama receiving corps is lacking this season, which is probably why the best one of them, Marquis Maze, wound up trying to throw a touchdown rather than trying to catch one. The ball floated, which is expected on these trick plays in which non-quarterbacks are asked to throw. It floated just enough. The LSU-Alabama game was one during which you kept waiting and waiting for something other than brutality (not that the brutality wasn't impressive and inspiring and even beautiful), waiting for something else. What else, though? That's the thing. There was no way to know what else until it happened. And then it did. Alabama strained its offensive character, and an overshadowed defensive back who on most teams would be the star of the secondary turned in a play for the ages.
— John Brandon

November 26
Return of a Rivalry

When cornerback Courtney Avery's interception at midfield sealed the victory for the Wolverines in the waning moments of their narrow win over the Buckeyes, did my dad, standing next to me in the 79th row of Michigan Stadium, get a little misty-eyed? He did. After all, he's a maize-and-blue die-hard who's had the same seats for 45 years, and with a 10-2 season, a BCS bowl bid, and wins over Notre Dame, Nebraska, and Ohio, it was clear, he said, that Michigan football was back, with the future only looking brighter. Watching my dad wave a pom-pom as the students stormed the field, did I get a little misty-eyed myself? You bet. Hell of a Thanksgiving.

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12 things to watch in 2011-12

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:26 GMT le 25 décembre 2011

From the lockout to "where in the world is (insert star player's name here) going to play" to power teams and much improved lotto teams, so much has happened in the past few months. Except for games being played, of course. But that's about to change. The preseason begins Friday night and the regular season is just days away.

So what will we be watching, specifically, this season? Let's look at the top dozen storylines I'll be focused on during what's already shaping up to be one interesting 2011-12.

1. Dwight's destination
Dwight Howard's trade request still stands and he's made his wish list clear -- it's Orlando, New Jersey, Dallas or the L.A. Lakers.

But where he ends up will just be the beginning. Securing Howard mandates making other changes as well, from finding more shooters for some teams to making a change at coach for others. No player in the league has more power to force change than Howard, who stands alone as the most dominant big man in the world. That includes Orlando, which will likely have to replace Otis Smith and Stan Van Gundy if it wants Howard to stay. Even if changes are not made to a team's GM and coach, style of play will certainly be adjusted to feature Superman.

2. Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and the most lethal play in the NBA
The best two-man game I've seen in the past six years was the Steve Nash/Amare Stoudemire flat ballscreen high up in the middle of the floor. No one made the quick pocket pass or the late lob better than Nash. And Amare was the most nimble big man around, capable of twisting his way to the rim through traffic on those early passes or jumping to 12 feet to flush those late lobs. Defending it required all five guys, who had to choose to help middle or risk giving up an easy 3 or a wing slash to the rim.

Griffin is now the only other big who can finish those two plays, and CP3 is just as genius at the pick-and-roll game as Nash. Surround that action with shooters/slashers and watch defenses melt. (Side note: Wait until Griffin is ready to make the 17-footer the way Amare can -- that'll give teams another dimension to defend.)

3. Who is this season's Memphis -- the surprise contender?
Every season does not produce a Memphis, a team in 2010-11 with a great mix of young talent and veteran studs that played incredible defense down the stretch. But we do have some teams that might sneak into the playoffs and do some damage once they get there.

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It goes without saying that a Clippers team with Chris Paul will be much better than last season, and replacing Al-Farouq Aminu with Caron Butler makes L.A. even better. Who would want to play the "Blake and Paul Show" in May? It's just as obvious that the Knicks' new frontline will help propel them to better things this season.

Houston, meanwhile, had the league's top offense after the trade deadline and made a strong playoff push. The loss of Chuck Hayes will hurt, but if Kevin McHale can help Hasheem Thabeet and Jordan Hill step toward their potential as defenders, or if GM Daryl Morey can use the team's considerable assets to add a top-tier small forward or center, Houston can make a big jump.

Indiana, however, is primed to be the bigger surprise. In second-year wing Paul George and newly acquired David West, the Pacers should feature a defense that by season's end could be suffocating.

One last dark horse, perhaps my favorite to be this year's Griz is the Nuggets. With Nene returning, Denver has the pieces to be very good. It may take more seasoning, but by March I'd guess Ty Lawson will be playing a very high level and Denver, which has always been able to score, will be a top-8 defense and a team capable of making the West finals.

4. Should these teams focus on the lottery?
The 2012 draft will be full of potential stars, and some teams in need of top-tier talent would be better off not making the playoffs.

Surely New Orleans might feel getting a top-3 pick will be the fastest way to replace Paul, and likewise Orlando if it loses Howard.

The Wizards and Raptors look to be improved this season, but both could benefit from adding a star, which they'll have a hard time getting via trade or free agency. The same can be said for a number of teams out West, including Golden State, Phoenix, Portland and Utah.

Every team mentioned in this space can put together a roster that can compete for the eighth playoff spot in its conference. But landing in the lottery this year isn't a bad consolation prize.

5. Late-game LeBron

I still can't believe what I saw from LeBron in June, when he disappeared in clutch moments in the Finals. I'm not sure he can either. And I'm sure it's buried away somewhere deep in his mind, a dark and scary place he never wants to revisit. But what if he has a bad fourth quarter on Christmas Day in Dallas or in any other "must-see TV" game later in the season? Will doubts creep back into his head?

It's fair to wonder how he'll respond, because it's likely going to happen -- every player has bad quarters, halves or games. Will he ever be the same postseason player he was prior to the Finals? Probably, but it bears watching.

6. Can Minnesota finally look like an NBA team again?
Let's be honest: Kurt Rambis had an amazing pedigree and I expected him to be very good in his first coaching job. But he wasn't. And he proved to be no Rick Adelman.

While Adelman is not going to win any personality contests, his offense is exquisite. With the talent on the Wolves, the team has the makings of an up-and-comer. There will be many nights of pain, to be sure, but the nights the players work in concert with each other will give us a positive look into Minnesota's future.

7. What direction will Portland take?
What would L.A. do without Kobe and Pau? Miami without Wade and LeBron? It would be the same devastating situation Portland is facing. With just a healthy Brandon Roy or Greg Oden, the Blazers would still be on the right track. But that's not the case.

It's a shame they might have to start over and move the talented young pieces they have, but it'd be understandable if they chose that route. On the other hand, they could still try to attract a star to pair with LaMarcus Aldridge. What will they do?

8. Can Steve Nash, Grant Hill and Tim Duncan outperform expectations?
In their own ways, Nash, Hill and Duncan are true treasures to basketball. They play with dignity and class, they're phenomenal teammates, and they were truly elite players when they were in their primes. They were still relevant as players last season, too.

But as we've seen all too often, players can suddenly fall off a cliff and lose most of their game quickly. The fact that all three of them have managed to not only avoid the cliff but continue to be extremely productive players only makes it more likely that they can't keep playing at that high level.

9. Is John Wall going to take a big step forward?
Neither Derrick Rose nor Russell Westbrook were elite players in their second seasons, but that was the season both made big jumps and began to look like the special players we saw last season. Wall, like Rose and Westbrook, is 21 entering his sophomore season and has pieces around him that can help propel his game to the next level.

If he only treads water in Year 2, like Tyreke Evans did (perhaps due to injuries), then his brand and the future of the Wizards will take a big hit. If he proves to be the outstanding talent we all think he can be, then it's fair to assume future free agents will target D.C. as their next stop.

10. Coaches on the hot seat
I thought it was ludicrous to see people calling for Erik Spoelstra's job last season when Miami didn't blow out of the starting gate. It was just as strange to see him on the hot seat after the terrific job he did getting his team to the Finals. Unless you blamed him for LeBron's meltdown. But I didn't. So what happens if Miami struggles early on again? Can Spoelstra, even with a new contract extension, survive a bad start in a shortened season?

Of course, Spoelstra isn't the only coach who will be looking over his shoulder when times get tough. Think Vinny Del Negro will feel secure if his team, led by Chris Paul, loses back-to-back games? How about Scott Skiles, whose team is a big question mark after having success two seasons ago? And what if Paul Westphal can't turn things around in Year 3 in Sacramento, where fans have good reason to be excited? When expectations are high and results low, heads will roll.

11. Will Daryl Morey be able to pull the trigger on a trade again?

I'll be honest, I like Morey and respect the job he has done in Houston, not to mention his role in getting "geeks" (not the term I'd use) to be an accepted and even coveted part of the NBA. (Roland Beech of 82games.com is an assistant coach with the Mavs -- who would have ever predicted that could happen even five years ago?)

Morey isn't the only GM who has suffered bad luck in the form of injuries to star players, but he is the only guy to construct a blockbuster trade that no one saw coming -- one that would have been followed by the signing of Nene -- only to have the league veto the deal.

Morey is competitive and is the last guy to just sit back and see what happens. The Rockets have a ton of good-to-great players, although none have made the All-Star Game. Still, only one player is over 29, and Morey has extra draft picks, so the conditions are right for another big trade attempt.

12. Who's going to be the best team in L.A.?

Quick, name the top NBA rivalries today and tell me which of them will have more star power and drama than Clippers-Lakers now? Plus, this is David vs. Goliath with a twist -- they live in the same house.

The Chris Paul aspect of the matchup only adds more intrigue. Then factor in Kobe's will and how he'll refuse to allow any local player to outshine him. But don't forget that Paul is the most competitive guard in the league other than Kobe. And Blake Griffin has the power to steal the limelight away from anyone he matches up with.

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Western Conference, worst to first

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:25 GMT le 25 décembre 2011

Has the new collective bargaining agreement really changed anything?

The preseason sagas of Chris Paul and Dwight Howard might lead you to conclude "no." But take a look at the Western Conference heading into this season, and you might be more inclined to say "yes."

Teams everywhere are being forced to make hard choices. The Dallas Mavericks and Los Angeles Lakers no longer have the stomachs to just throw money at their problems, not with a punitive luxury tax facing them in two years. So we're seeing different styles instead. The two "Superfriends" teams in L.A. possess virtually no depth, while truly deep teams in San Antonio and Denver have no A-list stars. Long term, a few small-market teams that have built carefully might be in the best shape of all.

HOLLINGER'S EAST FORECAST

Who's rising (and falling) in the East? Here are predicted finishes for all 15 teams in 2011-12. East Forecast »

The end result will, indeed, be competitive balance. While the West cleaves neatly into three groups -- the haves, the have-nots and the Rockets -- this season's Western Conference standings figure to be unusually compressed. I project only 23 games will separate first from worst in the Western Conference, as compared with last season's figure of 44 games.

At the top there's no obviously dominant team: The top three seeds took steps backward while the presumptive favorite, fourth-seeded Oklahoma City, made no major additions.

But the real news is at the bottom: All the bad teams in the West have improved. There are no punching bags here, folks, not even the Hornets. The West's three worst teams last season were the Minnesota Timberwolves, Sacramento Kings and Los Angeles Clippers. The Wolves will be dramatically better by virtue of talent additions and a coaching change; the Kings' star player is healthy again and they added another lottery pick; and the Clippers will no longer be doormats.

Some might also note that the West will play a higher percentage of its schedule in intraconference games than in previous seasons, but actually this is a minor factor. Given that the East is so top-heavy and its middle is firming up too, the difference between conferences isn't that large. I estimated this season's unique schedule will shift 1.20 wins from the West to the East over the course of the season -- that's not per team, that's total. Split 15 ways, it's effectively zero.

The more important effect of the tight schedule is that the combination of fatigue and an increased reliance on secondary players adds an element of randomness. That will compress the standings too: Nobody's going 55-11 in this environment.

As a result, the West is the competitive balance conference. (The East, not so much.)

Here's how I see things shaking out:

15. New Orleans Hornets (22-44)

Even though I have the Hornets projected to be the worst team in the conference, they won't be that bad -- they're pegged to beat three teams in the East and tie with a fourth. They won't be overmatched physically with a frontcourt of Emeka Okafor, Chris Kaman, Carl Landry, and Jason Smith. And Eric Gordon can obviously get them some points; few bad teams have such a good go-to scoring option.

My analytics actually had them winning a couple more games, but two subjective factors limited my view of the Hornets this season. First, I suspect they may keep trimming talent as the season wears on and trade scenarios emerge. If a good offer comes along for Kaman, Okafor or Jarrett Jack, I can't imagine the league -- er, excuse me, independently operating New Orleans general manager Dell Demps -- refusing. Second, along the same lines, New Orleans sure as heck won't be making major additions to this group.

But Hornets coach Monty Williams will have them playing respectable defense. I'm guessing they'll still finish around 12th in defensive efficiency, even with Jack surrendering blow-bys by the dozen at point guard (he's much better at the 2). Trevor Ariza is a strong wing defender, they have quality big men to protect the rim, and the Hornets have tended to favor bench players who defend.

The problem is scoring. While Gordon can fill it up, he creates little for others, and without Chris Paul or David West, this could get ugly. Plus, Ariza possesses the worst shot selection in the league and may feel free to gun away now that the two stars are gone. Aside from Kaman, the bench is giving them bupkus. Look for the Hornets to land 25th or so in offensive efficiency, effectively preventing them from winning more than a third of their games.

14. Phoenix Suns (24-42)

It took the Suns just two offseasons to completely dismantle a championship contender, although 2010 was the big one. By chasing away Steve Kerr and David Griffin, letting Amare Stoudemire walk, and then spending the money on Josh Childress and Hakim Warrick, they sealed their fate. A year from now, after Steve Nash and Grant Hill flee for Gotham, they'll be a 15-win team with virtually no young talent.

The Suns weren't that bad last season, but the only changes for this season appear to be downgrades. They replaced Aaron Brooks with Sebastian Telfair at backup point guard, and the ghost of Vince Carter with Shannon Brown at the 2. On a positive note, the Suns drafted power forward Markieff Morris -- adding him to Marcin Gortat and 7-footer Robin Lopez gives the Suns a better frontcourt than in recent seasons.

But with Stoudemire and Jason Richardson gone, there's just no scoring pop around Nash. Channing Frye endured a frustrating campaign last season and historically has performed much worse as a power forward, where's he's slotted for 2011-12. Nash and Hill are both in their late 30s and obvious risks for decline, especially with such a punishing schedule.

This looks like the inverse of the Hornets: a team that will finish maybe 12th in offensive efficiency and in the bottom five defensively. I can't see them getting back to the playoffs.

13. Sacramento Kings (25-41)

A number of factors point to the Kings being quasi-respectable this season, the most important of which is that Tyreke Evans should have recovered from his foot problems and resume attacking the basket at will. Having an energetic, free-throw-creating machine in the backcourt should do wonders for a team that ranked just 25th in offensive efficiency last season.

Don't forget about Marcus Thornton, who put up some big numbers after his trade from New Orleans a year ago, a steal of a deal in which Sacramento sent out free-agent-to-be Carl Landry. While the Kings needlessly bid against themselves in giving Thornton a four-year, $31 million deal -- a franchise tradition dating back to Mike Bibby -- he'll give them some bang for those bucks as a high-scoring sixth man. In the frontcourt, DeMarcus Cousins is a prodigious talent, albeit one with a lot of growing up to do. On talent alone, however, he's a major breakout candidate.

Here's the thing, though: There is nobody to pass the ball to all these scorers. Sacramento made three head-scratching moves before the lockout to worsen this problem, starting on draft day when they traded Beno Udrih to Milwaukee for John Salmons and moved down in the draft, even though Udrih is a better, younger player with a better contract.

Then they traded Omri Casspi and a first-round pick to Cleveland for J.J. Hickson, another iso-scorer and brutal defensive player, and bid on a four-year, $12 million deal for New Jersey amnesty cut Travis Outlaw -- another iso-scorer who can't guard, and one who has failed any time he has had to play the 3 regularly.

He'll be playing the 3.

The Kings will almost certainly finish last in the percentage of assisted baskets this season, and in the half court they're likely to fall back into iso-left, iso-right predictability because none of these dudes are giving up the rock. They also don't have much in the way of perimeter shooting, so the lane will get crowded anytime rookie sharpshooter Jimmer Fredette is off the floor.

The Kings did at least try to supplement their frontcourt by signing Chuck Hayes, a stout defender who does all the little things the Kings need, but he unfortunately has a heart ailment and his contract has since been voided. It's a shame, because the Kings might have accidentally learned how to play real basketball from his example. There's no indication they're learning it from the coaching staff.

As a result, the Kings will land around 20th in both offensive and defensive efficiency, and I don't trust their management to fix any problems that arise, especially since cash is scarce around these parts. Let's just hope this isn't their final act in Sacramento, because their fans deserve better.

12. Golden State Warriors (26-40)

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. The Warriors promised they'd do things very differently than they did during the Chris Cohan years, and maybe they eventually will. But for the time being, it looks like another season of tremendously entertaining losing for the Warriors. Stephen Curry and Monta Ellis are still together in the league's most flammable backcourt, while Golden State's big free-agent idea was to burn money on DeAndre Jordan and, when that didn't work, Kwame Brown.

At least the Warriors took some steps to improve the defense, however counterproductive they might have been cap-wise. New coach Mark Jackson seems fairly insistent about this, which would be a marked change from the last regime and presents the best opportunity for hope. Unfortunately, three of the five starters can't guard a snail and the fourth one is Kwame Brown. The bench, meanwhile, is basically a giant help-wanted ad, although the trade for Indiana's Brandon Rush will help a bit while injecting a little more D.

Offensively, the Warriors ranked 12th in efficiency a year ago and can expect to squeeze more out of Curry and David Lee this season, but that's likely to be offset by a giant bagel from the bench. The departed Reggie Williams and Vladimir Radmanovic were fairly productive a season ago, and Rush and youngsters Klay Thompson and Ekpe Udoh will be hard-pressed to match their output.

All told, it's possible to see the team winning half its games if everything goes right. That is, if Jackson motivates Lee and Ellis to actually try on defense, if Andris Biedrins likes basketball again, if Thompson contributes immediately, and if assistant GM Travis Schlenk finds another golden needle in the D-League haystack, then maybe they can surprise. More likely, a pliant defense and a nonexistent bench will again land Golden State in the lottery.

11. Utah Jazz (27-39)

Long-term, I love what the Jazz are doing. Love it, love it, love it. This team is my early favorite to be my go-to late-night League Pass fix.

Here's why: The Jazz are set up to become a major force about three seasons from now. Nobody has caught on to this nationally, but they're positioning themselves to be the next Oklahoma City. Utah has four lottery picks from the past two drafts -- Derrick Favors, Enes Kanter, Gordon Hayward and Alec Burks -- and are likely to have two more (their own and Golden State's) in the 2012 draft. That six-man group will give the Jazz a five-year window to win big in the middle of the decade.

Alas, they're a giant question mark in the interim. Al Jefferson, Devin Harris, Paul Millsap and C.J. Miles are all potent offensively and suspect defensively, although Harris is redeemable. One of the best defensive players in the league when he was in Dallas, Harris has slacked off since then.

Utah went off the rails with that group last season. It's hard to remember now, but the Jazz were once 14 games over .500. With the departures of Jerry Sloan and Deron Williams marking a shift in direction, they had the biggest first- to second-half decline in NBA history, going from 27-14 at the break to 12-29 afterward. In particular, the defense fell off -- the Jazz finished 23rd after ranking in the top 10 early -- and while some events were beyond his control, head coach Tyrone Corbin needs to prove he can motivate his troops to play halfway decent defense.

Utah also has some short-term options. I have to think they'll shop Mehmet Okur at the trade deadline since he's a fifth wheel in the frontcourt rotation and owns an expiring contract; Jefferson, Millsap and Harris all expire in 2013 and also could come into play.

That won't help them this season, obviously, and I think the kids are going to take their lumps. But get your shots in on the Jazz while you can, because in a few seasons they'll be back with a vengeance.

10. Minnesota Timberwolves (29-37)

Sorry, Hornets fans, but that unprotected lottery pick isn't quite as juicy as you may have been led to believe. Despite their comical zest for accumulating point guards and general knack for shooting their own feet, I expect the Timberwolves to achieve a measure of respectability.

Several items point in their favor, but let's start with Darko Milicic. Minnesota employed the single most counterproductive offensive strategy in basketball last season, constantly feeding the ball in the post to Milicic even though he was their least effective offensive player on a per-possession basis. Merely redistributing these possessions to players who can either score or pass will substantially improve the Minnesota offense.

Second, they have Rick Adelman coaching, which means two things: (1) They have Adelman, and (2) they no longer have Kurt Rambis. The Wolves didn't seem terribly motivated to play hard for Rambis, and Rambis didn't seem terribly motivated to adjust his system to the Wolves. It seemed Rambis hoped to wake up one day and find Darko had become Pau Gasol.

Also, Minnesota is better talent-wise because of second overall pick Derrick Williams and the point guard combo of Ricky Rubio and J.J. Barea. I really don't know how good Rubio will be; he's one of the most unique players the league has ever seen, in both good and bad ways. He might shoot 30 percent, and he might get the first triple-double in history in which points wasn't one of the categories. But he can't be any worse than what Minnesota had last season, when Sebastian Telfair and Jonny Flynn played 1,694 combined minutes for this team. Egads.

They have several other young players, and nearly all should be better. In addition to the players above, Kevin Love, Anthony Randolph, Michael Beasley, Wesley Johnson, Martell Webster, Wayne Ellington and Nikola Pekovic are 25 or younger.

Finally, they potentially can squeeze more from the same talent just by playing small. Half the team consists of 6-foot-8 combo forwards, one of whom is currently posing as its starting shooting guard. Moving Love to center not only takes "go-to guy" Milicic off the floor, it also opens the door for Williams, Beasley, Randolph and Johnson to snag minutes as forwards. I'd argue it's better for Love too, since he can't guard the perimeter anyway.

None of this means the Wolves will suddenly be awesome, and we still see disturbing signs of mismanagement in the background. But the rule of thumb in the NBA is that, via the draft, bad teams continually receive infusions of talent until they can't possibly be bad anymore. By this point, Minnesota has had so many high draft picks that they almost have to rise in the standings.

9. Houston Rockets (32-34)

All they can do is lament the trade that wasn't. The Rockets hit an absolute home run with the Pau Gasol deal before the league voided it -- they were getting Nene in free agency and Gasol to pair with him in the frontcourt. A Lowry-Lee-Budinger-Gasol-Nene starting five had the league's most underrated point guard, a defensive stopper who shoots 40 percent on 3-pointers, a wing scorer who can run, and two All-Star caliber big men. That was a top-four team in this season's West, and it would have been the culmination of an impressive rebuilding job -- going from "T-Mac & Yao" to "Nene & Pau" without ever dropping below .500.

Thanks to the league, they instead have a mess. Houston was a better team last season than many realize, winning 43 games with the scoring margin of a 47-win club. Unfortunately, some of the reasons for that success won't carry over into 2011-12. Most notably, they had an unexpectedly productive center platoon with Chuck Hayes and Brad Miller, who are both gone. For now, Patrick Patterson, Jordan Hill and Hasheem Thabeet are manning the middle.

Also, their two best players exhibit downside risk. Scola produced a career year at 31 and will probably take a step back. On the perimeter, Kevin Martin may have trouble duplicating the league's second-best point-per-minute rate, although he'll probably also play more than the 32.5 minutes a game he got a year ago.

This team will score, but Lowry and Lee are their only good defenders, and Lee may not play much with Martin and Budinger around. The latter pair are two of Houston's three best scorers, but Martin is a brutal defender and Budinger isn't much better. Somehow, one of them has to guard the Kobes and LeBrons of the league.

Overall, it looks like this will be a mildly rebuilding season in Houston. Assorted reclamation projects dot the roster (Jonny Flynn, Terrence Williams, Thabeet) and if the Rockets can get one of them back in working order, that will help.

The main reason I have Houston ahead of the Minnesotas and Golden States of the West is opportunity -- sitting on cap space and champing at the bit to use it, with plentiful trade assets to make a deal, the Rockets are likely to be a better team at the end of the season than they are now. They may have missed out on the Gasol-Nene home run, but they're still out hunting.

8. Memphis Grizzlies (37-29)

So let's deal with this silly idea that Rudy Gay is somehow bad for the Grizzlies' chemistry, a notion that gained momentum when Memphis made the second round of the playoffs without him. The Griz got off to a slow start with Gay, but much of that was due to awful personnel choices that had nothing to do with Gay. They were starting Xavier Henry, Acie Law was the backup point guard, and Tony Allen was barely playing.

You know how many times Allen and Gay both played at least 25 minutes? Seven. The Griz won six of those games, with an average margin of +7.7. The problem wasn't Gay, the problem was that for nearly all the time Gay was healthy, the Grizzlies weren't playing Tony Allen.

Both will start this season, giving Memphis one of the best starting fives in basketball. Alas, the bench is another matter. Just a couple of days ago I had the Grizzlies landing in fourth, and I thought they had a chance to do big things in the playoffs if they stayed healthy. The fact that I now have them eighth reflects two things: (1) Losing Darrell Arthur for probably the entire season is a harsh blow, and (2) the contenders are tightly packed. For the Western contenders, every game is going to matter.

Even with Arthur, the Grizzlies already had little in the way of "deep" depth, especially in the frontcourt where, at the moment, Hamed Haddadi is penciled in as the first big man off the bench. (Incidentally, I've priced in a signing or trade to get another big man in this prediction, but he won't be on Arthur's level.) Any injury to Marc Gasol or point guard Mike Conley will knock these guys sideways for a while, especially since they're hard up against the luxury tax line and have little flexibility to add players along the way.

7. Portland Trail Blazers (38-28)

Portland may have had the worst first day of training camp in NBA history. Within the span of a few hours, the Blazers found out Brandon Roy had to retire, Greg Oden would hardly play this season and LaMarcus Aldridge was suffering from a heart problem.

Presuming this is the last of the bad news (which is never a safe assumption with this team), the Blazers should again overcome all the injury problems and make the playoffs -- before once again losing in the first round. The Blazers seem prepared for the compressed schedule, as a rebuilt guard rotation should keep up the energy. Raymond Felton, Jamal Crawford and Nolan Smith are newbies and Elliot Williams might as well be after missing his entire rookie season. They'll join Wes Matthews, Nic Batum and Gerald Wallace to give the Blazers a deep perimeter contingent.

Up front, Aldridge should make his first All-Star team, but he won't have a ton of help. Marcus Camby was running on fumes last season, and Kurt Thomas and Craig Smith are the only other frontcourt bodies. I expect to see Portland play small with Wallace or Batum at the 4 quite a bit. Luke Babbitt, Portland's 2010 first-round pick, may also get some run, although he looked awful in his few chances a season ago.

In other words, you're looking at a standard one-and-done playoff outfit. Though they should win more than they lose, the Blazers can't match up for seven games against elite frontcourts or A-list perimeter stars. But keep an eye on this team going forward. They have Aldridge as a centerpiece and several good young perimeter players, along with $20 million in cap space after the season.

6. Dallas Mavericks (39-27)

I've noted before the eerie similarities between the 2010-11 Dallas Mavericks and the 2005-06 Miami Heat team that beat them in the NBA Finals. Dallas had better hope the similarities end there. In 2006-07, Miami put up the worst title defense this side of the 1999-2000 Bulls, losing their opener by 42 points and getting swept in the first round of the playoffs. The next season, they won a mere 15 games.

Dallas may have learned from Miami's mistakes, judging by its decision not to let emotion get in the way of its future. With a roster that was dangerously long in the tooth, the Mavs opted to let Tyson Chandler and J.J. Barea walk, build around one-year contracts, and gamble they can nab Deron Williams or Dwight Howard in free agency a year from now.

In the short term, the Mavs have handled things somewhat curiously, trading a first-round pick for Rudy Fernandez and then giving away Fernandez to Denver so they could sign Vince Carter -- even though Fernandez is probably the better player at this point. Obviously, a Kidd-Carter-Terry backcourt raises some major age questions, especially given the punishing schedule this season. Between that and the fact that Brendan Haywood is their only center, you could have made a case for Dallas missing the playoffs entirely -- except for two talent infusions to last season's group. The first is Rodrigue Beaubois' return after an injury-plagued 2010-11, which should provide some scoring punch when the veterans' legs are dead. The second comes via the gifting of Lamar Odom from the Lakers.

The Odom-Nowitzki combo will cause some headaches as a smallball frontcourt, but they can't allow Nowitzki to take that much punishment as a center consistently, especially with this schedule. With no Chandler in the middle, Dallas will take a step back to the middle of the pack on the defensive end. But offensively they should still be a highly efficient outfit, especially with Nowitzki as the centerpiece and so much shooting around him.

That alone makes them a no-brainer playoff team, and along the way, coach Rick Carlisle will steal a few games his team had no business winning. But in the big picture, they're taking a rain check on this season and defending their title in 2013.

5. Los Angeles Lakers (40-26)

The Lakers still boast three impressively talented players in Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum. But the question is whether they have anyone else.

After management's bizarre and seemingly impulsive decision to trade Lamar Odom to Dallas for a free year of HDNet and a keg of Lone Star, the Lakers' fourth-best player is Josh McRoberts. The fifth-best is, I dunno ... Matt Barnes? Yikes.

The Lakers owned the league's second-least productive position last season at point guard, where Derek Fisher and Steve Blake each struggled at both ends; L.A. made no changes at that spot. Their two best bench players were Shannon Brown and Lamar Odom; both are gone and Brown wasn't replaced. The Lakers have an $8 million trade exception from the Odom deal that they've shown no inclination to use, and they already let a $5.5 million exception from the Sasha Vujacic trade expire.

Since the failed trade for Chris Paul, all indications are that they've basically gone into organizational hibernation -- trimming an enormous payroll to something more restrained, banking their big three will be good enough to win games and sell tickets, and laughing all the way to the bank thanks to their enormous TV deal.

Meanwhile, Kobe and Pau are older and a bit less heroic these days, and Phil Jackson isn't around to cover everybody's weaknesses with smoke and mirrors. Make no mistake, Mike Brown is a good coach, but he's not the best coach ever. Inevitably, we'll see some decline here.

I'd grade the Lakers lower were it not for one factor: They're the L.A. Lakers. Virtually every veteran free agent who shakes loose during the season will want to come here, because (A) they love the weather and lifestyle, (B) it's the Lakers, and (C) they know they'll get minutes with such a weak bench. The Lakers will be able to scoop up players on minimum contracts that other teams can't, and that may help prop them up. Seeing the glass as half-full, they'll also get nice value from McRoberts, and second-year pro Devin Ebanks may be ready to help.

On the other hand, the schedule is going to be murder on this team more than on any other -- the key players are all old guys with the exception of Bynum, who has bad knees, and McRoberts. Plus, the bench isn't giving them squat. They'll make the playoffs, and if they manage the minutes and injuries well, they might even win a round once they get there. But they stopped being serious contenders the second they executed the Odom trade.

4. Los Angeles Clippers (41-25)

In a seven-game series played over two-plus weeks, I would take the Lakers over the Clippers. In a 66-game season played in approximately 67 days, however, it's a much tougher question.

This slate won't wear down Blake Griffin, and in fact I have him pegged for a top-five MVP-vote type of season. He developed rapidly even as last season wore on, and has become much more than just a dunking phenom. Throw in the offseason backcourt coup in which the Clippers nabbed both Chris Paul and Chauncey Billups, and they figure to be the league's most improved team.

(Quick aside: Please spare me the conspiracy theories about the Chauncey Billups auction. Two teams bid on him. Two. The one that didn't win knows exactly what it bid; presumably if it had bid $2,000,031 and lost by a dollar, that team would be screaming bloody murder. More importantly, remind me again how this helped the league/Hornets? So you think if the Clippers got a third point guard on the cheap, they'd be more likely to trade for a fourth? Sorry, but this one requires an even more willful suspension of rational thought than most.)

Here's the Clippers' biggest positive: Nobody is stopping this offense in crunch time, not even Vinny Del Negro. The Hornets were the best crunch-time offense in the league with Chris Paul at the controls, and now he's in L.A. with Blake Griffin as the dive man in the pick-and-roll and Chauncey Billups, Caron Butler and Ryan Gomes spacing the floor. Good luck guarding that. (Yes, Gomes -- he's played much better his whole career as a stretch 4, and I suspect he'll repeat in that role this season.)

The downside is that there are just too many holes around CP3 and Griffin. The top wing defender right now is Randy Foye; um, that's a problem. Yes, they'll likely move Mo Williams at some point for a player who can defend wings and I've factored that in to my estimate for this season, but until the problem is solved, it's concerning.

More worrisome is the frontcourt. Gomes is the top reserve, but he's a stretch 4. As far as true big men go, you're looking at Brian Cook and Trey Thompkins -- unless you'd rather look away, that is.

And while the offseason brought in CP3 and Billups, it was a bit of a dud otherwise. Bad contracts for Caron Butler and DeAndre Jordan may limit the Clips' ability to improve the squad going forward.

Finally, there are the larger organizational questions. The team is still owned by Donald Sterling, and few doubt that he can somehow sabotage this team at the worst possible moment. And there's Del Negro, who is generally regarded as one of the league's weakest bench jockeys but now has to hide some fairly glaring weaknesses. He's on a lame-duck contract too. (But on a positive note, if he leaves after the season, he won't have to sue Sterling to get the rest of his money.)

Add it all up and the Clippers will be really good, because you almost have to be with Paul and Griffin together. But their upside is limited by the lack of depth and defenders, and I'm not sure they have the organizational strength to overcome that.

3. San Antonio Spurs (42-24)

"Hey, remember us? We won more games than any team in the conference last season and lost in the playoffs partly because our best player was hurt. Feel free to ignore us until mid-April like you do every season, we'll just be quietly accumulating victories while generating as little hype as possible."

Actually, I do have some decline factored in for the Spurs. In fact, I've projected them to lose more games in a 66-game season than they did last season in 82. But they had a lot of room to fall, and the compressed nature of the Western Conference standings means they'll still be in good shape vis-à-vis their competitors.

The Spurs were largely an offensive team last season and that shouldn't change this season. In particular, scoring 4s will give them trouble, as Zach Randolph did in the playoffs last season. That may hinder them in the playoffs again if they draw the wrong matchup. You'll note that the five teams I just reviewed all employ a power forward the Spurs will have difficulty guarding.

But for the regular season, keep two points in mind about San Antonio. First, they're getting a dollop of youth and energy from rookie Kawhi Leonard and 2010 first-rounder James Anderson, who played only 26 games last season after breaking a bone in his foot. Second, their frontcourt should be much more imposing if they actually play Tiago Splitter, who was effective in his limited minutes last season and projects as a dramatic improvement on Antonio McDyess, who is set to retire.

The compressed schedule won't do their veterans any favors, but the Spurs are deep enough to spread around the minutes, and Gregg Popovich is the best in the league at managing the season. He won't hesitate to tank a game to keep his players fresh, and he may need to on multiple occasions this season.

The only worry for San Antonio is if it starts slow and decides to correct course and play for next season. The Spurs potentially have a giant wad of cap room next summer if they exercise their amnesty rights on Richard Jefferson's contract and re-sign Tim Duncan at a lower salary, and the oft-heard Tony Parker trade rumors could come to fruition and open up additional space. I think it's unlikely they go that direction, but it warrants mentioning.

2. Denver Nuggets (43-23)

I know, I know, you think I'm insane. But before you have me committed, hear me out.

If I had to bet on a long-shot team to win the title, Denver would absolutely, positively be the one. Not only are the Nuggets better than people realize, they have more potential for in-season improvement than any other team because of all their trade assets. More importantly, the regular-season format favors them more than any other team in the league.

Remember Portland in 1999, a team with no stars that won big in the lockout season because they threw waves of depth at their weary opponents? This team is the second coming of that squad, minus the technical fouls and incarcerations. The Nuggets go 12 deep, and George Karl, more than perhaps any other coach in basketball, will absolutely use all 12. I'm convinced it's his dream to become the first coach in history to have 12 players average exactly 20.0 minutes and 8.8 points a game, and he may come close to that goal this season.

Think about this: Andre Miller, Rudy Fernandez, Corey Brewer, Al Harrington and Chris Andersen are Denver's second five. (The starters are projected to be Ty Lawson, Arron Afflalo, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov and Nene.) Behind them are two rookie first-round draft picks, Jordan Hamilton and Kenneth Faried, both of whom should contribute immediately. Somewhere in there, beginning around midseason or sooner, is Wilson Chandler too.

Throw in two other factors and I really like Denver this season. First, they're good: They went gangbusters after the Melo trade last season, going 19-6 with a scoring margin greater than 10 points a game before playing the JV in the finale against Utah. They struggled in the playoffs when they had to depend more on starters-versus-starters matchups and suffered injuries in the backcourt. They'll likely struggle in the postseason again this season unless they procure another quality big.

But in the regular season? Forget it. The second reason to expect Denver to excel is that the combination of altitude and pace is going to wreak havoc on opponents. With Lawson and Miller pushing the tempo, waves of fresh players checking in -- nearly all of whom can run -- and exhausted teams sucking wind in the Mile High altitude, I expect the Nuggets to have a ridiculous home record on the order of 28-5 or so. If they achieve that, they need to be only a 15-18 road team to fulfill my prediction. (My projection, by the way, includes a small dose of Wilson Chandler at season's end, but no Kenyon Martin or J.R. Smith.)

That prediction is based on the roster staying as is. But remember, too, the upshot of Denver's stealth robbery of the Knicks in the Carmelo Anthony trade. The Nuggets have as many trade assets as any other team in the league. They have a $12 million trade exception from the Anthony deal, lots of young, talented players that other teams want, and a $7.8 million expiring contract belonging to Miller.

If the Nuggets can swing that into another quality big man, their playoff ceiling goes much higher. Barring that, they'll have a great regular season and another early playoff exit.

But in the big picture, everybody is sleeping on this team. With overwhelming depth, two potential breakout players in Lawson and Gallinari, and tons of trade assets, the Nuggets are in fantastic shape.

1. Oklahoma City Thunder (45-21)

Welcome to a new phenomenon, OKC: It's called expectations. No more feel-good stories about a young team on the rise. You're now widely expected to win the Western Conference, and your season will be seen as a colossal disappointment if you don't.

Oklahoma City has several young players who should be better this season; in particular, James Harden blew up after the Jeff Green trade and could win the sixth man award if he isn't promoted to the starting lineup. Kendrick Perkins also should contribute more after battling on a bad knee a season ago, and rookie Reggie Jackson may provide an additional scoring spark from the bench.

The spotlight, however, will focus squarely on Russell Westbrook. While he emerged as an All-Star last season and is still on the upswing, the question remains whether he can channel his ridiculous athleticism in a way that produces better shots for himself and teammates. Having Harden in the starting lineup with him may reduce some of the pressure Westbrook feels to hoist any time Kevin Durant can't get open (which happens a lot; watch off the ball when these guys play). Last season it was often Russ, KD and three non-scorers on the floor, so at times you could scarcely blame Westbrook for forcing shots.

With eight of their top 12 players aged 24 and younger -- yes, eight -- time would seem to be on the Thunder's side, but watch out. In another two years their kids start becoming restricted free agents, and it's going to be increasingly difficult to keep this team together on a small-market payroll.

That's why one wonders if and when they'll be lured by the siren's call of some veterans -- and some shooters -- to supplement the current roster, so they can charge to a title in the next season or two. For instance, I was a bit surprised they didn't use their cap space in the Chauncey Billups auction; instead, they used a small slice of it on Wolves refugee Lazar Hayward.

Nonetheless, the Thunder have talent galore and are my favorite to win the West. They have a pristine cap situation, arguably the league's best general manager in Sam Presti, and an enviable home-court advantage they'll likely have for three straight playoff series. But I still think they need more shooting and a bit more defense to take the final step.

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East Forecast: Ranking worst to first

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:24 GMT le 25 décembre 2011

Life isn't fair, and neither is the distribution of talent in the Eastern Conference, where four teams hoard the A-list stars and leave the rest fighting for scraps. While I wrote the other day that the West standings likely will be very compressed this season, the East is just the opposite.

HOLLINGER'S WEST FORECAST

Who wins the ever-competitive West? Here are predicted finishes for all 15 teams in 2011-12. West Forecast »

This conference has been split into extreme haves and have-nots each of the past four seasons, and it figures to be that way again. The NBA's two best projected records are in the East this season ... and so are the five worst. It's particularly ugly at the bottom, with early-stage rebuilding situations in five cities and a sixth team, New Jersey, teetering on the cusp of prosperity but potentially facing another bottom-to-top rebuild a year from now if its aspirations don't pan out.

Only a few upwardly mobile middle-class teams dot the landscape, and one of those (Orlando) might get kicked back downstairs. At least in terms of playoff contenders, it's become a more respectable neighborhood. Making the playoffs in the East will require winning half a team's games, and the top six seeds should all be genuinely good.

Here's how they stack up individually:

15. Charlotte Bobcats (13-53)

Michael Jordan has won seven championships (six as a player and a seventh when he gifted Tyson Chandler to the Mavs two summers ago), but Charlotte is currently the furthest in the league from a title. This is why Chad Ford and I ranked this team 30th every time we ran our Future Power Rankings -- the Bobcats' post-Larry Brown experience has left them with little cap space or young talent. This season, they'll bottom out before recovery starts.

The schedule will help them steal a few wins against tired opponents, but their talent deficit is daunting. Raw first-round pick Bismack Biyombo was stuck in Spain and missed most of training camp; nonetheless, he might be their starting center. Tyrus Thomas is probably the closest thing they have to a go-to guy, and wings Corey Maggette and Reggie Williams will put up numbers while allowing more. That's only if they can get in the lineup -- Williams is out for several weeks, and Maggette is permanently day-to-day. Keep an eye on shooting guard Gerald Henderson, however, who could evolve into a top-notch wing stopper.

At least the Cats know where they stand. They have two first-rounders in Biyombo and Kemba Walker to start the rebuilding process, and they will be more than $20 million under next year's cap once they give amnesty to DeSagana Diop or Maggette (who was acquired before the lockout, remember). More importantly, the recent hiring of general manager Rich Cho should spare them the laughable cap mistakes they made when Jordan was trying to run things himself -- dumping Chandler's salary without actually saving any money being the most comical of the bunch.

Alas, the damage has already been done. This season will be ugly, and the timing is unfortunate. When the Bobcats made the playoffs two years ago, it seemed the team was just beginning to gain traction with the fan base in Charlotte. Now it is back to square one, hemorrhaging cash and hoping for some lottery magic this spring.

14. Cleveland Cavaliers (18-48)

Well, it's better than a year ago. Slowly but surely, the Cavs are rebuilding their future and cleaning up their cap, and in two years, they might have a very good team.

This year's draft pick is the linchpin. He might not be LeBron What's-His-Name, but Kyrie Irving will be a very nice building block and the early favorite for the rookie of the year award. Fourth overall pick Tristan Thompson will combine with a returned-from-injury Anderson Varejao to contribute some energetic defense, rebounding and finishing in the frontcourt.

As expected, the Cavs gave amnesty to Baron Davis, cleaning up a messy guard situation and making their trade-deadline deal with the Clippers one of the best in NBA history. With no cap consequences to the deal, Cleveland essentially got the first pick in the draft for the cash difference between the salaries of Mo Williams and Jamario Moon and that of Davis.

Ramon Sessions, a vastly underrated offensive player but one whose defense has become indefensible, now backs up Irving and, one suspects, will often play alongside him in two-guard sets. There isn't really a true 2 on the roster, as Daniel Gibson and Manny Harris both are undersized, and that's likely to be a sore spot all season defensively.

At forward, the Cavs triggered a sweet deal before the lockout by trading J.J. Hickson to Sacramento for Omri Casspi and a first-round pick (albeit a heavily protected one), filling a gaping hole at the 3 and earning another asset for the future. At the other forward spot, Antawn Jamison will score 18 points a game and give up 27 until he's traded or bought out, which should be soon, given his advanced age, huge expiring contract and near-total indifference to stopping the opposition.

Overall, the Cavs have enough players now to give themselves a chance on most nights, but they're still going to lose a ton of games. Long term, the three keepers here are Irving, Thompson and Casspi, so those are the ones to watch.

13. Toronto Raptors (19-47)

Toronto has finally come to grips with reality. No longer are the Raps delusional about loading up on mediocre veterans with long-term deals, nor about winning games without bothering to play defense. With Toronto again last in defensive efficiency in 2010-11, the overmatched Jay Triano was finally shown the door. Replacing him is former Dallas zone defense maestro Dwane Casey, who now must upgrade one of the most pathetic defensive outfits in league annals.

Central to Casey's cause is center Andrea Bargnani, who is offensively gifted but remains one of the most clueless off-ball defenders in the game. He's mobile for his size, though, and the Raps might experiment with playing him at power forward periodically now that they have some genuine size. Don't be surprised if 7-footers Solomon Alabi and Aaron Gray get a fair amount of run.

Alas, they also have to clear minutes for Ed Davis, a revelation as a high-percentage finisher last season, but one who needs to add strength to battle NBA big men. Ditto for Amir Johnson, who quietly had a strong season in 2010-11 but, like his frontcourt mates, suffers from a lack of lower-body strength at the defensive end.

In fact, Toronto's frontcourt looks pretty darn good going forward. First-round pick Jonas Valanciunas won't be coming over this season, but at only 19 years of age, he ranks among the best players in Europe and looks like a star in the making. He and Davis could be a fearsome combo in five years; Bargnani, whatever you think of him, would make for a pretty potent sixth man in that arrangement.

On the wing, DeMar DeRozan flashed some star potential as a scorer, but the rest of his game lies dormant; he needs to pass the ball once in a while and play some defense. Small forward looms as a huge weakness, although the talented but ridiculously mistake-prone James Johnson remains intriguing. And at the point, Jose Calderon is a flawless offensive operator and a traffic cone for opposing point guards.

Big picture, there are a lot of problems here beyond Casey's control -- team president Bryan Colangelo invested almost entirely in offensive players, so the result is again likely to be a decent offense paired with a hopeless defense. But if Casey can persuade his charges -- particularly Bargnani -- to compete and at least use their length as a deterrent, the Raptors' D should be less of an embarrassment.

12 (tie). Detroit Pistons (22-44)

The Pistons basically quit on John Kuester last season, especially at the defensive end; there was no reason a team with this roster should have finished 28th in defensive efficiency. Enter Lawrence Frank, who presumably will have his troops better prepared and better motivated. Not having Richard Hamilton around might actually help, clearing up a playing-time logjam on the wing and a volatile presence in the locker room.

There's more good news for the Pistons. They didn't make a single transaction last season while awaiting the team's sale; now that Tom Gores has taken over, they're diving back in and reshaping the roster for the future. The franchise has taken an interest in analytics for the first time, hiring StatsCube guru Ken Catanella from the league office and Charles Klask from Orlando, and its salary-cap mess finally shows signs of clearing. If the Pistons give amnesty to Ben Gordon in 2013, they'll fall about $20 million under the cap just as their kids are ready to blossom.

In the short term, however, Detroit faces all-too-familiar problems, the biggest being a glaring lack of star power. Their best player is either Rodney Stuckey or Greg Monroe, and there's a decent chance neither of the two will ever play in an All-Star Game.

Beyond that, the roster is lopsided. There's an overload of combo-forward types with Tayshaun Prince, Jonas Jerebko, Austin Daye and Charlie Villanueva, although it's possible Prince will get some run at the 2 with Hamilton gone. Meanwhile, the only true interior players are the grizzled Ben Wallace and the rapidly declining (not to mention rapidly expanding) Jason Maxiell.

It's the same story in the backcourt. The Pistons are overloaded with tweener combo guards such as Stuckey, Will Bynum, rookie Brandon Knight and Gordon, but there is not a true point guard in the bunch and not a fearsome deep shooter, either.*

As a result, I have trouble seeing the Pistons winning much more than a third of their games. Perhaps they can surprise if Stuckey or Monroe breaks out, and certainly their depth will help them in the compressed schedule format. But even the "surprise" scenario leaves them well short of a playoff spot.

(* This is how far Gordon has fallen. Dude was awful last season.)

12 (tie). Washington Wizards (22-44)

The Wizards have a lot of young, talented players. Young, talented players who are professional and know how to play? Let me get back to you on that one.

This makes the Wizards a fascinating team to watch, because you'll see things you otherwise wouldn't in the NBA. For example, we're treated to amazing feats by the likes of JaVale McGee and John Wall, plays nobody else in basketball can make. Mixed in, however, will be all kinds of unexpected knucklehead moves that you'd rarely see from another pro team. Not surprisingly, these blunders usually sabotage the game for Washington.

In spite of themselves, the Wizards are slowly getting better. Wall in particular seems ready for a breakout after his rookie campaign was held back by injuries, and I've factored a borderline All-Star season into my projection. If so, that might also help Andray Blatche, who was miscast as a go-to guy but might thrive as a second option and pick-and-pop weapon. Meanwhile, years of high draft picks have given Washington a 10-deep base of young legs who will serve it well in this season's punishing schedule.

Nonetheless, it's hard to get too excited about this team until guys such as Blatche, McGee, Nick Young and Jordan Crawford figure out that a 20-point, 0-assist performance in which they give up 115 points doesn't constitute a "good" night. That's where veterans such as Rashard Lewis and Mo Evans might pay their freight -- somebody needs to set the right example for these guys.

Long term, however, this is a team on the upswing. At some point, these kids will figure out how to play (probably), and when they do, they'll be dangerous. Meanwhile, the Wizards will have a trove of cap room if they give amnesty to Lewis next summer and a fairly desirable market as a lure. They're a have-not at the moment, but with the bad contracts off their books and several talented young players, they shouldn't be doormats for long.

10. New Jersey Nets (28-38)

The Nets are the hardest team to project because of all the potential wild cards. While Kris Humphries finally signed, they still have a ton of cap room and might sign Andrei Kirilenko, too. Longer term, of course, the possibility of a trade for Dwight Howard teases.

For now, the Nets are a mishmash. Star guard Deron Williams has been playing in real games since October and should be in tip-top shape, and Brook Lopez looms as a secondary offensive weapon in the middle. That's a solid offensive foundation and certainly one that should improve on last season's 27th-place standing in offensive efficiency. If they indeed add Kirilenko to Anthony Morrow's shooting, Humphries' energy and a bench with some offensive options (Shawne Williams, Jordan Farmar, first-round pick Marshon Brooks), this should be a decent offensive team.

Defensively, the Nets are still short-handed. Lopez blocks shots but is ponderously slow and a comically poor rebounder for his size. The other bigs don't offer much on defense, either, and Morrow is a sieve on the wing. Williams' effort on D has also slackened the past two seasons. Of course, if they land Howard, all of that changes.

If they don't, the scenario is much worse. Williams is probably leaving after the season, and the Nets will effectively have given the Jazz Derrick Favors, Enes Kanter and a 2012 lottery pick for a year and a half of Deron Williams. So basically, they're heading into Brooklyn next year either riding atop a huge wave or smashed on the rocks beneath it.

In the meantime, they should be respectable in their final season in New Jersey. I priced in a re-signed Humphries and an added Kirilenko to this projection, but no Howard. That still leaves them short of the playoffs, but the folks in Jersey should be left with some decent memories.

9. Atlanta Hawks (33-33)

The Hawks won 44 games and made the second round of the playoffs in 2010-11, but that's misleading. They gave up more points than they scored in the regular season, went 10-17 after the All-Star break, lost one of the top sixth men in free agency and didn't do much to replace him, and will be without Kirk Hinrich for nearly half the season.

Pressed face-first against the luxury tax thanks to the bad contracts they lavished on Joe Johnson and Marvin Williams, the Hawks were left to fill in around the edges with veteran retreads such as Tracy McGrady and Vladimir Radmanovic. These weren't bad pickups for the price, but they don't offset losing Crawford and Hinrich.

On the plus side, Jeff Teague takes over at the point after breaking out as a slashing, scoring guard in last season's playoffs, and Al Horford (25) and Josh Smith (26) provide a solid foundation as a frontcourt. Smith, however, is frustrated and spent the offseason angling for a trade.

Atlanta's bench looms as a major weakness; past editions of this team weren't deep, either, but Crawford and Zaza Pachulia often gave them an advantage against opposing second units. I can't see that happening with the current group, especially with McGrady likely to be the backup point guard until Hinrich returns. (Pape Sy, who has been talked up for this spot, has no chance of keeping it beyond the second quarter of the first game.)

As a result, this is going to be a harder slog for the Hawks than they might think, especially with a schedule that does a short-benched team few favors. Unless they're blessed with outstanding health, they're in danger of falling out of the playoffs entirely. After three straight trips to the second round, that's going to be a jolt.

8. Milwaukee Bucks (34-32)

Last season, the Bucks were one of the best defensive teams in basketball, but it didn't matter because the offense was so awful -- they ranked dead last in offensive efficiency. They've tried some tweaking around the edges to fix that, sending out Corey Maggette for Stephen Jackson, adding Beno Udrih and Mike Dunleavy, and drafting Tobias Harris.

Nonetheless, the Bucks' biggest obstacle to the playoffs is simply this: They need Andrew Bogut and Brandon Jennings to play better. Bogut isn't really a go-to guy but plays that role for Milwaukee, and last season he was bothered enough by his surgically repaired elbow that he took a major step back statistically. Jennings, meanwhile, also seemed stuck after a very encouraging rookie season; while his jump shot gets most of the criticism, it's his inability to finish that's been the bigger problem.

Milwaukee also was wracked by injuries last season; on health alone, it should be a better team this season, especially if Drew Gooden comes back and stabilizes the power forward spot.

As for the help, Jackson is holding out with a nebulous back injury while he lobbies for a contract extension -- a strategy that will fail miserably unless former Warriors president Robert Rowell took a job with the Bucks and forgot to tell everyone.

But the Bucks hardly need Cap'n Jack. Milwaukee has vast reserves of depth -- so much so that it sent Keyon Dooling to Boston for a future draft pick -- and is well adapted to the grueling schedule this season. The starting five (Jennings-Jackson-Carlos Delfino-Gooden-Bogut) might not scare anybody, but as with the Nuggets out West, the Bucks go 12 deep with Shaun Livingston and Udrih in the backcourt, Dunleavy, Harris and Luc Richard Mbah a Moute on the wing, and Larry Sanders and Ersan Ilyasova up front.

All except Udrih can defend, and coach Scott Skiles will make sure they all do. They still won't be an offensive juggernaut, but they'll be better than last season and maintain a top-five defense. That combination should just squeak them back into the playoffs.

7. New York Knicks (35-31)

This might seem pessimistic in light of the hype coming from Gotham, but in the short term, I'm not sure the Knicks have dramatically improved. They've essentially traded Chauncey Billups for Tyson Chandler, which will help, but this is the wrong season to have a thin bench and brittle stars. Between Amare Stoudemire's knees and Chandler's toes, the Knicks are likely to feel the brunt of the schedule-makers' wrath.

Baron Davis, despite his weaknesses, will prove quite useful when he's able to play. Mike D'Antoni's system demands a point guard who can pass, and Davis can do that when he's not jacking up 3s with 20 on the shot clock. It's even more important given the Knicks' other high-profile moves -- they boast three of the best frontcourt finishers in the game, but nobody to get them the ball.

I factored half a season of Davis into my projection, figuring he will miss more than a quarter of the season with his current back injury and then some more with his next injury. When he's out, the Knicks have Toney Douglas running the point, which is less than ideal. While I like him as a player, he's a bad fit at the point in this system because he's blind as a bat.

Otherwise, the roster is a bit of a mess. Landry Fields and Iman Shumpert are nice prospects but aren't ready to be top-seven players on a contending team. Jared Jeffries and Renaldo Balkman are the top two frontcourt reserves. Really. And at some point the Knicks will have to play Mike Bibby in a real game.

About the best thing New York has going for it is, well, New York. Players are lured by the city, and, as with the Lakers, the Knicks have a great shot at signing any decent veteran who shakes free during the season via buyout, waivers or departure from China. Better yet, the Knicks still have their $2.5 million "under-cap" exception lying around to use on such a player.

Nonetheless, I have trouble envisioning a high seed for this team. The Knicks get more dangerous once the playoffs begin. If their three frontcourt stars and Davis make it to May upright, they'll be a very difficult first-round out. Getting to that point is the problem.

6. Indiana Pacers (36-30)

On most levels, few teams are set up for the future better than the Pacers. They have a lot of young talent, $15 million in cap space and nary a bad contract, and they scored a rare small-market free-agent coup by luring David West from New Orleans.

However, they face the classic small-market conundrum: How do we snag a star if we don't win the lottery? While Plan A is hoping Dwight Howard develops a passion for corn, more realistically their hopes depend on an advantageous trade opportunity. They've set themselves up for that chance, but they still need the right deal to fall into their laps.

In the meantime, they'll hope Paul George can take a step toward addressing their star problem. The second-year pro won't be their best player this season, but he is an alluring prospect with his size and fluidity, and at 6-10, he combines with Danny Granger to give Indy the biggest wing combo in the league. In fact, long term, one suspects Granger will be traded for a guard to clear the decks for George at the 3.

Despite the absence of a star, Indy has built itself a nice, deep team that should be able to take advantage of tired opponents on the schedule. One gets the impression the Pacers aren't quite done in the backcourt -- the only real rotation-quality guards on the roster are Darren Collison and George Hill, and neither sees the floor well. A deft passer would be Indy's preference going forward, because its frontcourt can seriously fill it up. West, Granger, George, Tyler Hansbrough and Roy Hibbert all should average at or near a point every two minutes this season.

The good news is that getting good guards is generally easier than nabbing bigs; the more difficult problem has already been solved. The Pacers have a two-year window to convert some of that cap space into an A-lister before the kids start becoming restricted free agents and hammering away at their cap position, but they've put themselves in great shape. For now they're a merely interesting, one-and-done playoff team, but they're potentially much more.

5. Philadelphia 76ers (37-29)

The limited practice time before opening day is going to favor teams with continuity, and the Sixers have more of that than anybody. The likely nine-man playing rotation will be identical to last season's; the only major change is the mascot, which they've tentatively named "At Least It's Not A Hip-Hop Rabbit."

Philly also sports a fair number of young players who should play better this season, most notably point guard Jrue Holiday and wing Evan Turner. Putting the pieces together into coherent lineups gets a little tricky, however. Jodie Meeks is the only consistent long-range threat, inviting teams to pack the paint. Sixth man combo forward Thaddeus Young, while deadly effective in the right matchup, has to be spotted carefully; he can't guard big 4s and has struggled when asked to play the wing.

The Sixers proved shockingly good when they played small with Young at the 4 and Elton Brand at the 5 last season. They could go to that option more often this season, especially since small, young and fast is likely to be a winning strategy in this season's grind of a schedule. However, they built a top-heavy roster that's dangerously thin in the backcourt, and an injury to any of their guards would leave them in a precarious spot. Philly was very fortunate in that respect last season, gliding through 2010-11 virtually unscathed health-wise, but it can't count on similar fortune again.

Big picture, the immediate future is a bit brighter than the medium term, despite the club's youth. Philly might challenge for a top-four seed this season, depending on Dwight Howard's mood, but it's difficult to see how it will take the next step forward with this group. Coach Doug Collins' history is that he gets a big boost in Year 1, starts getting on everybody's nerves in Year 2 and completely self-combusts in Year 3, which presents a bad omen. A worse one is the Sixers' lack of stars and subpar cap situation. Unless Holiday becomes a big star -- possible, but not likely -- they'll be tugged back toward .500 by two giant anchor contracts (Brand and Andre Iguodala) that have left them with their hands tied financially.

4. Orlando Magic (40-26)

I know everyone is anxious to predict doom and gloom for the Magic, but let's keep in mind that before losing to Atlanta in the first round, they'd put together a very solid regular season. Orlando won 52 games in an accredited basketball conference and had the point differential of a 58-win team. The Magic ranked third in defensive efficiency thanks to the might of Dwight Howard, and they might be able to considerably improve the offense if sharpshooting forward Ryan Anderson gets more burn.

In fact, my initial projection for Orlando was even rosier. Despite all the overpaid averageness surrounding Howard, Orlando's ceiling remains very high because of Howard's dominance in the middle. If he plays all season in Orlando at last season's level, I could easily see this team pushing for a top-two seed in the East.

But there's the rub. Orlando's success depends on Howard being fully engaged and playing at an MVP level; if he's anything less than the second-best player in the league, the Magic's chances fall off a cliff. This, then, is a bit different from the celebrated 2007 example in which Kobe Bryant demanded a trade and then belatedly realized he had a really good team around him. In Orlando's case, Howard has a really good team almost entirely because of his own efforts. Anderson and Jameer Nelson are the only teammates who project to generate a player efficiency rating better than the league average.

So if Howard isn't 100 percent committed to the enterprise, the Magic's fortunes inevitably suffer. And right now, Vegas has "checked out" as a seven-point favorite over "dialed in." If Howard goes into Vince Carter-in-Toronto mode, the Magic will take a step backward.

While Howard talk will obliterate any other news trying to escape Orlando, three other players who bear watching are Anderson, Earl Clark and Daniel Orton. If Howard is going to experience a Kobe-esque revival of interest in staying, the development of those three youngsters would be the most likely cause. Anderson has definite breakout potential, but we aren't holding our breath on the other two.

Overall, this is a difficult projection -- we don't know how long Howard is staying or how motivated he'll be while he's here. I split the difference and projected the Magic with a full season of unmotivated Dwight. That's not unrealistic; in a vacuum, I'd say Orlando would be better off declining the current lame trade offers and crossing its fingers he'll re-sign. However, a lot of water can go under the bridge between now and the trade deadline.

3. Boston Celtics (43-23)

It's amusing that the same Celtics fans who wanted Jeff Green tarred and feathered last spring now think they're hosed because he's out for the season. It's a loss, but he's a backup small forward and they can do other things with their lineups to mostly cover his absence. As long as they can avoid playing Sasha Pavlovic in an actual game, they'll be fine.

The more worrying problem for Boston is the grueling nature of the schedule, which will be magnified for the Celtics because of their age and mediocre bench. The theft of Brandon Bass from Orlando should help, and I suspect they'll get a lot more from Jermaine O'Neal than they did last season. Still, this team tied for 17th in offensive efficiency in 2010-11 and should be mediocre again; Boston is counting on its defense being at or near the top of the league to keep it in contention.

Perhaps it will be, but the combination of age, schedule and coaching staff defections (Tom Thibodeau left two years ago and Lawrence Frank this past offseason) might cause some slippage. All of Boston's bench players are good defenders except offseason pickup Chris Wilcox, but the C's still will have great difficulty retaining their No. 2 ranking in defensive efficiency.

Here's one other bummer for Boston: There are no games before Christmas this year. Over the past four seasons, the Celtics were a ridiculous 94-14 (.870) before Santa's arrival and a much more pedestrian 140-80 (.636) afterward.

In the big picture, the Celtics shape up for this season as Mavericks East: They're a Tier B contender, but rather than ride their veterans slowly down the tubes, they've built around short-term contracts and given themselves an opportunity to completely reshape the roster after the season. Paul Pierce and Rajon Rondo are the only rotation players with contracts for next year, presuming Bass opts out, and Boston will have more than $20 million in cap space and two first-round picks next summer.

2. Chicago Bulls (48-18)

Provided they can keep up last season's intensity through a sausage-grinder of a schedule, the Bulls are very likely the second-best team in basketball. Chicago led the NBA in defensive efficiency last season, thanks in equal parts to Tom Thibodeau's help-heavy schemes and a long, athletic rotation that defended the rim with gusto.

While the Bulls won a league-best 62 games, they finished just 12th in offensive efficiency and were shut down by Miami in the playoffs. This explains their quest to add more scoring. Chicago waived Keith Bogans and signed Richard Hamilton to provide scoring help for Derrick Rose; I'd argue Hamilton can help the Bulls' anemic second unit even more, depending on how they spot his minutes. Unfortunately, he's also higher-maintenance than Bogans, so the Bulls will need to manage that carefully to maintain the esprit de corps that fueled them through last season.

Aside from Rip, the big item in the Bulls' favor is continuity -- Chicago has the most intact roster this side of Philly, with Hamilton the only change. Several young players likely will improve, including Joakim Noah and reserve bigs Omer Asik and Taj Gibson. The latter combo presents an awesome defensive frontcourt with the second unit, but each is raw offensively. Rose comes off an MVP season, but the exciting part is that he's still getting better -- his free throw rate steadily escalated during 2010-11, while his long-range shooting and court vision are the next items on the list.

While continuity favors the Bulls, the schedule presents some challenges. Chicago is generally a deep team, but Thibodeau's instincts last season were to ride Rose and Luol Deng as long as humanly possible; do that with this season's schedule, and he'll break them. If he treads more carefully, the Bulls are heavy favorites to get back to the conference finals.

1. Miami Heat (52-14)

We don't know yet what LeBron James will do if he gets back to the Finals this season, and there is little he can do to mollify his critics between now and then.

Here's what we do know: James has a better chance of playing in June than any other player in the league. We already know Boston and Chicago had no answer for the Heat's stars last season, and it remains to be seen what the Western Conference could throw at him in a potential Finals matchup -- especially now that Dallas has reshaped its roster.

Thus, while I would take "the field" over the Heat to win the NBA title this season, I would take the Heat over any other single team. There simply is too much talent not to put them above the rest, especially since they're likely to have more help than last season.

The scary thing about last season's Heat was how heavily they had to rely on awful players. Between Mike Miller, Joel Anthony, Mike Bibby, Erick Dampier, Juwan Howard, Carlos Arroyo, Jerry Stackhouse and Dexter Pittman, Miami allocated 5,346 minutes to players who produced a PER less than 10 ... nearly matching the combined playing time for Wade and James.

That 5,346 figure should diminish considerably this season. Shane Battier's arrival and Miller's having operable thumbs should allow Miami's wing rotation to be far stronger, permitting more lineups in which James is playing either power forward or, in a frightening matchup situation, point guard.

In the backcourt, rookie Norris Cole should soak up the minutes taken by the Arroyos, Bibbys and Eddie Houses of last season, along with holdover Mario Chalmers. Unfortunately, Miami still lacks a point guard who can push the tempo and get James and Wade out in transition; the Heat had disappointingly few run-outs last season and ranked just 21st in pace factor.

And up front, Udonis Haslem returns after missing nearly all of last season. He'll often be playing as an undersized 5 next to Bosh or even James; while this isn't ideal, it's a big improvement on what they had a year ago.

Despite those upgrades, weaknesses remain. The Heat have only three players who project to have a PER better than the league average -- I'll let you guess which three. Their starting center, Anthony, was statistically one of the league's least effective players last season. Yes, he provides defense, but no player in basketball is more blatantly disregarded by opposing offenses.

And despite the bench upgrades, the depth situation remains fraught. For instance, Juwan Howard is the second big off the bench; I'm pretty sure he played with Bob Cousy. As a result, any injuries to one of the Big Three will quickly make this team very beatable. Plus, the grueling schedule puts teams with weaker benches at a disadvantage.

With all those caveats, Miami will be extremely difficult to beat in the playoffs, because there's more rest and the Superfriends can each play 40 minutes a game. With the drama quotient dramatically reduced this time around, I expect a more relaxed and comfortable Heat team than the one that pressed through early-season games a year ago. That team was already a heavy favorite, and with a better bench and unmatchable star power, this is again the team to beat. Whether James can deliver on that promise will have to wait until June.

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Top-10 draft pick scenarios

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:22 GMT le 25 décembre 2011

Hold on now. Don't put it down just yet that Indianapolis will win its way out of the No. 1 pick in the 2012 NFL draft. If the Colts lose their next game, they'll still be in line for the No. 1 pick and will begin what should be a very interesting offseason as it pertains to the quarterback position. But what if they do manage to win their way down the draft board?

For starters, it'll certainly shake things up in the top 10. But let's start now with an already shaken top 10 -- literally, the 10 teams that would draft first if the season ended today based on the standings -- and start looking at the needs and scenarios. Just remember a couple of things:

• The value argument: Although many believe that teams drafting high are more married to drafting on need -- after all, they are apt to get the pick of the litter at each position group -- the opposite can be true, and you'll see it when I discuss Indy. When you're drafting high, you can't be married to need alone, because even with the lower cost tacked to these picks with the new collective bargaining agreement, you can't miss.
• The need argument: I am using a preliminary list of needs. Remember, free agency is back in play this year, so many of these roster holes can be targeted before April's draft.

With that, let's speculate on some early scenarios.

Indianapolis Colts

Top needs DT, OL, WR, QB

Scenarios: The funny thing about Indy is that while people sit here and debate whether it should trade the No. 1 pick, from where I sit, if it did manage to play its way out of the No. 1 pick, it would be the team that absolutely should trade down. Why? Well, the Colts desperately need something closer to an elite defensive tackle, and I just don't see one who can be of enough value to take so high. Currently, the highest defensive tackle on my Big Board is down at No. 14. That's just too much of a reach. After that, the Colts really could use a dominant interior offensive lineman, but we know you don't chase those guys this high. I'd also really like to see them look for a wideout because of Reggie Wayne's future uncertain, but they couldn't spend a high draft pick on one given the other needs, so even Justin Blackmon wouldn't make much sense so high.

What would make sense would be taking Andrew Luck with the No. 1 pick and dealing with whatever fallout may come, because you make the move that's in the best interest of the franchise, period. No organization better understands the value of consistently elite quarterback play, and Peyton Manning's assumed health can't be taken for granted. He's a brilliant quarterback when healthy, but he's 36, and the "one hit away" cliché has rarely felt more real.

Minnesota Vikings

Top needs LT, CB/S, WR

Scenarios: If Minnesota bats second, I think it'll be happy with Matt Kalil. The Vikings need to upgrade at the left tackle position over Charlie Johnson, and the left tackle from USC is pretty close to can't-miss. There's also the possibility that the Vikings could go for a corner, in which case Morris Claiborne of LSU comes into play. Claiborne might be a slight reach at No. 2, so I'd go for the better player at the bigger need, but if they fall down the board, cornerback can come into the picture. The Vikings also could really use a top wide receiver, and if Blackmon runs an incredible 40-yard-dash time, I could see a team at least tempted as high as No. 2, although I agree with my colleague Todd McShay that it always feels like a stretch to draft a wideout that high unless he's a guy you believe could be the best at his position -- not just on your team, but in the league. The Vikes also need help at safety, but there's not enough value to be found; I don't even have a safety among the current top 25 players, so that's not something you do early unless you've traded way down.

Overall, the Vikings are another team I can see trading down. Does the newfound QB scarcity have them taking calls at No. 2, 3 or 4 for a team to get into position to draft Robert Griffin III? Why not?

St. Louis Rams

Top needs LT, WR, CB

Scenarios: Rodger Saffold took a step back this year, and the Rams have had all kinds of protection problems. If they get an elite left tackle, the Rams could move Saffold to the right side and get better in two spots. (This is why even when there's an adequate left tackle in place, I'll usually refer to left tackle as a need. You don't want "adequate" at that position if you think you can draft a great one and fix two positions with one pick.) We know the Rams desperately need a wideout who can help out in the passing game. I think if the Rams are at No. 3 or 4, it'd be a pretty logical place for Blackmon to come off the board. Similar to the Vikings, the Rams could use a corner in that secondary, which has been decimated by injuries.

Jacksonville Jaguars

Top needs WR, DE, CB

Scenarios: The Jaguars are terrible at wide receiver, which makes it hard to even evaluate Blaine Gabbert. I know Gabbert hasn't been very good, but can you imagine the difference in the career starts of Gabbert and Andy Dalton right now if you took A.J. Green off the Bengals and made him a Jag? Face it: It matters to have serious talent. So you could absolutely see the Jags eyeing Blackmon with a pick in the middle of the top 10. (Starting to see how nice it could be for Blackmon, huh?) The Jags also need a corner, although that position might not look as bad depending on how they evaluate their roster when fully healthy. But like St. Louis, they've been decimated in the secondary. The Jags also really need a defensive end, and this is where you could see North Carolina's Quinton Coples coming into the picture. He's currently the top 4-3 defensive end on the board.

Cleveland Browns

Top needs WR, DE, RB, QB

Scenarios: Greg Little has shown flashes, but the Browns could use another threat in the passing game. Jabaal Sheard has been as good as I hoped he'd be when I talked up that pick back in April, but they could really use someone on the other side of the formation to balance the pass rush. Then it gets really interesting.

I agree with Todd McShay that the Browns could be the rare team that is willing to pick a running back high in the draft, with Alabama's Trent Richardson the obvious name. Peyton Hillis is likely to play somewhere else in 2012, and Richardson fills that hole. But besides that, there's a real question regarding Colt McCoy and how committed to him the Browns are. Although I wouldn't predict it now, the Browns could be in the picture for Griffin.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Top needs CB, OLB, OL, RB

Scenarios: If the draft were held today, and the teams ahead of Buccaneers were maximizing need and value, the Bucs would be in a good spot to trade down. I'd like to see them get a corner, a guy like Alfonzo Dennard of Nebraska or Janoris Jenkins of North Alabama, or even Dre Kirkpatrick of Alabama probably could be had a little later. I know McShay has Kirkpatrick to the Bucs in his first mock, but I need to see a little more for him to get this high. They won't find the outside linebacker fit for their scheme as a good value this high, and I think the type of running back they need is more in the mold of LaMichael James. Tampa needs a speed threat to balance LaGarrette Blount.

The Bucs would love it if Claiborne were available, but if he's not, I feel like Tampa could move off a high pick.

Washington Redskins

Top needs QB, OL, CB, WR

Scenarios: No team should have been more disappointed by Matt Barkley's decision to return to USC than the Redskins. Not because they should have been targeting Barkley specifically, but because they could be forced to trade up if they want to make sure they can get the second-best guy on the board in RGIII. Are they willing to move more picks, a blight in recent years, to get the quarterback? Or do they hope he falls to them at somewhere between the No. 6 and 10 picks? The other option is to take a hard look at Landry Jones, but I'm really not sure Jones is a top-10 pick right now, and he could choose to stay to Oklahoma.

If the Redskins don't go with a quarterback and address that position in free agency (Matt Flynn, Brian Hoyer?) or trades (do they call Indy?) the Skins could certainly use a guy like Iowa's Riley Reiff to solidify an offensive line that isn't good beyond Trent Williams. If Blackmon is still around, he could be considered as well. There's probably not a more interesting team in the draft in terms of positioning than the Skins.

Carolina Panthers

Top needs DT, CB, WR

Scenarios: They got some good play from young defensive tackles this year, but this team needs to be better up front to stop the run consistently. It might be a little early to pick a guy like Devon Still of Penn State, Brandon Thompson of Clemson or Jerel Worthy of Michigan State, but the Panthers could look at each. They also really could use a cornerback across from Chris Gamble and another wide receiver to complement the still very good Steve Smith. Would Alshon Jeffery of South Carolina make sense? Jeffery will need to show some wheels if he comes out of school, but Carolina might be an ideal destination for the massive, 6-foot-5, 230-plus pound wide receiver.

Miami Dolphins

Top needs RT, QB, OLB, WR

Scenarios: Did I say the Redskins were the team most hurt by Barkley's decision? Well, the Dolphins certainly could fall in that camp, even with the flashes they've seen from Matt Moore this year. Moore is signed through 2012, and there's a chance the new coach will stick with him, but obviously the franchise needs to think about that position. Elsewhere, the team could really use a right tackle, and Reiff or even Stanford's Jonathan Martin could come into the picture. Both could eventually land on the left side, but that's what you want in a young right tackle. I also think the Dolphins will want to think about another pass-rushing outside linebacker across from Cameron Wake. Koa Misi's play hasn't been what I thought it would be by this point. They could also use a wideout across the formation from Brandon Marshall.

Buffalo Bills

Top needs OT, DE/OLB, WR

Scenarios: Their needs obviously shift some if Stevie Johnson isn't back in 2012, but I think the Bills should look up front and do as much as they can to protect Ryan Fitzpatrick to make sure they get as much return on that investment as they can. Reiff or Martin both make sense. One intriguing scenario is if Richardson is still on the board when the Bills pick. Do they go with the dynamic runner out of Alabama as the counter to C.J. Spiller and pass on keeping Fred Jackson around? It's not out of the realm of possibility.

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Villas-Boas on hot seat after Chelsea’s clumsy tie

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:50 GMT le 24 décembre 2011

Andre Villas-Boas’ increasingly bizarre coaching methods may have finally reached a tipping point after Chelsea’s mini-revival was stopped in its tracks with a 1-1 draw against Wigan on Saturday.

Villas-Boas’ approach has come under scrutiny and sparked amusement in soccer circles. He insists that his players come over to the sidelines to celebrate with him and his assistants after a goal is scored. He also sequestered his first-choice squad during training, keeping them away from the back-up members.

Such behavior was widely reported in the British press as being a sign that the Portuguese boss was feeling the pressure, but Chelsea responded with a Champions League victory over Valencia that may have saved his job, then a superb performance in which Chelsea handed Manchester City its first English Premier League defeat of the season.

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Villas-Boas' team was coming off a win against Manchester City.
(Ian Kington/AFP/Getty Images)
Those results led to a new sense of optimism, but Saturday’s setback against a Wigan side that is one of the weakest in the EPL was a painful blow.

Villas-Boas thought he was set for another win when youngster Daniel Sturridge scored his eighth goal of the season after 59 minutes, but Wigan bounced back and equalized late when Jordi Gomez capitalized on a mistake by goalkeeper Petr Cech.

“We couldn’t hold on,” Villas-Boas said. “Maybe we should have tried to go for a second goal, but because of the momentum Wigan had, as soon as we scored the goal we tried to hold on to what we had. This is a different Wigan team now, I think. They have picked up confidence and momentum from recent results and they made it very difficult for us.

“I don’t know if Petr Cech was unsighted but I don’t want to blame individuals. It was a collective mistake, a joint lack of concentration, but our confidence is not affected. It is a pity to fall back in the league a little bit, but it was a tough game and a fair result.”

Villas-Boas was on the verge of getting fired less than two weeks ago with Chelsea in danger of being eliminated from the Champions League before responding with a resounding victory in its final group stage game.

With qualification for the knockout stage ensured, AVB’s job should now be safe, at least until Champions League hostilities recommence in two months. However, the round of 16 draw was not kind, pitting Chelsea against Napoli, one of the toughest match-ups possible.

Villas-Boas’ comments this weekend were far more restrained than his recent habit of taking a scattergun approach in apportioning blame in different directions. Recent targets have included his own players, referees, and even former Manchester United defender Gary Neville, now working as a television pundit.

With Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal and Tottenham all playing Sunday, Chelsea would see this as an opportunity missed, against an opponent that was expected to cause little trouble.

Given the odd tactics Villas-Boas has employed so far, it will be intriguing to see what he comes up with next. But the sense is growing that no amount of tricks can turn around a generally dispiriting season in West London.

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A breakdown of Liverpool’s statement on Luis Suarez’s ban

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:48 GMT le 24 décembre 2011

Liverpool striker Luis Suarez has been banned for eight matches (one match longer than his ban for biting PSV's Otman Bakkal last year) and fined £40,000 for using racial insults against Manchester United's Patrice Evra. In response, Liverpool's official website published a lengthy defense of Suarez/attack on Evra that went beyond your usual club support for a punished player.
Here it is, in full:
Liverpool Football Club is very surprised and disappointed with the decision of the Football Association Commission to find Luis Suarez guilty of the charges against him.
We look forward to the publication of the Commission's Judgment. We will study the detailed reasons of the Commission once they become available, but reserve our right to appeal or take any other course of action we feel appropriate with regards to this situation.
That's certainly fair enough. I like to think Liverpool's actual press officer wrote this and intended it to be the club's full statement on the matter, but just before he could hit "publish," an escaped lunatic crashed through his office window, bludgeoned him with a rock and wrote what follows.
We find it extraordinary that Luis can be found guilty on the word of Patrice Evra alone when no-one else on the field of play - including Evra's own Manchester United teammates and all the match officials - heard the alleged conversation between the two players in a crowded Kop goalmouth while a corner kick was about to be taken.
How is Liverpool so sure that the committee doesn't have reason to believe otherwise when it hasn't studied "the detailed reasons of the commission" yet?
The Club takes extremely seriously the fight against all forms of discrimination and has a long and successful track record in work relating to anti-racist activity and social inclusion. We remain committed to this ideal and equality for all, irrespective of a person's background.
Unless, as you will soon find out, that background is Patrice Evra's.
LFC considers racism in any form to be unacceptable - without compromise. It is our strong held belief, having gone over the facts of the case, that Luis Suarez did not commit any racist act. It is also our opinion that the accusation by this particular player was not credible - certainly no more credible than his prior unfounded accusations.
So, Liverpool FC thinks the Liverpool player is innocent and the Manchester United player is a liar. Who needs independent commissions?
It is key to note that Patrice Evra himself in his written statement in this case said 'I don't think that Luis Suarez is racist'. The FA in their opening remarks accepted that Luis Suarez was not racist.
You don't have to be a member of the KKK to say something racist. Even smart people say stupid things sometimes.
Luis himself is of a mixed race family background as his grandfather was black.
Irrelevant. A homosexual person can have a relative that is homophobic or uses homosexual slurs.
He has been personally involved since the 2010 World Cup in a charitable project which uses sport to encourage solidarity amongst people of different backgrounds with the central theme that the colour of a person's skin does not matter; they can all play together as a team.
He has played with black players and mixed with their families whilst with the Uruguay national side and was Captain at Ajax Amsterdam of a team with a proud multi-cultural profile, many of whom became good friends.
See picture of Luis hugging Tokyo Sexwale above.
It seems incredible to us that a player of mixed heritage should be accused and found guilty in the way he has based on the evidence presented. We do not recognise the way in which Luis Suarez has been characterised.
It appears to us that the FA were determined to bring charges against Luis Suarez, even before interviewing him at the beginning of November.
When did Alex Ferguson start writing statements for Liverpool? That's an impressively paranoid accusation for an official club website.
Nothing we have heard in the course of the hearing has changed our view that Luis Suarez is innocent of the charges brought against him and we will provide Luis with whatever support he now needs to clear his name.
We would also like to know when the FA intend to charge Patrice Evra with making abusive remarks to an opponent after he admitted himself in his evidence to insulting Luis Suarez in Spanish in the most objectionable of terms. Luis, to his credit, actually told the FA he had not heard the insult.
Well, then maybe that's why they're not charging him? Someone really should tell Liverpool that while Suarez can't play a few football matches, John Terry is being investigated by the police for allegedly using a racial slur during a match (no one made a report to the FA on that matter, which is why they aren't investigating it).
The bottom line is that Liverpool is obviously welcome to appeal and defend its player, but maybe it should've counted to 10 before publishing this.

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The Chaos of Shoving an 82-Game Schedule Into a 66-Game Bag

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:31 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

The lockout recently ended, and NBA officials worked tirelessly to complete a three-for-one deal that would create ripple effects for the league's 30 teams. When it went through, they rejoiced and felt they were better off with the additions.

No, this has nothing to do with Chris Paul. Instead, Matt Winick completed the trade with Staples Center and exchanged three extra days by giving back one that the arena requested. He is the NBA's senior vice president of scheduling and game operations, a title that makes him the schedule's master architect. He has been tasked with the job for about 25 years, a position that inherently opens him to complaints. This year's schedule, because of the lockout, is quirkier than ever — in some ways more than the truncated 50-game season of 1999. Try Staples Center for example: The arena had yet to come to fruition in the last lockout. The Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena housed the Clippers. The Lakers and Los Angeles Kings shared the Great Western Forum. Shrine Auditorium hosted the Grammys.

Now, they are all housed under one big sharing facility that is the busiest in the country. That is why two extra days can be split many ways and is reason to rejoice. "If you can make a three-for-one-trade anywhere, it's great," says Winick, who worked with the Mets before joining the NBA in 1976 as the director of media information. "There, it's exponential. The Staples Center is a unique matchup every year. You have two basketball teams, an NHL team, and then they have big events that take up a lot of days. When they have the Grammys, it's a one night event on television. They need 10 days in the building to accommodate that one night. Those are some of the problems you face in doing the schedule."

The regular-season schedule that will begin on Christmas took some bargaining, bartering, and begging to get out in a timely fashion. It also took the veteran presence of Winick, Thomas Carelli, the league's senior vice president of broadcasting, and Danny Meiseles, who works in production, programming, and broadcasting for NBA Entertainment. The league and union reached a tentative deal on November 26, and each side ratified a 66-game season. The trio stationed themselves in a room shortly thereafter to carve out the schedule. They sent a preliminary schedule to teams the Friday before it was released. They gathered feedback and change about 10 percent of it over the next four days.

"I've never taken as many 6:13 a.m. trains from Long Island to the office," Winick says, adding: "We announced the schedule on Tuesday at 7 at night. Monday night, we were still making changes."

Winick requests availability from arenas each year at around the All-Star break. This is the toughest part because each arena is also looking to maximize its dates and profits. Arenas are required to hold a certain amount of dates and each team can request a couple of dates when they are assured of receiving home games, Winick takes over from there and inserts the schedule into a computer program. "It plugs in the dates," Winick says. "It plugs in the matchups. It prevents you from doing things you can't do, really. In other words, we couldn't schedule the Knicks and the Lakers three times."

"You think of it as a puzzle, and if all the pieces don't fit, it doesn't work. Every piece has to fit and a lot of times, in the regular-season schedule, we'll get to the last five games and the schedule might take two hours a game to fit it in. Sometimes, you solve one problem and cause a different problem. After working on it for a while, the only way you can solve a problem is by causing a different problem. And then maybe the second problem you cause is easier to fix than the first problem."

The NHL alleviated some of the pressure for this schedule by giving up dates it had marked for possible playoff games in arenas the leagues share. Other guidelines fell into place because of time and travel constraints. Each team would play 18 out-of-conference games, which reduced travel and meant that Portland wouldn't have to make that one-game trip to Miami out of necessity. Every team also skips six cities (in a normal 82-game season, each team visits and hosts an out-of-conference opponent once).

"If the Lakers are going to go to Dallas and San Antonio, you try and maximize those games for fans so that you can utilize them on your network partners," Carelli says. "Some of them are harder than others. Some of them have to be dictated by arena availability. In other words, you can't have a game in San Antonio pretty much in all of February, because you know they are going to be on the road because of the rodeo. So you have to figure out where you are going to send them, from a basketball standpoint first, that's going to be fair for them. Then, they would be a team that you would want to put on television. It's where would you have them that can do all those things."

So yes, there is a reason why the Lakers will play home-and-home sets against Boston, New York, and Miami, and hop over cities like Cleveland, Charlotte, and Indiana. Winick says that he has no influence on competitive balance, especially since the schedule is figured out before free agency.

"Without knowing where the free agents are, you really don't know what's going to happen competitively," he says. "The last time in the lockout schedule, the Knicks finished eighth and were in the NBA Finals. There's a lot more uncertainty with team rosters in making this schedule than there was in a normal situation. And we have an obligation to our fans to give them the best possible attractions on television, and that's part of the process as well."

There is give and take with everything. Consider: The Lakers do not travel to Chicago, where the Bulls finished with the league's best record last season.

The league also had to navigate the tricky waters of back-to-back-to-backs. Winick originally thought that each team would be forced to play as many as three, given the compressed time frame.

"We started out with three," Winick says. "As we went further into the process, we saw we could get by with two. Then we said we're not going to have two teams with three. We're going to do whatever we can do to get it to two. You look for other spots to move one of those games. Maybe, instead of Milwaukee going to Indiana that day, Detroit goes into Indiana and that frees Milwaukee from three in a row and it doesn't cost Detroit a three in a row."

Teams will play at least one set of three games in three nights this season. More than a third of the league will play two triple sets. There will be 42 sets of back-to-back-to-backs in all, a reduction from the 66 needed in 1999. Teams will average about two extra games a month this season compared with an 82-game one. It's not bad, all in all. If your team has a brutal stretch, possibly two or three, it evens out because every team does.

Stu Jackson, the league's executive vice president of basketball operations, oversees the operation. "I just stayed out of their way and allowed them to do what it is they do," Jackson says. "During this whole process, there are certain issues that came up, whether it be from a competitive nature on the floor, or if there were aberrations in the schedule that Matt or Tom identified as areas of concerns that we needed to make a decision to either go ahead with it or not. By way of example, if a team has a single game trip out and back across a couple time zones, that's usually not something you would do in a regular-season schedule, but if it helps facilitate this schedule and saves us from making 10 other moves by removing that game, well that becomes a decision point that you have to make."

It is normally a thankless job for all involved by default. There are 30 teams ready to complain about schedule quirks in a normal year. This season, of course, is different. "A couple teams actually thanked me," Winick says. "I think they thanked me because they had a schedule and a season. I'm not sure if they liked the schedule, but they were just happy that they had one."

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Rankonia: The Triangle Power Rankings 12/23

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:29 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

1. Lob City, Concept
The video posted above, which shows Blake Griffin coining the phrase "Lob City," is hilarious. The only thing more hilarious is Grantland director of business stuff David Cho's attempt to explain "Lob City" in a single 63-word sentence: "This is most definitely a thing, and when you check Twitter late at night on the East Coast, you're going to see it and be like, 'Wait, what is Lob City again?,' and we are here to remind you that it is the name coined by Blake Griffin when he anticipates the joining of Chris Paul to the non-Lakers L.A. franchise." Wow.

2. Chris Paul, Lob City Clippers
From Chitown-native-turned-Los Angeles transplant Robert Mays, who has apparently disregarded Derrick Rose's entire existence: "I have no idea how, but through some strange happenings, I managed to completely forget that he is Chris Freaking Paul. It took about a quarter of one preseason game for me to be convinced that he's going to be the MVP of the league."

3. Derrick Rose and His Moms
Super-sassy Amos Barshad nominates the urban fairy tale that is Derrick Rose for "getting, like, $100 million and saying, 'I think I can finally say this now. Mom, we finally made it.'" (cue Jeffersons theme song).

4. Neymar, Santos
From Brian Phillips, on 19-year-old soccer phenom Neymar: "His team got eviscerated by Barcelona in the Club World Cup final, his only real scoring opportunity was stopped by Victor Valdes, he did nothing to validate the "better than Messi" hype being flung around by Pele … and yet he is somehow 20,000 times more famous than he was two weeks ago. That is hashtag-grade #winning."

5. The Davidson Men's Basketball Team
The Encyclopedia Brown of Canadian Superstar Discovery, Michael Weinreb, found something on the Internet that he'd like to share with you: "Davidson! No Steph Curry, but a 23-year-old Canadian exacts revenge on his behalf."

6. Ben Roethlisberger, Pittsburgh Steelers
Ben Roethlisberger is an inquisitive man. Luckily for him, the loser of our "Who has to follow James Harrison on Twitter" contest, Triangle co-editor Sarah Larimer, is there to provide Big Ben with the answers he desires:

QUESTION: "Where's James Harrison when you need him?"
ANSWER: On Twitter, of course.

7. Katie Baker, Grantland Staff Writer
For directing us to the "2012 Inside Lacrosse All-Team Powered By Flow Society," and no other reason.

8. The HBO Real Sports End of the Year Round Table: Bryant Gumbel, Armen Keteyian, Mary Carillo, Frank Deford, Andrea Kremer, Bernard Goldberg, and Jon Frankel
There is a weird, disconnected beauty in watching and listening to these professional journalists talk about sports the way a university board of trustees discusses campus alcohol policy. Pretentious, informative, and highly unentertaining, I respect all of you for sticking to your guns and refusing to lure me in with accessibility. Can't wait for 2012.

9. Aaron Rodgers, Green Bay Packers
Potty-mouth Shane Ryan, on that quarterback who is 0-1 in his last one games: "More than 1.5 million Americans voted for him to make the Pro Bowl, tops among NFL players. And this is for a dude who, in all likelihood, will not be able to play in the Pro Bowl due to more important obligations. A.k.a the mothaf***in' Super Bowl. That's popularity. Also, he's about to erase Brett Favre from the collective Green Bay memory by winning a second title. After this, the only fans in Wisconsin still wearing the Favre-4 jerseys will be dudes who ride snowmobiles to work. Which, to be fair, is a healthy number, but the point is this: Rodgers is the people's champ, the thinking man's hero, and the One True Idol of Midwest America. This holiday season, he inspires me to Lambeau Leap into the arms of my unsuspecting, terrified family."

10. Kenny Williams, Chicago White Sox GM
In an attempt to get on Longreads (respect), Jonah Keri wrote an essay on Chicago White Sox GM Kenny Williams:

"Ever since Moneyball, we've fallen all over ourselves to praise baseball front offices for their genius, with a focus on general managers. The Red Sox and Theo Epstein had a book written about them. I played kissy-face with Andrew Friedman and the Rays. We even got a Moneyball backlash book about the Braves.

"Kenny Williams is more interesting than any of these guys.

"When this offseason started, the White Sox were widely rumored to be shopping a bunch of young veterans, including starting pitchers John Danks and Gavin Floyd, and slugging outfielder Carlos Quentin. With the Tigers looking strong and Mark Buehrle on his way out of town, it made perfect sense. When Williams went a step further and traded closer Sergio Santos — locked up dirt-cheap for six years — for a minor leaguer, it seemed this winter would be even more purge-y than feared.

"Nope. When Williams couldn't find the real deal for Danks, he changed course, signing the lefty to a five-year, $65 million contract. This is the same GM who traded for Jake Peavy when he was injured, who took on Alex Rios' multiyear contract when the Jays dumped him for nothing, and made multiple other moves that no one saw coming.

"Some of these moves have blown up in Chicago's face. Peavy's a one-man disabled list, Rios looks terrible, and the Santos deal is a head-scratcher. But the cool thing about Williams is you can't begin to slap a label on him. He isn't Moneyball, he's not the great defender of Scout's Honor, he's not new-school or old-school or Wall Street or Jump Street. He just looks at what's out there, and dives right in. Even if it means blowing up what he had planned 10 minutes ago. Dude's more flexible than the Romanian gymnastics team."

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Handicapping the 2011 NFL MVP Race, 2.0

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:26 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

When we last looked at the MVP race around Halloween, it didn't appear to be much of a race. Aaron Rodgers and a bunch of guys fighting for second place. We noted at the time that the guy who was our pick to occupy second place, Drew Brees, was on a record-breaking pace that he was unlikely to sustain.

Well, oops. Since then, Brees has basically maintained and even slightly improved upon that seemingly unsustainable level of play. He was completing 71.0 percent of his passes, averaging 8.3 yards per attempt, and was projected to throw 41 touchdowns against 18 interceptions. Now, with just two games to go, he's completed 71.6 percent of his passes, is averaging 8.2 yards per attempt, and is on pace to throw 42 touchdowns against just 13 picks. With Rodgers' grip on first place slipping after the Packers lost to the Chiefs last Sunday, is Brees really now a viable MVP candidate?

Now, let's be clear: This debate would not be happening if the Packers had beaten the Chiefs. As great as Brees has been this season, the elite starting quarterback on an undefeated football team is going to win the Most Valuable Player award virtually every time. The move to bring Brees (and to a lesser extent, Tom Brady) back into the MVP discussion after a team's first loss in Week 15 reeked to us of recency bias; that is to say, focusing on the events that are fresh in the voters' or viewers' minds without considering other meaningful data. Green Bay's loss to Kansas City was an upset in a game the Packers should have won, but you would be hard-pressed to say that it was more embarrassing than New Orleans' losses to the Buccaneers in Week 6 or the Rams in Week 8. If Rodgers' loss to the Chiefs had come then and Brees had gone down in ignominy against the Rams this past Sunday, it would have been seen as the final straw that knocked Brees out of the MVP discussion and pushed the award toward Rodgers. Instead, because of the timing of the wins and upset losses, the opposite happened.

That led us to a question worth asking about the broader idea of what wins MVPs: Is that recency bias institutional? Do MVP voters really value production and winning (Brees' Saints are on a six-game winning streak) during the second half more than the overall package? And if so, should that lead us to the conclusion that either Brees or Brady is about to usurp Rodgers and win the MVP?

To figure that out, we took the yardage, touchdowns, and wins accrued by each of the 18 quarterbacks and seven running backs who have won a share of the MVP voting since 19881 and split out their production by quarters and halves of a season. If there was a recency bias in effect among voters, the players who won the MVP would produce more of their overall total output in the final half or even quarter of a season.2

If a recency bias does exist, it doesn't show up in the numbers. The 25 MVP winners since 1988 accrued 51.7 percent of their yards as a passer, running back, or receiver and 51.9 percent of their touchdowns during their teams' first eight games of the year. The average player accrues about 50.2 percent of his yards during the first half, so our MVP winners are actually going even beyond that. In addition, their respective teams' records are about the same in each half, as they win an average of 6.3 of their first eight games and 6.5 of their final eight. The sample is too small for us to rule out the idea that the recency bias with MVP voters does or doesn't exist, but there's no evidence of it existing in the sample we've got. This isn't a regularly occurring problem.

OK, so perhaps there actually is more to Brees being in the discussion than that the Packers loss. We're going to leave Brady out of this conversation because he's having a worse season than the one he had a year ago, and it's extremely hard to vote for a guy as MVP in back-to-back seasons when he's declined during the second year and isn't clearly the top guy after the decline. Let's go with Rodgers vs. Brees, mano a mano, and pick a winner.

Based on the raw statistics, Brees has the edge on Rodgers. He's on pace to break his own record for completion percentage while coming close to Dan Marino's record for passing yards in one season. Here are their numbers through the first 14 games:

RODGERS VS. BREES
Player Cmp% Yds TD INT
Brees 71.5% 4,780 37 11
Rodgers 68.1% 4,360 40 6
So Brees' advantages in completion percentages and yards per game make up for his higher interception rate. Right? Well, no. The numbers above fail to tell the whole story, because they fail to properly account for two things that dramatically affect the statistics of individual players: pace and usage.

In their first 14 games, the Saints have had 154 offensive possessions.3 Green Bay, meanwhile, has had only 145 offensive possessions. Only Pittsburgh (144) has had fewer opportunities to move the ball. The biggest reason why that's occurred, of course, is that Green Bay's defense has forced the fewest punts of any team in the league while inheriting, on average, the third-best starting field position in football. If you get the ball against the Packers and you don't turn it over, you're going to hold on to it for a long time.

As a result of those nine extra possessions and the nature of how the two teams play, Brees has thrown 110 more passes than Rodgers has this year, which is 23 percent of Rodgers' total attempts. That can be spun as a positive (Brees has played at a similar level to Rodgers over an additional 23 percent of plays) or a negative (Rodgers has nearly matched Brees' totals in what amounts to a quarter of a season less than what Brees has done). What we're more interested in, though, is evening the playing field. The average NFL offense has had 160 possessions to work with this season. What if Brees and Rodgers had each gone onto the field for 160 drives? What would their numbers project to then?

RODGERS & BREES ON THE LEVEL
Player Cmp Att Cmp% Yds Y/Att TD INT
Brees 433 606 71.5% 4,966 8.2 38 11
Rodgers 355 522 68.1% 4,811 9.2 44 7
Brees will still have thrown more passes and completed them more frequently, but Rodgers makes up most of the difference in yards, since he's averaging a full yard more per attempt than Brees is. If his team played at this pace, Rodgers would be in line to match Tom Brady's record with 50 passing touchdowns in one season. Rodgers has been slightly more efficient, but Brees has been slightly more productive.

Rodgers can make up the raw yardage difference by virtue of his extra impact as a runner. Without adjusting for the extra possessions, Rodgers has run for 251 yards on 44 carries this year, scoring three times. He's averaging just less than 5.8 yards a pop. Brees has a respectable 76 yards on 14 carries, but having scored just once, he's had much less of an impact as a scrambling quarterback than Rodgers has. On the other hand, Rodgers has fumbled four times this season, and Brees has put the ball on the ground only once (with that "fumble" being the ridiculous premature snap to him in Week 15). So that makes up most of the turnover difference between the two.

Here's how close their offensive production is: The Packers have scored 480 points to the Saints' 457, but the Green Bay defense and special teams have produced 42 points on return plays, while the Saints defense and special teams have mustered only 18. Take those points out of the equation and their offenses are within one point of one another through 14 games. That's freakish. Because of the possession difference, the Packers have produced more points per drive, but the Saints have picked up the ball with an average of 71.8 yards to go for a touchdown, while the Packers have needed only an even 70 yards, on average, to go for their score. That's the difference between fifth (Packers) and 15th (Saints) in average starting field position. That 1.8 yards per drive might not sound like a lot, but over the course of 160 drives, that's 288 yards.

Strength of schedule is often a last resort for separating players who are so close, but both Brees and Rodgers have had friendly schedules. Using the DVOA statistic as our barometer of quality, the average pass defense facing Brees has ranked 18th in the NFL, while the average pass defense facing Rodgers has been 20th. Brees has played four games against top-seven competition (Detroit, Houston, Jacksonville, and Chicago), while Rodgers has just two such games (Detroit and Chicago, although he has to play each again over the final two contests of the year). They have each played four games against the four worst pass defenses in the league. Brees has suited up twice against 29th-ranked Tampa Bay, as well as Indianapolis and the bottom-ranked Minnesota Vikings, while Rodgers has two games to go against those Vikings, as well as matchups against the Buccaneers and Saints, who are currently 30th.

If late-game heroics are your thing, each player has a case. Rodgers suffers from being in too many blowouts, but his 68-yards-in-58-seconds sprint to set up a game-winning field goal at the end of the Week 13 game against the Giants qualifies as sheer dominance, especially in a situation where the vaunted momentum was entirely on the New York side of the coin. Meanwhile, Brees has two slower drives that stand out from earlier in the year. In Week 3 against the Texans, he took the Saints 93 yards in eight plays with 4:08 left before Mark Ingram scampered in from 12 yards out, giving the team a 40-33 win. Two weeks later, Brees was the architect of a six-minute drive in the fourth quarter that culminated in a Pierre Thomas touchdown catch with 50 seconds to go, turning a 27-23 Panthers lead into a 30-27 Saints win.

In the end, the deciding point in this MVP race may come down to a Brees drive that didn't work out. Think all the way back to Week 1, when Rodgers and Brees matched up against each other on opening night at Lambeau. The Saints take over with 5:35 left on their own 24-yard line, down 15 points, with just one timeout left. Their chances of winning are estimated to be at about 1 percent. Somehow, Brees brings them back to life. They drive 76 yards in 3:20, scoring on a throw to Jimmy Graham to get within eight. They get the ball back with 1:08 left after the Packers go three-and-out and, somehow, march 70 yards in 55 seconds. On the final pass of the game, A.J. Hawk is called for pass interference in the end zone, giving the Saints first-and-goal from the 1-yard line on an untimed down. On those two series, Brees goes 10-of-15 for 134 yards.

It's not enough. On the untimed down, Brees hands the ball to Mark Ingram and Clay Matthews stacks him up at the line of scrimmage for no gain, ending the comeback bid. If the Saints score, get the two-point conversion, and go on to win the game, the argument of Brees versus Rodgers is a cinch for Brees. Instead, as close as the race between these two great quarterbacks is, Aaron Rodgers is likely going to be voted as the Associated Press MVP. And it may have come down to a play made by a linebacker during Week 1 in September.

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Kasey Keller on MLS, EPL and USMNT

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:25 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

Kasey Keller stopped by ESPN's HQ in the far flung outpost of Bristol, CT., this week, and I had a pleasure of spending a few minutes with him. (Keller was here auditioning for a possible broadcast gig with the network.) Given that the now retired keeper's CV includes stints in England, Spain and Germany, as well as finishing out his career with the Seattle Sounders, our conversation covered a fair bit of terrority, starting with MLS and ending with Jurgen Klinsmann's mission with the U.S. men's national team.

MLS has made terrific strides in attendance -- it's the third-most attended sport in U.S. -- yet TV ratings continue to flatline. How do you explain, and solve that?

Kasey Keller: It's a combination of things. I think where teams have really started to pick up their marketing strategies, they're seeing the benefits from it in their daily attendance. There's better stadiums, better scenarios for fans to come to games. One problem that MLS is having in trying to boost TV ratings is the competition with the rest of the leagues around the world. You can't go watch an English Premier League game from your home in Seattle, but you can watch the Seattle Sounders play live. If I've given myself a couple hours to watch a game on Saturday, I might TiVo the Man United against Chelsea game and watch that when I get up. Or am I going to stick around and watch the MLS game at 5 o'clock? That's the battle MLS is still fighting.

What's promising is that some of our regional broadcasts are [generating big ratings]. Our ratings in Seattle are tremendous -- they are on par with other pro sports. But ultimately, it's hard to say. The national game is so big, and that's what you want to have succeed. But if I'm a Seattle fan, am I going to watch Columbus play Toronto?

That's a tough ask, but at least we're seeing better atmospheres, which translates on TV.

KK: Correct. Which is the starting point -- you have to start with fans in the stands.

Should MLS do a better job of marketing itself? What's the message it's sending -- a league for up-and-coming stars, or a league that can compete with others around the world?

KK: I think that's part of the challenge, but it has to be more of a local market. The marketing has to come where you have to build that recognition with the home base. And I think eventually that will filter out. You have to create stars as well. I think what has been frustrating for some of us who have been in the game for a long time -- and I know I'm here at ESPN -- is you've just watched a 1 1/2 hour of Baseball Tonight, and then you flip on SportsCenter and you see the same highlights from Baseball Tonight. You've got a handful of goals and you're fighting to get those highlights on the station that is promoting your league. I know some of that is consumer driven, but at the same time there's enough sports fans now where a baseball fan still going to appreciate a great goal.

Speaking of stars, should MLS's most promising players play overseas for the experience?

KK: I can't judge someone else's life choices. For some people, it's huge to go challenge themselves in Europe. For other guys, they're comfortable staying home. I think if you want to be the best, you have to play against the best. You look at a player who has a successful career playing basketball in Europe, eventually he's going to try and come over to the NBA. Ichiro could have done whatever he wanted to do in Japan, but he felt he needed to come over here for a long spell and test himself.

At some stage, if you want to prove yourself, you have to go to the next level.

Now [MLS commissioner] Don Garber may have a different timeline than a lot of people think where he sees the league going -- people may think he's a little bit aggressive that it'll be able to compete with the top leagues around the world in a shorter period of time. But I'm not going to fault guys for staying here, either.

One topic that fans love to discuss is the difference between the leagues, especially MLS, EPL and La Liga in terms of pace, the physical nature of play, the technique. How do you see the differences?

First off, I don't think you can compare the physicality of MLS to EPL. The Premier League is more physical. I think what happens in MLS is that the play is more reckless at times. So what you're seeing is a mis-timed challenge as opposed to just being physical. There's not a lot of Didier Drogbas, John Terrys and Rio Ferdinands in MLS. When you want to talk about physical, look at Nemanja Vidic.

Having played in both Spain and England, there's no question La Liga is the most technical league in the world. Without a doubt. But I was surprised at how fast the play was in La Liga. ... The difference is that it's fast more with the ball under control as opposed to in England where it's fast with the ball going into space and having two people challenge for it. In Spain, there's more one-twos, guy whipping down the wing, and a lot more crosses than I expected. Maybe not as many 50-50 crosses, but more cut backs, more through balls put into areas, as opposed to saying, "OK, I'm in an area, put the ball into the box and let's challenge for it."

[+] Enlarge
Franck Fife/Getty Images
"There's a difference between wanting to play a particular way and having the players capable of playing that way," Keller says about Jurgen Klinsmann's philosophy.
What are your thoughts on the direction Klinsmann is taking the U.S. national team?

KK: That is the big question -- where is the direction going? There's a difference between wanting to play a particular way and having the players capable of playing that way.

We all want to play like Barcelona. Man U wants to be a team that plays like Barcelona. Man City and Chelsea want to play like Barcelona. Right now there's only one team that can play like Barcelona. And when I was playing in Spain, that wasn't the Barcelona that is playing right now. This Barcelona is something special.

But that's the tricky part for Klinsmann. I think he has an idea of how he wants the team to play. But are the players capable of playing that way? And if they can't, will he adapt? We'll know when [World Cup] qualifying starts and results matter. Right now, you can say, "I'm trying to do this, I'm trying to do that, play this guy here, play that guy there," but when it matters, then we'll truly see what direction the team is going to go.

Klinsmann must see the players he has in front of him and know the limits. Surely Klinsmann must already have a sense of how the team is going to have to play, right?

KK: No question. The hard part right now is that he doesn't have a striker. He doesn't have a Brian McBride who, when they're in trouble, is going to clear the ball or directionally head the ball out of danger, keep possession and get goals on set pieces. ... Are you going to be a counter-attacking team, are you going to use speed? Are you going to be big and physical? Where are we going, what direction? So far from what I've seen under Klinsmann, I don't know if we can just throw a ball out on the field and say, "OK, guys, go play this other team off the park." Because that hasn't happened yet.

Along those lines, should Klinsmann continue to play Dempsey in a more central role, build the team around him?

What's happened is, because of his lack of striking options, Clint has ended up playing up top more than he's ended up in midfield. Obviously, Landon [Donovan] has missed a bunch of games, a couple through injury and a couple because of the MLS final, so we haven't quite seen what his role is going to be. ... And there's a totally different role for Michael Bradley now that his dad is no longer the coach. So there's a lot of different things going on -- and little things, too, like you've now got a couple new German-Americans in the fold, Danny Williams and Timmy Chandler. Chandler looks like he's secured that left back problem the team has had for a few years, so that's good. He also brings some good size and physicality into the team.

Williams has slotted in pretty well, even out of position, knowing that he plays in the middle for Hoffenheim and has been playing out wide for the U.S. So I think we've got some good options. I still don't know if we have that playmaking midfielder, that role Claudio Reyna did for so long for the team -- the guy who's going to get you out of trouble, keep position, and at the same time spring people on attack.

It's the most coveted type of player at club level, too.

KK: No question, it's a tough role to fill. If you don't have that, how do you line up your team? Are you going to have to say, "OK, let's use the size that we have." You have a Brek Shea, but where's that big guy you can dump the ball to and mix it up.

Where does Jozy Altidore fit into all of this?

I would like to see Jozy be more of a runner. I was watching U.S. vs. Ecuador game, and during that whole game, I didn't see one pass behind the defense and a striker running behind the defense. I know Ecuador was playing a bit deep, but where's that runner behind the defense. If you're hoping to score with defenders in front of you, in a good defensive position, it's going to be a lot more difficult. You want to see one-on-ones, balls that are cut back, situations like that where a lot of goals are scored. Without a willing runner who gets in behind, you've got to hope for that perfect 25-yard ball -- and they don't happen all the time.

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ESPN.com's all-Prem team (so far)

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:23 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

'Tis the season around the ESPN.com soccer offices: that magical time when we stage our semi-annual battle over the Prem's current best XI. Naturally, this war of wills does not occur on the company premises, as a plethora of pints, pontificating and punches is required. But after bruising our livers and sternums, we've managed to cobble together the Most Excellent team at the season's midway point.

With several top players having injury issues (Lucas Leiva, Jack Wilshere, Stevie G since the late 1990s), extended scoreless stretches (Wayne Rooney, Luis Suarez), or simply age-induced suckage (Ashley Cole, Rio Ferdinand), our choices were more contentious than in previous years, but we'd bet that even Sir Alex could get this squad to the Champions League knockout stage.

Oh, and one other caveat: Just like in the natural ebb and flow of an EPL game, plenty of players excel in one half of the season and vanish in the second, except for Andrei Arshavin, who routinely disappears from August to May. For a case in point, Stuart Holden was rated as the Prem's best player this time last season before injuries curtailed his breakthrough.

As always, your opinions are welcome, but remember that this is a time of peace and love. Just ask Suarez and John Terry.

Keeper: Joe Hart, Manchester City

The Taylor Twellman lookalike may not keep many clean sheets -- six in 17 Prem games this season -- but he's got the proverbial ice water in his veins, the one keeper whose bad days or sporadic howlers never move his emotional needle. Now that Roberto Mancini has released his greyhounds, City's defensive vulnerabilities have been on greater display. But in recent weeks, Hart has raised his game in response. Six saves against the Gunners, including a 90th-minute pure-reflex parry to deny Thomas Vermaelen's thundering half-volley. Another half-dozen at Anfield to prevent Liverpool from taking all three points. So much of David Silva's wizardry and Mario Balotelli's Why-Always-Him goals mean little without Hart's acrobatics between the posts. If you still need proof of his bad-assery, check out his Oakland Raiders get-up for the club holiday party.

On the bench: Tim Krul (Newcastle), Michel Vorm (Swansea)

Right back: Kyle Walker, Tottenham

You have to be good to vault in three years from non-league Northampton Town to man-marking Zlatan Ibrahimovic into irrelevance for England. Yet for 21-year-old Walker, his dizzying ascent into the Spurs first team makes complete sense. As an attacking full-back, Walker's speed and crossing ability (eat your heart out, Theo Walcott) have filled one of Harry Redknapp's problem positions, removing the names Vedran Corluka and Alan Hutton from the bile ducts of every Spurs fan. With the completeness of his game in evidence, young Walker has emerged as Micah Richards' and Glen Johnson's primary threat in the England starting lineup. His solitary goal -- an unstoppable 25-yard thunderbolt of a game-winner in the North London derby -- was one that even RvP would applaud.

On the bench: Micah Richards (Manchester City)

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Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images
Vincent Kompany has become the leader of City's ego-laden squad.
Center back: Vincent Kompany, Manchester City

Fast, strong in the air, agile for a big man (6-foot-3) and devoid of the drama and tabloid attention that dog plenty of his better-paid, higher-profile teammates, Kompany is the acknowledged leader of City's ego-laden group, a far cry from the player whose conduct and character were openly criticized and questioned by the then-Belgian manager Dick Advocaat in 2009. Even Balotelli listens to him, perhaps because he is the only Belgian who can tear apart a phone book with his bare hands.

On the bench: Daniel Agger (Liverpool)

Center back: Phil Jones, Manchester United

Not even Sir Alex expected him to be this good this early, but United's injury woes have forced the young tyro from Blackburn into the heart of the lineup. Rarely has $26 million looked like such a bargain, but United's (and England's) future captain brings an unflinching commitment to every moment. Fabio Capello, a man who knows a thing or two about the defensive arts, has made straight-faced comparisons of Jones to defensive icons Franz Beckenbauer and Franco Baresi. In spite of hyperbole worthy of any English paper, there's no denying that the 19-year-old has been a revelation, enabling us to overlook his silly blond highlights and unfortunate choice of karaoke songs. The fact that SAF can also play Jones in other positions, including right back and in midfield, only adds to his potential.

On the bench: Thomas Vermaelen (Arsenal)

Left back: Jose Enrique, Liverpool

The Reds have been lacking for a quality left back since the Clinton administration, and given Kenny Dalglish's proclivity for signing brand names (Andy Carroll, highly rated England U-21 anchor Jordan Henderson, pugnacious Scot Charlie Adam), you expected him to fill the John Arne Riise-shaped void with yet another marquee player. Instead, he stole Newcastle's best player while everyone was still questioning his sanity for shelling out $50 million for the most overrated Magpie. Enrique is an astute, no-nonsense defender with immaculate ball control who fits King Kenny's pass-and-move ideal. Two assists is a small return for a fullback who likes to get forward, but he's an integral part of the Prem's meanest defense -- LFC has conceded 13 goals in 17 games -- and compared to fellow newbies like Stewart Downing, he was cheap. With Ashley Cole and Patrice Evra having noticeably down seasons, Enrique practically picked himself for this team.

On the bench: Benoit Assou-Ekotto (Tottenham), Leon Barnett (Norwich City)

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Scott Heavey/Getty Images
Without Luka Modric, Spurs would be like Stoke … only in prettier kits.
Midfielder: Luka Modric, Tottenham

And to think he almost crossed town to join Chelsea. Say what you want about Harry Redknapp (and we enjoy saying plenty), the man has an eye for his soccer horseflesh. Modric has been nothing short of sensational, with control and distribution skills that would make Wal-Mart executives weep. Ever since indefatigable Scott Parker joined the club and assumed the bad-cop, ball-winning duties alongside the tiny Croat, Modric has reveled in his newfound freedom as both expansive passer and creative schemer. Without him, Spurs would be Stoke in prettier kits.

Midfielder: David Silva, Manchester City

Look past the numbers, amazing as they are -- five goals, eight assists, 43 shots and several game-changing moments from midfield -- and ponder just how much the Spaniard has evolved at the heart of Mancini's team. All City attacks and counters spring from the jet-heeled Silva, the Spaniard with a "mine in his left foot" (according to Spanish paper El Pais). Silva has already surpassed his goals and assists from last season in half the time, and his kinetic interplay with Sergio Aguero, Balotelli, Edin Dzeko and Yaya Toure -- and stunning in-game vision -- are breathtaking to behold. Considering that he's 5-foot-7, he's handling the physical rigor and punishing tackling of the Prem far better than Cristiano Ronaldo ever did. That he's unable to command a full-time spot in the Spanish national team is either terrifying or cause for a Hague tribunal.

Midfielder: Juan Mata, Chelsea

If you've ever found yourself curled up in the fetal position, intimidated by the assembly line of great Spanish players, here's another excellent reason for your Ibero-phobia. With three goals and seven assists in 14 Prem games, Mata is the future of Chelsea, according to Andre Villas-Boas' ambitious blueprint: a technically gifted, high-octane close dribbler with superb passing range and the ball skills to roast any defender. It's not easy to dislodge Frank Lampard, the longtime hood ornament adorning the Blues' engine, but Mata has adjusted quickly to the EPL and has seemingly shrugged off the melodrama of "team in crisis" and "Villas-Boas for the sack" to become a key component of the new-look Chelsea. Playing with speed and 360-degree "Exorcist" vision, cueing counterattacks and generally doing everything (except taking penalties) much faster than Lamps, he's yet another reason England has no chance to lift a trophy at Euro 2012 this summer.

On the bench: Cheik Tiote (Newcastle), Scott Parker (Tottenham), Leon Britton (Swansea), Joey Barton (QPR), Clint Dempsey (Fulham)

Forward: Demba Ba, Newcastle United

Ba's 13 goals in 16 Prem games are probably 13 more than most people thought he would manage, especially after goal-allergic Stoke balked at signing him last season given his history of knee injuries. Dynamic, quick, a nightmare for defenders both aerially and on the ground, he was exhumed from the wreckage of West Ham. Think the St James' rabble even so much as remember Andy Carroll now that Super Ba is around? Of course, they might pine temporarily for the Magic Ponytail (who did serve manfully in black-and-white stripes) when Ba heads to the African Cup of Nations in January. On second thought, probably not.

Forward: Robin van Persie, Arsenal

We know, you're stunned.

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Chris Brunskill/Getty Images
Feed the Yak: Perhaps the only thing standing between Steve Kean and the unemployment line is Yakubu's goal-scoring form.
Forward: Yakubu, Blackburn Rovers

This season's version of DJ Campbell or Peter Odemwingie, the offbeat, small-market hero is doing everything in his power to guide a struggling side to safety. It's not having the intended effect, despite Yakubu's pleas for angry Rovers fans to leave Steve Kean alone, but those same disgruntled supporters can't deny the success of Feeding The Yak: 10 goals in 12 games, and one of the better shot-to-goal ratios among leading scorers (his have come from a paltry 31 shots, making Suarez, with five goals on 73 shots, look positively Heskey-esque). Simply put, when the tubby, underappreciated Nigerian gets the ball with the goal at his mercy, he generally seals the deal, leading his under-fire boss to not only believe his managerial job is safe, but also that Yak could be the first Rovers player to score 20 Prem goals in a season since the glory days of Alan Shearer.

On the bench: Mario Balotelli (Manchester City), Emmanuel Adebayor (City), Sergio Aguero (Manchester City), Luis Suarez (Liverpool), Bobby Zamora (Fulham)

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The 13th Day of NBA Christmas

Posted by: timbersfan, 23:21 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

Even if we already covered nearly everything in the "12 Days of NBA Christmas" and my two-part NBA Mega-Preview Podcast, allow me to stuff your stocking with some final wagers and gambling props for the 2011-12 season. Warning: I invoked the spirit of Cousin Sal and made up a couple of these. They're marked with a Maris-like asterisk. Anyway …

For Indiana's over/under (36 wins), Minnesota's o/u (24) & Detroit's o/u (24) …
PICKS: "Over"

I have good news! (Well, if you're a degenerate gambler, but still … I have good news!) This season's over/unders for win totals finally trickled out on online betting sites these past few days. I made my "over" picks based on this formula: "(compressed schedule) X (young legs + serious depth) = cheap wins." Detroit won 30 games last season despite a near player mutiny; this season, they have a deeper roster, a better coach, and an easier schedule (heavy with games against the inferior East). Meanwhile, The Timberwolves have absolutely no reason to tank (remember, the Hornets have their unprotected no. 1 pick this year) and might have one "let's try to win now!" trade still in them. If that's not enough, multiple fan bases are slowly coming to the sobering realization that they'd rather watch Minnesota's second team (Ricky Rubio, J.J. Barea, Derrick Williams, Anthony Randolph and Anthony Tolliver) than their own starting lineups.

But my favorite of the three picks? Indiana. Here's how much I love this year's Pacers team: I even ogled their Central Division odds (+800) and NBA title odds (75-to-1) for a few minutes before thinking, "Wait, this is getting crazy." Just know that, if the Pacers don't crack 40 wins this season, I'll give you a refund for this column. While we're here, I like these "overs" as well (just not quite enough to bet): Philly (36), Denver (37.5), Chicago (47.5) and the Clippers (41.5). In fact …

To win the Pacific Division …
PICK: Clippers (-110)

Why bet the Clippers' over when you can just steal money here? Here's what I witnessed in person in two preseason games: A hungry/focused/rejuvenated/deep Clippers team led by a superstar poised for a career year (Chris Paul), a budding superstar who wants to demolish the league (Blake Griffin) and an aging star who's already embraced being one of the team's two leaders (Chauncey Billups, playing with a chip on his shoulder to boot). It took exactly 24 hours for the new pieces to fall into place: They can run and play half court; they can protect the rim and play above it; they have shooters; they have scoring off the bench; they have multiple options at crunch time; they're competitive; they even have two quality handshake/chest-bump guys (DeAndre Jordan and Mo Williams). You name it, they have it. Everyone on that team can smell it already. They know they're going to be good.

More important, who's beating them in the Pacific? Not the Warriors, Suns or Kings. That leaves a creaky Lakers team that had the worst 4 thru 12 players of any potential playoff team and is really going to miss Lamar Odom, Phil Jackson and the Triangle (and not in that order). In fact …

To have a bigger season from hell …
PICK: Lakers (-130*) over Celtics

Put it this way: If this really WAS the "season from hell," wouldn't you have started it with the vetoed three-team trade, the Odom trade, their Black Sheep Brother Clippers getting Paul, Kobe's divorce and Kobe's wrist injury, followed by a 1-3 Bynum-less start to kick off the season and a flood of Dwight Howard-related trade rumors coming? There's just enough "2011 Colts" potential for this 2011-12 Lakers season that I would have soiled myself in delight if not for my decrepit Celtics, who go five-deep (yes, I'm counting Brandon Bass) before it drops off a Thelma and Louise-sized cliff. I'd say the Lakers and Celtics have the same goal: "Let's just make the playoffs. If we can eke out a 6-seed to avoid the top two teams in Round 1, even better … but let's not kill ourselves trying. We just need to make sure we get in." That reminds me …

For this year's most boring storyline that we'll have to keep addressing …
PICK: "The Effects of the Shortened Schedule on the Playoff Picture" (-300*)

Too many games, too few days, too much greed. Scheduling those extra six games at the expense of the overall quality of the season? Indefensible. You'll see older teams throwing away screwed-by-the-schedule games (and resting multiple starters) over playing older stars three games in three nights, eight times in 11 nights, or whatever treacherous stretch is looming. Expect San Antonio, Dallas, Boston and the Lakers to remember what happened in 1999 — when the 8-seed Knicks snuck into the Finals after a 50-game season — and handle their schedules accordingly. Get ready for NBA fans across the country to be saying things like, "Wait, I'm paying to see the Celtics and they're starting Keyon Dooling, Marquis Daniels and JaJuan Johnson tonight — is this a D-League game and nobody told me?"

Will Dwight Howard get traded this season?
PICK: No (+200*)

If I'm Orlando GM Otis Smith, I'm going down with the ship: Unless the Lakers panic-trade me Bynum and Gasol for Howard and Turkoglu's contract AND fold J.J. Redick's contract within their Odom-created trade exception, I'm keeping Howard and hoping he takes more money to stay (remember, Orlando can pay him more than anyone). If he doesn't stay, I'm getting fired anyway. Let's hope this happens because (a) if Howard goes to Chicago with Derrick Rose, we're screwed (I explain in Day 9's column), (b) it's always scary to think of him on the Lakers, even if they won't have the cap space to help him until 2015, and (c) I'm excited for a super-awkward, "Is Dwight staying or going?!" All-Star Weekend in Orlando.

For this year's most popular ESPN.com Trade Machine companion …
PICK: Orlando (-400*)

Bummed out about this one — I was ready to back Utah (+500*) until they shipped Memo Okur's Expiring Contract to New Jersey on Thursday.

For "Kobe and Steve Blake for Deron Williams, Johan Petro and Anthony Morrow" being this year's craziest trade rumor that gains steam.
PICK: Yes (+500*)

Jesse The Crazy Clippers Fan threw this one at me at Wednesday's preseason game and it made me do the nodding/furrowing my brow combo. If you're the Lakers, you'd escape from the last three years ($83.5 million!) of Kobe's cap-crippling deal, reinvent yourselves around Bynum, Gasol and Williams, give yourselves a little more flexibility, get younger and eliminate any possibility of Kobe going into 2007 Toxic Kobe mode. If you're the Nets, you'd abolish any "Williams might leave next summer" concerns and proudly charge into Brooklyn next year with one of the most famous basketball players ever leading the way (under contract through 2014, no less). And if you're Kobe, I mean, maybe you're not unhappy about this deal? New York, new owner, new uniform, new start, new fans, no baggage … he'd basically be hitting the RESET button on the final part of his career. Pretty interesting. Who says no?

Will Denver give Tim Tebow courtside seats at least three times this season in a thinly veiled attempt to get Nuggets fans fired up and freak out the visiting team so that a crazy late comeback will happen?
PICK: Yes* (-400*)

Please note: I'm actually throwing this in a three-team parlay with "no" for "Will Steve Nash ask for a trade this season?" (-500*) and "yes" for "Will Khloe Kardashian gain at least 17.5 pounds this season because of Dallas barbecue?" (-220*) for even odds.

For VetoGate going away (over/under January 15)
Pick: "Over*"

No way it's going away. None. Too many people were involved; too many people know what actually happened; too many people get pissed off every time David Stern speaks publicly about it. On Colin Cowherd's show this week, Stern said, "I can assure you, and I reiterate it today, that the first time the league office knew the parameters of the suggested trade was when we said no." If that's true, then he's really saying that Dell Demps (the Hornets' GM), Hugh Weber (the Hornets' president) and Jac Sperling (the NBA's league-appointed chairman for the Hornets) blatantly lied to everyone on Houston's side and the Lakers' side as they were negotiating and consummating that trade. I don't know how to make that any clearer. Somebody is lying. For the record, it sure seems like the Lakers and Rockets believe it's David Stern. To be continued.

To be the best amnesty pickup …
PICK: Baron Davis (+180*) over Chauncey Billups

I love the Chauncey/Clippers match: He gets to shoot open 3s, save his legs, defend the other team's worst perimeter player, be a leader and do Chauncey things. But Baron landed in an even better situation: As I've written a million times, he feeds off the crowd for better or worse. When it's "better," he rises to the occasion and unleashes the full Baron package: attacking the rim, bouncing around, coming through in the clutch, you name it. When it's worse, he goes through the motions, jacks up awful 23-footers and feeds himself (food).

Those past three Clipper years couldn't have been worse for him: Sticking Baron on a hopeless team in front of a dead crowd just means he'll check out (and with no remorse whatsoever). But a team like the Knicks? On a contender that needs him? With those great fans, with that spotlight/pressure on him, with every home game feeling like a show? I think 2007 Baron comes back. Remember, Knicks fans have a proven track record of attaching themselves to head cases (Latrell Sprewell, John Starks, etc.), disregarding their baggage and clicking with them. They won't accept anything less than Baron's best. It's the right match at the right point of his career. Baron Davis can be redeemed. I truly believe that.

To be the fattest Knick of all time, even fatter than Eddy Curry …
PICK: Baron Davis (+1500*)

Sorry, I had to hedge the previous bet.

To be a more valuable better free-agent pickup …
PICK: Rip Hamilton (+150*) over Shane Battier

Question: Would Miami have won the 2011 Finals if Battier had been out there instead of Mike Miller? Yeah … if it was the Battier from 2007 or 2008. I don't think 2012 Battier is the same guy. He'll definitely help Miami as a bench guy; he pushes the Heat closer to the whole "you need eight solid-or-better guys to win a title" threshold; he definitely gives them more reliable Wade/LeBron injury protection. But he doesn't have the potential to transform Miami like Hamilton does in Chicago. Now that he's finally playing with a real point guard and guys who can actually set picks again (remember, he suffered through a three-year drought in Detroit there), I see Rip curling off screens, hitting open 3s and opening the floor for teammates just like he did in Detroit once upon a time. Perfect team, perfect fit. I love when stuff makes sense.

THE SUPER-QUICK WEEK 16 PICKS
COLTS +7 over Texans
Bigger upset Thursday night: Indy beating Houston or me winning a Thursday-night pick?
Broncos (-3) over BILLS
Teeeeeeeeeeeeebowwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!
JETS (-3) over Giants
I hate this pick only slightly less than I hated the thought of "Giants +3."
Rams (+15) over STEELERS
Vikings (+6.5) over REDSKINS
"Suck for Luck" takes a dramatic twist — I see both the Rams and Vikings flirting with upsets before choking late, followed by Bill Polian ordering his son to slice Dan Orlovsky's hamstrings.
Cardinals (+4) over BENGALS
When in doubt, take the points.
CHIEFS (-2.5) over Raiders
We need the Chiefs to keep winning so we can wager against Romeo Crennel in 2012 and 2013. Just trust me.
Dolphins (+10) over PATRIOTS
(Cringing at the thought of blowing the 2-seed.)
Browns (+12.5) over RAVENS
You cannot give Seneca Wallace this many points. You CANNOT give Seneca Wallace this many points.
PANTHERS (-6.5) over Buccaneers
TITANS (-7) over Jaguars
Pad-the-stats performances by Cam Newton and Chris Johnson swing tens of thousands of fantasy playoff finals everywhere … and on the flip side, Blaine Gabbert and Josh Freeman don't swing any.
Chargers (+2.5) over LIONS
Translation: I see Detroit out-frauding San Diego.
Eagles (+1.5) over COWBOYS
Let's hope I never spend this much time thinking about Felix Jones' groin again.
SEAHAWKS (+2) over 49ers
The Niners aren't finished making everyone secretly doubt them yet.
Bears (+12) over PACKERS
Green Bay has officially moved into "Let's just make it to Week 19" mode.
Falcons (+7) over SAINTS
Upset special: Falcons 29, Saints 26, Dumb Mike Smith Decisions 0.
This Week: 1-0
Last Week: 6-9-1
Season: 110-108-8
To have a better comeback season …
PICK: Carlos Boozer (-110*) over Billy Crystal

I don't blame Crystal for giving away his Clipper courtsides these past few years; would you want to watch uninspired basketball while having to make small talk with the reprehensibly oily Donald Sterling during timeouts? I'm amazed he kept the seats. Now I see him making a massive comeback for Lob City this season; he even attended Wednesday's preseason game, for god's sake. Still, it won't match the impact of Boozer's comeback season in Chicago. There were real reasons why he stunk last year (new team, new situation, injured in training camp, not in the best shape, just never got it going, lost confidence) and real reasons why he'll shine this season (motivated and hungry, a 20/10 guy when healthy, better chemistry with Rose). He's too good to stink twice.

That the league's first legitimate HGH scandal will break …
PICK: Yes* (+1200)

Just throwing it out there.

To be the league's leading rebounder …
PICK: Kevin Love (+200)

Easy money. Love beat out Howard by a full rebound last season and he's in better shape. What am I missing?

To be the league's leading scorer …
PICK: Carmelo Anthony (+700)

Kevin Durant is the favorite (-150), but Carmelo (headed for a monster year, by the way) averaged almost exactly the same points after the Denver trade that Durant averaged after the Perkins trade (when Durant's minutes finally went down). Throw in more shots for James Harden this season and I see Carmelo edging Durant by a full point. That reminds me …

To be this season's breakout guy …
PICK: James Harden (+250*) over Eric Gordon and John Wall

All three will make "The Leap," it's just that everyone will notice Harden most because he's playing for a contender (and in a bunch of nationally televised games). It's going to be cool to say things like, "I know everyone can't stop talking about Durant and Westbrook, but I really love that James Harden" in about six weeks.

The words "Phil Jackson" and "Knicks" will be uttered in the same sentence over/under 15 million times on ESPN between now and July
PICK: Over*

Easy money. I'm parlaying this with +250 odds for "Jackson has been secretly working on a book about his last few Lakers years that creams Kobe, Mitch Kupchak and Jimmy Buss."

For Golden State's over/under (31.5 wins) and the Lakers' over/under (40.5)
PICKS: "Under"

We already covered the Lakers; just know that Golden State's "under" is my single favorite wager on the board. Mark Jackson made the classic "I'm the new coach!" mistake: He's trying to impose his own idealism ("we're gonna be all about defense!") on a team that isn't even remotely built for that idea (a Warriors team with Monta Ellis, Stephen Curry and David Lee — three of the worst defensive players in basketball) instead of just looking at his roster and saying, "Here are my team's strengths, I need to play to those for now until I get the right players for what I want to do." It's too bad Jackson and Mike D'Antoni can't just switch jobs. By the way, Golden State plays 48 games against the much-tougher West and just 18 games against the weaker East. This is like stealing.

While we're here, I like these "unders" as well (just not quite enough to bet): Boston (41 wins), Miami (50.5), and Sacramento (20.5). In general, the contenders got screwed by being more television-friendly. You know how every NBA team only plays three teams twice from the other conference? Well, the Celtics drew the Lakers, Mavericks and Oklahoma City; the Lakers drew Boston, New York and Miami; Dallas drew Boston, Miami and New York; and Miami drew Dallas, Oklahoma City and the Lakers. All of those games will be televised on ESPN, ABC and TNT. Meanwhile, Indiana drew Golden State, Minnesota and New Orleans … and you're not gonna believe this, but you won't see any of those six games on ESPN, ABC and TNT. Who said there wasn't a single advantage to being a small-market NBA team?

For Ron Artest's next name change …
PICK: "Metta World Amnesty Clause" (+2500*)

(Sorry, I couldn't resist.)

To win Rookie of the Year …
PICK: Kemba Walker (+500)

It's the kookiest "Rookie of the Year" race in recent memory. Other than Kemba, the only other potential picks I liked (if only for favorable odds) were Ricky Rubio (+750) and Tristan Thompson (+700 as a "field" bet since he doesn't even have odds). Why Kemba? He's the only rookie who can (and probably will) become his team's crunch-time scorer. If you win the most SportsCenter highlights, you'll win "Rookie of the Year." That's just the way it goes.

By the way, I don't mind this rookie class: I'm excited to watch everyone we just mentioned, as well as Derrick Williams (a future star, although he won't get the minutes this year), Kyrie Irving (two years away from being good, but whatever), Brandon Knight (ditto), Rubio (even if he can't hit the side of a barn with his jump shot, you'll love watching him because he already passes the "half-step ahead of everyone else," "definitely has the passing gene" and "couldn't be more fun to play with" tests), the one and only Jimmer Fredette (25-foot range and streaky in a good way, like Vinnie Johnson crossed with Steve Kerr), and of course (Marv Albert voice), "Bis-mack Bi-YOM-bo!!!!!!!"

To be the league's 2012 MVP …
PICK: Chris Paul (+1000)

Total value pick. If the Clippers break through this season (and I say they will), Paul will receive the lion's share of the credit just like Steve Nash did in 2005. It's either going to be Paul, LeBron (+250), Rose (+500) or Durant (+500). May as well grab the best odds.

(Confession time: At gunpoint, I would have picked Paul, anyway. It took exactly three quarters for him to totally own that entire Clippers team. If you watch them on Christmas, watch for little breaks in the action when Paul beckons over his other four teammates and they come scurrying over like little kids. It's like watching Kanye yell for his backup dancers during a rehearsal or something. Pretty funny to watch. There isn't a leader in the NBA quite like Chris Paul. You will see.)

To win the Western Conference …
PICK: Clippers (+600)

Confession time, no. 2: I don't think you should bet the West. The Clippers, Dallas (+300) and Oklahoma City (+200) have the best teams; you could also talk me into the Spurs (+1100) or Lakers (+250) pulling a 1999 Knicks and catching fire for a couple of series; and you could absolutely talk me into the Grizzlies (+1400) unexpectedly wreaking havoc again. That's six potential winners in all, which means two words: stay away. The Western playoffs will be like the NHL playoffs this past spring: total craziness, total chaos, be prepared for anything. But if I absolutely HAD to make a wager? Lob City has the best odds and it's the most fun pick. You're wagering on, quite possibly, one of the most entertaining professional basketball teams ever assembled … and it's in YOUR best interest for them to win. What's better than that?

To win the 2012 title …
PICK: Chicago (+600)

The Bulls weren't that far off from beating Miami (+180) last spring; they're decidedly better now. Besides, what would be more fun than a Clippers-Bulls Finals? Los Angeles vs. Chicago? Blake Griffin on a national stage? Chauncey Billups and Rip Hamilton reunited in the Finals, only on different teams? DeAndre Jordan and Joakim Noah woofing at each other for seven games? Vinny Del Negro and Tom Thibodeau having a "deer in the headlights" contest? And best of all, Derrick Rose and Chris Paul battling for the Best Point Guard championship belt, the NBA championship and the heart of Worldwide Wes? That's the best Finals since … oh, wait, since last year. And that's pretty good. Merry Christmas and thanks for reading

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bye bye beckham

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:16 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

The front page of Le Parisien scheduled to hit the streets of France on Wednesday morning is a whole lot clearer about David Beckham’s future than Beckham has been the past few weeks.

“Il a dit oui,” it proclaims. “He said yes.”

France’s largest newspaper reports that Beckham, a 36-year-old midfielder who last month helped the L.A. Galaxy win its third MLS Cup title, has agreed “in principle” to an 18-month deal with Paris Saint-Germain that will pay around $18.7 million.

It would be a silly gamble for such a well-established publication to trumpet a piece of news it wasn’t sure about. But the denial from Beckham’s camp came quickly, nevertheless.

"No agreement with any football club has been reached. Any talk of a deal is premature. David is presently considering his options," a spokesperson told Agence France Presse.

Of course, media outlets have been wrong about Beckham before. Recently, in fact. Over the weekend, the prestigious France Football claimed he would be attending last Sunday’s game at the Parc des Princes and that he would be confirmed as a PSG player soon thereafter. Beckham didn’t show.

But the evidence is piling up that the English icon’s MLS sojourn has come to an end. L’Equipe, the French sports daily, even claims to have details about Beckham’s “rock star” unveiling, which supposedly will take place next month at the Hôtel de Ville—Paris’ monumental city hall.

Meanwhile, as this “will he, won’t he” saga continues in a manner that might even impress Brett Favre, the Galaxy and coach Bruce Arena are left twisting. Already faced with the potential departure of Beckham’s central midfield partner, Juninho, and rumors that MLS defender of the year Omar Gonzalez is attracting attention from wealthy clubs in Mexico and Europe, the champs could be facing a rush to rebuild.

It’s unfair, but it’s par for the course for Beckham, who often appeared to spend as much effort trying to get out of L.A. as he did getting to The Home Depot Center during his four-plus years with the Galaxy. There were the two loans to A.C. Milan, the training stint at Tottenham Hotspur that Beckham tried to extend and the overriding sense he just didn’t consider MLS his highest priority.

Beckham sure finished well, however. His scintillating ’11 season did a great deal to change impressions of his time with the Galaxy. Healthy and committed, Beckham was in outstanding form as L.A. won both the Supporters Shield and MLS Cup and his efforts off the field to promote MLS were admirable.

There is no question the league has benefitted from Beckham's stay, not only because of the extra attention from fans and media, but because of the credibility it now has with players around the world.

If it indeed is true that all’s well that ends well, then Arena and the Galaxy should say “merci” to Beckham and walk away. They shouldn’t wait for an announcement from Paris. They should take control of the situation, realize the “Beckham Experiment” has run its course and announce they’re moving on.

L.A. should behave like the “big club” it hopes to become, like a club that’s bigger than any one player.

Even if Beckham wanted to sign on for another year, his focus would be more on preparing for an invitation to play with the ad hoc British soccer team at the London Olympics, especially after he validated his championship credentials in last month’s 1-0 MLS Cup triumph over the Houston Dynamo.

Then, at the conclusion of the ’12 season, we’d go through the back-and-forth, transatlantic speculation all over again.

It’s unnecessary.

While the effect Beckham had on MLS’ standing in the world is well documented, it’s difficult to imagine what might be accomplished in a sixth year that wasn’t done during the first five. The novelty factor is gone, a championship was won, and like a child discards a security blanket when it’s old enough to face the world on its own, MLS must prove itself capable of drawing fans without the Beckham crutch.

League president Mark Abbott said as much in a recent interview with Sporting News.

“There clearly have been a lot of benefits to the league and the Galaxy as a result of Beckham playing in the league,” Abbott said. "That said, the league has never been, and will never be, depending on any single player.

“In 16 years, we’ve built clubs that have meaning and relevance in their markets. While a single player can help, no one player is responsible for that. No one player can do it on his own, and the loss of one player won’t detract from it. It’s about continuing to build the connection and relevance of each club in their market.”

When D.C. United traded striker Raúl Diaz Arce to the New England Revolution following the ’97 season, many of D.C.’s Salvadoran fans revolted. After all, Diaz Arce was a national hero who meant a whole lot more to them than a 2-year-old team with which they had scant connection.

There were days when MLS teams signed players to appeal to certain demographics. The Chicago Fire took the field with three Poles in its inaugural season. The New York Red Bulls (then the MetroStars) showcased Italian icon Roberto Donadoni when MLS kicked off in ’96.

Those days are over. With increasing relevance and exposure and an average attendance that surpasses that of the NBA and NHL, MLS now can afford to have teams that seek out players based solely on their on-field impact.

While Abbott’s words might sound like the carefully crafted statement of an executive who hopes to put his best foot forward, they’re nevertheless correct. At this point in its development, MLS must be about fans’ commitment to their club, not any individual player. That’s how soccer works around the world, and that’s what the league has started to build in cities like Seattle, Philadelphia, Portland and others.

So to David Beckham, American soccer offers its thanks. It was fun. The league got its hefty P.R. bump, while you and your family got to enjoy the laid-back California lifestyle while raking in tens of millions of dollars. Perhaps we’ll see you return if you exercise the club ownership option in your contract, and you’ll be made welcome. But for now, bon voyage. It’s becoming a bit of a hassle. It’s time to move on.

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MLS team ambition rankings

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:24 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

The 2012 MLS season won't start for another three months, but there's plenty to talk about in the big picture as the league takes the next steps toward being a truly major sport in North America. That's why I decided to come up with my annual MLS Ambition Rankings: a measure of the aspirations of all 19 MLS teams.
MLS has often been described as "soccer socialism," and for good reason. The league is built on a single-entity model, in which the owners are in business together, contracts are owned by the league and a tight salary cap keeps spending from spiraling out of control. But the reins have been loosened in recent years. The Designated Player rule went into effect in 2006, allowing each team to have players (up to three these days) whose salaries aren't limited by the cap. New stadiums have been built, and MLS HQ has allowed individual teams to have more control than they used to.
As a result, we've started to see some perestroika in MLS's soccer socialism, but only in certain circles. Some MLS teams are more ambitious than others. My MLS Ambition Rankings take into account a number of factors. Do you spend money on Designated Players? Have you built your own soccer stadium? Does your owner/chief executive speak out publicly (on Twitter and elsewhere) and act like winning is the most important thing in the world? Does the atmosphere at your games feel major league? Do you create real buzz? Do you pony up for training-table meals, practice facilities, youth development programs and first-class travel for international competitions?
Where does your team rank? Let's break it down:
1. LOS ANGELES
How many MLS teams would drop the nearly $10 million on a third DP in midseason that the Galaxy did to land forward Robbie Keane? Owner AEG made the Galaxy the gold standard for MLS ambition by signing David Beckham in '07, and L.A.'s aspirations extend far beyond the United States. "We want to be the first club in the history of soccer in this country to do $100 million gross revenue a year and join the elite in the rest of the world," says AEG president Tim Leiweke, who isn't afraid to talk big and spend gobs of money on the players, the sparkling stadium and training fields, the coaching staff (Bruce Arena is the highest-paid coach in MLS) and travel accommodations. As midfielder Mike Magee says, "I hear horror stories about how other teams travel, but when we go to CONCACAF tournaments we're on the Lakers' plane. Everything's first-class."
2. SEATTLE
No stadium atmosphere in MLS feels more major league than the one in Seattle, where the 2011 average attendance (38,496) dwarfed that of every other team in the league. This week David Stern called the Sounders the most successful expansion franchise in the history of American sports, and he's probably right: Seattle's ownership has done nearly everything right from the start, and fans have responded, on occasion competing for the largest soccer crowd in the world for regular league games. Majority owner Joe Roth may not be local, but he's a highly visible leader (along with minority owners Drew Carey and Adrian Hanauer) who exults in success (three straight U.S. Open Cup titles) and seems truly pained by failure (exiting the '11 MLS Cup playoffs).
3. NEW YORK
You can't fault owner Red Bull for spending money, whether it's on the sparkling new $200 million stadium in New Jersey or on DPs like Thierry Henry and the much-maligned Rafa Márquez. Clearly, MLS's New York franchise is in much better shape than it was, say, five years ago. But there are caveats. The Red Bulls don't create much buzz in the Gotham area, Austrian Dietrich Mateschitz is an absentee owner, and the practice facility at Montclair State isn't impressive. As for the trophy case, yep, it's still empty.
4. KANSAS CITY
Five years ago, I never would have predicted that K.C. would become one of the most ambitious teams in MLS. But that's exactly what has happened under the new local ownership, which has built a remarkable $200 million stadium, invested in DPs and held the team accountable for success. "I think we have a great opportunity to grow -- as long as we f---ing win," says CEO and co-owner Robb Heineman, one of a new breed of thirty-something MLS owners who's all about winning. (Heineman is a must-follow on Twitter at @RobbHeineman.)
5. TORONTO
MLS's first Canadian club isn't afraid to drop cash; witness the league's third-highest payroll (including DPs Torsten Frings, Danny Koevermans and Julian de Guzman), expensive coach Aron Winter and a $20 million investment in MLS' most ambitious youth development academy. TFC has a terrific group of hardcore fans, but the buzz has worn off as the team has continued to fail to reach the MLS playoffs. It remains to be seen how the sale of 75 percent of owner Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment to Bell Media and Rogers Communications will affect the team's ambitions moving forward.
6. PORTLAND
The Timbers may not have the numbers of fans that archrival Seattle does, but the fan environment at Jeld-Wen Field is absolutely incredible, rivaling any atmosphere in Europe or Latin America. Merritt Paulson is another heart-on-his-sleeve thirty-something owner (follow him on Twitter at @MerrittPaulson) who can be seen occasionally in the middle of the raucous Timbers Army and who seemed crushed when Portland failed to make the playoffs in its first MLS season. Portland hasn't built a mind-blowing new stadium like Kansas City has, but it has spent money to refurbish its urban ground and hasn't shied away from signing DPs like Diego Chará -- and if we're to believe Paulson's Twitter feed, more are on the way.
7. SALT LAKE
Owner Dave Checketts has been terrific for MLS, using his clout to get public financing for a new soccer stadium and using his instincts to hire the right former players to run RSL's soccer operation: coach Jason Kreis and general manager Garth Lagerwey. No team in MLS gets more good soccer for the money invested than Salt Lake does, and no MLS team has had more success in CONCACAF competition. Yet there's still the sense that Salt Lake is a small-market team in the long run, and let's face it: A big part of ambition is how much money you're willing to spend.
8. PHILADELPHIA
Seattle's expansion effort has gone so well that anything else isn't the same by comparison, but the Union's efforts have been sensational too. PPL Park is a great place to watch a soccer game, and the buzz around this team is real. Owner Jay Sugarman may not be very vocal, but CEO Nick Sakiewicz -- long one of MLS' top execs -- makes up for it in a way that's similar to AEG's Tim Leiweke. On the soccer side, Philly has one of most promising youth development operations in the league. This is a team that's going places.
9. HOUSTON
If the league can finally find a new owner to take over AEG's half of the Dynamo, this team could move upward quickly in the Ambition Rankings. Houston's new stadium is opening next May, and even better it's in an urban setting, unlike the ones for Dallas, Colorado and Chicago. That should ratchet up the buzz a bit in Texas, helped also by the fact that Houston (a 2011 MLS Cup finalist) is almost always one of the league's better teams under Dominic Kinnear. But the ownership situation needs to be solved, and co-owner Oscar de la Hoya needs to use his star power and be more involved publicly (a la Drew Carey in Seattle).
10. VANCOUVER
The Whitecaps had the league's worst record in season one, but this MLS team has ambitious goals ("We aim to become one of the top 25 football clubs in the world"), and there are already several promising aspects in place. B.C. Place may not be soccer-specific, but it does provide a solid urban environment, and Vancouver is near the top of MLS in sponsorships sold. The ownership group, headed by Greg Kerfoot and including NBA star Steve Nash, is publicly engaged, and the team has spent money on DPs, some of them better (Eric Hassli) than others (Mustapha Jarju). The youth development plan is also impressive. Now the Whitecaps just need to start producing on the field under new coach Martin Rennie.

11. CHICAGO

D.C. is rebuilding under coach Ben Olsen but uncertain stadium issues continue to cloud the franchise.
Tony Quinn/Icon SMI
The Fire has made some big plays in recent years, building a new stadium and signing DPs like Cuauhtémoc Blanco. But the stadium site in Bridgeview has not been a good one -- there's little buzz around the Fire -- and owner Andrew Hauptman keeps a low profile. The team does appear to be rebounding from the depth of the Carlos de los Cobos era and finished last season well under new coach Frank Klopas. Better days are on the way?
12. MONTREAL
It's hard to know where the Impact will fit in the Ambition Rankings until the team starts playing in MLS in 2012. But we do know that Stade Saputo (built in 2008) is being expanded to slightly more than 20,000 seats, and owner Joey Saputo isn't shy about attracting attention. The Impact also made a run at signing Nicolas Anelka as a DP, an effort that bodes well for building buzz in Quebec.
13. DALLAS
First, the good: the Hunt Sports Group built one of the first soccer-specific stadiums in Pizza Hut Park. FC Dallas has also improved on the field in recent years, and its youth development program has been one of the league's most successful. The team has also dipped its toe into the DP waters for David Ferreira and Fabián Castillo. Now the bad: The stadium was built way too far outside the city of Dallas, causing the team to have no major league buzz, and the Hunt family is clearly on the conservative side of MLS owners.
14. D.C. UNITED
The most successful franchise in the early years of MLS has struggled mightily to find a better stadium situation than it currently has at RFK, and the ongoing frustrations in the nation's capital have caused United to consider perhaps moving to Baltimore. Out-of-town owner Will Chang may or may not be committed for the long haul, and the club is trying to start over from scratch on the field under coach Ben Olsen. In other words, there's still a lot of uncertainty in D.C.; one bright spot from an ambition perspective is that Kevin Payne remains one of the league's more entertainingly public executives.
15. COLUMBUS
Crew Stadium will always deserve props for being MLS's first soccer stadium, but let's be honest: It looks downright cheap compared to Kansas City's Livestrong Sporting Park and Red Bull Arena. Columbus's owner, the Hunt Sports Group, doesn't want to spend much money on its coaching staff, and the Crew hasn't created much buzz since the departure of Guillermo Barros Schelotto.
16. COLORADO
Give owner Stan Kroenke some credit for building a soccer stadium and for a surprise run to win the MLS Cup final in 2010. But that's about it. Kroenke is the definition of "absentee owner," and the Rapids are well known for being cheapskates, whether it's for paying their coach a pittance or refusing for years to get a massage therapist for the team. The Rapids create little buzz in Denver, and the players wonder if Kroenke is far more smitten with his other teams (including the St. Louis Rams and Arsenal) to care. Nor does it help that the team seems adrift after the departures of coach Gary Smith (just one year after winning MLS Cup) and managing director Jeff Plush.
17. SAN JOSE
The Earthquakes got some good news on Wednesday with the approval of a permit needed to start construction of a proposed $60 million, 18,000-seat stadium near the San Jose airport. Once that gets more serious, San Jose could rise in the Ambition Rankings, but the fact remains that this is a small-market team that (despite having prolific scorer Chris Wondolowski) doesn't feel major league.
18. CHIVAS USA
Owner Jorge Vergara talked a lot of smack when his team started playing in MLS in 2005, but where has he been the last few years? And what does Chivas USA want to be these days? Robin Fraser appears to have been a smart hire as coach, but the club itself has done little to change the idea that it's "the other team" in L.A., one that's simply renting the Galaxy's stadium. Keep an eye, however, on the team's youth development efforts, which could prove fruitful down the road.
19. NEW ENGLAND
No fan base sends me more complaints about its own team ownership than New England's. The Revs play in an NFL stadium far from any city, and any hopes for an urban soccer stadium in Boston remain talk and little more. Spending some money to make Shalrie Joseph a DP has been the exception to the rule in New England. Winning seems terribly important to the Kraft family when it comes to the New England Patriots, but how much do the Krafts care about the Revolution?
So there you have it: the first edition of the MLS Ambition Rankings. Let's plan on making it an annual event.

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City unites just in time

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:19 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

Did you really think that just because Roberto Mancini's millionaire miscreants suffered their first Prem defeat last week that all their mojo would vaporize? Perhaps the fans of the chasing clubs hoped that the indignity of being relegated to the Manchester Europa League would cause David Silva to forget how to pass and shoot, Joe Hart to forget how to make saves or Mario Balotelli to forget how to glower at Mancini when he was subbed out before the end of the game?

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Andrew Yates/AFP/Gettty Images
Rather than wilt under the pressure, Manchester City brushed aside Arsenal to regain its league-leading status in the Prem.
If so, congratulations. You have something in common with that soon-to-be-French comic icon Monsieur David Beckham. It was Becks who proclaimed that City had "no chance" to win the league because United possesses more experienced players and the most puce-faced of managers. Oh, how the French media will love his trenchant analysis of Ligue 1 once he brings his MLS Cup-winning form to Paris Saint-Germain for a tres cool $18 million.

Beckham's clueless punditry aside (you'd think he'd be more in tune to the subtle machinations of the Prem, considering that his best friend is Gary "I may have been a rat-faced windbag as a player but now I'm the new Andy Gray" Neville), City, it turns out, is just fine. Flipping the old "1-0 to the Arsenal" on its ear, the league leader returned the Prem to its regularly scheduled programming after a brief interruption -- four hours to be precise -- during which United fans rejoiced at the prospect of overtaking their loathsome nouveau riche neighbors for the first time since Oct. 15.

"Hey, have you seen the table lately?" the United contingent at my watering hole bellowed throughout the first 53 pell-mell minutes of the deadlocked City-Arsenal game. Then Silva pounced on the rebound of a fierce Balotelli drive to make it 1-0 and the only sound you heard was the dejected sighs of some 30 United fans simultaneously holstering their league table-checking iPhones. City had passed the gut check, and I had the pleasure of watching a bevy of Red Devils slink into the gloaming, their tails tucked quietly between their Chicharito jerseys and their Wayne Rooney hairpieces.

Despite the narrow margin of victory -- and the fact that City allowed the Gunners to have more possession, a rarity at the Etihad -- the win was proof that Mancini had stared down his side's first intimations of adversity and buried them in the plot reserved for Carlos Tevez's Prem career. Knowing that United had vaulted over it into first place, City could have easily wilted in the face of a resurgent Arsenal and its own internecine ego battles. The cut-and-thrust of the first 45 minutes made for breathless entertainment as the surprisingly resilient Gunners stood in the middle of the ring trading punches with City. By halftime, only Theo Walcott looked like he had taken one too many shots to his reputation.

And yet, Arsene Wenger's boys couldn't keep City out forever, especially when the Sky Blues began the second half in such a frisky mood -- and by frisky mood I don't mean grappling with each other on the field. Even Balotelli resisted the urge to get his funk on when Mancini hauled him off in the 73rd minute. Granted, he didn't exactly radiate Christmas cheer toward his manager, but the Italian man-child also didn't go all "Cincinnati versus Xavier" on his manager, either.

David Hirshey
For more from David Hirshey, check out his columns on all things soccer.
• City handed first EPL loss
• Chelsea pushed to brink
• Fragile egos crossing
• City and United
• Is Newcastle for real?
• The bad-behavior derby
• The table has turned
• Stoke is stoked
• Prem's ugliest feuds
• The Premier Liga
• Lessons of transfer window
• Manchester City's egos
• Is Arsenal disarmed?
• The more things change
• United tops predictions
• A primer on eve of EPL
• Klinsmann brings hope

Rather, it was Mancini who nearly combusted in the 63rd minute, when Samir Nasri overhit a pass to Balotelli, who was staring down a wide-open goal. The normally suave Italian had worked himself up into such a lather on the touchline that he shoved assistant coach David Platt for having the temerity to try to interrupt his frothing.

As much delight as I took in Mancini's verbal assault on the Gooner-deserting-for-double-his-salary swine, little Samir didn't play badly, although you felt the stadium announcer was indulging in a bit of Wenger-baiting mischief in proclaiming him Man of the Match. Certainly Vincent Kompany, Hart, Gareth Barry (who quietly did plenty of dirty work to neuter Aaron Ramsey and Mikel Arteta in midfield) and Silva had more impressive games than the traitorous Frenchman.

For Arsenal, this was, as Wenger said in his prematch press conference, a chance to measure "how far we can go." On Sunday's evidence, it's safe to say that the Gunners can probably go far enough for a nice vacation, but they definitely won't make it all the way to Hawaii, if you know what I mean. They are now 12 points behind City, and though they memorably closed a similar gap to overtake United for the title in 1998, the last time I checked they no longer have a multitude of game-changers such as Thierry Henry, Dennis Bergkamp and Patrick Vieira to make such seismic comebacks look mundane.

Wait, maybe that's why Wenger talked this week of still considering a short-term loan for Henry in the January transfer window. Not that the Red Bulls captain qualifies anymore as a difference-maker, but perhaps his guile and pedigree would lessen the burden on Robin van Persie. After all, the flying Dutchman can't bail out the Gunners every single game, and against City he was effectively grounded by the twin shin bashers of Kompany and his old Gunners pal Kolo "Diet Pills" Toure. Not that an atypically muted performance could stop the City fans from gleefully taunting Arsenal with chants of "van Persie is ours," a reminder that the club's financial muscle had prized Nasri, Toure, Gael Clichy and Emmanuel Adebayor from the Emirates since Sheikh Mansour's checkbook arrived in Eastlands.

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Clive Brunskill/Getty Images
City managed to do what most teams can't -- keep Robin van Persie off the scoreboard.
If it's any consolation to Wenger, City appears to have no interest in Walcott after another exasperating performance from the England winger, who time and again squandered his searing speed and trickery in a Charmin-soft matchup against ponderous right-back turned left-back Pablo Zabaleta. Walcott's ineptitude allowed City to counter with pace and precision, and only a string of acrobatic parries from Wojciech Szczesny and a handful of well-timed interventions from Thomas Vermaelen and Laurent Koscielny kept City from running up the score. As improved as Koscielny has been over the past couple of months, it was his brain freeze that permitted Balotelli to sneak unmarked down the left and then skip inside Alex Song's air tackle to unleash the shot that the opportunistic Silva stabbed home on the rebound.

And so, City's victory not only restores its alpha dog Prem standing -- the Sky Blues remain two points ahead of the pesky, barnacle-like United, which refuses to go away -- but marks a remarkable run at the Etihad in which the Sky Blues won 26-of-28 despite never quite reaching the transcendent heights Sunday that have defined their streak.

As for Arsenal, its determined climb back to fourth may have fallen short but it can take comfort in its newfound mettle since its eight-ful last visit to Manchester. Still, moral victories don't make up the difference between Champions League qualification and Thursday night trips to Moldova. And if the Wenger's men should indeed stumble, well, I wouldn't be surprised if the Man City fans get their Christmas wish and end up stealing away a certain high-scoring Dutchman. On behalf of all Gooners, I hope that Dutchman turns out to be Rafael van der Vaart.

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Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC /Getty Images
Did Chelsea's AVB underestimate Wigan? It certainly seemed so given his starting XI and odd substitutions.
Yo-yo alert: Chelsea back in crisis!

Another weekend, another Prem learning experience for Andre Villas-Boas. Lately, it's been all about handling the vicissitudes of Fading Frank Lampard's emotional well-being or knowing which on-air pundit to attack for questioning his managerial philosophy. It goes to show that even though he's squatting on the touchline like a dog sizing up a hydrant, AVB always has to be on his toes.

But Saturday's lesson was particularly harsh, as the Portuguese Man of War failed to remember the most basic of tenets -- be wary of the "trap" game. With Chelsea coming off the twin jet streams of CL qualification and knocking City from the perch of the unbeaten and a pivotal derby match against Spurs looming for Thursday, Wigan was begging to be taken lightly. Perhaps it was Villas-Boas undefeated league jaunt with FC Porto last season that led the barely post-pubescent manager to get so very, very cute with his starting XI and subs.

While the hapless Latics probably don't require too much attention -- they miraculously escaped relegation last season with eight points from their final four games and lost eight straight this year between mid-September and November -- AVB's tactics made certain the Blues would step right into the steaming pile.

From the opening kickoff, everything about Chelsea suggested it believed its mere attendance at DFW Stadium should merit the three points. With Lampard and Raul Meireles clogging the middle like unwanted hair in your sink, Chelsea's pace was Evertonian. The last time the Blues visited Wigan, they cruised, 6-0. That's bad in tennis and worse in soccer, so AVB certainly rolled out a set of players who thought of this one as a freebie.

For starters, the manager chose not to play David Luiz in a game that cried out for pace, creativity and an unruly mane of curly hair. Then, perhaps in the giving spirit of the season, AVB bent to internal pressure to give the ghost of Chelsea past in the No. 8 shirt a chance to prove that he could still start in a league that didn't begin with the letters M-L-S. Lamp's Arshavin-esque, listless 90 minutes were so lacking in influence that the one bit of Chelsea inspiration happened while the midfielder was off the field getting treatment for a bloody lip. In the 59th minute, Ashley Cole launched a raking 50-yard cross-field pass for Daniel Sturridge, who cushioned it immaculately in flight, held off a defender and drilled the ball past Ali Al-Habsi -- a sublime goal that should have opened the floodgates.

Instead, AVB suddenly developed Scottish bloodlines and started making substitutions straight from the Book of McLeish. Seven minutes after the goal, off came the Spanish schemer, Juan Mata, for John Obi Mikel's reductive presence, and suddenly Wigan gained greater control as Roberto Martinez countered by throwing on two extra strikers with 20 minutes to play. Then, with only a single sub remaining (Oriol Romeu was off at halftime), AVB inexplicably took off Sturridge and, even more terrifyingly for anyone who had bet the over, let Florent Malouda onto the field.

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That the 88th minute equalizer was started by yet another ex-Chelsea starlet, Franco Di Santo, added a little seasoning to the pot that was already on the boil. Lampard was busy looking for his yesteryear and Branislav Ivanovic was flailing about like a fish on a trawler deck. And gimpy, masked man Petr Cech tipped over like a sectional sofa before spilling Hugo Rodallega's (my favorite Will Ferrell movie) toe poke straight into the path of Jordi Gomez, the one Wigan player in good enough form to claim a tap-in so simple that even Fernando Torres (left on the bench again, presumably to stay healthy ahead of the transfer window) could have converted. On second thought, the way his season has been going, Torres would have probably conjured up a way to blaze that sitter over the bar.

No doubt the hypersensitive AVB will feel aggrieved by the result, but the numbers suggest otherwise: Wigan had the greater share of possession (51-49); more shots on goal (14-11) and on target (6-2); more corners (7-5); and frankly, more to feel good about (two wins and two draws in its last five games). The most painful fact for Chelsea fans is that Wigan seems as likely to win the league as does Chelsea. I wonder how Roman Abramovich feels about that.

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Atletico's despair, Ronaldo's rant

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:18 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

A prominent but currently unemployed English Premier League football coach phoned me the other day to ask about jobs in Spain. The conversation was soon steered to Atletico Madrid, and I said with conviction, "Don't touch it with a barge pole."

He found that hard to understand and moved off the topic with the thought that "if you do make a good job of it and turn them around, you'll be regarded as a guru ... a legend."

He was right about that, but I'm certain that the same thought has flitted through the minds of the coaches who have tried to make something out of the Rojiblancos -- a club that has burned through an average of one coach per year since the mid-1990s. Nineteen of them, in fact, since 1995.

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Shaun Botterill/Getty Images
Is Luis Aragones the man to save Atletico?
This past weekend, the fans roared their fury, their frustration and what increasingly sounds to me like their desperation at manager Gregorio Manzano. He was roundly abused, and soon, he'll be the next sacrificial lamb.

You can take issue with whatever it is you dislike about Manzano's playing ethos, his decisions or his dour schoolmasterlike manner if you really want to. But he is not the problem. Nor were many of his predecessors. The fans began chanting loudly for the return of the messiah (it's that time of year), Luis "Big Boots" Aragones.

Aragones was one of their most emblematic players ever. Fearsomely tough and aggressive, shot like a thunderbolt, a hunger to score goals and a proper leader "Zapatones," as he was known, led Atletico to glory. He has subsequently become legendary not only for coaching Spain to the Euro 2008 crown but also for his battles against alcohol, depression and other afflictions.

Despite his age, the 73-year-old Aragones gives off the air of being indomitable, and I'd guess that he is exactly the kind of man who could come in, scare the bejesus out of a few players, tighten up the defending and put the results on an upward curve. The same can probably be said of Diego Simeone, Atletico's former Argentine midfielder who appears to be hovering over Manzano's position.

But in due course the same problems would surge up. The club owes a couple of hundred million euros, some of which is to the taxman. It regularly signs poor players, failing to get good value for money in the transfer market. And, to be blunt, Atletico is not a well-run club.

A new stadium is in the offing, but, horror of horrors, there is the danger of a similar situation engulfing this famous, passionate and valuable club that has done so much damage to Valencia. The problems are not identical, but there is a definite air of decay and despair just at the time when the new stadium will be constructed -- which will add to Atletico's financial burden and require the club to start packing the place to the rafters with fans to begin reducing the debt.

Aragones is also known as the Wise Man of Hortaleza, an ironic nickname that emanated from his birthplace and a wisecrack he once made about his own brother. If he is wise, then Big Boots -- who helped Atletico reach the European Cup final in 1974 -- will steer clear for his own health and well being.

Simeone is a different case. He's young, smart, vital. But if he takes over and temporarily improves the situation, Atletico still must stop trying to plaster over long-term problems so that shrewder heads can be brought to the board and the technical department. It's the only way for Atletico to pull itself out of the mire.

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AP Photo/Angel Fernandez
After scoring his 13th hat trick for Madrid this past weekend, Ronaldo hit back at his critics: "They know nothing about football," he said.
Ronaldo hits back at his critics

My position on the Cristiano Ronaldo question is not only well-known, it was established long enough ago that when the Real Madrid striker had a little rant at the end of the 6-2 defeat of Sevilla this past weekend, I was delighted to hear his tone getting aggressive and his voice being raised.

"They know nothing about football," Ronaldo said of his principal critics. His fury was not simply at being criticized, but at the ridiculous reaction to the fact that he had a poor game in the Clasico. Suddenly, in some quarters, football was not a team game. Suddenly, the fact that Madrid was completely overrun in midfield and defended inadequately became less important. Ronaldo missed some chances and didn't have the capacity to, as they say, "win the game on his own." The fact remains that the Portuguese is Madrid's best footballer, his scoring rate remains record-breaking and the only trophy (in fact, match) that Jose Mourinho has won against Pep Guardiola's Barcelona happened to occur when Ronaldo scored a brilliantly created and dispatched header during the Copa Del Rey final in April.

I reject the idea that Ronaldo cannot rise to the occasion against Barcelona. While he has been at Madrid there has been a Barcelona superiority that is so overwhelming that Ronaldo's team creates fewer chances. And Mourinho's tactics often isolate the striker.
What Ronaldo is capable of doing for his team is ensuring that it wins the title even if Madrid cannot beat Barcelona one-on-one. If his response is as aggressive, consistent and determined throughout the remainder of the season as it was during the destruction of Sevilla, when he scored his 13th Real Madrid hat trick, Barca will have implacable opponents, and we will all have a great title race.

Graham Hunter
For more Graham Hunter, check out his columns on all things La Liga and Spanish soccer.
• Barca beats Madrid again
• Spain's three kings
• Ibra's book of nonsense
• Spain's balance of power
• Rossi's injury huge blow
• La Liga's ultimate late bloomer
• Messi chasing Barca record
• Laporta's fall from grace
• Barca's off-the-pitch battle
• Real Madrid's game plan
• Spain's cause for concern
• Can Messi stay motivated?
• Real closing gap on Barca
• The magic of Malaga
• Positives from Clasico
• The mind of Mourinho
• Barca's net asset
• Now or never for Real
• Barca vs. Arsenal

Barcelona's battle-tested triumph

Watching Lionel Messi & Co. win the Club World Cup this past weekend reminded me of Manchester United's run to the Champions League final 12 years ago. Let me take you back to 1999 and the news conference that United's Sir Alex Ferguson gave in advance of the final against Bayern Munich. That was, of course, the Red Devils' treble-winning season, and because they faced a last-day championship decider against Spurs plus an FA Cup final against Newcastle ahead of playing Bayern at Camp Nou, the media day for that glorious Champions League occasion was nearly two full weeks in advance.

The German side had wrapped up the Bundesliga title and looked like very muscular opponents. I was sitting next to a German journalist who said to Ferguson, "Our team has all its work done, the title won and time to rest and recuperate before playing you in Barcelona. Meanwhile, you have got nonstop battles in the league and the cup -- that's a massive disadvantage to United, isn't it?"

Without breaking stride to reflect on his answer, Fergie said: "Let's wait and see. We will be in battle mode, and perhaps your players will be too rested."

For most of that Champions League final, it looked as though the German journalist had won the argument just as Bayern was winning the match. But United was, in fact, battle-hardened -- it fought to the dramatic end, and Bayern's players proved to be less well-conditioned, less well-toned. They dozed off and lost.

In many ways, the Club World Cup which Barcelona has just won, in remarkable style, was reminiscent of that situation -- if not the drama of the match. Santos had finished its domestic business, had the chance to rest and train for a performance with flourish, while Barcelona was coping from weeks of injuries, testing games and irregular defending.

But Pep Guardiola has proved an absolute master of simmering his team when the workload needs to be handled. And he has almost always been able to then draw the absolute mental and physical best out of his squad when the moment of truth arrives.

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That's why Barcelona looked mobile, fitter, quicker, more agile and dominant while the Brazilians appeared short of pace and slower to react, and with all due respect, they were Barcelona's playthings.

So spectacular was the destruction of the South America champions that the praise has all flooded toward Messi and Xavi rather than the manager. But Guardiola prepared his men to peak for three games: the Clasico, the Club World Cup semifinal and final. The results were impressive: Barcelona won all three matches, scoring 11 and conceding only once. Just one more absolutely immense piece of work from this man who is about to start figuring out whether he will sign a contract renewal. How everyone associated with the Camp Nou must pray that his decision is to stay rather than test himself somewhere else.

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The Fabulous and the Flops of NFL Week 15

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:18 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

As always, we detail the sordid and the successful every Tuesday in our weekly look back at the previous weekend's games; this is "The Fabulous and the Flops" for Week 15.

This week, we'll identify the player who might qualify as the worst backup quarterback … ever. We'll point out which quarterback looks like a different man during the second half, try to compare a player to a couch, and note which head coach was brave enough to own up to his mistakes on Sunday. We'll start, though, with the blowout from last Thursday night.

Atlanta Falcons 41, Jacksonville Jaguars 14

Fabulous: John Abraham, who pulled his season from the category of "disappointing" into "productive" by virtue of a 3.5-sack day against embattled Jaguars starter Blaine Gabbert. Those sacks produced a whopping 35.5 yards, and Abraham was able to force a fumble on two of them. That big day gives him 8.5 on the year, and it might just kick-start a Falcons pass rush that's been one of the worst in football this season; consider that fellow starting end Ray Edwards, who was signed this offseason to kick the pass rush into high gear, has just 3.5 sacks this season.

Flop: The Atlanta running game. Jacksonville had a very good run defense during the first half of the season, but injuries have turned that unit into an average group of run stoppers at best. The Falcons, who have prided themselves on running the ball since the arrival of Michael Turner in 2008, should have been able to piece together some serious yardage once Atlanta got out to an early lead. Instead, its three running backs ran the ball 32 times and gained just 93 yards. Blech. Those runs produced just six first downs, and Atlanta is now averaging 3.9 yards per carry on the year, which is good for 25th in the league. Don't get fooled and think it's 2008: This is a terrible running game.

Dallas Cowboys 31, Tampa Bay Buccaneers 15

Fabulous: Tony Romo, who continues to play great football in December despite his win-loss record. He benefited from the injury-enforced absence of Aqib Talib after the first quarter, but 23-of-30 for 249 yards with three scores is pretty impressive. That brings his December totals up to a stunning 72-of-103 (69.9 percent) for 869 yards, and Romo has thrown eight touchdowns without having a pass intercepted. For his career, he now has a 98.1 passer rating in September, a 91.6 figure in October, rising to 111.4 in November, and then falling to 86.3 in December. That's just not a big difference. If you're reading into those numbers and suggesting that Romo plays worse in December, you're creating an effect that isn't there.

Flop: Jeremy Trueblood. The Tampa Bay right tackle was ninth on our list of the 25 least valuable players in the NFL before the season, but after being benched following an injury during the 2010 season, he's gotten his job back in 2011. If Saturday night was a good example of how he's played this season, he should lose it again before 2012 starts. Trueblood allowed pass pressures on each of the first two plays from scrimmage for the Buccaneers offense. Later on, he let Marcus Spears slip into the backfield to stop LeGarrette Blount on a third-and-1, and DeMarcus Ware's lone sack of the game came at Trueblood's expense.

Miami Dolphins 30, Buffalo Bills 23

Fabulous: Reggie Bush. Is it really time to start regarding Reggie Bush as a legitimate NFL running back? Much like Marshawn Lynch, Bush has followed years of mediocrity with an impressive multi-game stretch toward the end of the 2011 season. On Sunday, he had 203 yards on 25 carries, including a 76-yard scamper through the middle of a rain-soaked field with one of the better illegal touchdown celebrations you'll ever see. That marked his third consecutive game with 100 yards or more, as Bush now has run for 406 yards on 61 carries in December. Before this year, Bush had run for 100 yards in a game exactly once as a pro, and that came in 2006. Give credit to the Dolphins: They believed that they could get more out of Bush as a pure running back than the Saints had. And give credit to Bush, too; he now has more rushing yards than he had over his final three seasons as a Saints player combined, and he's averaging five yards per carry.

Flop: Ryan Fitzpatrick. His numbers don't look awful, as he went 31-of-47 for 316 yards with two touchdowns and three picks, but that's a lot of work in garbage time. Through the first three quarters of the game, Fitzy was 12-of-24 for 137 yards with all three of those picks. Even if you throw in those fourth quarter numbers, though, Fitzpatrick has entirely fallen off over the second half. If you split his season in half at the Redskins game, you basically see two different players:

The Collapse of Ryan Fitzpatrick
Cmp Att Cmp% Yds Yds/Att TD INT
Games 1-7 155 229 67.7% 1,739 7.6 14 7
Games 8-14 154 267 57.7% 1,590 6.0 8 12
Before 2011, Ryan Fitzpatrick had completed 57.8 percent of his passes and averaged 6.0 yards per attempt. Which of these two halves do you think is more representative of Fitzpatrick's actual ability?

Seattle Seahawks 38, Chicago Bears 14

Fabulous: Bears run defense. Remember how we noted two weeks ago that it might be time to take Marshawn Lynch seriously? Well, the Bears weren't convinced. Despite facing umpteen short fields and sudden possessions after turnovers, they shut down what had been a very effective Seattle running game. Lynch was held to 42 yards on 20 carries, and the rest of the team had 10 carries for 18 yards. Six of Lynch's carries went for no gain or a loss. This defense deserves better than …

Flop: Caleb Hanie, who serves as another example of why you can't take one quarter of action very seriously. In last year's playoffs, Hanie came in after Jay Cutler got hurt and Todd Collins 0 for 4 performance basically signed the death warrant on his own career. The Bears took Hanie's play as a sign that he was ready to be Jay Cutler's primary backup, and while he was an upgrade over the atrocious Collins, he's not an NFL quarterback. After his latest start, Hanie's thrown 102 passes and completed 51 of them, for a completion percentage at an even 50 percent. He's thrown nine interceptions, producing an interception rate of 8.8 percent. Nobody has thrown interceptions that frequently over 100 or more pass attempts in 23 years! Steve Grogan narrowly beat it out in 1988. After you adjust for the era Hanie plays in, pro-football-reference.com suggests that Hanie's been worse at avoiding picks than anybody in NFL history since the merger. Hanie's also been sacked on a whopping 14.5 percent of his dropbacks. PFR suggests that only three players since the merger, after adjusting for era, have gone down more frequently. Bottom line: Caleb Hanie might be the worst quarterback to throw 100 passes since the AFL merged with the NFL. If Chicago's backup had merely been below average, their defense would likely have been enough to get them into the playoffs. Instead, they will spend their January on the finest golf courses in America.

Carolina Panthers 28, Houston Texans 13

Fabulous: Panthers coach Ron Rivera, who ran a fumblerooski play for a touchdown that he said was motivated by The Annexation of Puerto Rico from the legendary early-nineties movie The Little Giants. Ironically, if you watch the final ten minutes of the Giants-Cowboys game from The Little Giants, it's very similar to the final ten minutes of the actual Giants-Cowboys game from a couple of weeks ago.

Flop: Johnathan Joseph. Joseph has been one of the best cornerbacks in football this season, but Steve Smith had a great game against him on Sunday. Smith caught five of the seven passes thrown to him and gained 82 yards, including a 26-yard touchdown pass where he torched Joseph for six.

Indianapolis Colts 27, Tennessee Titans 13

Fabulous: Pat Angerer. Perhaps the only young Colts player exhibiting star potential during this dismal season, Angerer was all over the field on Sunday. He made 12 tackles during the game, including two behind the line of scrimmage for losses. He was superb in coverage on underneath routes, breaking up a pass while going out to defend against Chris Johnson numerous times in the flat. Oh, and Angerer made big plays in the fourth quarter. First, he forced a fumble out of tight end Jared Cook after a 27-yard completion, giving the Colts a key possession to take time off of the clock. Then, after a Johnson touchdown was called back after the star back was ruled down by contact, Angerer picked off Matt Hasselbeck in the endzone, preserving Indy's 20-6 lead.

Flop: Joseph Addai. While Donald Brown ran for 161 yards on 16 carries and sealed the game up with an 80-yard scamper deep into the fourth quarter, Addai was a stopper for the Indy offense. He got 13 touches (11 carries, two receptions) and produced a total of 27 yards. Addai finished the day with just two first downs. Everyone on the Colts roster should be celebrating their first victory of the season, but Addai should be doing so quietly in the corner.

Kansas City Chiefs 19, Green Bay Packers 14

Fabulous: The Kansas City offensive line. We gave them some credit yesterday, but let's call some extra attention to the great work done by the Chiefs' offensive line in pass protection. With a quarterback taking regular snaps for the first time in two months and an elite pass rusher on the other side of the field, the Chiefs built their gameplan around play-action passes and an upright, unmolested Orton. Thirty-one dropbacks later, Orton had been knocked down just once and went the entire game without being sacked. He was rarely hurried and had extra time to stare down the receiver on a number of his big plays.

Flop: Jermichael Finley. Safety is the weakest link in Kansas City's defense, so it was only natural that the Packers would target players like Reshard Langford and Sabby Piscitelli by getting Finley up the field. When he got there, though, he left the ball behind. Finley caught just three of the 10 passes thrown to him, and while one of them was a wildly impressive 41-yard snatch, his drops were the biggest reasons why the Packers only scored 14 points.

New Orleans Saints 42, Minnesota Vikings 20

Fabulous: Drew Brees. Shocking, huh? As it turns out, 32-of-40 for 412 yards with five touchdowns is enough to qualify as a good day. Granted, it was against a Vikings defense that has seen its secondary make its own play calls at times this year, but Brees just about played a perfect football game. One stat note: Brees was recorded as having fumbled a ball away during this game, but it's an absurd assignment of value. With Brees in the shotgun, center Brian de la Puente snapped the ball past Brees while the quarterback was changing his protection. 15 yards later, the Vikings fell on it. This was a play that had virtually nothing to do with Brees and wasn't remotely his fault, but because the NFL has to assign fumbles to somebody, the quarterback gets the blame here.

Flop: Christian Ponder. Again, take disappointing raw numbers (14-for-31, 120 yards, two touchdowns, one interception) and then discount them for garbage time. In the first half, Ponder was 4-of-8 for 18 yards. His Vikings went to halftime trailing by just eight because the Saints fumbled the ball away inside their own 30-yard line on two different drives. The ensuing Minnesota drives went for a total of -10 yards and produced two field goals. During the third quarter, Ponder was 0-for-5 with an intentional grounding penalty. The only Vikings first down of the quarter came when Ponder took a sack and Roman Harper was called for a late hit. Ponder threw for just one first down (a 10-yard touchdown pass to Toby Gerhart) before the fourth quarter, at which point his team was down 29 points. Donovan McNabb, sitting on his couch, is a better quarterback than Christian Ponder is right now. Sorry, that's an extraneous comma. Let's try that again … Donovan McNabb sitting on his couch is a better quarterback than Christian Ponder is right now. As in, if you carried McNabb onto the field on his couch, had him throw passes and take snaps out of the shotgun while he sat on said couch, and then had two offensive linemen matriculate him up the field after each completion like he was Byron Leftwich, McNabb would still be better than Christian Ponder.

Washington Redskins 23, New York Giants 10

Fabulous: The Washington secondary. The Eli Manning who looked unstoppable against the Cowboys in the fourth quarter was silenced by an oft-maligned group of defenders on Sunday. Missing star safety LaRon Landry, DeAngelo Hall's defense stepped up and made a number of big plays to create and preserve a Redskins sweep over Big Blue. The Redskins broke up 12 of Manning's 40 pass attempts, including ten passes defensed by members of the secondary. Those defensive backs also picked Manning off three times, including an interception in the end zone by Josh Wilson while the Giants were within one touchdown of the lead during the fourth quarter.

Flop: Hakeem Nicks. Nicks' drop came on one of the few times the Giants had a receiver run free downfield, and while we can't give Nicks credit for breaking up a pass that was intended to himself, it was a drop that cost his team seven points. That was the beginning of a frustrating day at the office for Nicks, who caught just five of the 12 passes thrown in his direction, gaining a mundane 73 yards.

Cincinnati Bengals 20, St. Louis Rams 13

Fabulous: Kellen Clemens. 25-of-36 for 229 yards with a touchdown and no picks for a guy who wasn't good enough to play ahead of Mark Sanchez and only signed with the Rams 11 days before his start? That's actually pretty impressive. You know what's really scary? The Rams had 210 net passing yards, and that was the first time they had gone over 200 yards since Week 9. Clemens' offense also went through an entire game without turning the ball over, which was the first time all season that the Rams made it through 60 minutes without a giveaway. Insert your own seat/tickets joke here. (Clemens did fumble once, but his team recovered it, so there was even a bit of luck involved there.)

Flop: Cedric Benson. 22 carries for 76 yards and a touchdown. Not great, but no reason to nominate the guy as the flop of the game, right? Well, dig a little deeper. Benson fumbled three different times on Sunday, recovering two of them himself while getting Jerome Simpson to recover the third. That the Bengals recovered all three fumbles is serendipity, not skill. He did all this against a run defense that's allowed 4.8 yards per attempt, the fifth-highest rate in football. Cincinnati finished with just 110 yards rushing; only three teams all season have failed to hit that total against the grotesque Rams ground defense.

Detroit Lions 28, Oakland Raiders 27

Fabulous: Calvin Johnson. OK, so he's not really injured. Maybe he was just resting. This, though, is the Megatron that the Lions need to make it into the playoffs. It was, considering the meaningful context, Johnson's best game as a pro: 9-of-14 for 214 yards with two touchdowns, including the game-winner with 43 seconds left. On the final drive, Johnson was basically uncoverable, picking up receptions for 21 and 48 yards and drawing a defensive pass-interference call against Stanford Routt for 17 yards before catching the touchdown pass that gave Detroit the lead. He also drew a holding call and a 14-yard DPI against Routt earlier in the game, although Johnson also took an offensive pass-interference call himself.

Flop: Hue Jackson. Not only was Jackson incredibly naive to pass up the two-point conversion we discussed in Monday's column, he appears to be doubling down on ignorance. He blamed Johnson's 48-yard grab on the final drive on middle linebacker Rolando McClain, noting that the Raiders were in the Tampa-2 defensive scheme on the play and that it was McClain's responsibility to travel back and cover the middle of the field. Jackson's correct, but it's unreasonable to expect a middle linebacker to go stride-for-stride up the seam with one of the league's dominant wideouts for 40 yards. With that in mind, it was probably really, really stupid to call for a vanilla zone coverage on Detroit's drive for the game without getting some sort of double-team on the Lions' best offensive weapon.

Arizona Cardinals 20, Cleveland Browns 17

Fabulous: Greg Little. In what might be the league's most stultifying offense, Little has been earmarked as the most plausible path to excitement. During an up-and-down rookie season, Little hasn't delivered very much. Against the Cards, though, Little had a 76-yard touchdown catch that gave the Browns the lead with 18 minutes to go, and he threw in catches of 15 and 29 yards to supplement his big day. He finished with five catches on nine targets for 131 yards.

Flop: Seneca Wallace. The ol' scrambler showed some gumption during his first start of the season, but he gave away a fumble at the wrong time. With a three-point lead and third-and-15 facing Cleveland on their own 14-yard line, the Browns could have simply run a draw play or some other safe handoff and punted. Their upside, the odds of converting third-and-15, was very slim. The downside, of course, was enormous; playing field position with John Skelton could have possibly set the Browns up to win the game. Instead, Wallace was sacked and fumbled (upon review), and while Skelton's offense moved the ball backwards a full ten yards in three plays, it set up the game-tying field goal.

New England Patriots 41, Denver Broncos 23

Fabulous: Denver's running game. The Broncos simply could not be stopped on the ground, running for a whopping 252 yards on 31 carries while scoring three times. These weren't runs in garbage time, either; Denver had 20 carries for 182 yards and two scores in the first half. The only things that actually did stop the Broncos from running the ball were turnovers, since the Broncos fumbled the ball away to the Patriots twice on running plays, turning the game around after a hot Broncos start.

Flop: BenJarvus Green-Ellis. We've said this before, but the Law Firm might be closing up shop very soon in New England. Green-Ellis is on the field because he's a vicious pure runner; there are plenty of guys on the roster who are faster, better at receiving, and superior at pass-blocking. For BJGE to be worth a roster spot, he needs to run efficiently and consistently. Instead? Green-Ellis ran for 17 yards on 10 carries against the Broncos, scoring on a one-yard plunge in the fourth quarter.

Philadelphia Eagles 45, New York Jets 19

Fabulous: LeSean McCoy. Take out the middle of the season and Shady is a legitimate MVP candidate! Most voters do tend to count the middle of the year, though, and so Shady will end up finishing relatively low on the charts. The Eagles were gifted with some short fields on Sunday, but McCoy made the most of them. His 18 carries produced 102 yards, including a 33-yard score that was one of his three touchdowns on the day. He now holds the Eagles record for most touchdowns in one season, beating out Hall of Famer Steve Van Buren.

Flop: Santonio Holmes. Holmes would eventually catch four of the six passes thrown to him and pick up a 25-yard score, but he also ended two early Jets drives. One saw him fumble away a short pass that was promptly returned for a touchdown, and, nonplussed, Holmes tipped a pass intended for him into the arms of Asante Samuel for an interception.

San Diego Chargers 34, Baltimore Ravens 14

Fabulous: Antwan Barnes. Just the latest ex-Eagles pass rusher to break out somewhere else (see: Clemons, Chris and Babin, Jason), Barnes hit double digits in sacks for the first time in his career by dropping Joe Flacco four different times on Sunday. That's 11 sacks for Barnes on the year. He also had two other tackles for loss in the running game.

Flop: John Harbaugh. He was a flop on Sunday, but let's give Harbaugh some credit for what he did the next day. After failing to use his timeouts late in the first half to give the Ravens a shot at a two-minute drill, Harbaugh looked pretty bad. After thinking about it, he came back out on Monday and admitted that he screwed up. It's not a huge deal that he screwed up, since every coach does. It's good, though, that Harbaugh recognized his mistake and was willing to admit it. Most coaches would be afraid or unwilling to admit that they were wrong. Good for Harbaugh.

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Stephen Curry Goes Back to School

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:10 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

Stephen Curry steered his black SUV into a parking spot on the campus of Davidson College, the small liberal arts institution outside of Charlotte, N.C. He stepped out carefully to make sure his white shoes remained that way. It had rained, and the sun will make only a few scarce appearances throughout the day. Curry was bleary-eyed and caught in a mistake that most college students avoid at all costs: He had enrolled in a morning class.

Some NBA players played overseas during the lockout and kept up their basketball acumen. Some made music videos, and others disappeared from the public spotlight. About 45 players, including Curry, resumed college work they brushed aside to become professionally eligible. The trek is not really new. A healthy number of players return to school each summer. But one of the scant benefits of the extended offseason and lockout is that it allowed some players to make real dents in those long-dismissed credits.

Curry is on his way to a long, successful NBA career. He is the kind of baby-faced, good-natured player around which a team can genuinely market itself. A sociology degree is not necessary to make all of that happen. But the gravitational pull between Curry and Davidson is substantial and homey. It is more pronounced in an era of one-and-done players freshly removed from the generation of prep-to-pros. Curry helped put the school on the map, as far as basketball aficionados are concerned, with the school's 2008 run. "Heck yeah, I have," Curry said when asked if he thinks often about walking. "I went to my class's graduation last year. My roommate and some of the other guys I went to school with walked, and I celebrated with them. They have an annual graduation for all the members of the team. I want that."

The NBA, for Curry, embodied a fanciful dream. The degree represented a tangible goal, until the priorities and reality oddly flip-flopped a few years ago. Curry is the son of the sharpshooter Dell Curry. He developed late and could not even convince his father's school, Virginia Tech, to offer a scholarship. Instead, he went to Davidson, where they do laundry for students, tests are unsupervised, and students sign an honor code. The school has produced 23 Rhodes Scholars, but just five NBA players.

When Curry departed for the NBA and the Golden State Warriors after his junior year, he told his parents and coach Bob McKillop that he would return to finish his degree. Or they told him. Sometimes, Curry thinks that McKillop's cursory looks are a sign for him to hurry up, lest he mess with McKillop's pristine graduation rate. "He always gives me this look," Curry said. "I can't tell if he's thinking that in his head, but that's what I think."

On his first day back at Davidson this semester, a professor asked if "Wardell Curry" was present. "Yeah," Curry said meekly to the announcement of his seldom-used first name, "Most people just call me Stephen." And there was the time a student discreetly tried to take his picture in class and the flash blinded Curry. "Were my eyes open?" Curry asked afterward. "Yeah, thanks," the student sheepishly replied.

Curry walked into the student union after exiting his car. He stopped at a computer to check whether a professor had e-mailed back a response to a question. The college activated Curry's e-mail when he reenrolled. He started receiving about four or five e-mails a week soon after. Some students inquired about his availability for pickup games, and others wanted autographs. "I answer the ones that make sense to," he said.

He left the building, unfurled his umbrella again, and walked into Chambers Building. It is the academic hub of the campus and holds most of the classes. The school's enrollment is short of 2,000 people, and, even if you are not all that social, you can learn the names of most people if you stick around for a few years. Imagine Curry here in 2008. He handled the explosion of popularity well. Nearly one in four students plays a sport here, after all. Still, it occasionally unnerved him. Sometimes, he ducked into the basketball offices and hung out there for most of the day. His roommates had to sneak him into his apartment in other moments. Now Curry knows only a handful of students who were freshmen when he left, including the three seniors on this year's team.

He enrolled in three classes this semester: a class on the history of education, a medical sociology class, and today's qualitative research class. The research class is a precursor for Curry's thesis. He is planning to write on the relationship between basketball players and tattoos. He has already polled about five players and drawn a surprising correlation. Nearly all the players1 said they wouldn't have as many tattoos if they weren't in the NBA spotlight, and they certainly wouldn't be as visible, because they believed it would damage their prospects at other employment.

Curry has only one discreet tattoo on the inside of his left wrist. It reads "T.C.C." and stands for trust, commitment, and care. Curry received the tattoo along with four teammates, and it served as their motto. The idea for the thesis arrived while Curry drove to class and tuned into a sports radio show. The show's topic concerned Panthers owner Jerry Richardson apparently asking Cam Newton to refrain from any tattoos or piercings. Curry thought about the many NBA players who would have shattered that rule.

Curry talked about his findings in class and about how the paper should be framed. The class lasted a little over an hour, and Curry sat in a circle of only a dozen students. The size is comparable to the rest of Davidson's courses. The faculty-to-student ratio is about 10-to-1. "I've got some catching up to do," Curry said afterward. "These lockout negotiations have really put a dent in my classes."

He met up with one of the remaining familiar faces after class. Lauren Biggers worked as an assistant director of sports information at the school, and helped handled the onslaught of media requests. She is now in Davidson's alumni department.

"We need to talk about your outfit," Biggers said.

Davidson plays Duke the next day. It is the classic David-against-Goliath matchup, except David is Curry and he no longer plays for the school. Curry debated which team to root for. (His younger brother, Seth, is a junior at Duke.) His wardrobe is taken care of, though. He will wear a red Davidson jersey in the front with Duke colors in the back.

Biggers and Curry grabbed food, which is when Curry met his first adulation of the day. Rosemary Turner, a cafeteria worker, has waited for Curry to show since she last saw him and snapped a few pictures of him. They were now developed, ready to be signed. Curry smiled and autographed a large stack, one after another.

The talk shifted to when Curry will finally graduate.

"2041," Biggers joked.

"It depends on how you would define if everything goes right," Curry said. "Ideally, I really don't know because it could be — the earliest it could be is August. The latest is a dot, dot, dot."

In the afternoon, Curry walked to the Baker Sports Complex. Belk Arena's court is sunken and flanked by two more basketball courts at street level. The men's basketball team often switches with the women's basketball team or the volleyball team for time on the main court. The arena holds more than 5,000 people, but only when the stands from each side are compressed and loom over the action.

Curry mostly worked out during the lockout with fellow NBA Charlotteans such as Antawn Jamison and Anthony Morrow at a facility closer to Charlotte. He decided to practice with Davidson today, an act permissible by the NCAA because he is enrolled in classes. Curry parked his car in the back lot. McKillop forbids players from using the back lot, but an NBA player is afforded some privileges, right?

Not here. Curry will later return to his car having been toilet papered by Steve Rossiter, a former teammate and roommate, also in town. Brendan McKillop, one of Bob McKillop's two sons who played under him here, also watched the practice.

Curry assumed his role on the scout team in practice. Instead of Monta Ellis and David Lee, his teammates were a couple of backups, an assistant coach, and a student manager. In one of the greater ironies of the lockout, Curry played the role of Seth as Davidson prepped for Duke.

Curry, in white shorts and a white shirt that contrasted against Davidson's black jerseys, remained a respectable distance as the coaches huddled the players. The team moved on to drills and McKillop's voice boomed over the screeching shoes. "That's what we need, five guys in the right place at the right time," McKillop instructed on breaking the press. "You can take it direct, you can pull that way, you can push that way, but don't invade his space."

For a while, the NBA player on the court could not be spotted. But then the scout team switched to offense. Curry hit a couple of deep 3-pointers. "Get out," assistant coach Jim Fox told the defense. "All the way out. That's what he'll do."

With the defense stretched out on him, Curry sliced through two defenders and kissed the ball off the very top of the backboard before it flicked through the net. The practice ended, and the team packed for the bus ride to Duke. Curry stayed behind to catch up with Rossiter and Brendan McKillop, who both now live and work in New York. The familial atmosphere is a large juxtaposition to Curry's entrance into the professional world. The Warriors drafted him even though he had never worked out for them. The incumbent star guard, Ellis, immediately announced that a backcourt that consisted of the two would not work.

The sides will reach a sudden agreement to end the lockout in a few days. The movement caught a lot of people off guard, Curry included. The school will allow him to finish his two final examinations, an essay, and the 20-page research paper. Curry will try to complete them during an abbreviated training camp. It is a better option than losing all of the progress he had made. "Once training camp starts, it's going to be pretty demanding," Curry said in a follow-up talk. "I've just got to grind it out." His name will immediately be thrown into a number of trade scenarios. The most prominent talks center around Curry as the main carrot dangled to land Chris Paul. "I've been through this ever since I was drafted," Curry said. "I was drafted, and the next night I was supposed to be in an Amar'e Stoudemire trade. We've had trade rumors around our organization since I've been here. None of that's new to me. But it feels good to be relevant in basketball talks and not just about the lockout."

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Day 11: The Day After the Day the Market Crashed

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:08 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

With the 2011-12 NBA season only nine days away, we just watched the market crash faster than the housing market in 2008. Was it only last week when the following signings happened?

• Detroit re-signed Tayshaun Prince and Jonas Jerebko for $46 million combined over four years. This would have been ridiculous even if they didn't play the same position as Charlie Villanueva and Austin Daye … who, by the way, both play for the Pistons. I think this was Joe Dumars' last-ditch attempt to get fired. Next stop: robbing a liquor store.

• Minnesota paid $19 million for four years for J.J. Barea,1 making him the third free agent point guard in three years that they've signed for at least $16 million2 (even though they spent three first-round picks on point guards over that same timeframe3) and giving them three point guards for the 2011-12 season.4 I don't know what to tell you.5

• Caron Butler roofied Clippers' GM Neil Olshey, stole his corporate Clippers card and wired $24 million into Butler's checking account before Olshey woke up. Wait, that's not what happened? Sorry, I got erroneous info there. My bad. Butler really did sign for $24 million over three years, though. The Clippers spun this as "We had to lock it down, the Nets were about to give him $30 million," which should have been their first red flag: When you're bidding against a team that splurged on the likes of Travis Outlaw and Johan Petro last year, that's a pretty good sign you need to back away.

• Sacramento re-signed Marcus Thornton for $33 million over four years, which happened to be $8 million more than Orlando paid Jason Richardson. I thought that was interesting because, if everything breaks right for Thornton over these next four years, he might end up becoming a poor man's Jason Richardson. Go figure.

• Golden State struck out with Marc Gasol, Nene, Tyson Chandler, tried to overpay DeAndre Jordan (four years, $43 million), then settled on a one-year, $7 million deal for the immortal Kwame Brown. I'm not sure if "settling" is a strong enough word, to be honest. If the newly single Ashton Kutcher spent the night talking to Scarlett Johansson, Elizabeth Olsen, and Blake Lively, threw the kitchen sink at Kaley Cuoco and went home with a portly cocktail waitress, I don't think we would use the word "settling." That's basically what happened here.

• Orlando dealt Brandon Bass to Boston for Glen "Big Baby" Davis, then gave Davis $26 million over four years. I'm actually glad this happened because it allowed me to have the following exchange with my dad.

Dad: "I've always liked Brandon Bass!"
Me: "I know!"
Dad: "Big Baby was our worst player after we traded Perkins, he absolutely killed us!"
Me: "I know!"
Dad: "He couldn't do anything. He lost the ability to play basketball!"
Me: "I know!"
Dad: "And now we're paying Bass less money for less years when he's a better player!"
Me: "I know!"
Dad: "I'm really glad Otis Smith is still in the league!"
Me: "I know!"

Not every move this month was perplexing. Memphis smartly re-signed Marc Gasol (four years, $58 million). Miami spent the right amount of money on Shane "I'm not the same guy I was three years ago, but that's OK, I can still help" Battier (three years, $9.4 million). Indiana landed yet another overcompetitive guy for their overcompetitive team (David West: two years, $20 million). Dallas swooped in after Lamar Odom asked for a trade and Mitch Kupchak panicked (getting Odom for the impossibly ridiculous price of one year, $8.9 million). The Kings realized that they were building an entire roster of black holes and spent $21 million on a classic "defense-first, does the grunt work, doesn't care about stats" guy (Chuck Hayes).6

Wait, there's more! The Lakers stole Josh McRoberts for $6.1 million over two years, which would have been my single favorite signing if Portland didn't STEAL Jamal Crawford for $10 million over two years (seriously, where was everyone else on that one?????). The Clippers made the best amnesty claim of all time: Chauncey Billups for the staggeringly low, it's-almost-like-the-league-tipped-them-off-on-how -high-to-go price of $2 million. Chicago signed Rip Hamilton for the exceedingly fair price of $15 million over three years; assuming Rip has something left in the tank (and I think he does), that ranks alongside Gasol, Billups and Odom as the four biggest "Moves That Will Affect the 2012 Title Picture."7 Charlotte snared one of my favorite under-the-radar guys for $5 million over two years: Reggie Williams, a gamer and long-range sniper (2010-11: 42.3 percent 3-point FG) who toiled in obscurity for a lousy Warriors team last season. Milwaukee took a two-year, $7.5 million flyer on Mike Dunleavy Jr. If He Can Stay Healthy that I wholeheartedly supported. Dallas (Delonte West), Toronto (Aaron Gray), Phoenix (Shannon Brown), New Jersey (Shawne Williams), Atlanta (Tracy McGrady), Portland (Craig Smith) and Boston (Chris Wilcox) landed solid rotation guys for dirt cheap. And best of all, Miami locked down Mario Chalmers for the measly price of $1.2 million over three years.

(Hold on … what?)

Sorry about that — Chalmers signed for $12 million over three years. I misread that. So if you're scoring at home, LeBron, Wade and Bosh took less money so Miami could spend $40.5 million over the next three years on Chalmers, Mike Miller and Joel Anthony. Witness!

So who's left? We're only nine days away from the start of the 2011-12 season (I know, it's crazy) and by my calculations …

Six quality free agents remain: Arron Afflalo, Samuel Dalembert, Rodney Stuckey, Nick Young, Andrei Kirilenko and Kris Humphries. Poor Humphries: He's one of the league's best rebounders, only his unlikable performances on "Kourtney and Kim Take New York" have been so damaging that it actually affected his free-agent value. I'm convinced. No owner wants to be the guy who spends a lot of money on Humphries, then goes home and has his wife or daughter say, "You signed Kris Humphries??? He's a total asshole! I hate the guy! He told Kim she had a big ass and no talent last week! How could you do that????"

Three quality free agents are trapped in China until March (so you might want to save cap space for them): JR Smith, Aaron Brooks and Wilson Chandler. Expect to see those three names appear a combined 32,000 times in the columns and tweets of Marc Stein, Chad Ford and Chris Broussard over the next three months.

Two intriguing amnesty guys are available: Gilbert Arenas and Baron Davis (out for 6-8 weeks with a herniated disc). If the Knicks don't sign Baron, I'll be shocked. And if the Knicks or Lakers don't take a low-risk flyer on Arenas as a bench scorer, then clearly everyone in the NBA thinks he's gone insane, because it's insane NOT to take a flyer on that guy.8

Four players are available if you want to overpay someone who will invariably let you down: Al Thornton, Julian Wright, Yi Jianlan and Yi Jianlan's chair. I really wanted to throw Nick Young on that list, but he's probably too talented.

Five super-duper sneaky veterans are still lingering: Kenyon Martin (trapped in China), Michael Redd (couldn't he drain a few 3s for a contender?), Peja Stojakovic (ditto), DeShawn Stevenson (the LeBron stopper!) and Reggie Evans (last season: 26.5 MPG, 11.5 RPG). If the Celtics don't sign DeShawn soon, I'm throwing a tantrum. The only thing that stops LeBron better than DeShawn Stevenson is the fourth quarter.

Four other guys that I personally like (and I might be alone here): Jason Smith (a young 7-footer with a whiff of potential); Ike Diogu (a banger who played well for the Clips last year); Sasha Vujacic (trapped overseas, but he's a relatively competent backup guard, a quality agitator and someone who can ice wins for you at the free-throw line); and Nenad Krstic (also trapped overseas, possibly for as long as three years, but he's a center who drains 17-footers and isn't awful). Wait, did I just say I liked Sasha Vujacic? Let's pretend that never happened. Please. I'm begging you.

As for the rest of the free agents … I don't like anyone else. Seriously. Cross them all off. Not worth our time.

As for the remaining bidders, obviously any team can grab someone for minimum money. But I wanted to concentrate on the teams that clearly have one move (at least) to make before Opening Night. In no particular order …

INDIANA PACERS

Needs: One more impact guy. They have the cap space.

Additional Notes: As a Celtics fan, I'm officially terrified of what's happening in Indiana. Danny Granger, David West, Roy Hibbert, George Hill, Darren Collison, Tyler Hansbrough, Paul George (one of my favorite young guys) … I mean, they're a solid forward/center and/or a solid scoring guard from being a bitch in the playoffs. I really, really like this team. You know what may have changed their December game plan, though? Eric Gordon getting thrown into the Chris Paul trade. For years, Clipper insiders were worried about Gordon leaving in 2013 (when he becomes an unrestricted free agent) to play for his hometown Pacers. Shouldn't the Pacers make a few short-term signings to preserve their 2013 cap room for Gordon?

What They SHOULD Do: Throw the kitchen sink at Afflalo. Something like $42 million for four years.9 Make Denver match it. (They will.) Then, throw a shorter offer at Nick Young and make Washington match it. (They will.) Now you've just knocked out your two biggest competitors for the overseas guys in March, which means you can roll the dice with Michael Redd for nothing (already in the works), bide your time until the overseas guys start coming back, then pounce on some short-term scoring punch with J.R. Smith (two years, $12 million) while keeping your eyes on the prize (Gordon in 2013). Either way, I love looking at the Pacers right now — they're proving that a small-market team can stay competitive with wacky traits like "logic" and "ingenuity."

CHARLOTTE BOBCATS

Needs: Size. They're starting Boris Diaw at center this year and can't even amnesty DeSagana Diop because rookie (Marv Albert voice) "Bis-mack Bee-YOM-bo!" might be trapped in Spain for awhile.

Additional Notes: When your center combo is Boris Diaw and DeSagana Diop, you're pretty much daring the league to contract you.

What They SHOULD Do: That's a loaded question. The Bobcats have cap space and DON'T think they need Sam Dalembert. I don't know what to tell you. Why is this team still in the league?

NEW YORK KNICKS

Needs: Hint … their backcourt consists of Landry Fields, Iman Shumpert, Toney Douglas and Mike Bibby's chalk figure right now.

Situation: They have a two-year exception starting at $2.5 million. That's it.

What They SHOULD Do: Sign Baron AND Arenas for the minimum (why not?), then wait for Jack Bauer to free Aaron Brooks from China (and convince Brooks' agent that playing in New York for one year, for $2.5 million, on a playoff team that desperately needs him, would be a splendid way for him to show off Aaron Brooks). While we're here, I wanted to address the following e-mail from Dave H. in New York:

"I love your NBA columns, and The 12 Days of NBA Christmas is awesome on many different levels. I'm your target diehard NBA audience. So I want to know. … why are you fucking up and not writing about the potentially biggest signing of the year … Tyson Chandler? Is it because you want to see how the Knicks finish constructing their roster, or because you're just being a dick? Either way, I don't like it. Stop being a fucking dick. Break down their roster, Dr. Jack Ramsey style! I demand it! And I want the full treatment, with analysis of potential late arrivals like Baron Davis, what it means, AND becaause I had to ask for this, tell us explicitly how scared you are of this team.Thank you."

Dave, here's why I am not worried about the Knicks: Mike D'Antoni already proved last season that he has no problem running Amar'e Stoudemire and Amar'e Stoudemire's uninsurable knees into the ground. This season, D'Antoni has 10 times more pressure on him — not only have the expectations of Knicks fans quadrupled, but Phil Jackson's 2012-13 shadow is suddenly lingering over everything. There is no hotter coaching seat. (No, not even yours, recently extended, Erik Spoelstra.) That means he'll stupidly play Amar'e big minutes again, only this time, he'll be doing it during a shortened season with less rest. How do you think that one's turning out, Dave? If "five fun weeks for the Knicks, followed by Amar'e breaking down and everyone blaming D'Antoni while simultaneously freaking out that they used up their amnesty already" was a wager, I'd lay some wood on it right now. 10

(And just in case you think this is the bitter rantings of a threatened Celtics fan … )

BOSTON CELTICS

Needs: Yikes, what don't they need? They're starting Jermaine O'Neal at center. The third guard is Keyon Dooling. The best bench swingman (Jeff Green) might be out for the season with a "mystery ailment" (that's never good). As a Boston buddy of mine texted last night, "It's starting to feel like 1991." That's not a good thing.

Additional Notes: They're over the cap and already used this year's exception. The good news is that Green's murky situation is holding them hostage indefinitely.

What They SHOULD Do: Sign Arenas for nothing. Why not? If that doesn't work, try to survive for two months until the overseas guys (Brooks, Vujacic, Kenyon Martin, etc.) come back, then try to steal one or two of them for cheap … you know, assuming Pierce, Garnett and Allen haven't been destroyed by the shortened season by then. I want to throw up.

LOB CITY

Needs: Backups for Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan. Unless they plan on playing those guys 48 minutes a game.

Additional Notes: Lob City's payroll creeped toward the tax line ($70 million) after the Jordan/Butler/Billups signings. With Chris Paul and Billups aboard, they definitely don't need Randy Foye (one year: $4.25 million) AND Mo Williams (two years: $17 million), right? They could try to trade one for an expiring big guy (Mehmet Okur or Jermaine O'Neal); they could amnesty Williams (I wouldn't do that, by the way); they could re-sign Diogu (I hope they do, actually) and figure it out later; or they could go with the Erick Dampier/Troy Murphy/Etan Thomas veteran pu pu platter. Sadly, they can't get creative and push for a sign-and-trade with New Jersey — Mo Williams and a future no. 1 for Humphries — because Humphries looks just enough like Blake Griffin that it would be too confusing.

What They SHOULD Do: Sign Diogu, then flip Foye to Washington for Ronny Turiaf. Done. Let's make it happen today, Lob City. Thank you.

NEW JERSEY NETS

Needs: Dwight Howard.

Additional Notes: Dwight Howard or bust.

What They SHOULD Do: Sign one-year dudes so they can preserve their cap space for Howard. Pretty sure that's what they're doing, actually: They just made history by amnestying Travis Outlaw (signed in the summer of 2010, no less!); now it looks like they're going to offer Kirilenko a giant one-year deal, if only so Mikhail Prokhorov has someone to go out drinking with when he's visiting New Jersey. Stay tuned.

DENVER NUGGETS

Needs: A certain two-guard with a badly misspelled name.

Additional notes: I hated the final price for Nene (five years, $67 million) for purely selfish reasons — it was just low enough that I can't make fun of it, just high enough that they'll probably regret it, and yet, a price they probably had to pay. I don't think there's ever been more money spent on a snark-proof, praise-proof free-agent signing.

What They SHOULD Do: Sign Afflalo before someone else overpays him, but make sure they leave enough cap space to match any Chandler offer as soon as he comes back. By the way? Don't sleep on the Nuggets as a surprise contender — they have a chance to go 10-deep11 during a shortened season that gives young/deep teams a genuine competitive advantage. In fact, I'm penciling them into the playoffs, along with the Grizzlies, Spurs, Mavericks, Clippers, Zombie Sonics and Blazers. That leaves one spot for the Lakers, Rockets, Suns, Warriors or Hornets. Should be a tight race.12

HOUSTON ROCKETS

Needs: To play in a league that's not rigged.

Additional Notes: They spent three years stacking enough assets to make that Pau Gasol trade. There was no Plan B. Might be time to bottom out and rebuild. In the meantime, they'll probably lock down Dalembert for short money (maybe $13-14 million for two years).

What They SHOULD Do: Make a Godfather offer to Boston — Luis Scola, Kyle Lowry, Kevin Martin and Goran Dragic for Rajon Rondo, Ray Allen, Jermaine O'Neal and the rights to that Clippers pick that becomes unprotected in 2016. I hate giving up Rondo and wouldn't do it — I think he's headed for a monster eff-you season — but wouldn't the Celtics at least have to have a couple of long meetings about that offer? And did you know that, when future Houston GM Daryl Morey was working for Boston during the 2006 regular season (before Houston hired him away in April), Rondo was his favorite 2006 draft prospect and the reason Danny Ainge traded for Rondo's rights?

WASHINGTON WIZARDS

Needs: Um … good players?

Additional Notes: I can't figure out Les Boules. They could have amnestied Rashard Lewis, created globs of cap space and cherry-picked two or three of the remaining quality guys in a market that just crashed. Why not make a run at Afflalo and Wilson Chandler (when he becomes available) and gun for the playoffs right now, especially when John Wall is the odds-on favorite to become this season's breakout star (a la Blake Griffin last year)? Potentially, they can sign two quality guys for a discount price. How does a nucleus of Wall, Afflalo, Javale McGee, Wilson Chandler, Jan Vesely, Jordan Crawford, Turiaf and Whatever They Get From Andray Blatche sound? Why wait?

What They SHOULD Do: It's too late … they never amnestied Lewis. Now that the Clippers are finally good, I'd like to nominate Washington as the league's new laughingstock-for-decades franchise.13

NEW ORLEANS HORNETS

Needs: More players, new owners, a week that goes by without a massive conflict of interest.

Additional notes: Lost in the Lob City hysteria — did you notice the Hornets suddenly have a half-decent team? They have two legitimately competent low-post scorers (Carl Landry and Chris "It Can't Be Forgotten That I'm in a Contract Year" Kaman), a shot-blocker/rebounder (Emeka Okafor), a half-decent point guard (Jarrett Jack), an elite swing defender (Trevor Ariza), an athletic forward with upside (Al-Farouq Aminu), a potential top-ten scorer poised to make The Leap (Eric Gordon), Minnesota's 2012 draft pick (trade chip!) and enough financial flexibility to sign one more decent free agent. For a shortened season, I might like the 2011-12 Hornets' nucleus more than the 2011-12 Lakers' nucleus.14

What They SHOULD Do: Wait for one of the overseas guys (Brooks?), then ride Chris Paul's Ewing Theory potential to an improbable playoff spot. Do you know how many playoff series Chris Paul won for New Orleans in six years? One. It's true. Look, there's no bigger Chris Paul fan than me, but the Ewing Theory is the Ewing Theory. The 2011-12 Hornets absolutely qualify.

Is this leading to the 2012 Hornets winning the title, then a sobbing David Stern handing the trophy to himself? Probably not. OK, definitely not. But what if the Lakers battled some injuries and some dissension, and suddenly the league-owned Hornets and the screwed-by-the-league Lakers were battling for the eighth playoff seed with a week to go? I'm moving this scenario to the top of my Christmas list. Enjoy the weekend.

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Day 10: The Black Sheep Little Brother's Revenge

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:07 GMT le 23 décembre 2011

We're celebrating Day 10 with a bullet-point column for three reasons …

1. I am no longer capable of writing a coherent column with a beginning, middle and end.

2. It's a special holiday anniversary tribute to Gilbert Arenas and Javaris Crittenton.

3. It symbolizes the bullet the Clippers put in the Lakers yesterday.

Yesterday, the Lakers were hanging out in front of the Staples Center, twiddling their thumbs and coming to the depressing realization that Josh McRoberts was their fourth-best player, when suddenly the Clippers did a drive-by shooting, popped them in the leg and sent them limping away. It wasn't a fatal blow, but the Lakers definitely lost a ton of blood. And they might spend the next few years walking with a limp.

On to the bullets …

• Will December 14, 2011, be remembered as the day when the Black Sheep Little Brother Clippers turned the tables on the Successful Big Brother Lakers? That depends on Chris Paul's surgically repaired knee (325 percent more vulnerable now that he's wearing a Clippers jersey), Paul's future (will he stay in Los Angeles for longer than two years?), Blake Griffin's future (will he sign a lucrative extension next summer without knowing if Paul is sticking around?), everything that happens with the possibly imploding Lakers these next few months (stay tuned),1 and, of course, the world ending in 2012. Leave it to the Clippers to finally become a contender during the same year for which the Mayans predicted an apocalypse.

• Forget about the future for a second. At the very least, you have to give the Clippers credit for the following sequence: Successful Big Brother thought it was getting Chris Paul, made the trade, had the deal blocked by the NBA in one of the shadiest moments in professional sports history, was forced to trade a ticked-off Lamar Odom to its biggest rival as part of the fallout … and then, incredibly, Black Sheep Little Brother improbably swooped in and pulled off the trade. Even better, Successful Big Brother is furious about it! You can't even say the Clippers turned the tables on the Lakers; it would belittle what happened. Are we sure this wasn't part of what the Mayans predicted? Has anyone checked?

• One last time: I still don't think the Clippers should have sacrificed Eric Gordon in this trade. A smarter, less desperate team would have waited out the NBA/Hornets, known there were no other suitors, banked on them panicking once the season started and Paul was dejectedly going through the motions on a dreadful team, then swooped in with a "Chris Kaman, Al-Farouq Aminu, Eric Bledsoe, Mo Williams, Minnesota's pick and a future no. 1 for Paul and Trevor Ariza's contract" offer. They would have gotten it done. With a little more patience, they could have secured that Paul/Griffin/Jordan/Gordon nucleus for the rest of the decade.

But after watching what happened last night, it's hard to blame them for going all-in on two years (and, hopefully, more) of Chris Paul. They sold out every season-ticket and partial season-ticket package last night. There's nothing left. That's never happened for them before. They're relevant. They matter. They might contend for the title. Despite the steep price, they couldn't be happier with what they bought. And as I wrote on Monday, I think David Stern was banking on this the whole time — he's known Donald Sterling for 30 years; he knew the Clippers would cave, and they did.

• Here's another reason you trade Gordon: For once, Clipper fans feel better about their team than Laker fans do. Know this: Laker fans are freaking out. Between the canceled trade, the Clippers getting Paul, Dwight Howard being pulled off the table, Odom's inexplicable trade, Kobe slowly going into Super-Icy Pissed-Off Mode, the haunting prospect of Derek Fisher and Steve Blake trying to defend Chris Paul, the growing influence of Jimmy Buss (a.k.a., James Dolan 2.0), Not Phil Jackson (a.k.a. Mike Brown), Kobe's advancing age (not even monthly Germany trips can stave off Father Time, Kobe), and their bizarrely constructed roster (no speed whatsoever, no easy points, three low-post players, no above-average perimeter athletes other than Kobe), I can't remember seeing Laker fans this distraught. Even during those ugly post-Shaq/pre-Gasol years, they got to watch Kobe during his "becoming the best all-around player in the league" stretch. What now? What's worse than an aging roster that doesn't make sense? Would flipping Bynum and Gasol for Dwight Howard REALLY change anything? And what possibly possessed them to give Odom away????

• More on Odom: He was their security blanket for the annual Bynum injury. Any time Bynum went down, they slid Odom into the starting lineup and never missed a beat. Last season, Odom started 35 games and averaged a 16-10 with 58 percent shooting. Where are they getting those numbers this year? Bynum missed 47 games in 2008, 32 games in 2009, 17 games in 2010 and 28 games in 2011. They can't keep him on the floor. You really think they're getting 66 games out of Bynum in 120 days? Does anyone see this is happening? If I gave you the over/under of 50.5 games for Bynum in 2011-12, wouldn't you grab the under? So who's getting those minutes? Josh McRoberts? When they gave Odom away for that meaningless pick and that $8.9 million trade exception, I assumed a trade was coming. Where's the trade? How do you just give him away like that?

• My prediction: The Lakers' steadfast refusal to deal Bynum will end up being the downfall of the Kobe era Lakers. Last year's team struggled for many reasons, but mainly because L.A.'s best four players (Odom, Bynum, Gasol and Kobe) couldn't play together at the same time. They were just too slow and plodding. And also their superstar stopped playing like a superstar. Even if Kobe remains one of the best 10 or 12 players in the league, that's a little different than the night-after-night meal ticket from 2004 through 2010. After 1,311 games (including playoffs), it's harder for him to score, harder for him to beat guys off the dribble, harder for him to defend, harder for him to play back-to-backs … now he's dealing with a brutal schedule (again, 66 regular-season games in 120 days!) and even more of a facilitator load because of a different offense and Odom's absence. Could Kobe finally wear down this season? Remember in last year's two playoff rounds (a win over New Orleans, then a loss to Dallas), he wasn't the best player in either series. When's the last time that happened? If you're a Lakers fan counting on Kobe Bryant to save the day this season, just know that there's a good chance he doesn't have those kinds of chops anymore.

Even the staunchest Kobe defender would agree the Lakers desperately need an infusion of fresh blood. But from where? That's why they should be considering a Bynum trade. What if they flipped him to a desperate-for-a-center team like Houston (Bynum, Steve Blake and Luke Walton's contract for Luis Scola, Kyle Lowry, Hasheem Thabeet and Patrick Patterson?), Minnesota (Bynum for Derrick Williams and Wesley Johnson?), Indiana (Bynum for Danny Granger?) or Philly (Bynum and the Metta World Peace/Walton contracts for Andre Igoudala and Elton Brand?)? Wouldn't they be selling high? What makes them think Bynum can stay on the court? Why even risk the last two years of Kobe's dwindling prime?

• Along those same lines: Since they know the Rockets are hot for Gasol, why wouldn't they tinker with that same Rockets package from last week's vetoed three-teamer (Luis Scola, Kevin Martin, Goran Dragic and a 2012 o. 1 pick), see if they can dump Walton's contract in the deal (and maybe take back Hasheem Thabeet's expiring deal), then see if they can flip Martin to Milwaukee (for Stephen Jackson and a draft pick), Denver (in a sign-and-trade for Arron Afflalo) or Phoenix (for Jared Dudley, Mickael Pietrus' expiring deal and a future pick)? If their ultimate play is Dwight Howard, wouldn't it make more sense to deal Gasol for multiple pieces, then make a run at Howard with Bynum plus some of those pieces? Let's say they made that Houston deal (Gasol for Scola, Martin, Dragic and a 2012 no. 1 pick), then quickly flipped Bynum, Martin, Dragic, their 2012 no. 1 pick and Houston's no. 1 pick for Howard and J.J. Redick (and kept Scola for themselves). Now you're looking at Howard, Scola (such an underrated offensive player), Metta World Peace, Kobe and Fisher as starters, with McRoberts, Blake and Redick off the bench. That's a pretty good outcome, right?

• One more Lakers note: The best five teams in the West, on paper, are Dallas, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, Memphis and the Clippers in some order. From there, it gets weird: Denver is still putting together its team (and has two potentially key guys still trapped in China); Portland got blindsided by the Greg Oden/Brandon Roy injuries (although I still think it's a playoff team); Houston might blow things up and rebuild unless it can revive the Gasol trade; New Orleans already blew it up; Minnesota and Golden State will be better (but not "playoffs" better); Sacramento and Utah are in No Man's Land; and Phoenix looks like a fringe playoff team.

Where do the Lakers fit into that mess? The safe move would be to squish them into the top five and make it a top six, but how do we know for sure? With the shorter schedule all bets are off — we know from the goofy 1999 season that weird stuff happens when you chop training camps and condense schedules. (Remember the 1999 Sonics missing the playoffs after winning 61 games the year before? Or the Knicks barely squeezing out an 8-seed, then catching fire and making the Finals?) We know Bynum is suspended for the first five games; what if the Lakers start out 1-4? What if Kobe tweaks his knee and misses two weeks? What if Mike Brown turns out to be Rudy Tomjanovich Jr. as a Lakers coach? What if they're barely .500 in March right when Bynum suffers his annual injury? Would you bet your life on the 2011-12 Lakers making the playoffs? I sure wouldn't.

• Semi-related: Los Angeles is a really, really weird sports town. Because of the city's mammoth size and all the transplants, every team has die-hard fans (the Lakers, the Dodgers, UCLA and USC with the most, then the Angels, the Kings and the Clippers trailing), but there's an excess population of casual sports fans who drift around depending on who's interesting. I moved to Los Angeles in November of 2002, right after the Angels won the World Series and grabbed those bandwagoners. They drifted over to Gagne's Dodgers in 2003 and 2004, then briefly to the 2005-06 Clippers (the Brand/Cassell team), then to the Bush/Leinart Trojans (2005), then to the Gasol-infused Lakers and the Mannywood Dodgers (2008), and then the Lakers gobbled up all the casuals and transplants these past three years. Just so you know, those people are about 16 Griffin/Paul alley-oops from jumping over to Clipperland.

It was kinda sorta maybe happening, anyway. Griffin has slowly emerged as the NBA's most appealing young star. Kids love him. The Internet loves him. His commercials are funny. He's done a nice job of pushing his sense of humor with various Internet clips and TV appearances. When the Clippers played on the road last year, Griffin quietly made them one of the league's biggest draws. Within the league itself, opposing players, scouts, executives and even grizzled writers love his work ethic and competitiveness; this was someone who noticeably improved as the season went on, added a low-post game on the fly, figured out how to pace himself during games and generally turned into a force. And this was playing without any semblance of a competent point guard for more than half the season, save for an undeniably fun stretch when an overweight Baron Davis rekindled his career just long enough to make Blake his dunk muse. Now Griffin is getting the best point guard alive, someone with a proven track record of making his teammates better? No wonder Griffin reacted so happily in the now-famous "Lob City!" video.

• Yes, I'm fully aware that Vinny Del Negro is prominently involved in the 2011-12 Clippers season. Elephant, meet room.

• As for Chris Paul, do you think he feels like he won the lottery? The Clippers are trotting out the league's most entertaining team, two franchise players (only Miami and Oklahoma City can say the same), a potential "Stockton/Malone 2.0" brewing with Paul and Griffin, the Lob City gimmick (let the record show that Griffin and DeAndre Jordan finished second and third in dunks last year http://www.cbssports.com/nba/dunk-o-meter/yearly, and that Jordan's "2008 Tyson Chandler" potential was the most underrated thing about this trade), and enough legitimate playoff rotation guys (Jordan, Billups, Williams, Randy Foye, Caron Butler) that they're one more signing (a veteran rebounder or big man who can spell Griffin and/or Jordan) or trade (swapping Williams or Foye for that piece) from becoming a legitimate, no-doubt-about-it threat to make the Finals.

To recap: Paul gets a contending team, a potentially historic pairing with Griffin (who complements him perfectly), a shot-blocker to protect him defensively (Jordan), and a supporting cast of leapers and shooters who will become something of a toy chest for him. He gets to play in a big market — Los Angeles, no less — and nearly all the credit if the Clippers end up flipping places with the Lakers. Every one of his home games will be sold out. Nearly every one of his road games (probably all of them) will be sold out.

Even better, people will be rooting for him — the Clippers won't be villains like Miami last season, just supremely entertaining, the perfect team for our current 24/7 basketball world that's dominated by nonstop tweets, YouTube clips, trade rumors, "sources say," endless blog posts, seven DIRECTV-pass games at once and everything else. There won't be a potential alpha dog battle brewing — like in Miami or Oklahoma City — because Paul doesn't care about that crap, just about running the show and making everyone else better. There won't be suffocating expectations; after all, it's the Clippers, which means anything can go wrong at any given time. There won't be pressure, not with Clippers fans so exceedingly grateful that, for once, their favorite basketball team matters. It's the rarest of sports situations: all upside, no downside. At least for right now.

So yeah, Chris Paul might flee the premises in 19 months. That's why giving up a talent like Gordon was so risky, maybe even a little reckless. Then again, I'm only a Celtics fan who lives in Los Angeles and happens to have Clippers season tickets — I can think about this stuff objectively. If you love the Clippers? If you rooted for the Black Sheep Little Brother all these years? If you've never mattered before? If the Lakers have been kicking sand in your face for three solid decades? Suddenly it's not so much of a risk.

The best thing about following sports? When the stars align and your team wins a championship. The second-best thing? Anticipation. Having a quality team, knowing it's headed someplace, dreaming about the possibilities. Staring at the schedule, circling games, knowing that something like 50 of your next 150 nights are going to be a blast. Glancing at the clock at 3:30 in the afternoon and saying, "Four more hours." Standing in front of your seat 20 minutes before tipoff, watching warm-ups, feeling that buzz, feeling those goose bumps slowly form on your arms.

That's the gift of the Chris Paul trade. And if it comes with a shelf life, so be it.

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The Fabulous and The Flops of NFL Week 14

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:59 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

In this week's Fabulous and the Flops, we're advocating for suspensions for big hits, criticizing the performance of a likely Rookie of the Year, and talking about the most embarrassing drive of the year by any offense.

Pittsburgh Steelers 14, Cleveland Browns 3

Fabulous: William Gay. Pittsburgh's nickel cornerback showed tons of promise during his second season as a pro in 2008, but has struggled upon being moved into the starting lineup in 2009. In Week 10 against the Bengals, Gay came up with the game-sealing interception in the fourth quarter, a feat he repeated on Thursday night when he picked off Colt McCoy with three minutes left in the fourth quarter. Gay also broke up two other passes and ended a drive with a tackle of a scrambling McCoy on third down.

Flop: Everyone involved with the Colt McCoy concussion. You, Cleveland Browns organization, for letting a player back into the game who couldn't even remember being hit. You specifically, coach Pat Shurmur, for refusing to admit afterward that the team didn't administer the standard concussion tests to McCoy. You, the NFL, for not putting independent neurologists on the sideline before the season even started to make sure those tests are followed through. You, James Harrison, for producing yet another illegal helmet-to-helmet hit. Oh, and back to you, the NFL, for not suspending Harrison before now. After all the chattering this offseason about how the league was going to improve its policy on concussions and protect their players, we got to see a woozy quarterback come in after two plays in a nationally televised game, just as we would have last season or the year before that.

Change must come now. No more chest-thumping and rhetoric. If you want players and teams to actually care about concussions, suspend Harrison for more than one game and increase the scrutiny on the sideline.

Baltimore Ravens 24, Indianapolis Colts 10

Fabulous: Terrell Suggs, who lived in the Indianapolis backfield all day. Suggs had two tackles for loss, a quarterback knockdown, and three additional sacks, each of which resulted in a Dan Orlovsky fumble. He now has 13 sacks in 13 games, which is more than he was able to produce in 2008 and 2009 combined. Is he the favorite for Defensive Player of the Year?

Flop: Dallas Clark, who came back from a fibula injury and caught just one of the six passes thrown in his direction. Clark is taking opportunities away from Jacob Tamme, who was productive in Clark's absence and caught his only target of the day, a touchdown reception on the final play of the game. It's not clear that Clark will even be on the team next year, so while we can't fault him for wanting to play, we can fault the Colts for not turning the position over to Tamme, who might actually be a part of the next good Colts team.

Atlanta Falcons 31, Carolina Panthers 23

Fabulous: How does Steve Smith ever get open? By all accounts, every Panthers game should be like last week's, when Smith was triple-covered on every play and Cam Newton was forced to throw elsewhere. Perhaps, the secret is that Smith doesn't need to be open to get the football — his 48-yard catch on Carolina's final drive of the game saw him locate a deep pass in the air before the defender, position himself so that he was the only person with a play on the ball, and somehow make a perfect catch while he contorted his body to land with two feet inbounds.

Flop: Cam Newton, who threw the Falcons back into the game during the second half with a pair of ugly interceptions. On his final drive with four minutes left, Newton completed that 48-yard pass to Smith … and went 0-for-6 otherwise. Across the entire second half, Newton was just 10-of-26 for 129 yards, and nearly 40 percent of those yards came on that one pass to Smith. His offensive line didn't help matters, either. Cam was already missing right tackle Jeff Otah before Jordan Gross was forced to sit this game out with an injury. Then, during the game, center Ryan Kalil went down with a stinger. Otah, Gross, and Kalil represent Carolina's three Pro Bowl-caliber linemen. The Panthers can afford to lose one, but they will struggle to move the ball without all three.

Houston Texans 20, Cincinnati Bengals 19

Fabulous: A.J. Green, a superhero masquerading as wide receiver. Green's numbers weren't that extraordinary, as he caught just five of seven targets and gained 59 yards, but he spent all day against star Texans cornerback Johnathan Joseph, and he provided a couple of moments that should have reminded everyone of his brilliance. One of his catches allowed Cincinnati to convert a fourth-and-3 that eventually resulted in a touchdown. On a later drive, Green drew a 25-yard pass interference penalty on Joseph (not included in the stats above) before catching a 36-yard lollipop over him to get Cincinnati into the red zone.

Flop: Arian Foster, who was limited to just 41 yards on 15 carries by an underrated Cincinnati run defense. Foster did contribute four catches for 33 yards, but he produced a total of two first downs all day.

Detroit Lions 34, Minnesota Vikings 28

Fabulous: Joe Webb, who scrambled the Vikings back into this game. On his first drive, Webb was the king of third downs. On his first third down, Webb converted third-and-1 with a 3-yard scamper. On the next one, he picked up third-and-8 by beating Cliff Avril to the sticks for 9. Oh, and then he topped those plays by picking up third-and-10 with a scramble that produced a 65-yard touchdown run. That was the longest run by a quarterback since 1998, when Steve McNair had a 71-yard touchdown scamper against the Buccaneers in Week 10.

Flop: Leslie Frazier, who decided to have fun with injury shenanigans this week. During the week, he teased that Adrian Peterson was going to play, when it was obvious that Peterson wasn’t anywhere close to ready to get back on the field. Then, after Christian Ponder's hip acted up, Frazier decided to let Ponder, a rookie quarterback who is almost entirely dependent upon his mobility, suit up for one of the worst halves of football you will ever see. Ponder was picked off on three of his 21 attempts and was lucky to get away with two or three more errant throws. Hey Vikings, you have nothing to play for! Maybe it would be smart to rest your rookie quarterback for a week.

Jacksonville Jaguars 41, Tampa Bay Buccaneers 14

Fabulous: Maurice Jones-Drew. OK, so MJD's importance is probably overshadowed by his four touchdowns, all of which came from within five yards of the end zone. But remember that he did this with Blaine Gabbert at quarterback. And how thin are the Jags at wideout? They split MJD out as a flanker on Sunday. Sure enough, he caught a touchdown pass.

Flop: Josh Freeman and Josh Johnson. How do you complete 53 percent of your passes and throw three interceptions when you're up against a secondary that's down to their third-string cornerbacks? Freeman also fumbled twice. In his past six starts, Freeman's thrown 12 interceptions and fumbled four times. The Bucs haven't won any of those starts.

Philadelphia Eagles 26, Miami Dolphins 10

Fabulous: Brandon Fields. The Dolphins couldn't move the ball on offense for most of the day, but they put their defense into excellent field position because of the work done by their punter. Fields had a net average of 49.8 yards per punt, and he pinned the Eagles inside their own 10-yard line twice.

Flop: LeSean McCoy. Sure, Shady ran for two touchdowns, but those runs came from one and two yards out. McCoy got 27 carries and produced just 38 yards; good for a dismal 1.4 yards per carry. Beyond the touchdowns, his other 25 carries produced just three first downs. Since 2000, only three backs have run the ball 20 or more times and averaged fewer yards per attempt. The post-merger record, though, belongs to Emmitt Smith. Smith ran the ball 22 times in a 1999 game against the Giants and gained just 26 yards; that's not even 1.2 yards per pop.

New York Jets 37, Kansas City Chiefs 10

Fabulous: Shonn Greene, who had his best game in more than two years by running for 129 yards and a touchdown against the Chiefs. If you throw in his 58 receiving yards, Greene set a personal best for yards from scrimmage on Sunday. He had a fumble overturned inside the red zone, which seems like a good time to note that he's not fumbling anymore. Through his first two seasons, Greene had a fumble every 51.5 touches. This year, he has just one fumble on 233 touches.

Flop: The best football league on the planet for producing the worst drive of the season. With 8:14 left in the third quarter, the Jets embarked on a possession that served as a wonderful advertisement for the NBA's impending return. There were no fewer than eight penalties on the drive. Eight! The Jets started off with a chop block call that moved the ball half the distance to their goal line, and then picked up a holding penalty on the next play, which moved the ball to their own 2-yard line. Two plays later, Kansas City's Jovan Belcher was called for roughing the passer to give the Jets a new set of downs. On the very next play, an incomplete pass from Sanchez was met with two defensive holding calls. Todd Haley responded to this as only he could, trying to get thrown out of the game by arguing with the officials. Since this isn't baseball, he got only a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. (Haley’s ejection had to wait until Monday afternoon.) The Jets then ran two plays for 4 yards without incident before Brandon Flowers was called for pass interference on third-and-3, resulting in a 16-yard penalty. Finally, on the ensuing play, Mark Sanchez didn't get the snap cleanly, but managed to pick up the ball and loft a bomb to Dustin Keller, drawing another pass interference penalty, this time on Kendrick Lewis. All in all, the Jets advanced the ball 93 yards while picking up a total of 12 yards on offense.

New Orleans Saints 22, Tennessee Titans 17

Fabulous: Marques Colston. The Titans spent most of Sunday taking away big plays and forcing the Saints underneath, but Colston broke the game open with two go routes up the seams, both which went for touchdowns. Only one other Saints play went for more than 25 yards.

Flop: Chris Johnson. Three straight weeks in the "Fabulous" column were obviously too much for CJ2K to bear, since he returned to his 2011 form by gaining just 23 yards on 11 carries. Johnson did contribute 43 yards on five catches as a receiver, but the Saints allow the fourth-most yards per carry in the league. How on earth did Johnson fail to hit even 2 yards per rush?

New England Patriots 34, Washington Redskins 27

Fabulous: You've seen what Rob Gronkowski did on Sunday. We're not going to belabor the point. But consider that Gronkowski has 14 receiving touchdowns in 13 games, and he has a 15th touchdown that came on a slight lateral that was, for all intents and purposes, a pass play. And if he had been able to corral a Tom Brady pass that went off his shin on Sunday, he would, for all intents and purposes, have had 16 touchdowns.

Here's a list of the guys who have had seasons in which they had caught more than 16 touchdowns in their first 13 games: Randy Moss, Jerry Rice. That's it. Carl Pickens had 16 in 13 games. It's safe to say that Gronkowski is a better player than Carl Pickens.

Flop: DeAngelo Hall, who was called for defensive holding early in the third quarter and expressed his anger with the flag by throwing it downfield, which resulted in a 15-yard penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Arizona Cardinals 21, San Francisco 49ers 19

Fabulous: Larry Fitzgerald, who took his team onto his back and caught seven of the nine passes thrown to him, producing 149 yards and a long touchdown. One hundred twenty-seven of those yards came in the second half, when the 49ers wore down while trying to defend a lead without Pro Bowl linebacker Patrick Willis.

Flop: Beanie Wells. We know that Beanie is injured, but he got 15 of Arizona's 17 carries from running backs and produced a total of just 27 yards. He was injured against St. Louis, too, but that didn't stop him from having a field day.

Denver Broncos 13, Chicago Bears 10 (OT)

Fabulous: Matt Prater. We covered this yesterday.

Flop: Marion Barber. Likewise, we castigated and excoriated Barber in Monday's piece.

Green Bay Packers 46, Oakland Raiders 16

Fabulous: Ryan Grant! We'll keep Aaron Rodgers out of this space this week, but it's difficult to not just pencil him in here every single Sunday. Perhaps that's why Grant enjoyed so much success against what should have been a dominant front four. He averaged 85 yards on his 10 carries, producing a 47-yard touchdown run, and he caught the only pass thrown to him for 13 yards.

Flop: Carson Palmer. After his four-pick day on Sunday, Palmer now has 13 interceptions in seven games. That's a 30-interception pace for a full season. Since they acquired Palmer, the Raiders have won three games, each by one touchdown or less. Their four losses over that time span have come by 14 points or more. They've now been outscored by 76 points in those seven games, and they're outplaying their Pythagorean expectation by a full two wins. They might be the worst team in the division.

San Diego Chargers 37, Buffalo Bills 10

Fabulous: Ryan Mathews, who was the picture of efficiency when the Chargers gave him the ball. He ran for 114 yards on 20 carries and caught all six of the passes thrown to him, producing 34 yards. Of those 26 touches, just one went for no gain or a loss. And perhaps most excitingly, Mathews didn't even fumble once.

Flop: Ryan Fitzpatrick, who went 13-for-34 for 176 yards against a defense that consists of several different varieties of toast at cornerback. Fitzpatrick's decline during the second half of the year has really been remarkable. Through the Week 8 shutout of the Redskins, Fitzpatrick completed 67.6 percent of his passes, averaged 7.6 yards per attempt, and had a 2:1 touchdown-to-interception ratio. During Buffalo's six-game losing streak, Fitzpatrick is completing just 55.9 percent of his throws, averaging a measly 5.8 yards per attempt, and has thrown more interceptions (nine) than touchdowns (six).

New York Giants 37, Dallas Cowboys 34

Fabulous: Eli Manning, who threw for an even 400 yards on his 47 attempts and might have hit for even more if his receivers weren't dedicated to dropping passes. Manning's completion percentage was only 57.4 percent, but on the final two meaningful Giants possessions of the game, Manning was 8-of-12 for 122 yards with those two huge touchdown passes to give New York the lead.

Flop: We covered the many fiascoes perpetrated by the Cowboys yesterday. Suffice to say that the flop column for them is overfilled this week.

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Passing Around the Blame in Dallas

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:52 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

With 3:24 left in the fourth quarter on Sunday night, the Cowboys had a win expectancy of 98 percent. Ninety-eight percent! Dallas, of course, promptly snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory for the second week running, as a failure to execute in every facet of the game cost them first place in the NFC East and a clear path to the division title.

For the Cowboys, though, mere collapse does not do. Every close Dallas defeat seems to require a scapegoat. If it's not Tony Romo throwing a key interception, it's Jason Garrett icing his own kicker, right? So who was Sunday night's scapegoat? We polled our Twitter constituency to identify that scapegoat and got about a dozen different answers. The reality is that there were a lot of moving parts in that Cowboys loss, and pinning it on one particular player or aspect of the game is unrealistic. So instead, we're going to partition the loss out and split it among a number of key Cowboys in a totally subjective way. Here's who to blame (or not blame) for the latest Cowboys disaster:

Miles Austin (zero percent): On that fateful third-down pass that could have sealed the game up for the Cowboys, Austin broke free at the line and then failed to locate the ball in the air before it was too late. Cowboys fans were blaming him after the game for not diving in an attempt to catch the pass, but we're going to trust Austin's instincts for how to properly catch a pass here. In addition to his work before that failed play, Austin also deserves some credit for his 22- and 23-yard receptions on the final drive that should have set up …
Dan Bailey (zero percent): Bailey got iced for the second week in a row! That means icing works! Right? Well, this would be a pretty generous definition of iced. If iced means "have a kick blocked the second time around," then sure, Bailey was iced. Too bad icing didn't work for Lovie Smith in Denver before Matt Prater's game winner in overtime. Bailey was great before the kick and, well, it's not his responsibility to block Jason Pierre-Paul.
Mat McBriar (5 percent): Even after the failed third down with 2:25 left, the Cowboys should have been able to pin the Giants well inside their own territory and force Eli Manning to go a minimum of 70 yards for the game-winning touchdown. Instead, McBriar punted from his own 25-yard line and was only able to advance the ball 33 yards, giving the Giants the ball on their own 42-yard line while creating a short field for Manning to eviscerate.
Jason Garrett (5 percent): You can quibble with Garrett's play selection at times, but it's generally a good thing when you get your best wide receiver open by three yards streaking toward the end zone, regardless of when the game situation is. You can suggest that the Cowboys should have run the ball and forced the Giants to use their final timeout before the two-minute warning, but their odds of picking up a first down running the ball on third-and-5 are pretty slim. Before that, though, Garrett's work as a play-caller wasn't exactly inspiring. He waited too long to adjust Dallas' protections against Jason Pierre-Paul. We'll get to that in a bit.
Tony Romo (10 percent): Romo hit some big throws during the game — the bomb to Laurent Robinson on third-and-10 for 74 yards comes to mind — but he's the one who screwed up on the biggest play of the game, overthrowing an open Austin in a situation in which anything but an overthrow seals up the contest. If Romo underthrows the pass, it's pass interference on a frantic Aaron Ross and the Cowboys can come close to kneeling on the football before punting. If it's thrown properly, it's a touchdown and the Cowboys coast. If it's even just slightly overthrown, Austin has a good shot at reeling it in. Instead, Romo simply missed. He did some excellent work to set up a shot at a game-tying field goal on the final drive, but oh, what could have been. In addition, while it's always sort of dumb to assume that the game would continue the exact same way if you remove a scoring play from the game, Romo's curious safety in the first half ended up serving as the margin of victory. If Romo didn't take a safety and the Cowboys punted, the Giants would have been down 34-27 during their final drive and undoubtedly kicked the extra point upon scoring.
Rob Ryan (15 percent): Ryan's defense did one thing well: stop the Giants in short yardage. That's the only thing that kept the Cowboys in the game, since their defense was otherwise awful. It's hard to give up 38 points and really look good, but the Giants left additional points and opportunities on the field with big drops. It felt like the play-calling blitzed at the wrong times and dropped into coverage when a rush was needed, and just like the Giants, a quick substitution by the Cowboys on defense created a blown assignment for an easy touchdown pass. The scheme Ryan employed also placed a disproportionate amount of pressure on an overmatched Sean Lee (interception aside) and the defense's two most disappointing players …
Terence Newman (18 percent): When the Giants needed a completion on Sunday night, they seemed to go to Newman's side of the field, notably picking up a fourth-and-3 on an easy pitch-and-catch with Manningham on the drive that ended with Lee's interception. Even more distressingly, Newman dropped what would have been an easy pick-six in the first quarter; if he turns that around and takes it to the house, the entire game might change. But even he was able to do more than the unit's biggest star.
DeMarcus Ware (22 percent): If you didn't notice Ware on Sunday, well, you weren't alone. Playing against a team that was starting an ancient artifact at right tackle (Kareem McKenzie) and a deposed left tackle moved back to his abandoned spot after an injury to Will Beatty (David Diehl), Ware was an absolute nonfactor. He suffered a stinger in the fourth quarter that likely sapped his effectiveness, but he had just one tackle for loss all day, with no sacks or even a knockdown of Eli Manning. And crucially, Ware took an offsides penalty on each of the Giants' final two drives, including one that wiped a bad snap and 10-yard loss off the board.
Everything related to stopping Jason Pierre-Paul (25 percent): JPP was just about the best player on the field Sunday night, something you might have heard Cris Collinsworth say about a dozen times. In addition to the game-sealing blocked field goal, Pierre-Paul had two sacks: one that produced a safety and the other ending a drive. He forced Felix Jones' fumble that set up a Giants field goal at the end of the first half. He made two tackles for no gain or a loss almost single-handedly, and he chased down Jones on a big blitz during the final drive and prevented him from picking up big yardage on a checkdown. The Cowboys didn't pay JPP enough credence in their game plan and failed to adjust their protection accordingly on offense. What he was able to do on the field goal, though, was sheer athletic brilliance. The best compliment we can pay him: He looked like DeMarcus Ware out there.
The Week in Tebow

Oh, ho-hum, another incredible comeback victory from Tim Tebow and the Broncos when they were essentially dead to rights on multiple occasions in the fourth quarter. Yawn. Wake us up when he wins by a couple of touchdowns.

OK, we're kidding. That was awesome. Comebacks like that are the reason we watch football, let alone from a guy who has been doing it seemingly on demand this season. As our colleague Chris Brown put it on Twitter, "What a great story. It makes no sense, it's not sustainable, but it's football and just so much fun." It's amazing that a 13-0 Packers team has been totally (and in a way, rightfully) overshadowed by a quarterback who was a league-wide joke as recently as October, and it's a credit to Tebow that he's been able to keep his team in close games. In fact, in taking a look back at Sunday's game, it's very tricky to parse out Tebow's impact on the comeback. In one way, Tebow is getting too much of the credit for things he had nothing to do with. In another, though, Tebow isn't getting enough credit from that famed straw man group, the people who just look at the numbers and didn't actually watch the first three quarters of the Broncos game.

The stat bandied about with regard to Tebow's comeback has been that he started the game 3-for-16 against the Bears defense. Chicago's pass defense played a sound game and actually induced Tebow's second interception of the year in the first half, but 3-for-16 grossly undersells how Tebow was playing. His receivers dropped six passes, and one of them was an easy touchdown to Demaryius Thomas that the second-year receiver flat-out dropped. It's also worth noting that, for whatever weaknesses he has as a passer, Tebow is playing with arguably the worst group of receivers in football. Thomas, Eric Decker, and former Patriots special teamer Matt Willis are not the sort of players who should be combining for 28 targets a game, as they received on Sunday.

In fact, Tebow's begun to turn the corner from gimmick quarterback to something resembling a legitimate NFL passer. The Broncos have gotten away from the option stuff they installed as their offensive base after the Lions shellacking, and Tebow's been given more responsibilities as a standard dropback passer. Sunday was the first game since the Lions contest where the Broncos threw more than they ran, and while part of that is related to the 10-0 deficit they were in during the second half, Tebow threw 13 times in a scoreless first half. Tebow drew two roughing-the-passer penalties to extend drives while exhibiting a legitimate skill, his ability to extend passing plays by making rushers miss. Tebow is getting better at improvising when plays break down as he develops a rapport with his receivers, and as those bonds get stronger, he should be even more improved when he gets out of the pocket. Tebow may never be a great pocket passer at the professional level, but teams are going to be very afraid of what he can do when he's outside the hashmarks and looking downfield. As bad as his receivers are, secondaries can't cover them for eight or nine seconds while also worrying about the possibility of a Tebow scramble.

All that being said, if you want to assign Tebow the full credit or blame for winning or losing, he didn't get his team in a position to win the football game during the fourth quarter. After an incredible onside kick from Matt Prater1 was narrowly recovered by Chicago, the Bears ran the ball for no gain to get to the two-minute warning. The Broncos had no timeouts left, so with the opportunity to run 40 seconds off the clock after second down and third down, the Bears could have punted from midfield with 40 seconds left and forced Tebow to drive 50 yards for a field goal with no way to stop the clock.2 All Marion Barber had to do, of course, was stay inbounds, and you know by now that he did not. It was a stupid play by Barber, but this is the same guy whose entire career has been built upon receiving praise for how hard he hits the hole and how he runs every carry like it's his last. Barber should have known to stay inbounds at all costs, but are you truly surprised that he failed to?

And even then, after the field goal, the Bears were in a good spot to seal up a win without giving Tebow the ball. Remember, Caleb Hanie drove the ball 42 yards in six plays to set the Bears up with third-and-7 from the Denver 38-yard line, at which point they were faced with a conundrum. They could have chosen to kick a 55-yarder on third down, a play that would have been within Robbie Gould's range in the thin air of Denver. Of course, we just went and criticized the Cowboys last week for failing to make Dan Bailey's kick any easier at the end of regulation, so we're not going to be hypocrites and suggest that the Bears shouldn't have tried to advance the ball. They made the right decision to do so, and it's incredibly unfortunate that Barber couldn't hold on to the football with the game on the line. Tebow deserves a ton of credit for the drives he pulled off after those two Barber mistakes, but as a team, Denver was handed two miracles that had nothing to do with Tebow whatsoever.

Ironically, even as Tebow and the Broncos seem immune to the sort of statistical regression toward the mean that we forecast for them on Friday, the Bears are the cautionary tale against believing that teams can just avoid those nagging realities forever. After staying remarkably healthy and going 7-3 in those infamous games decided by a touchdown or less in 2010, the Bears started off 2011 by keeping up those habits. Over the first two months of the season, the Bears stayed relatively healthy and continued to win the close ones, winning all three of their games within seven or less. Then Jay Cutler got hurt. And then Matt Forte got hurt. And the Bears, who seemed like absolute locks for the playoffs at 7-3 before Thanksgiving, have lost three consecutive games. Each of those losses has been by seven points or less. With a break or two here or there, the Bears could have won any or all of the three games. Instead, they're limping toward the postseason and might not make it there in one piece.

Thank You for Not Coaching

The Broncos might have won on Sunday, but they made some very curious choices along the way to their victory. The most notable of those decisions came late in the second quarter, when Denver faced a fourth-and-1 on the Chicago 49 with 4:12 left in a 0-0 game.

In a vacuum, it's probably a very reasonable decision to punt and play field position football. In Denver? It made no sense. Consider the context: The Broncos have Tim Tebow at quarterback, who has been excellent in short-yardage situations. Their odds of picking up the first down were almost surely in excess of 60 percent. If they were stuffed, the downside was giving the ineffective Caleb Hanie the ball at midfield. And if they chose to punt, they had to punt to the best return man in the history of football, Devin Hester. How is punting the optimal decision there?

They weren't the only ones who made curious decisions. The normally brilliant Jim Harbaugh made a very curious challenge during the first quarter of the 49ers' loss to the Cardinals, challenging that an incomplete pass from Kevin Kolb on third down during Arizona's opening drive was actually a fumble. That sounds like a high-reward challenge, but the Cardinals had recovered the fumble on the field, so the only upside of the Niners challenge was turning a fourth-and-6 punt from the Arizona 17-yard line into a fourth-and-15 punt from Arizona's 8-yard line. Those nine yards are absolutely irrelevant, and even if you want to rightly claim that it slightly improves San Francisco's field position, the impact it has on San Francisco's ability to make future challenges with virtually the entire game to go is worth a lot more than those nine yards.

Arizona later had a challenge attempt go in its favor, as it threw in a challenge flag one moment before the 49ers snapped the ball and attempted a fake punt that resulted in a long completion to center Jonathan Goodwin. It didn't appear that the Cardinals had a great shot at winning the challenge, but when the replay equipment malfunctioned, the veracity of the challenge didn't matter. The Cardinals got their challenge back, the 49ers had their fake punt wiped off the board, and San Francisco promptly attempted and failed to kick a 50-yard field goal. The decision-making here isn't a problem, but the idea that the challenge system is dependent upon the replay equipment working is absurd. How can the replay system fail when we can see plenty of replays at home? If the equipment on the field fails, the decision should be left up to the replay assistant in the booth upstairs. Decisions should be placed in the referee's hands as frequently as possible, but if the ref can't make a call because of failed technology while other technology exists to make a proper ruling, the league should never have to resort to that sort of embarrassing excuse.

The Spree for RGIII

As they do every single year, NFL general managers and personnel men have begun their annual winter process of trashing a clear first overall pick. After a year-plus of anointing Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck as the best quarterback prospect of his generation, one personnel director told ESPN's Adam Schefter that " … there are people around the league who prefer Robert Griffin III to Luck." Presumably, those people are not secretaries or janitors, so let's wonder why these personnel people are suddenly pushing Griffin ahead of Luck on their draft boards.

In this context, Griffin is playing the same role Ryan Leaf played before the 1998 draft. That's not to say that the accurate, poised Griffin is a prospect cut from the same cloth as the famously dreadful and immature Leaf, but that Griffin is stuck playing the alternative when an alternative isn't needed. Griffin's role in this process has nothing to do with him as a player; if it weren't Griffin, teams would use Matt Barkley or Landry Jones as the bogeyman across from Luck.

It's truly less about Griffin's strengths as a player and more about his strengths vis-à-vis perceived weaknesses of Luck. Just as critics of Peyton Manning pointed to Leaf's huge arm and used it to slight Manning's ability to get the ball downfield (something we seem to think has not been a problem for Peyton), the arguments against Luck will quickly come to revolve around his lack of athleticism relative to the threat offered by Griffin, who won the Big 12 hurdles championship at Baylor when he was 17 years old.

Why does this process happen? Why do teams suddenly start chattering in December about how the consensus first overall pick isn't really all that and a bag of chips? Well, it's probably because they want that consensus first overall pick. Think about it; let's say that you're the Vikings and you want a shot at drafting Andrew Luck. The best thing you can do is try to decrease Luck's market value by creating some confusion in the marketplace as to whether he's actually the best player available. Even if you can't convince the Colts that Griffin is a better player than Luck, as long as you can convince them that you would be happy to take Griffin with the third overall pick as opposed to giving up a massive haul to move up two spots and take Luck, you've eroded Indy's leverage by seeming less desperate. Maybe you end up getting a Luck trade for a little less than you otherwise would have. There's no downside, certainly, to making Indianapolis think you'll pay less.

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What Do We Really Know About Ryan Braun?

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:50 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

We don't know what Ryan Braun did or didn't take.

ESPN.com's report says Braun tested positive for elevated levels of testosterone, found to be from synthetic sources. That report claimed the results were owing to Braun taking a performance-enhancing drug. A source close to Braun has disputed that interpretation, claiming Braun was indeed found to have elevated testosterone levels, but not as a result of taking a PED.

We don't know if Braun will be suspended.

He's appealing the case through arbitration. If the positive test is upheld, Braun faces a 50-game suspension, starting on Opening Day 2012. Several reports noted that no one has successfully appealed a positive test for PEDs. But that's not necessarily 100 percent accurate. No case where the initial positive test result was made public has ended with an overturn. But since news of the Braun test first came out, several well-connected writers have talked of cases where news of an initial positive test was never made public.

We don't know how reliable the tests were.

As ESPN's Mark Fainaru-Wada and T.J. Quinn reported:

A source close to Braun said that when he was told about the positive test, he immediately requested to be tested again. That second test, using a different sample that was tested by Braun's camp, the source said, was not positive.
Since this claim of a second test comes from Braun's side, it's tough to ascertain its veracity. If a second test did in fact occur and came up negative, we still don't know when that second test occurred. Then there's the issue of false positives. The lab that conducts the tests measures the ratio of testosterone as compared to epitestosterone. A typical T/E ratio for men is about 1-to-1. For MLB purposes, if the player's ratio comes in above 4-to-1, that's considered a positive test. This despite the fact that the number can fluctuate among certain men for reasons that have nothing to do with taking any illicit substances. Not to mention the risk of false positives in such tests.

So we've got conflicting reports, claims of conflicting tests, with one party making claims coming with a major conflict of interest. You have to figure Major League Baseball would have preferred this news not leak out until Braun had completed the arbitration process and a final verdict had been issued. It's no wonder the league is refusing to comment now, with so much uncertainty still hanging over the case.

Beyond all that uncertainty, beyond the sense of disbelief and disappointment surrounding this case that was oddly absent when fellow Miami-area baseball product Alex Rodriguez was implicated in a PED scandal, beyond what this could mean for the Brewers, their NL Central rivals, your fantasy team, or even Braun himself, there's one other thing we don't know:

We don't know if so-called performance-enhancing drugs actually enhance the performance of baseball players. And if they do, how, and by how much.

There's a widespread belief among many baseball followers that PEDs bring gigantic benefits to those who take them. The most rigorous way to prove a theory is to conduct a proper double-blind randomized clinical trial. Give PEDs to 500 players, withhold them from 500 others, then track the results. That way you know who used and who didn't use, and you strip out any possible placebo effect, where a player might gain confidence and possibly play better just by thinking that PEDs will help his performance.

Of course in the real world, this is impossible. That means we're left with a whole lot of anecdotal evidence. A player puts on muscle through a rigorous workout regimen while cycling on a particular substance, and observers make definitive statements about how many more homers that player hit or how much higher his batting average was as a result of PED use. We believe ourselves to be experts, able to pinpoint when a player supposedly started using, exactly how much benefit he gained, and how we should thus evaluate his numbers. With players like Jeff Bagwell, the pseudo-analysis goes a step further, with hordes of writers declining to vote Bagwell into the Hall of Fame because he had big muscles, and some other players of his era were caught using, so … well … you know.

If you want to argue that a player deserves to be punished for taking a banned substance, so be it. If Braun's positive test is upheld, I support the mandatory suspension that will be coming to him. Those are the rules, those are the known repercussions for breaking them, that's what needs to happen.

We can't be certain of anything else. Those who claim that players using steroids must mean those substances work assume some kind of medical knowledge on the players' part, because of an unproven belief that they actually enhance performance. Those who see the offensive boom of the early-'90s to mid-aughts as the product of PED use ignore a multitude of factors ranging from a diluted pool of pitchers caused by expansion to smaller ballparks to strike zones the size of postage stamps.

Meanwhile, those who argue that Braun should be stripped of his 2011 NL MVP award ignore that others weren't made to give up theirs after the fact. (They also ignore that Matt Kemp was a more worthy candidate who got screwed because he played with crappier teammates than Braun did.) As Baseball Writers Association of America secretary/treasurer Jack O'Connell told the L.A. Times: "The voters used the information they had at the time of the election. I don't see how we can change that."

For all the certainty out there, all the overwhelming urges to rush to judgment, we're still left with this: Right now, we know nothing.

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The Rise of the NBA Nerd

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:47 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

Last April, Kevin Durant, of the Oklahoma City Thunder, held a playoff postgame press conference in a blue long-sleeved shirt with tiny screen-window checks. It had a spread collar and was buttoned up to his neck. Durant's attire was noteworthy for several reasons, the first of which was that for most people it wasn't noteworthy at all. Once upon a time, NBA press conferences were no different from the press conferences of other sports. An athlete looked like he threw on whatever was handy, answered reporters' questions, then went on with his night. Durant is a good example of how that's changed: He also likes to meet the press wearing a backpack.

For the people who notice this sort of thing — and it must be said that the backpack is something you're meant to notice — the change Durant encapsulates is both surreal and ironic. The bag is never removed, worn with the safety strap fastened, and rarely acknowledged, as if the affect is actually just natural, as if Durant might be carrying actual homework. In the same way that there are people who never thought they'd see a black American president, there are also people who never thought they'd see a black basketball star dressed like a nerd.

Durant isn't alone. In their tandem press conferences, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, of the Miami Heat, alternate impeccably tailored suits with cardigans over shirts and ties. They wear gingham and plaid and velvet, bow ties and sweater vests, suspenders, and thick black glasses they don't need. Their colors conflict. Their patterns clash. Clothes that once stood as an open invitation to bullies looking for something to hang on the back of a bathroom door are what James now wears to rap alongside Lil Wayne. Clothes that once signified whiteness, squareness, suburbanness, sissyness, in the minds of some NBA players no longer do.

If you happen to be someone who looks at Durant, James, or Amar'e Stoudemire's Foot Locker commercials — in which he stalks along a perilously lit basketball court wearing a letterman's cardigan, a skinny tie, and giant black glasses (his are prescription) — and wonders how the NBA got this way, how it turned into Happy Days, you're really wondering the same thing about the rest of mainstream black culture. When did everything turn upside down? Who relaxed the rules? Is it really safe to look like Carlton Banks?

It certainly appears that way.

Carlton Banks wore his polo shirts, khaki pants, and cardigans tighter than a young black kid would dare in 1990-anything. The joke was that he and his two sisters were culturally white, and the secret of Carlton is that he began to see himself the way both his hip-hop cousin, Will, and the show saw him; and as he began to gain a black consciousness (like when he discovered Public Enemy), he gradually came to resent the laughter.

Carlton was something new for TV. The Huxtables of The Cosby Show were upper-middle class. The Bankses were rich. And Americans weren't used to seeing rich black kids, which is why we were asked to watch The Fresh Prince through the eyes of a poor black one, and, in his discombobulation, Will saw in the Bankses what an indigent black kid from West Philly might: cartoons. Turning Carlton and Hilary into jokes made success look silly. The story of black men on television in the 1980s was always lightly Dickensian — upward mobility in the hot air balloon of rich white guilt: Benson, Webster, Arnold, Willis. The Fresh Prince was the same formula but with intraracial chafing.

All the interesting comic tension of the show was in how long it would take until Will got Carlton to do something black. How long until he, say, wore a track suit or stopped dancing like Belinda Carlisle and started doing the running man. This, of course, is also what people spent Sammy Davis Jr.'s entire career hoping they'd see, that he'd replace the skin he'd seemed to shed, that he would change back. The tragedy of Davis is the triumph of Carlton: Neither did. You know who changed on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air? Will. Carlton got Will educated, enlightened, prep-schooled, and blazered. It's only a mild overstatement to say that Carlton changed us, too.

There were other black nerds — the Derwin of De La Soul's first album, the Poindexter mentioned in Young MC's "Bust a Move," Steve Urkel, Spike Lee's Mars Blackmon — but Carlton was the most pernicious because he was with us the longest. At its best the Carlton character embodied things that gave some black people pause — enthusiasm, knowledge, diction, all that's symbolized by a sweater wrapped around your shoulders. If you saw a little of yourself in Carlton or a schoolmate saw a little Carlton in you, you probably felt unlucky, since being a Carlton became synonymous with aspirational whiteness and selling out.

AP Photo/Tim Hales
What's most surreal about what LeBron James and Dwyane Wade are wearing is that the clothes are versions of what, in the late 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s, got kids terrorized. Black youth culture was so steeped in hip-hop and monolithic ideas of what and who black people should and should not be that in order to incorporate a tie into your daily wardrobe, you had to walk a kangaroo court of Karl Kani hoodies and FUBU jeans. Black love once seemed more conditional than it does now. In 1991, Kanye West might have been too much of a weirdo to be a star.

But 21st-century blackness has lost its rigid center, and irony permeates the cultural membrane.
But 21st-century blackness has lost its rigid center, and irony permeates the cultural membrane. More than kids knowing they can be president of the United States, it might be more crucial to the expansion of black identity that — thanks to, say, N.E.R.D or Odd Future — they know they can be skate punks. Kanye West can release an album called The College Dropout, then run around the world dressed like an Oberlin junior. (The backpack craze was popularized by him.) West had done what 15 years of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Family Matters could not. He ushered in the chic of the black nerd. He cleared a safe space for narcissism and self-deconstruction; for singing rappers with names like Drake, J. Cole, and Tyler, The Creator; for the Roots to be Jimmy Fallon's house band; for the threat in the music to move from the street to the psyche. Hip-hop had already begun to splinter into a land of a million mixtapes before West's arrival. And with that shattering, black male style was transitioning away from Sean Combs' "Puffy" era gilded age, with its plushness, flamboyance, glamour, and actionable danger.

If you were black, liked hip-hop, but also liked the confessional dimensions of the singer-songwriter, West was an alternative you could relate to, and you could see the change in NBA press conferences. Once upon a time — about two or three years ago — these same players greeted the press and stepped onto buses awash in big, creamy sweaters, roomy leather jackets, and substantially karated wristwear. Then, suddenly, that was switched for less urban, more meticulously groomed style. You can still find baggy denim shorts, long white T-shirts, sideways baseball caps, and platinum ropes with a diamond-encrusted crucifix. But it's Allen Iverson in the time of Blake Griffin, Gucci Mane in the moment of Drake. These men aren't dressing for A-T-L pool parties. But they're not wearing the clothes of the streets, either. Durant and James and Stoudemire are wearing what black kids are wearing in the suburbs, where white kids' belief that the racial grass is greener applies to black kids.

Michael Loccisano/Getty Images
If there were a tagline for the change, it would have come from Jay-Z's melodic admonition "Change Clothes": "Y'all niggas acting way too tough / Throw a suit and get it tapered up." So the big stars arrived at press conferences looking like the executive Jay-Z suspended his rap career to become, looking, well, like the president of the United States.

In a sense, the shift is also a snapshot of how stylists continue to remove Darwinism from sports style. There's very little natural selection now. And yet, no matter who dressed him, it's fun to see Amar'e Stoudemire, in those Foot Locker ads, walking past NBA aspirants as some kind of instructor, like he's the Tim Gunn or RuPaul of the NBA. The cardigans and black frames, the backpacks and everything else: It's all as overdetermined as what happens on Project Runway with Lady Gaga and Nicki Minaj, and with the drag queens. "Nerd" is a kind of drag in which ballers are liberated to pretend to be someone else.

When David Stern imposed the league's reductive dress code six years ago, all this role-playing, reinvention, and experimentation didn't seem a likely outcome. We all feared Today's Man. But the players — and the stylists — were being challenged to think creatively about dismantling Stern's black-male stereotyping. The upside of all this intentionality is that these guys are trying stuff out to see what works. Which can be exciting. No sport has undergone such a radical shift of self-expression and self-understanding, wearing the clothes of both the boys it once mocked and the men it desires to be.

It's not a complete transformation. Being Carlton wasn't just code for nerd, it was code for gay, and the homophobia these clothes provoked still persists, even from their wearers. Once last year, Dwight Howard, of the Orlando Magic, wore a blue-and-black cardigan over a whitish tie and pink shirt to a press conference. When a male reporter told him it was a good color on him, instead of asking the reporter "Which color?," Howard spent many seconds performing disgusted disbelief: Whoa, whoa. A moment like that demonstrated how hopelessly superficial all this style can be. The sport can change its clothes, but, even with Dan Savage looking over its shoulder, will it ever change its attitude? If Howard thinks compliments about his cardigan are gay, he probably shouldn't wear one.

Still, something's changed in a sport that used to be afraid of any deviations from normal. That fear allowed Dennis Rodman to thrive. Now Rodman just seems like a severe side effect of the league's black-male monoculture. The Los Angeles Lakers officially recognize the man who was involved in one of the most notorious fights in sports history as "Metta World Peace." Baron Davis, of the Cleveland Cavaliers, spent the summer in a lockout beard that made him look like a Fort Greene lumberjack. And Kevin Durant wears a safety-strapped backpack. If Stern was hoping to restore a sense of normalcy to the NBA, he only exploded it. There no longer is a normal.

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The Reducer: Week 15, Let England Shake

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:46 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

In this day and age, with the proliferation of Continental coaches and international players in the Premier League, with Nicolas Anelka going to China, Joey Barton listening to Bon Iver, and the league's top team funded by the royal family of Abu Dhabi, led by an Italian manager and starring an Ivorian, an Argentinian, a Spaniard, and a Ghanaian-born Italian, the question needs to be asked … what is English football?

There was a time when that answer was obvious. English football was all about defenders' heads wrapped in bloody bandages, uniforms covered in mud, pitches that looked plowed, wingers bombing up the flanks, and colossal headers blasted past colossus keepers. The players were named George, Terry, and Tony. They kicked heavy soccer balls made of leather from stoic Yorkshire cattle. They put their faces in front of blistering shots and consumed warm lager and fried fish at halftime.

For whatever reason — blame it on the drop in temperature or the moon being in the House of Allardyce — the English Premier League seemed very … English this weekend. A lot of blood, guts, thunder, aerial balls, players being flipped into the air, crosses, headers, and set pieces in the rain. Let's take a look at some of the British steel on display.

Chelsea 2, Manchester City 1

One of the best presents any Arsenal fan got for their club's 125th birthday, which was celebrated in fine style over the weekend, was the knowledge that their 2003-04 side would continue to be the only Premier League team known as "The Invincibles." And that present, strangely enough, came courtesy of Chelsea, who beat Manchester City, 2-1, in the pouring rain.

Blues boss Andre Villas-Boas, despite comporting himself in the press like an off-meds Carrie Mathison, has somehow righted the ship at Stamford Bridge. I say "somehow" like it's a mystery. Really, the first-year Portuguese boss has gone back to the things that have always worked for Chelsea over the last 10 years; be aggressive, be physical, drive forward, and let Didier Drogba cook.

Played under the floodlights, in the rain, like this one was, played at 100 mph with 100 percent commitment, matches tend to turn on a piece of luck. With the amount David Silva was being kicked (which I really hope doesn't become a strategy for the second half of the season), the result could have just as easily gone City's way.

But it didn't, and in this league, to some extent, you make your own luck. In wins against Newcastle, Valencia, and City, Villas-Boas has relieved some of the pressure on his jumpy defense by starting them out in a deeper position; asking them to soak up attacks rather than head them off. The Blues started a trio of terriers in midfield — Romeu, Raul Meireles, and Ramires — who hounded and harassed Yaya Toure to the point where the Ivorian central midfielder looked cooked after an hour.

Neither goal was scored by Didier Drogba, but he seemed to constantly be involved; dropping deep to help his midfield in possession, breaking off to the wing, pulling a centre-back out of position, or just generally being a handful.

What did we learn from this match?

• It's better for Roberto Mancini when Mario Balotelli plays with a kind of "You mad cause I'm stylin' on you" detachment, because, toward the end of the match, when he started showing his frustration, he seemed primed for a card

• Chelsea might have provided something of an alternative blueprint on how to defeat City. If Napoli showed that the Etihad boys were vulnerable to the counter, Chelsea showed that just keeping things close and putting the onus on Joleon Lescott and Gael Clichy to not make mistakes is an equally viable game plan.

• Or you could just kick Silva.

• To his credit, Silva didn't seem overly concerned about the amount of hip-checks and high boots he was taking. My favorite moment of the match came later on, when he and his former Valencia teammate Juan Mata held a conversation while holding their hands over their mouths.

• They were probably talking about Fernando Torres, who spent the entire night in the pissing rain and only really looked like he was coming on when Drogba picked up one of his "only a flesh wound" ankle injuries.

Stoke 2, Tottenham 1

One of my favorite movies to watch as a kid was the Stephen King directorial effort Maximum Overdrive. In the film, machines have taken over the Earth, leaving a random group of people to fend for themselves at a North Carolina truck stop while big rigs and 18-wheelers menace and destroy all around them.

I always think of this movie when watching Stoke and how long-haul sons of bitches like Robert Huth and Ryan Shawcross can make any opposing football team look like a bunch of cowering mortals, seeking shelter in a truck stop.

Within the first few moments of Tottenham and Stoke's Brittania Stadium clash there were already multiple midair collisions, a long throw that nearly resulted in a goal, a robust Gareth Bale toppling, and the sight of Stoke forward and the World's Angriest-Looking Man, Jon Walters, jumping out of his own boots.

Even when Tottenham got something resembling football going, they couldn't match Stoke's all-last-ditch-all-the-time style of defending.

In the tenth minute, Gareth Bale broke on the Potters after Rafael van der Vaart redirected a one-touch pass from Emmanuel Adebayor. Bale, standing on the verge of getting it on, lining up Lennon for the cross, let the ball go and then ... Huth! There he was (shoot me in the face). Robert Huth threw his entire body and soul in front of the ball, somersaulting into goal and earning a delirious response from the Stoke faithful.

Every game has its own internal rhythm dictated by a myriad of factors; weather, time of kickoff, last match played by either side, and the permissive or restrictive streaks of whatever referee is watching over the proceedings. Sometimes you get a free-flowing, if physical, game. Sometimes you are slowly killed by 1,000 blown whistles. Stoke do something incredibly smart (and a bit cynical) when they play: so physical is their style, so tenacious, that to call every foul would stop the match dead in its tracks.

That's not a complaint, per se. I don't actively enjoy watching Stoke play, but I do respect it. They game the system in the best way they can. Manchester City do it by spending the GDP of Tunisia on signing Serbian defenders and then consigning them to the reserves. Stoke do it by coaching up a bunch of dudes that are three Snickers bars away from being Sloth from Goonies. Whatever works.

While I'm sure Scott Parker has the bruises to prove otherwise, this match won't be remembered for any Earth-scorching tackles as much as it will be for its flawed officiating. Referee Chris Foy failed to see one and a half handballs, allowed a bad offside call to go through, and sent off Younes Kaboul after the Spurs defender nicked Walters. It was sort of hilarious to watch Walters gesticulate wildly after his tumble, given the fact that the Stoke fans had been frothing at the mouth, screaming "CHEAT" at Scott Parker after Walters shoved him to the ground early in the match and booing Luka Modric because he had the temerity to get kicked in the box, leading to Adebayor's penalty shot and Tottenham's only goal.

I know all football fans are unhappy in their own way, but Stoke's support can certainly seem pretty rabid when they get the bit between their teeth.

After the match, Spurs boss Harry Redknapp tried being sanguine about the tough decisions his squad faced: "I never complain about referees' decisions." He then proceeded to vociferously complain about the referee's decisions (for even more vintage: "I just felt like he was quite enjoying not giving us anything"). In the end, what can you do? Forget it, Harry. It's Stoketown. (For more instant vintage winery from Harrry, check Quote of the Week.)

Step Overs

• Martin O'Neil has been lauded as a master motivator and something of a cup-play expert. He's also been knocked for being a total flake and overpaying for past-their-sell-by-date players. Upon being hired at Sunderland, there were a lot of "Martin O'Neil Is Overrated" articles in the British press. And for 84 minutes of the Black Cats' match against lowly Blackburn, those articles seemed right on. But then, with one David Vaughan wonder strike and a typically physics-shattering free kick from Seb Larsson, we saw the O'Neil Effect: At least in the early days, his team plays for him and that team's fans don't give up. Two seasons from now, when Emile Heskey is leading Sunderland's line in one of these, everyone will be shaking their heads and O'Neil will probably jailbreak from the Northeast with his cell phone turned off. But until then it should be a hell of a show in Sunderland.

• Shout-out to Norwich, who took advantage of an anemic and banged-up Newcastle backline to score four goals, most of which came from crosses into the box, finished by the big-man-bald-man combo of Grant Holt and Steve Morison.

Rumors

Mario Goetze to Arsenal probably won't happen since he tore a thigh muscle and is out until at least the New Year. This should allow Arsene Wenger to concentrate on what he really needs: a left-back. Andre Santos is out for several months with an ankle injury and Kieran Gibbs is made of origami paper … Liverpool are apparently kicking the tires of Real Sociedad's Inigo Martine, who could go a long way toward replacing Xabi Alonso's long, long, long range shooting ability … Now back in the title race with City's loss, it will be interesting to see if Sir Alex Ferguson can loosen the Glazers' purse strings to buy a centre-back (Nemanja Vidic is out for a few months with a knee injury) and a creative central midfielder who could take the pressure off Wayne Rooney and allow him to play closer to goal. Going out of the Champions League won't help his shopping list, however (meaning cross Wesley Sneijder off of it).

Goal of the Week (Probably Season): Robin van Persie, Arsenal

(1:30 in) I still haven't decided whether van Persie's wonder strike against Everton is better than his shin-hit-for-all-time against Charlton. On one hand, the latter has a higher freak-of-nature rating, but this jaw-breaking volley is a completely clean hit. You decide.

Quote of the Week: Harry Redknapp, Tottenham Hotspur

On the performance of referee Chris Foy: "He'll look at it tonight, on TV, when his wife is making him a bacon sandwich and think, 'Oh fuck me, what have I done there?'" Take a bow, son.

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NBA Player Watch: Los Angeles Clippers' Eric Gordon

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:44 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

Los Angeles Clippers shooting guard Eric Gordon took his game to another level last season, his third in the NBA, by scoring 22.3 points per game and improving his PER from 14.1 to 18.5. Gordon's game was pretty efficient, finishing the year scoring 1.001 points per possession, ranking him among the top 20 percent of all NBA players. Gordon's true shooting percentage of 56.6 dipped slightly from his first two years, but it was still good enough to place him 11th among shooting guards who played significant minutes, according to HoopData.com. Gordon's game is already efficient, so before we look at how he can take his game to the next level, let's take a look at what Gordon already does well.

The first area in which Gordon has really improved since his rookie year is the pick and roll. Despite playing a majority of his minutes at the shooting guard position, pick and rolls were Gordon's bread and butter last year. According to Synergy Sports Technology, Gordon came off ball screens in 27.4 percent of his possessions. When he did so, Gordon was able to post a PPP of 0.944, placing him among the top 10 percent of all NBA players when using a ball screen. What made Gordon so successful was his ability to make pull-up jumpers off the dribble. Gordon is very quick with the basketball in his hands, and that puts the pressure on his defender as he drives off the screen. If the defender plays a step back to contain Gordon's drive, it leaves Gordon with an open jumper. Gordon's shot is one of the prettiest — and most fundamentally sound — in basketball, and the result is a very high effective field goal percentage of 48.6 when using ball screens:

Sebastian Pruiti
Here, Gordon comes off a screen set by Blake Griffin. Griffin's defender steps out but doesn't show hard, and Gordon uses the screen and starts to attack him with the dribble.

Sebastian Pruiti
With all of this space, Gordon decides to pull up for a jump shot. Gordon shoots so well off the dribble because he always seems to stay on balance. He has the rare ability to go from driving hard toward the hoop to stopping on a dime and rising straight up.

Sebastian Pruiti
Now that Gordon is able to go straight up, it means that he is able to land in the same exact spot with both feet firmly on the ground. Here is the shot, and another, in real time:

While taking a jump shot, the lower body — specifically the ability to jump straight up and down — is important because it removes an additional variable from a player's shooting motion. Since he's not floating to one side or the other, he doesn't have to adjust for that drift and can focus on shooting straight at the rim.

Also, if a player jumps at the same height and straight up and down every time, it's easier to identify what went wrong with his missed shots and then fix it. If he's always floating in different directions or not putting the same amount of legs into every shot, trying to adjust his technique becomes guesswork. Gordon's picture-perfect form allowed him to avoid lengthy shooting slumps last season.

Now, because Gordon's pull-up jumper is a threat when he uses ball screens, defenders are forced to play him tight. This frees up Gordon's passing lanes:

The PPP of plays in which Gordon passes to the roll man is 1.174, and his screeners, after receiving the ball, shoot 60.6 percent from the field. Gordon has great vision and passing ability, so when the defense pressures him and the floor opens up, he can find an open teammate in scoring position. More often than not, Gordon makes the correct pass-or-shoot decision when he comes off screens, and the result is either a made jumper or an easy dunk for the screener. Of course, it doesn't hurt that Blake Griffin is usually the forward setting picks for Gordon and then diving to the hoop.

Gordon also had success last season as a spot-up shooter. He posted an effective field goal rate of 54.9 percent and a PPP of 1.143 in catch-and-shoot situations, which put him in the top 13 percent of all NBA players. Once again, Gordon's shooting form is the key to his success:

Gordon keeps his elbow underneath the basketball. While he shoots from his shoulder, his guide hand is in the correct position on the side of the ball, and he gets fantastic rotation on his shot. That, in addition to his lower-body positioning, means that Gordon will make more spot-up jumpers than he misses.

While it's obvious that Gordon does a number of things well, he still needs to improve to become the star the Clippers hope he'll be. The first area in which Gordon struggles is moving without the ball. A shooter like Gordon should be a threat when working off the ball, but when Gordon comes off screens away from the ball, he only shoots 38.8 percent. Gordon's problem is that he struggles to get squared up to the basket when on the move:

Sebastian Pruiti
Here, Gordon comes off of a pin-down screen set by Chris Kaman. As the pass approaches him, Gordon should be curling toward the pass, allowing him to make the catch, square up, and shoot. But Gordon doesn't do that. Instead, he runs straight with his back away from the rim as the ball comes to him.

Sebastian Pruiti
As you can see, when Gordon makes the catch, he isn't even facing the rim. Shooters who use screens well know how to curl around the basketball to catch it and face up in one smooth motion. Gordon doesn't. Most of the time, when Gordon catches the ball, he's not even facing the rim.

Sebastian Pruiti
Gordon still has his strong form, but he wastes too much motion and time between making the catch and getting squared to the hoop. The result in these situations is usually a miss. Here are a few more clips:

Gordon also struggles in transition. When he is the ball handler on the break, Gordon turns over the basketball 8.4 percent of the time. This really hurts his efficiency, resulting in a PPP of 1.201, which is not even in the top 40 percent of NBA players in these situations. Why does Gordon commit so many turnovers in transition? He tends to force the issue and put the pressure of scoring squarely on his shoulders:

In the above situations, Gordon tries to create transition opportunities even when they aren't there. In the first clip, Gordon could make a simple pass to Blake Griffin, but instead he fakes the pass, tries to Euro-step past his defender, and loses the ball. In the other clips, Gordon pushes the basketball in situations in which they don't have the advantage. He forces it in a 2-on-5 situation and a 2-on-3, and also tries to push the ball in transition after a made basket by the opposing team. When he tries to create fast-break opportunities without the numerical advantage, Gordon's passing lanes in these situations close up quickly, and the result is turnovers.

Last year, we saw Gordon take a step in the right direction. He became a very good ball handler and decision-maker when coming off screens, and he became a spot-up shooting threat. However, if he wants to continue to develop, he must learn to play effectively off the ball. Additionally, Gordon really needs to take better care of the basketball in transition. The Clippers are a young and athletic team that will probably try to amp up the pace, and with Gordon acting as a primary ball handler, he can't turn the ball over so often. If Gordon can clean up those two areas, there is a good chance that he can turn into a superstar.

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What Ever Happened to the Triangle Offense?

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:43 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

The Triangle offense has been, pretty much irrefutably, the single most dominant offensive attack (in any major sport) of the past 20 years. Since 1991, teams running the Triangle have won 11 of the 20 possible NBA titles. Obviously, that statistic is a little disingenuous: Those 11 championships involve only one head coach and are distributed between two dynastic teams (both of whom had greater talent than virtually anyone they faced). If you install Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant into any offense, you'll win 60 games. The Triangle was not the reason the Bulls won six titles and the Lakers won five. But the Triangle was what both teams used exclusively. It wasn't the explanation for their success, but it was central to their operation. It was a component of their dominance. Which is why it's so strange that — today — not one team in the NBA uses the Triangle. It's a dead offense.

So why did it die?

The easy (and lazy) answer is that no one uses the Triangle because it's too complex. As a rule, coaches are plagiarists. When a coach sees something that works, his natural inclination is to steal the idea — except, it seems, if the sport is basketball and the scheme is the Triangle. It's arcane and intimidating. Everyone seems to understand it a little, but almost no one understands it completely. It's both familiar and enigmatic: The Triangle is perhaps the only offensive set any casual NBA fan can identify by name, despite the fact that no one outside of Phil Jackson's coaching sphere can describe how it works with any clarity. But that dissonance, argues Jackson, proves nothing.

"The Triangle is extremely simple," Jackson insists. "You just need enough energy to get up and down the floor, because it's a 94-foot offense. Everything happens in 4/4 time, like rap music. That's how I always described the tempo to players."

Of course, what Jackson considers uncomplicated isn't a universal condition — moments after claiming that the Triangle was "extremely simple," he mentioned that there are approximately 35 different options that can be used when the ball is reversed to the top of the key. The Triangle relies on its practitioners' ability to read an opposing defense in real time, so it's only as simple as the dumbest player on the floor. That's part of the reason it never became normative. Another might be Jackson's perception as a deeply Zen dude, which might make a traditional meat-and-potatoes man wince. But there's something else here that's harder to quantify; there's a prejudice against the Triangle that goes beyond its technical details. It's almost as if some people want the Triangle to disappear.

"People will sometimes look at a team and say, 'Those players won't work in the Triangle. The Triangle won't work here.' And that's so ridiculous," Jackson says. "People just have this attitude about the Triangle, like it's this pariah offense. That's totally wrong. It just takes a little time."

If Jackson's use of the word "pariah" seems overly dramatic, consider this: I spoke with another coach about the Triangle for more than an hour, but only after agreeing our conversation would remain off the record. His reasoning? He fears being perceived as a "Triangle coach" could marginalize his reputation. The conventional wisdom is that coaches who love the Triangle are inflexibly married to its principles and unwilling to adapt to new personnel. Whenever a team using the Triangle struggles, the Triangle absorbs the blame.1 And since so few people really know how (or why) the Triangle works, it becomes a circular criticism. "No matter what I say in this interview," the coach told me, "nobody will understand this offense. It's impossible to explain over the phone."

This is true. Even after conducting these interviews, I'd be lying if I claimed to completely understand how the Triangle is supposed to work. I know the architect of the offense was Tex Winter and that former Bulls assistant Johnny Bach was integral to its adoption in Chicago. I know the base alignment of the Triangle is a human triangle on one side of the floor — a center on the block, a forward at the wing, and a guard in the corner. An explanation of everything else requires a chalkboard and a year of experience. But here's what our unnamed coach told me:

1. The Triangle is considered a "flow offense," in which player movement is the most important detail (set plays are rare). It's also considered a "mirror offense," because the same things happen on each side of the floor. Neither of these qualities is unique or even uncommon.

2. The strength of the offense is that all five players are interchangeable and that anyone on the floor can occupy the post (assuming that player has the best post matchup).

3. There are passes players are automatically supposed to make if they receive the ball at certain positions on the floor against specific defensive alignments. These decisions are called "automatics" (and those automatics are what the players need to mentally internalize).

When the Bulls ran this offense in the '90s, the key adaptation Jackson made was moving Scottie Pippen to the top of the key and playing Jordan as a forward (in Los Angeles, he made a similar tweak with Lamar Odom and Bryant). But those players would have succeeded in any offense. The real advantage of the Triangle is what it does for players with less ability. Most NBA sets are static; they require perimeter players to create their own shot, usually off the dribble. The Triangle's relentless off-the-ball movement allows standing jump shooters to contribute within their own preexisting skill set. This is why it worked so well for John Paxson and Steve Kerr, and even for guys like Sasha Vujacic and Luke Walton. You don't need four or five athletic scorers to make the Triangle work. Two is plenty, because it amplifies the value of role players.

"When I look at Oklahoma City," the anonymous coach said, "I see a team that is built to run the Triangle. They are so designed to run the Triangle that it's almost a joke. Imagine them running a two-man game on the weak side with [Kevin] Durant and [Russell] Westbrook. Who the fuck is gonna stop that?"

In theory, no one. In practice, everyone, because Oklahoma City doesn't run the Triangle. Nobody does.2 And that reality is more complicated than the offense itself.

When Jackson coached the Albany Patroons, he initially used a flex offense.3 He felt CBA players needed structure. It wasn't until he became an assistant for Doug Collins in Chicago that he converted to the Triangle.

"When I came to the Bulls, Tex Winter and Johnny Bach were the assistants," says Jackson. "I was relatively ignorant about NBA offensive systems. Well, maybe not ignorant. But certainly naïve. And Tex4 was a big proponent of his offense. At the time, we were running through a sequence of ineffective point guards. Kyle Macy. Sedale Threatt. Sam Vincent was brought in. Craig Hodges was there. But Tex would always argue that you didn't need a great point guard to win in the NBA. This idea of the point guard dominating the ball is a relatively new idea in the game of basketball, really. … One of the things that's pretty obvious [about my coaching career] is that I never had to fight to get a dominant point guard. Because once you do that, defenses can align themselves against that one guy. You can pressure the point guard high on the floor and move the ball away from whomever you want to shut down. That was always my defensive philosophy against people like Isiah Thomas and John Stockton."

This, it seems, is one of the less reported motives behind Jackson's affinity for the Triangle: By decreasing the import of the lead guard and having two players share ballhandling duties, the offense's emphasis was shifted to the baseline. That brand of thinking conflicts with the current NBA climate, in which so many point guards have emerged as high-profile superstars. It also explains why the Triangle met with such resistance in Chicago until Jackson took over in 1989.

"Doug [Collins] had a hard time with the Triangle, because his backdrop as a coach was Hank Iba,5 who coached him in the '72 Olympics," Jackson says. "He really believed that the guards should be at half court when a shot was being taken on offense [in order to stop transition], so he didn't like the idea of a guard being stuck in that corner."

When asked why the Triangle is disappearing, Jackson suggested that it's a hard offense for an impatient person to teach to modern athletes: "The problem with the Triangle is that you have to teach the most basic, basic skills: Footwork. Where you stand on the floor. And if you have the kind of player who wants to attack and score every time he touches the ball, he will hurt this offense." In general, Jackson sees the league imprudently moving away from post-oriented sets: "The game is evolving into a 3-point shooting game. You can't win a championship with a European offense, like what Phoenix has run for the past few years. But that seems to be the style people are copying. My issue with a team like Miami is always, 'Who is going to score in the post?' An interior game is still key, even if you don't have a high-scoring center. Clearly, that's what Dallas has with Dirk [Nowitzki], and that was the difference in last year's championship series."

It's fun to talk about the Triangle with Jackson,6 mostly because he's smart and candid about everything. Yet it's possible that this willingness to express unvarnished opinions is part of the reason the Triangle is dying: Jackson is widely viewed as arrogant. He engenders jealousy among his rivals (and seems to enjoy doing so). His acolytes are few and far between. Unlike most coaches who've had major success, he hasn't spawned a significant coaching tree of former assistants — his only real tentacles into the league have been recently fired Timberwolves coach Kurt Rambis and ex-Mavs coach Jim Cleamons (currently working in China). Neither ran the Triangle in totality. Jackson's NBA impact has been massive, but his ongoing influence will be muted. It appears that he will not be remembered as the NBA coach who ran the Triangle best; in all likelihood, he will be remembered as the only NBA coach who ran it at all. If the Triangle truly dies, it dies with him.

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Chauncey Billups' Cojones, Holiday Movies, and Idiots Who Touch the Stanley Cup

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:42 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

Now that the Knicks signed Tyson Chandler and effectively took themselves out of the Chris Paul sweepstakes, how excited are you for Knicks hype that is actually about the current season and not the next offseason? Or am I underestimating the News and Post's back page rumormongering abilities?

— Michael L.

I'm … really excited … I … think? Honestly, I'm still completely unclear as to who exactly is even on the Knicks/in the NBA/stuck in China/underloved/overpaid/under David Stern's thumb/overweight. This past week has been OUT OF CONTROL. Christmas Day is going to feature soooo much atrocious basketball. I can't wait. Anyway, my three favorite Knicks-related storylines have been:

Jorts. I forgot all about Jorts!!!!!!
The fact that Tyson Chandler, as promised, is "hanging next week" with Ari Marcopoulos, who created a fan zine about him (Chandler described his understanding of a zine as "the mixtape of magazines") well before it was even known that the player would be headed to New York. Wish: granted!
Each and every single word that has come out of the Chauncey Billups camp since last Thursday. In particular: "He has no intention of being open-minded about any possible situation." My new love/workplace/life motto. I like how he's acting like the most mistreated man in the league, after getting a cushy double-digit contract extension for launching up ridiculous 3 after ridiculous 3 for a team that acquired him at the trade deadline and owed the man nothing. I'm not even mad. That's amazing.
Why is there no love for Jimmy Howard? I never hear about him outside of Detroit & Red Wings media. The guy is having an amazing year statistically and has top ten worthy saves every night. However he's no where to be found on the All Star ballot. I think he's the best American goalie in the league this year.

— Nick K.

Jimmy Howard has more wins than any other NHL goalie with 18, has the second-best goals against average in the league at 1.82, and has amassed three shutouts this season. The Detroit Red Wings are 19-9-1, just one point out of second place in the Western Conference. So why wasn't he on the All-Star ballot? Well, for one thing, the All-Star ballot is kind of a farce; though it is released more than a month into the season, it barely acknowledges what has occurred up until then. (Case in point: The New York Rangers' representation included defenseman Marc Staal, who has played zero games this year as he recovers from a concussion.)

That Howard wasn't one of the 18 goalies on the ballot still looks, in hindsight, insane — but he was clearly hurt by his middling performance in 2010-11, in which he posted an ugly .908 save percentage and a GAA of 2.79. Red Wings goaltenders are traditionally discounted, fairly or not, for playing behind such consistently good squads. Take Chris Osgood: His retirement this summer sparked heated discussion in hockey circles over whether his 401 career wins (10th all time) and three Stanley Cups (two as starting goaltender) ought to qualify him for the Hall of Fame — or whether he was just held aloft by his outstanding teams.

Howard currently has more All-Star write-in votes than any other NHL player (the Bruins' Tyler Seguin has the second-most) and stands eighth in total votes among goaltenders. Because only the top vote-getting goalie is guaranteed a spot on the roster (the others are picked by the league), there's still a good chance Howard could make the cut. As you said, Detroit-area media is shouting particularly loud about their local goalie: radio station WRIF in particular, which has "taken to the streets" in a "Vote for Howard" tour bus for the cause.

How long do you have to be dating someone for until you are required to buy them a Christmas gift? I only ask because I have been casually dating a girl for a few weeks and as the holiday season is approaching I don't know if she qualifies for a gift yet.

— John G.

It's late fall, the nights are growing longer, the air is feeling crisper, and you just want someone with whom to stumble home from Rivalry Week tailgates. (Perhaps you first made out on Halloween; that literally and figuratively half-assed Risky Business costume turned out to be a hit.) Things are going well — you get a nice Thanksgiving out-of-sight-out-of-mind break from each other before the antlers-and-sweaters parties begin in earnest. Then suddenly you realize with a start: Wait, are we a thing?

You're not alone. Check out this chart of "Peak Break-Up Times on Facebook," which is at once amusing (the Monday spikes), unfunny (the April Fool's Day pranksters, yuk yuk yuk), ALL TOO REAL (memories of the "Spring Break spring clean" just made me run crying from the room like the salesgirl in Mallrats), and just about right (the huge spike two weeks before the holidays, as everyone does some cost-benefit accounting).

My advice: If it's been only a few weeks, either (a) abide by commonly accepted Secret Santa-style rules, by which I mean inexpensive but thoughtful (this two-part "Gifting Guide for Humans" contains some fun ideas, and so — if browsed correctly — does this website); (b) go out on a nicer-than-usual "holiday" date, whether it be dinner, drinks, dessert, or whatever; it lacks the pressures of reciprocity; or (c) just tie a bow around a bottle of alcohol (Maker's Mark or prosecco are both pretty safe bets) and call it a day. Seriously: If a budding relationship wilts because of a gift-giving disconnect, you can do so much better. And if things go smoothly? Well, then you've got the much fancier, flashier, and higher-stakes Valentine's Day to contend with in just two short months. Godspeed.

Why are men made to look like complete idiots in commercials these days?

— Eli R.

You're supposed to disguise your whole name, Eli, not just the last initial. SO adorable.

I was explaining the NHL points system to my friend and he asked why an overtime win is worth the same as a regulation win but an overtime loss is worth more than a regulation loss. We thought about it and came up with: a regulation win should be 3 points, an overtime/shootout win should be 2 and an overtime/shootout loss should be 1. This way every game is worth 3 points and points aren't magically added when games go into overtime. It also makes logical sense that if a team is rewarded for being tied at the end of regulation, they should be rewarded even more if they win in regulation than in extra time. What are your thoughts?

— Eliott G.

I completely agree. A 3-2-1-0 format would be simple to implement and easy to explain. Teams would get the same credit they get now for lasting 60 minutes without losing AND for winning in OT or a shootout — and they'd get extra credit, compared to the current system, for dispatching their opponent in regulation. It would help mitigate the annoying tendency of teams playing the last five or so minutes of a tie game "not to lose" just so they can be assured of that one point. (Here the risk of going all-out to try to win would be worth a little bit more.) The biggest downside is that fans would have to get used to seeing much higher point totals in the standings than they're used to, and I think, given the fact that the standings are about to look a whole lot different regardless, the fans would be able to deal.

(PS: Re: the shootout, I think my favorite middle-ground suggestion between "She's a witch!" and "But my mommmm liiiikeess itttt" came from Yahoo!'s Greg Wyshynski when he was a guest on the B.S. Report, and suggested instead of a 1-on-0 breakaway they should at least make the shootout mimic a 2-on-1 or 3-on-2 game-like situation. It'll never happen, but imagine the highlight reels if it did?)

Friends and I were recently debating the best holiday movies and thought about the sheer volume of good ones out there (Home Alone, Emmett Otter's Jug Band Christmas, Elf, It's a Wonderful Life...) So it got me thinking, where are all the bad ones? A quick Google search landed me here. Personally, I feel robbed I never heard of half of these (Santa with Muscles??) and a little scorned that Jingle All the Way made the list. Thoughts on the best/worst?

— Garett D.

Keeping in mind that I know nothing about "film," I haven't seen most movies that exist in the world, and I'm using a loose definition of holiday movies, here are some of my most favorite and most hated, in no particular order:

HO HO HO: The Ref, The Family Man; Scrooged; Elf; Home Alone; National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation; Prancer

NO NO NO: The Polar Express; The Family Stone; Jack Frost; Christmas With the Kranks; Deck the Halls

MOVIE EVERYONE LOVES THAT I HATE: Love Actually (sorry!!)

MOVIE EVERYONE HATES THAT I LOVE: How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the Jim Carrey version)

My boyfriend and I got engaged in the stands at Game Seven of the World Series, five years and a day after our first date watching the Cardinals win the World Series in 2006 at a bar next to Busch Stadium. We had all but decided to name our firstborn Albert David before the devastating Angels signing. Do I have to name all my children after Cardinals? Is David enough of an homage or do I have to go all out with Skip or Lance? How soon is too soon to name a child after an athlete? Is it just too problematic if the player is still alive, because of the potential for Roger Clemens/Johnny Damon/Mark Bellhorn-style Yankees signings, Jose Canseco/Lenny Dykstra-style personal implosions, Jordan-style Hitler-staches or Julian Edelman/Ben Roethlisberger-style assault charges? Can I get away with someone safe and old, like Tim Wakefield, or is there too much of a chance it is going to come out next week that he's signing with the Mets?

— Caitlin M.

I wish I had taped a video of myself reading this question. All smiles, a few nods, a joyous giggle at the mention of the Hitler-stache … and then, when I got to the epic Mets burn, a physical recoil that rivaled even "2 Girls 1 Cup" reaction footage. Well played. And congratulations on the engagement! I want to know everything about what it was like. What inning was it? Were the people around you drunk and annoying or were you too excited to care? Was your name on the big scoreboard? They didn't wand your fiancé at security and find the ring? Did you know it was coming? OHMYGODWEREYOUSOEXCITED??? (Sorry, this has been your Bake Shop edition of "Shit Girls Say.")

Unfortunately, this absurd recent look at baby-naming conventions doesn't address sports. But I think middle names are your best bet, because middle names are best designed for abuse. (My stance on this might be because I have the world's most boring and generic middle name, and I'm always jealous of people with whimsical parents who let them choose their own, or those with stuffy parents but rad middle names like von du Veldenschmidt.) Go wild! Go with Busch! Go for Izzy, or Holliday, or Herzog! (I could see where "Whitey" could be problematic.) How about Buck or La Russa? Oh my god, GIVE YOUR KID THE MIDDLE NAME FREDBIRD. JUST DO IT. The best thing about middle names is that they're unisex. Caitlin Albert actually sounds kind of cool, unless you abuse it in a Miss Havisham way to remind her that men are liable to compensate for going bald by fleeing to LA.

Can we start referring to Phil Kessel as "The Weight One," a nickname that pays homage to his fatness, but impressive talent?

— Scott K.

After seeing this photo of him (which appears to be real — it's posted on his girlfriend's Facebook page, and I despise myself for having just typed that phrase in earnest) touching the Stanley Cup, I think Phil Cursel might be more appropriate. Sorry, Leafs fans.

I moved to Philadelphia from the UK in July. I have had to learn about the Phillies, the Flyers and the Eagles. I am getting tired (and still don't know what a cornerback is). Can you tell me all I need to know about the 76-ers in a paragraph? Or less.

— James P.

Here's what I know about the Sixers, based on a visit to their arena last season: Their PA announcer was even more like a bad wedding DJ than most PA announcers typically are, and their mascot was a nightmare-fuel bunny rabbit named "Hip Hop" with huge furry biceps and a do-rag who taught me what the bad kind of tripping feels like. Both of these team employees have been ousted in the offseason, however. (You can read Grantland's take on the new mascots here; I just went and voted for the dog on the strength of his pantsless-trench-coat-flasher look.) So I turned to Grantland's resident Sixers fan-4-life Chris Ryan for some better answers. Here's what he had to say:

James! Welcome to the City of Brotherly Love. So, the Sixers. Here's the deal: Philly is a great, great hoops town. From Sonny Hill League, high schools like Simon Gratz (Rasheed Wallace's alma mater), and the incredible (if not what it used to be) Big 5 college rivalries. Ten years ago the Sixers were the crown jewel of this hoops heaven and Allen Iverson was the king. We've never really gotten over his departure/fall from grace. I know the T.G.I. Friday's on City Line Avenue and the Palmer Social Club have definitely not recovered, economically or otherwise. But the Sixers have a young, fun team right now who will be just good enough to not get a good draft pick. Here's your primer: Jrue Holiday is awesome, Andre Iguodala wants to be elsewhere, and Evan Turner's favorite movie is The Notebook. See you at the Wells Fargo Center, mate.

In the history of music, has there ever been a more ridiculous, more impassioned, more misplaced outpouring of emotion than in Sisqo's 2000 classic hit, "The Thong Song"? Specifically, I refer to the bridge of this song at around 2:40. After a suspenseful instrumental buildup rivaled only by the theme from Jaws, Sisqo lays it all on the line and goes for it. I think the most ridiculous part is when he goes "I don't think you heeeaaaard me!!" Think about that for a second. Literally all he has been singing about for the past two minutes is how much he loves thongs, yet he still feels the need to tell the listener: Look. I don't think you understand me, okay? I LOVE THONGS. I know you've been listening to me for the past two minutes but you're not HEARING me. I LOVE them. It's pretty powerful stuff. So, my question is, can you give another moment in musical history in which such a misplaced outpouring of unnecessary emotion occurs?

— Rami L.

See, I'd argue that Sisqo's emotion is neither misplaced nor unnecessary. Clearly the man tapped into something big with his seminal (um, not-quite-puns not-quite-intended, gross!) masterpiece. How else would it have become such a timeless classic, one that earned Sisqo his very own "20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection" CD alongside the likes of Heavy D and Public Enemy? The people love the thong! The greatest Wall Street Journal front-page article ever written was about the thong — on my 21st birthday, no less, which I will always remember because I had just started a finance summer internship and we would get quizzed on WSJ articles early in the morning and I was really hungover and that's the only article I could come up with. With sentences like: "It's like lace butter, says Joni Wheat, a 33-year-old personal shopper in Chicago," can you really blame me? Somehow I got the job.

Your important close read of the lyrics reminds me of nothing less than one of my top, oh, three favorite all-time things on the Internet, and that is John Darnielle's 2003 message board thread discussing "100 Reasons why 'Ignition - Remix' Is So Damned Great." (To give you an idea of the extent of my love, you should know that I just had a minor panic attack when I tried to locate it and got a server error. Here it is in all its glory, and in case it ever goes away for good I just copy/pasted the whole thing to a Word document that I am about to save on a thumb drive because I am NOT KIDDING AROUND WITH THIS.)

Reasons no. 27, 28, and 101 are incredible. The whole thing is incredible. And the cameo appearances by music critics like Matthew Perpetua and Jody Beth Rosen, combined with the snapshot-in-time arguments from nonbelievers like "(ps. Beyonce & Jigga's new single pretty much kills this tune)" make this a true historical document that someone really should send to the Library of Congress. In fact, I think I've got a second thumb drive laying around … In closing: Every last one of my Facebook friends has now been spammed with the news that "Katie listened to Thong Song on Spotify." Thanks a lot, Rami L.

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The Randomness of the NBA's 66-Game Season

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:41 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

What's more exciting than the shortened NBA season that starts on Christmas Day? Of course, it's betting on that shortened NBA season! Because the NBA is removing 16 games off the docket and eliminating plenty of rest days, there's a lot of uncertainty about how the season will play out. Will younger, faster teams dominate during the dog days by virtue of their spry legs? Or will veteran teams with experience playing alongside one another gain an advantage by showing up in shape and not needing time to gain a rapport with new teammates? One thing is for sure: With a shortened schedule, the season will be subject to more randomness by virtue of the smaller sample size of games. Moving the NBA season from 82 games to 66 is the equivalent of taking the 162-game baseball schedule and turning it into a 130-game slate. At the 130-game mark of this year's baseball season, the eventual World Series champion Cardinals were 67-63 and 10.5 games out of the wild card they would eventually claim as their route to the playoffs. A lot can happen with an extra 20 percent added on to a season, and a lot can avoid happening when the league slices the last fifth of a season off the books.

That randomness makes the NBA futures for this upcoming season particularly tantalizing. As a season grows longer, the cream is more and more likely to rise to the top, but with a shortened season, a mediocre team might be able to make it to the top and enjoy home-court advantage for most or all of the playoffs. And of course, as we're navigating a compressed period of free agency and the unsure futures of Chris Paul and Dwight Howard, a team's odds can change on a moment's notice based on a rumor alone.

So amidst this ever-changing situation, let's evaluate how the lines have moved since the league reopened for business. We've gone to our home sportsbook at the Aria on the Las Vegas strip and grabbed their odds on each NBA team winning the title this year. For each team, the chart below lists their opening odds, the line as of Tuesday evening, and the implied odds for each team after we adjust for the vig (or juice) on the bet. Why do we do that? Well, if you add up the raw probabilities for each NBA team, you get to a total of 182.8 percent, and there's only 100 percent of a title that can go to one team. That extra 82.8 percent is Vegas' vig, so if we want to find the real implied probability without the vig included, we divide each raw probability by 182.8 percent.

NBA ODDS
Team Opening Odds Odds on 12/13 Win Percentage
Heat +250 +180 19.5%
Lakers +500 +250 15.6%
Bulls +500 +500 9.1%
Thunder +800 +500 9.1%
Celtics +2200 +600 7.8%
Mavericks +800 +800 6.1%
Knicks +2200 +800 6.1%
Trail Blazers +1800 +1800 2.9%
Spurs +3000 +2000 2.6%
Magic +2500 +2500 2.1%
Grizzlies +4000 +2500 2.1%
Nets +15000 +2500 2.1%
Clippers +5000 +3000 1.8%
Hawks +4000 +4000 1.3%
Rockets +4000 +4000 1.3%
Nuggets +5000 +5000 1.1%
Suns +5000 +5000 1.1%
Jazz +5000 +5000 1.1%
Hornets +6000 +6000 0.9%
Pacers +7500 +7500 0.7%
Warriors +7500 +7500 0.7%
Bucks +7500 +7500 0.7%
76ers +10000 +7500 0.7%
Bobcats +6000 +8000 0.7%
Timberwolves +8000 +8000 0.7%
Cavaliers +10000 +8000 0.7%
Raptors +15000 +15000 0.4%
Kings +15000 +15000 0.4%
Wizards +15000 +15000 0.4%
Pistons +20000 +17500 0.3%
The biggest line movement, as you might have suspected, belongs to the New Jersey Nets. Rumored to be Dwight Howard's desired destination, the Nets have gone from starting out at +15000 (or 150/1 odds, which would pay out $150 for every dollar you bet if the Nets won the NBA title) to +2500 (or 25/1). If you consider these probabilities to be standings, the Nets went from being tied for the second-worst championship probability in the league to being tied for the 10th-most. Then again, their odds have only risen from 0.4 percent to 2.1 percent, so it's still a relatively small change.

Other teams out East have seen their chances rise, too. The Celtics (+2200 to +600) and Knicks (+2200 to +800) have been bet heavily as two of the relative long shots that still seem to have a prayer of winning gold this spring. Think about it. Pretend that you're a sports fan who just wants to try to win a nice chunk of change on an NBA bet. Would you rather have bet on the defending-champion Mavericks at +800, or would you rather have picked a Celtics team that would pay out nearly three times as much? It's no surprise that the teams in that range have seen their odds fall, and while the Magic also occupy that space, their impending Howard trade has undoubtedly scared bettors away.

You might also be noticing that there have been moves to make a team's odds shorter, but not much has gone on in the opposite direction. Only one team has seen its odds grow longer since the market opened, and those Charlotte Bobcats have gone from +6000 to +8000. What does that tell us? Well, nobody on earth is betting on the Bobcats to win the NBA title.

As for the favorites, well, they're about where you would expect. Despite their collapse in the finals last year, the Heat remain the subject of gambling affections, and their odds have fallen from +250 to +180, suggesting that they'll win the championship just about one out of every five times this season gets played out. Just behind them are the Lakers, who went off the board (were unavailable for betting) last Thursday as the news of the Chris Paul trade went across the wire. A situation like this causes a line to go off the board so Vegas can properly react and price out the new situation before bettors hit them hard, but in the end, this stalling session ended up saving gamblers money. Before the Paul trade was announced, the Lakers were listed at +400, and they would have likely seen their odds hit +200 if the line was still posted as the trade was being discussed like it was final. Instead, those bettors who would have hit the line at +200 weren't allowed to, and since the Paul deal was canceled, it saved those people money. See, look! We finally found some group of people who benefited from David Stern's executive decision to cancel that trade.

We'll check in with these futures again before Christmas, after free agency has had a chance to run its course. Hopefully, we'll have concrete Howard and Paul trades to account for, too.

Week 15 Line Moves

(All line movements per vegasinsider.com).

Carolina Panthers at Houston Texans
Opened: Texans -5 -110
Now: Texans -6.5 -110

The T.J. Yates era has been a lot more fun than anybody expected; not only did he lead his team to a last-second victory against the Bengals on the road last week, but he started the game with a picture-perfect bomb to Jacoby Jones that would have gone for a touchdown if Jones had remembered to catch the pass. This line movement likely owes some steam to the return of Andre Johnson, who happens to be much better at catching those sorts of passes than Jacoby Jones. If Carolina travels to Houston without star left tackle Jordan Gross, who missed last week's loss to the Falcons with an ankle injury, this line could hit the full seven.

Cincinnati Bengals at St. Louis Rams
Opened: Bengals -3.5 -110
Now: Bengals -6 -110

As it turns out, the market values the functionality of Sam Bradford's ankle at about 2.5 points. Or, alternately, it values the difference between a one-legged Bradford and a two-legged Kellen Clemens who doesn't know the plays at 2.5 points.

New York Jets at Philadelphia Eagles
Opened: Eagles -1 -110
Now: Eagles -3 EVEN

The good thing about the Eagles bandwagon is that they've really worked a lot on the entrances and exits to make it easy on, easy off. You can really see how desperate people are to get back on the Eagles; the Jets just won a game by 27 points and got the opposing coach fired, and people are still betting heavily against them.

Detroit Lions at Oakland Raiders
Opened: Raiders -1 -110
Now: Lions -1 -110

Speaking of bandwagons that the public is anxious to hop back onto, let's form in an orderly line and sprint back to the Lions! Sure, they nearly blew a 28-7 to the Vikings' third-string quarterback and lost a game in which they had a +6 turnover margin last week, but Ndamukong Suh is back! The Raiders got blown out last week, but it was by the Packers. They have a pretty good excuse.

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Day 9: The Might of Dwight

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:40 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

Dwight Howard might switch teams this month. I used the word "might" because it might happen and it might not happen. He might stay in Orlando. He might get traded. He might be happy in Orlando. He might not be happy in Orlando. He might stick around for a few months. He might leave tomorrow. He might win multiple titles. He might not appear in the Finals ever again. He might be the one to blame for Orlando's underachieving these past two seasons. He might be a victim of an incompetent front office. He might be one of the best centers ever. He might be someone who took advantage of a really weird era. Might. Might. Might.

Nobody knows what to make of Howard these days. Isn't it fascinating that Chris Paul's up-in-the-air situation has totally overshadowed Howard's up-in-the-air situation? Why isn't it a bigger deal that, for the eighth time in basketball history, a superstar center might be available? Wilt Chamberlain switched teams in 1965; the Sixers won a title two years later. Wilt switched teams again in 1968; the Lakers won a title four years later. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar switched teams in 1975; the Lakers won five titles from 1980 to 1988. Moses Malone switched teams in 1982; the Sixers won a title nine months later. Shaquille O'Neal switched teams in 1996; the Lakers won three titles in a row from 2000 to 2002. Shaq switched teams again in 2004; the Heat won a title two years later. No superstar center has ever switched teams in his prime (or the tail end of his prime) without a parade eventually following.

Just so we're clear, the best six centers of all time were Bill Russell, Kareem, Wilt, Hakeem Olajuwon, Shaq and Moses in that order (in my opinion). They won a combined 26 of the past 54 titles. From there, it drops a level to David Robinson (2 titles), Bill Walton (2 titles), Willis Reed (2 titles), Dave Cowens (2 titles) and George Mikan (5 titles), and then it drops another level to Patrick Ewing (0 titles), Wes Unseld (1 title), Nate Thurmond (0 titles) and Robert Parish (4 titles).1 What happens over the next few years of Howard's career will determine where he ranks historically. He will never approach Russell, Kareem or Wilt. That Hakeem/Shaq/Moses group is within reach, although Robinson's spot is probably more realistic.

And you know what? That makes sense. Robinson is probably our best comparison for Howard: a physical specimen and sabermetric wet dream who never made you say, "If my life depended on one game, I'd want HIM on my team." Of course, Robinson battled Hakeem, Ewing, Shaq and Dikembe Mutombo during his prime; Howard is battling the Gasols, Nene, Andrew Bynum and Tyson Chandler. You could unearth 50 different ways to prove that, statistically, Dwight Howard is better offensively and defensively than every other current center. (Like clockwork: 23 points, 14 rebounds, 2.4 blocks, 60 percent shooting and a quantifiable effect on opposing field goal percentage night after night after night.) He's the most reliable star since Karl Malone and the most durable center since Wilt, playing in 614 of a possible 621 games (including playoffs) in seven Orlando seasons.

That eerie consistency turned out to be more interesting than anything else about Dwight Howard. Maybe his Superman gimmick (brazenly stolen from Shaq) and a couple of gregarious Dunk Contest appearances made a subtle mainstream impact, but nothing memorable or original. His best basketball moment happened in 2009 — Orlando shocked the heavily favored Cavs before losing to the Lakers in the Finals — when Howard was overshadowed by LeBron ("Does this mean he's leaving Cleveland???") and Kobe ("He finally won a title without Shaq!"). Even his juiciest off-the-court issue turned out to be juiceless: After the mother of his child (a former Magic dancer, no less) joined the cast of Basketball Wives, Howard's legal team sprung into action and banned her from even mentioning him on the show.

He's the only superstar center without a definable hook, unless you want to count his steadfast refusal to stop picking up cheap fouls or swatting shots out of bounds (over keeping those blocks in play). Russell had defense. Wilt had everything. Kareem had the sky hook. Moses was impossibly relentless, Shaq was impossibly overpowering, Hakeem was impossibly quick. Howard has … durability? Consistency?

These past two weeks doubled as something of a microcosm of Howard's career — like always, nobody can figure out what's important to him. His "trade request" said it all. Howard asked to be dealt before his contract expires next summer. When pressed for a reason, he complained that Magic general manager Otis Smith never gave him input in deals. (It almost seemed like Howard was hoping the Magic would fire Smith and hire his buddy Gilbert Arenas to replace him, which, by the way, would have been awesome.) A day later, Howard backed off that stance and decided that, actually, he didn't want to be traded … but if it happens, it happens. Somewhere in the middle of this wishy-washy mess he submitted a list of acceptable trade partners to Orlando's management. The list had three teams on it.

1. Los Angeles Lakers

A lifestyle/brand choice, not a basketball choice. Assuming they dealt Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum for Howard (along with Turkoglu's contract and maybe even J.J. Redick's contract), that leaves them with 33-year-old Kobe Bryant (1,311 career games, undeniably past his prime) and a bunch of role players and overpaid guys clogging their cap … and that would be Howard's team for the next three years, you know, because Kobe earns $25.2 million this year, $27.849 million next year and $30.453 million in the final year of his contract. Good luck winning a title there, Dwight.

2. Dallas Mavericks

A smarter choice because he joins the defending champs, plays with an alpha dog (Dirk Nowitzki) and gets a big-market owner who loves spending money and employs smart people. Too bad they have nothing to trade. Sorry, Dallas, you're not getting Howard and Hedo Turkoglu's contract for Brendan Haywood, Shawn Marion, Jason Terry, Roddy Beaubois and some future no. 1s. This can't happen until next summer, when Dallas will have finally created enough cap space to sign a marquee free agent. Can you wait that long, Dwight?

3. New Jersey Nets

It seemed far-fetched that Jersey could land Howard for Brook Lopez (one of the league's most overrated young players)2 and a couple of future first-rounders who won't amount to anything because Howard guarantees you 47 wins a year … and today that far-fetchedness (far-fetchosity?) was confirmed when ESPN's Chad Ford reported that Orlando turned down a three-team deal netting them Lopez, Gerald Wallace and five first-rounders, along with a chance to dump every bad contract it has. (The Magic also pulled Howard off the table entirely, at least for right now.) Let's say Orlando changes its mind — New Jersey would have Deron Williams, a slew of awful contracts, deep pockets and the Brooklyn thing going. There's a ton going on, no question. I like the Howard/Williams pairing, absolutely. But that's not a guaranteed title contender for a couple of years … at least.

That brings us back to the "What's important to you, Dwight?" question. Again, it's unclear why he soured on Orlando — it's hard for me to believe that "Otis Smith doesn't give me input" trumps loyal fans, warm weather, no state taxes and a half-decent basketball situation (Jameer Nelson, Jason Richardson, Redick, Ryan Anderson, Glen Davis and whatever Turkoglu gives them) that matches what he'd have in, say, New Jersey.3 If he cared about winning titles AND playing in a big market AND finding a trade partner that actually made sense for Orlando, he would have picked these two destinations as well.

4. Los Angeles Clippers

The Clips could blow everyone else away with a "Chris Kaman, Eric Gordon, Ryan Gomes, Eric Bledsoe, Al-Farouq Aminu and Minnesota's unprotected 2012 no. 1 pick for Howard and Turkoglu's contract" offer if Howard ever said the words, "Upon further review, playing with Blake Griffin, Mo Williams, Caron Butler, Chauncey Billups, DeAndre Jordan, Randy Foye and Turkoglu, living in Los Angeles and competing for a title every year sounds pretty cool, let's do it." Nobody is topping that offer. Repeat: nobody. I'm assuming he wants to avoid the Clippers because of Donald Sterling, because they're usually a mess, and because he doesn't want that Clipper stink on him. (I can't totally blame him.) But if he cares about winning titles and playing in a big market, that's his second-best option behind …

5. Chicago Bulls

And here's why the Dwight Howard era makes me nervous. As I've written before, God doles out the "complete car wash package" to only a handful of athletes. We love the ones who take care of it; we resent the ones who don't. Through seven years, Howard displayed every skill except one: an ongoing thirst to dominate everyone else. Shaq drifted through his career, made excuses, only intermittently stayed in shape and made a point to care about a variety of things — not just basketball — but during the 2000, 2001 and 2002 playoffs, history will show that he annihilated everyone in his path. (Same for Hakeem in the 1994 and 1995 playoffs, Moses in the 1983 playoffs … the list goes on and on.) Dwight hasn't had that moment yet. Never jumped a level when it mattered. Never dragged his teammates to a better place, made them feel invincible, made his opponents say, "Once that guy gets going, we're helpless." If anything, those opponents swung the other way, allowed him to get his stats and concentrated on shutting down everyone else (like Atlanta did last spring).

Quite simply, it's been weird to watch. The numbers say one thing; our eyes say something else. We're watching someone take care of the "complete car wash package," but not totally. And that infamous trade list summed everything up. How could the Chicago Bulls NOT be on it?

How could Howard not be thinking, "Get me to Chicago, I could win right away!"

How could Howard be looking at this NBA landscape without saying, "Maybe it's a good idea for me to team up with Derrick Rose, the 23-year-old MVP?"

How could someone in his camp not point out to him, "Hey Dwight, if you pushed for the Bulls, they could offer Joakim Noah, Luol Deng, Omer Asik, salary-cap filler and two no. 1 picks and take back your deal and Turkoglu's deal, and you'd still have Rose, Carlos Boozer, Rip Hamilton, Kyle Korver, Taj Gibson, whatever veterans they can bring in AND the best defensive coach in the league?"

And if you're picking a cold-weather team based on markets, point guards and branding opportunities, how could you pick Brooklyn (living in the shadow of the Knicks), Deron Williams, this goofy Nets ownership, a lousy supporting cast and a franchise with a sad-sack history over Chicago (the third-biggest market), Rose (better and younger than Williams), a better supporting cast, a shrewd ownership and one of the most rabid fan bases in the league?

Put it this way: If I'm Dwight Howard, I'm thinking about titles and titles only. I don't care about money — that's coming, regardless. I don't care about weather — I have to live in whatever city for only eight months a year, and I'm traveling during that entire time, anyway. I don't care about "building my brand" and all that crap — if I don't start winning titles soon, my brand is going to be "the center who's much better than every other center but can't win a title." I care only about playing in a big city, finding a team that doesn't have to demolish itself to acquire me, finding one All-Star teammate who can make my life a little easier (the Duncan to my Robinson), and winning titles. Not title … titles. I want to come out of this decade with more rings than anyone else. I want to be remembered alongside Shaq, Moses and Hakeem, not Robinson and Ewing.

If you're looking at it like that, Chicago has to be the choice. Two summers ago, I thought LeBron copped out by joining forces with his biggest rival; it just seemed peculiar that the most talented player of his generation, and possibly ever, would willingly become the Robin to someone else's Batman. Howard's trade list was peculiar for a different reason: Either he doesn't follow the league, cares about the wrong things, has the wrong people advising him, or all of the above. Because I can't imagine, for the life of me, why Dwight Howard wouldn't be scheming to become Derrick Rose's teammate right now.

As a basketball fan, I'm disappointed. As a Celtics fan, I'm delighted. Either way, the way he ignored Chicago tells me everything I need to know about Dwight Howard. Wherever he lands, that team will definitely win. I just don't know if it'll win. And neither do you.

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The Eighth Day of NBA Christmas

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:39 GMT le 15 décembre 2011

old on, I have to finish setting Monday's column on fire. It was called, "Day 7: The One Day When the Clippers Actually Mattered." After wasting most of my day writing it, I spent the afternoon watching it slowly burn to a crisp. You know, just like the NBA's credibility.

If you're looking for answers, you came to the wrong place. If you're looking for logic, keep looking. I don't know why David Stern tarnished his legacy, shredded his league's credibility and opened the door for a collusion/circumvention lawsuit by the NBA Players Association (filed on Chris Paul's behalf). But I've heard some fantastic theories, including …

THEORY NO. 1: Stern didn't want a screwed-up franchise (the Clippers) with a screwed-up owner (Donald Sterling) to acquire one of his signature players (Paul).

Possibility of being true: 40 percent. That's actually a semi-defensible reason, no? Had Stern said, "I'll approve the trade, Donald, but only if you agree to sell the team to someone who doesn't embarrass the league and make everyone's skin crawl … you know, like you," I would have been fine with that. That's not the overriding reason, though.

THEORY NO. 2: Stern wanted someone to make a 30 for 30 documentary about him and worried about a dramatic hook, so he started acting like Vince McMahon right after the Montreal Screwjob to sway a celebrity filmmaker like Jason Reitman to make December 8, 2011: The Day the NBA Died.

Possibility of being true: One percent. Remember when Vince reinvented himself as a heel after Bret Hart punched him, started calling himself Mr. McMahon and even made that catchy "No Chance in Hell" entrance song? I know that seems like it was the goal here … but it wasn't.

THEORY NO. 3: There's no conspiracy at all — the real problem is that Stern is relying on the NBA's executive vice president of operations, Stu Jackson, to advise him on the "fairness" of every trade offer for Paul.

Possibility of being true: 50 percent. The "Jackson is advising him on trade offers" part is actually, and amazingly, true.1 That doesn't mean it's part of a bigger conspiracy — if one exists — but I hope you appreciate the rock-solid unintentional comedy of Stu Jackson assessing what's fair and unfair with an NBA trade. A nice guy by all accounts, Stu Jackson is the answer to the trivia question, "Who's the only executive in NBA history who did such a lousy job, his franchise actually had to relocate?" (Please see this footnote.2) Ask the 40 remaining NBA fans in Vancouver how they feel about Jackson's front-office acumen. On my podcast two years ago, Stern called Vancouver's NBA experience his single biggest regret as NBA commissioner; Jackson was in charge of Vancouver's basketball decisions that entire time. Now he's advising Stern on a basketball trade that's doubling as the biggest conflict of interest of Stern's entire commissionership? Really???? Either way, here's your answer to another trivia question: "What improbable chain of events had to happen for Stu Jackson to get another NBA GM job?"

THEORY NO. 4: The league has a mystery Hornets buyer lined up and doesn't want to jeopardize the sale by not getting enough value for Chris Paul.

Possibility of being true: 60 percent. They'd rather keep Paul and let the new owner figure it out UNLESS someone blows them away. Translation: When you don't care if you trade someone, you can waste everyone's time making insane requests like, "Hey Houston, we'll let you get Pau Gasol in this revised three-team deal, but only if you give up six of your seven best assets" (100 percent true) and, "Hey Clippers, you can have Chris Paul, but only if you include Eric Gordon, the rights to Minnesota's unprotected 2012 no. 1 pick, Chris Kaman and last year's no. 1 picks (Al-Farouq Aminu and Eric Bledsoe)" for someone who, again, is leaving our team in seven months. It's like someone saying, "I know my house is worth a million dollars, and I know I have to sell it before the bank forecloses on it, but if you want to buy it, I'm gonna need $2 million in cash."

THEORY NO. 5: That same mystery buyer is either blocking these trades himself (because he has an irrational idea of Chris Paul's value), or believes he can convince Paul to sign an extension with the Hornets (equally irrational).

Possibility of being true: 35 percent. For the record, rumors have been swirling about this mystery buyer for three days; the New York Post's Peter Vecsey even mentioned "him" squashing last weekend's three-teamer. If that's somehow true, I hope he's reading this — I'd like to become the first writer to call him a moron.

THEORY NO. 6: Stern made a bet with a buddy that he could keep humiliating and neutering Hornets GM Dell Demps until a frustrated Demps finally resigned.3

Possibility of being true: 10 percent. Remember when Mortimer and Randolph Duke made a $1 bet about Winthorpe resorting to crime in Trading Places? Same thing. By all accounts, the NBA pushed Demps aside completely Monday and assumed control of talks with the Clippers; Demps also hasn't been allowed to make any roster moves. Should we mention that the Hornets have only seven players under contract right now … and three of those seven are Quincy Pondexter, David Andersen and Patrick Ewing Jr.? In the next few days, if Dell Demps gets mysteriously framed for heroin possession and moves into an apartment belonging to a hooker with a heart of gold, these odds jump to 50 percent.

THEORY NO. 7: Stern eked out only 16 "yes" votes for the latest labor agreement by promising the naysayers that he'd address the whole big-market/small-market disparity as well as the whole stars-jumping-teams issue. Now they're making Paul an unfortunate litmus test — by NOT caving unless it's for a Godfather offer, the league is practicing what it preached.

Possibility of being true: 80 percent. Imagine Stern's horror when, within 72 hours of the NBA's "We're back!" announcement, "Who's getting Dwight Howard?" and "Who's getting Chris Paul?" became the league's two biggest news stories. Sure seems like he's trying to prove a larger point here. And that point is, "I don't care how bad this point is, or how bad this makes me look, I am proving a point!"

THEORY NO. 8: The league believed it would find a Hornets buyer before the season; that never happened; and now it's ill equipped to handle the inevitable conflict of interest issues that accompany any Chris Paul trade … so it would rather bury him in New Orleans for the season until the team gets sold than allow him to file for free agency next summer. And if it screwed over CAA's Leon Rose and William "Worldwide Wes" Wesley (who were prominently involved with The Decision and Carmelo's saga last season), even better.

Possibility of being true: 80 percent. In 2008, Michael Heisley blew a potential Grizzlies sale by trading his best player, Pau Gasol. He thought the deal would make Memphis more attractive to buyers, when actually it made the franchise less attractive. That's why the league was searching for the "perfect" deal here; the league would rather avoid the headache (and backlash) of steering Paul toward a big market. So why spend three weeks going through the "Demps has authority to make a trade" charade? Why waste everyone's time? Why come off so poorly and disingenuously? How did a seemingly well-run league that had 12 solid months to prepare for this particular moment botch that moment so completely and totally?

THEORY NO. 9: The league is trying to destroy the Hornets so it can contract the franchise in June.

Possibility of being true: 5 percent. I know it sounds far-fetched, but let's say you couldn't find a new Hornets owner and wanted to dump that franchise, only you knew you couldn't do that right away. Wouldn't you ruin the team's relationship with its franchise player, make it impossible to get fair value for him, tank the 2011-12 season and run the team so reprehensibly that every player would be terrified to play there?

What's the answer? I'd wager on a theory pupu platter of nos. 1, 3, 7 and 8 … with no. 5 sprinkled in for good measure. That's why the NBA faces a fairly compelling "collusion and circumvention" legal case, and that's why CAA power agent Rose reached out to embattled Players Association head Billy Hunter for help after Thursday's vetoed trade.4 Hunter and Rose kept Paul silent while trying to revive the three-teamer (no luck), then pushed the Clippers these past two days once Paul agreed to play there. If the Clippers deal isn't revived within the next 24 hours, we're headed to court and the league will need to prove that it didn't collude to prevent a Paul trade.

Look at it from Paul's side. He only wants a fair chance to be traded from his team. He doesn't want to re-sign with the Hornets, and why would he? They don't have an owner. They have a GM who's hung like a Ken doll right now (through no fault of his own). They just allowed his best teammate (David West) to leave for Indiana. After they backed out of two separate trades, they've become one of those eBay buyers with awful feedback ratings; nobody wants to deal with them. Oh, and Paul's best teammates right now are Emeka Okafor, Jarrett Jack, Trevor Ariza and David Andersen. Good luck finishing 20-46 with that motley crew.

Beyond that, the new labor agreement practically spells out the words, "CHRIS PAUL WOULD BE AN IDIOT IF HE DIDN'T PUSH FOR A TRADE RIGHT NOW." Read this piece or this piece for the gory details, but Paul needs to broker a trade to a favorable team, then pick up his 2012-13 player option ($17.79 million) OR sign an extend-and-trade for $36.49 million combined in the 2012-13 and 2013-14 seasons. Unfortunately for him, the NBA doesn't want superstars to control their own destinies like they did before. That philosophy makes sense when "stars" are quitting on their teams — like Vince Carter did in 2004, or Carmelo did last year — but becomes murkier for a loyal franchise guy like Paul, someone who's been one of the league's best role models, busted his butt to make New Orleans competitive and threw himself into the city's Katrina-ravaged community. You would think one of the league's best signature stars earned the right to say, "I want to play for a contender instead of an unowned, small-market, talent-poor lottery team that's just been turned into a joke." You would think.

And look, I don't want to play the sympathy card for someone making $16 million a year to play basketball for a living. But what if this debacle is creeping toward a "Sorry, Chris, you have to finish the season playing for this putrid Hornets team, we're not trading you" conclusion? What then? How is that fair? If the league's best American players had any balls whatsoever — yeah, I'm looking at you, Kobe, Dwyane, LeBron, Dwight, Deron, Blake, Derrick, Carmelo and everyone else — they would threaten to boycott the 2012 Olympics until Paul's situation was rectified. Trust me, the league doesn't care about a "collusion and circumvention" lawsuit; I still haven't found a legal expert who thinks Paul can win it. But having every American star no-show the 2012 Olympics? Now THAT would catch the NBA's attention.

Of course, we could solve this mess by swinging a reasonable trade. I thought New Orleans made out better than anyone else in last Thursday's three-teamer; if Stu Jackson disagreed, that makes me feel even better about that assessment. I also thought the Clippers' offer of Kaman, Aminu, Bledsoe and Minnesota's pick5 was a totally fair offer, especially after every other suitor had dropped out of the chase.6 Why should they have to give up Eric Gordon? You only trade for Paul if you want to contend; giving up the league's best under-30 shooting guard (Gordon) defeats the purpose of acquiring Paul in the first place. Wouldn't the Clippers contend immediately with Griffin, Paul, Gordon, DeAndre Jordan, Mo Williams, Caron Butler, Randy Foye and Chauncey Billups?7 If it doesn't work out, no biggie — the 2011-12 Clips would still be a playoff team with tradeable assets to boot, and it's not like anyone else is acquiring Paul. If I were running the Clips, I wouldn't let Stern and his henchmen break me.

Then again, these are the Clippers — the league's dumbest franchise for three decades and counting. If any team is capable of getting fleeced by its own commissioner, or dealing the no. 1 overall pick in consecutive years (a distinct possibility if this Paul trade goes through), it's a Clippers franchise that's been cursed for 35 solid years. And here's where we have to give Stern the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he's playing this one perfectly.8

Maybe he blocked last week's three-teamer knowing there was a willing patsy (the Clippers) sitting in the weeds.

Maybe he remembered that no NBA franchise has ever traded for a superstar in his prime without also locking that superstar down long-term9 … but if a franchise were ever bucking that trend, it would be Donald Sterling's Clippers.

Maybe he knew that Sterling spent the past three-plus decades living in his buddy Jerry Buss' shadow as the much reviled owner of the Clippers — the black sheep of the L.A. sports scene since 1984, the whipping boy, the punch line — and would be delighted if his little-brother Clippers pulled off something that the big-brother Lakers couldn't pull off.

Maybe he realizes that, deep down, Sterling cares only about what he's getting (the best point guard alive) and not what he'd be giving up (promise, hope, potential, Ping-Pong balls … basically, all the crap he's been selling to Clipper fans these past 30 years).

Maybe Sterling cares only about keeping Griffin two years from now. Maybe he thinks Paul's presence will sway Griffin toward signing a lucrative extension next summer. Maybe he's only thinking, "Give me one of the most electric pairings in NBA history right now and we can figure out everything later." Maybe Stern is banking on this.

Maybe he envisions Sterling getting seduced by that one Zihuatanejo-esque moment in the distance: Paul dribbling 30 feet from the hoop in the last minute of a tight Lakers game, Griffin catching his eye, and suddenly, Griffin charging toward the basket as Paul lofts a pass toward the rim. The pass will be perfect, and only because Paul plays point guard about as perfectly as anyone ever played the position. Griffin will take care of the rest. Clipper fans will leap up and down, slap palms, scream incoherently toward the ceiling. The Lakers will call timeout and slink back to their bench. Griffin and Paul will point at each other, smile, laugh, and slap hands, the league's most electric new duo, the hottest ticket in town.

And when that sequence happens, believe me … nobody will care that the Clippers gutted their future to rent Chris Paul for 19 months, or that the league disgraced itself to get there.

But guess what? The Billups acquisition changed everything for the Clippers; suddenly they believe they can contend without Paul, and in the shocker of shockers, they might be right. They backed away from negotiations last night, and one more time this morning, leaving David Stern sitting at the "CHRIS PAUL FIRE SALE" table by himself. There isn't a single suitor in sight. Not one. With the season just 12 days away, Stern finds himself stuck with a miserable star, a disgruntled fan base and the single most hopeless roster in the league. Unless that was his intention all long, it sure seems like the old man overplayed his hand … twice. And we thought Donald Sterling was a bad owner.

Bill Simmons is the Editor in Chief of Grantland and the author of the recent New York Times no. 1 best-seller The Book of Basketball, now out in paperback with new material and a revised Hall of Fame Pyramid. For every Simmons column and podcast, log on to Grantland. Follow him on Twitter and check out his new home on Facebook.

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Robert Griffin III: Heisman Winner?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:16 GMT le 10 décembre 2011

On Halloween in Waco, Texas, Robert Griffin III roamed the Baylor campus in a hockey mask. He'd buttoned his flannel shirt to the neck, and he wore a pair of combat boots his father had broken in while on patrol in Iraq. His jeans were stuffed with pillows, and his chest with a pair of lion-shaped slippers, so that he resembled an incarnation of Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13th movies, if Jason had spent the autumn months binging on carbohydrates. In his hand was a knife; it was an actual knife, but he had wrapped it in tinfoil so as to dull the edge. After doing several television interviews in costume, alternating between whimsy and youthful sincerity — "If I'm going to dress up as Jason Voorhees," he said to one reporter, "I'm going to be the best Jason Voorhees I can be" — he insisted we head over to campus just to see what would happen.

The truth is, nothing much did. The reaction was blasé. Griffin wore his hockey mask, and despite the dreadlocks peeking out behind it, no one recognized him as anything other than some dude who'd dressed up as a murderous sumo-wrestling lumberjack. He frightened a few coeds, and we got thrown out of the student union's cafeteria for reasons that make little sense,1 and a girl buried in a histology textbook glared at him as if to say, Grow up already. As we passed through the union, I heard a girl randomly say to her friend, "Like I'm going to pay money to watch Baylor lose at football. Yeah, right."

We walked outside. There is a live bear sanctuary on campus — Baylor is that kind of place, picturesque to the point of surreality — and Griffin hung out there for a moment, then burst into the gym and did calisthenics with the volleyball team, then crossed the road to the tennis courts, where he borrowed a girl's racquet and proceeded to home-run derby a tennis ball over the chain-link fence. In the process, his mask fell off his face and cleaved into shards.

"All right," he said. "That was fun."

We started walking back to his car, at which point a girl across the street completely flipped out. For a moment, I worried that something had gone horribly wrong at the bear sanctuary, but she had seen Griffin without his mask and wanted a picture with him. "I recognized you from afar," she said to the man dressed as a serial killer. "But that's because I'm a creeper."

I went to visit Robert Griffin at what turned out to be the low point of his season, at a time when no one — not even Griffin himself — seemed optimistic about his chances of winning the Heisman Trophy. Two days earlier, Baylor had lost by 35 points at Oklahoma State, and that loss came on the heels of a 27-point loss to Texas A&M the week before. Griffin had worn the Halloween costume to lighten the mood. It was clear that the Bears possessed one of the weakest defenses in the country, and that if they were to salvage something from this season, they would need Griffin to carry them even more than he had up to that point. This didn't seem humanly possible, and I presumed Baylor (which had never won more than three Big 12 games in a season until last year) would fade, and perhaps slip into a third-tier bowl game, and Griffin would finish eighth in the Heisman voting, and life would go on as it always has in Waco.

But it just so happened that after I left town, Griffin did get even better. Against Missouri: 406 yards passing, three touchdowns. Against Kansas: 433 total yards, four touchdowns. Against Oklahoma: 479 passing yards, four touchdowns, and perhaps the most accidental signature moment of any Heisman candidate in history: a pass over the middle that was deflected by a defender and landed, in stride, in the arms of receiver Kendall Wright, who scored the game-tying touchdown.2 Griffin got knocked out for most of the second half against Texas Tech with a head injury, and then came back for the season finale, a blowout win over Texas in which he threw for a pair of touchdowns and ran for two more. The Bears won five straight under fourth-year coach Art Briles and finished 9-3, and it appears increasingly likely that on Saturday, Griffin will become the first Baylor football player to win the Heisman Trophy.

It is the sort of moment that could change perceptions about Baylor, and even about Waco itself, which, to those of us who hail from the faraway liberal enclaves of the Northeast, is still famous as the site of a massacre of a religious sect, not to mention one of the more horrific crimes ever associated with college sports.

I have no doubt that there are many residents of Waco who are fatigued by these associations, especially since (a) the Branch Davidian compound where David Koresh and his people hunkered down is actually several miles outside of town, (b) both the men's and women's basketball teams are now national powers, and (c) Waco, like many midsize American cities, has enough contemporary problems to deal with. (Mostly, when I told people I was going to/had been in Waco, they commented on how boring it was, which is never a good reputation to have: as a place that is only not dull when it is sinister.) I heard that the city has a rather excellent zoo, and that the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum is worth visiting, but the truth is that the most exciting things to happen in Waco — those rare news stories that attract national attention — have often been negative. When university president Ken Starr (yes, that Ken Starr, another odd twist in the Baylor narrative) held out the possibility of legal action against Texas A&M in order to hold the Big 12 together, there was a national outcry: How could Baylor not know its place in the college football world?

This is why Saturday's announcement means far more to Baylor than it does to Alabama or Stanford or LSU or Wisconsin. There are five Heisman finalists,and all have legitimate cases, but only one has the potential to redefine both a university and the city that surrounds it.

There are certain things about Waco that students of Baylor quickly come to understand: The first is that Dr Pepper is to Waco as Coca-Cola is to the remainder of America.3 The second is that no one really ventures very far from campus, a phenomenon so prevalent that it's earned a name: The Baylor Bubble.

"I don't want to say the wrong thing, but the first thing I heard when I got here is that there's this Baylor Bubble," Griffin tells me. "There's Baylor, and there's everybody else. I've written many papers on it, about Baylor just having to take the initiative and realizing that Waco is its city. People walking down the street, if they walk across to the other side of the highway, they might get scared because they're outside the bubble. It's getting a lot better. There are more powerful people and people a lot smarter than I am who are dealing with it every day. Still, I've done a lot of volunteering, and it's really sad, and you can only do so much."

Out by the stadium, there's a promotional billboard that reads: Baylor-Waco: Proud Partners. Even in this season of RG3 (as Griffin is known in the Twitterverse and elsewhere), the Bears had trouble attracting near-capacity crowds to home games until the very end of the year. Baylor is a Baptist school, which sets it apart from the remainder of the Big 12; walk across campus and you will see Bible verses inscribed on the sidewalks. The school newspaper, the Lariat, is not allowed to promote alcohol or drug use or sex, "though I can still say our team sucks," says sports editor Tyler Alley. The school's student body is largely white, and many hail from wealthy suburban schools in Dallas and Houston; the campus itself is lavish and beautiful, and there is even a picturesque parking garage with several restaurants attached that some people jokingly refer to as the "Garage Mahal." And then you drive a few blocks away, toward downtown, and there are rows of pawn shops and strip malls and auto-parts centers. At one point, I saw a dangerously thin old man letting his dog out onto the lawn of a small house while wearing a cowboy hat and an undershirt and jeans, as if posing for a Walker Evans photograph. "There's definitely a disconnect," Alley told me.

Obviously, the local quarterback walking away with a trophy doesn't heal the rift between the townspeople of Waco and the students at Baylor. But there is something truly abnormal about Griffin; he is that rare elite athlete who seems to consider his professional sports career to be a secondary pursuit. "It's like he's been doing this a long time," Wright, his best receiver, told me, and I'm not sure if he was talking entirely about football.

Griffin graduated from high school early, finished college in three years, and will soon finish his graduate program in communications ahead of schedule. He's already planning on attending law school, regardless of what happens with the NFL. He is not naïve enough to imagine that, merely by playing football, he can alter the realities of Waco itself; he lived in a project house in New Orleans for six months when he was a kid, and his father grew up in the New Orleans projects, and he's spoken to students at several of Waco's poorest schools and understands that the problems are far too deep for any 21-year-old to fully address.4

"You can't totally change that perception [of Waco]," he says. "But you can shift the attention elsewhere."

Griffin was born in Okinawa, Japan and went to school in Copperas Cove, a small town near Fort Hood. His parents, Robert Jr. and Jacqueline, were both sergeants in the Army. He was a superior athlete at a young age, winning track meets and playing quarterback, and yet most of the major colleges in the region declined to recruit him as a passer. LSU told him that he could play receiver, unless he showed up at their camp and proved himself able to throw the ball. Texas recruited him as an "athlete," and it is hard not to at least raise the question as to whether race played a role in those assignations.

"Have I seen an African-American quarterback who wasn't athletic, who might not be the fastest guy on the field but couldn't run a little bit? Probably not," he says. "Have I seen a lot of Caucasian quarterbacks who move around a lot but don't get the label of 'dual threat'? Yeah. I mean, Aaron Rodgers moves around a lot. Jay Cutler.

"Because I was a sprinter in track, that was the biggest thing. When you have an African-American quarterback who's extremely athletic, a lot of times those coaches think, 'Well, I can go get a less athletic quarterback who might not be as explosive but can still throw the ball a little bit, and move this guy to receiver because he's got world-class speed. It's not, 'We're gonna move you to a different position because you're African-American.' It's, 'You're probably the best athlete on your team, so we need athletes at different positions.'"

And so he committed to Houston, and when coach Art Briles departed Houston for Baylor, so did Griffin. He graduated from high school early with the notion of competing in the Olympic Trials; his primary event is the 400-meter hurdles, which is considered one of the most difficult races of all, and he was a semifinalist at the trials in 2008 at the age of 17. The hurdles, Griffin says, are what keep him focused on the race itself, and he latches onto the metaphor before I can even bring it up. Griffin seems to relish his overachievement, the clearing of various obstacles, not to mention the bevy of options he now has: Between law school and a final year of eligibility at Baylor and the potential of becoming an Olympic sprinter and the NFL draft (not to mention his engagement to a girl he met at Baylor), he has, as he says, many doors, and he insists the NFL is the last of those doors.

Of course, it is also the most lucrative, and the most superficially alluring, and given the shift of the league's paradigm toward versatile quarterbacks like Cam Newton, there may be room for Griffin to further alter it. These last few games, in which Griffin has proved both his pocket presence and his ability to throw the deep ball, have vaulted him into the first round on most draft boards. On NFL.com, a scout named Bucky Brooks declared that Griffin "will be the next quarterback to revolutionize the game."

"With the NFL, if they come knocking at your door, you're not going to tell them no," Griffin says. "But it's a tough business. The NFL doesn't like it when they have a smart guy who knows how much he's worth. The NFL now, it's about talent, and if you have talent, it doesn't matter what's going on. That's why you get a lot of guys who get in trouble who are still playing, and things happen and they do illegal stuff and they still get to go out and play, because as long as they can get people to watch them play, the NFL's making money. It's just about the spectacle. That's all it is."

And then, in discussing the spectacle, he brought up Tim Tebow. Griffin said he'll argue with his friends about anything other than politics or religion, but when I told him you couldn't separate Tebow and his faith at this point, he nodded, mentioned the "Tebowing thing," said he was rooting for Tebow, and then told me about a disagreement he had with his mom. He told her there were different kinds of Christians, and she said no, and Griffin told me she's the type of person who will say, "Have a blessed day," and he's the type who might not invite you to church but will bring you with him if you ask.

"I don't have to constantly throw it in their face," he says. "I'm a believer."

The Heisman Trophy is designed to go to the most outstanding college football player in America. That definition can be interpreted any way a voter chooses, and it usually is: In Griffin's case, the question is whether enough people believe that a superlative individual season should trump the best player on a superior team. Nobody had a finer season than Griffin, but all of the other four finalists played on better teams than he did.

Off-field matters are generally not factored into Heisman voting at all, and perhaps they shouldn't be, but there is a gravity to Griffin that seems like it should count for something; if there were an interview portion of the Heisman vote, Griffin would likely beat out even Stanford's Andrew Luck, another hyperintelligent quarterback who came into this season as the prohibitive Heisman favorite. If he stays at Baylor for another season, I have to imagine Griffin will be the first Heisman winner/candidate in quite some time to be actively enrolled in law school. His accomplishments call to mind John McPhee's classic book about Bill Bradley, A Sense of Where You Are: "The most interesting thing about [him] was not just that he was a great basketball player," McPhee wrote, "but that he succeeded so amply in other things that he was doing at the same time, reached a more promising level of attainment, and, in the end, put basketball aside because he had something better to do."

I don't know if Griffin will put professional football aside for one more season at Baylor, or if he will put professional football aside for a shot at the Olympics, or if he will someday put aside professional football to become a lawyer or politician. I honestly don't think he knows what his future holds at this point. "I can't lose focus, because I've got so much lined up," he says. "There's so much pressure on me to be successful. And that's matched by the pressure I put on myself."

He tells me he is enjoying college as much as he can, and trying to relish the moment as he contemplates whether or not he will enter the NFL draft. When I was there, he'd just written a paper on a feminist film theoretician named Claire Johnston, and he found it a fascinating diversion. Even dressed up in a ridiculous Halloween costume, posing for photographs with people he's never met, he is measuring himself against his own internal standards. The Heisman would be a major hurdle to clear, but you also get the sense that for Griffin, it is nothing more than a start. He is young, and he is smart, and he's only beginning to sense his place in the world.

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Born in Flames: The Arrival of Alex Smith

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:11 GMT le 10 décembre 2011

Here are some signs that your local team is doing well: City buses begin tweaking their LED displays to big-up the team on game nights; adults begin wearing ball caps on their morning commute; children begin writing all their book reports on their first-, second-, and third-favorite players' autobiographies; national networks begin requesting that your games be moved to nighttime to accommodate their schedule; and local rappers begin penning paeans to the future champions who walk your streets. San Francisco rapper Bailey knows how to pick a winner. In 2010 he recorded "Black and Orange" in honor of the Giants' playoff run. This week he released "Who's Got It Better?" the title a reference to one of 49ers coach (and Star Wars enthusiast) Jim Harbaugh's motivational chants. "Follow, while I ball like Smith," Bailey raps, "Reggie, Alex, or Aldon, take your pick."

It's a measure of Alex Smith's standing in the community that a local rapper is even bothering to try to bask in some of the Niners quarterback's reflected shine. As the saying goes: To err is human, to forgive divine, and to be a fan is to never forgive. It is to remain scornful and withhold forgiveness until someone proves his or her own divinity, or demonstrates some fundamental unwillingness to err. Before this season, Alex Smith had never really come close to offering any reason for the mellow, raging 49er fan to feel anything approaching patience, let alone forgiveness or even affection.

Fans in the Bay Area have made a pastime of wondering exactly where it all went wrong for the once-proud Niners. Unerringly, they have pointed to the selection of Alex Smith as the first overall pick in the 2005 draft. Even at the time, Smith was an unexciting and, thanks to his University of Utah pedigree, somewhat inscrutable pick. Every other highlight clip seemed to feature a quarterback draw and/or artificial turf. There were doubts as to whether his skill set would translate in the pros. And, on a purely superficial, poster-in-a-kid's-bedroom level, there was that unglamorous, decidedly un-"Joe Montana"-like name.

It's hard to describe the low that has afflicted the Niners fan base in the 10 years since their last playoff appearance, except to offer that they are the only major franchise in the area whose fans feel a sense of entitlement. During that glorious period, winning ceased to be pleasurable; it was a pathological necessity. While the Raiders, Athletics, Giants, Warriors, and Sharks — even Stanford and Cal — have each enjoyed moments in the sun at some point during the Niners' decade-long absence from the playoffs, none of them could claim the same sense of institutional privilege as the Niners. None of them had, within the memory of their middle-aged fans, once been considered a flagship franchise of their respective league. The 49ers of the 1980s and 1990s didn't just win. They embodied that special sense of continuity — Bill Walsh's coaching tree; those star-studded lines of succession at the skill positions — that distinguishes a dynasty from a great run. One is hard-pressed to describe Alex Smith's success this season as some kind of rise, return, or comeback, for such terms suggest that he was ever here to begin with. He is still more or less the same player, only he is a better decision-maker and more efficient risk-taker. Most important, in a league of storylines he is finally in control of his own story. He has somehow morphed into one of the most compelling and unlikely underdogs of the season — certainly more so than Cam Newton, Tim Tebow, or — in their own minds, at least — the Detroit Lions' defense.

There were concrete reasons for Smith's underperformance these past few years, foremost among them the revolving door of head coaches and offensive coordinators with whom he has had to work. There have been injuries, faintly amusing rumors that his hands were too small to properly grip the ball, and many years when the roster surrounding him was simultaneously too young and too old. But Smith's problem in the public imagination was always the weight of expectation thrust upon him. The first overall pick should possess gravitas, presence, vision. Smith's lopsided grin didn't project confidence. He wasn't allowed to look glum or turn inward amid that chorus of boos and discouragement. He couldn't be a pleaser — one of the lessons the accommodating Smith learned the hard way.

But this has all changed. The expectations affixed to his selection have expired. Other than perhaps Jeff George — and the comparison is admittedly a stretch — what other first-overall quarterback over the past two decades has taken this long to develop into a solid pro? Instead, the mere fact of Smith's survival has become all that one needs to know about his past. There's a dignity to his persistence, a sense of self-awareness and humility that isn't usually associated with players of Smith's supposed stature.

The first-overall pick isn't supposed to have a chip on his shoulder or play the underdog, since the narrative of being snubbed or doubted simply doesn't hold. That's what makes Tom Brady so absorbing, the champion who is unable to forget the six quarterbacks taken ahead of him in the 2000 draft. It's what powered one of Smith's predecessors, Jeff Garcia, to court grievous bodily injury on a weekly basis. Regard Aaron Rodgers' placid intensity, as though he got all the clenched-fist rage out of his system years ago; now his seething is ambient, a self-powered motor. A Niners fan as a child, Rodgers dreamed of being selected first overall and becoming the team's next great quarterback. Instead, they selected Smith and he tumbled to the Packers at age 24.

It was weirdly fitting that the first two teams to clinch playoff berths last week were Smith's Niners and Rodgers' Packers, forever twinned in the consciousness of the Niners fan, only now Smith is the one with something to prove. For the Niners faithful, it is slightly painful to revisit the recent, intertwined histories of these two franchises. Rivals for a brief spell in the late 1990s — and only the Angel of History can speculate as to what would have happened had Terrell Owens not made this catch — the Packers have flourished under the guidance of coach Mike McCarthy, a former Niners coordinator who oversaw their abysmal 2005 offense, and Rodgers.

The decision by then-head coach Mike Nolan to select Smith over Rodgers remains folkloric. Was there a moment that could have produced a different future? Perhaps it was Rodgers' sour attitude toward the battery of Nolan's diagnostic drills, a sideways glance as he was asked to throw the ball through a hoop or hop around on one leg. Or maybe it was during an interview, as Nolan scrutinized their faces when presented with the same riddle-like questions. Or maybe the sum total of interactions suggested to Nolan that Smith was the more cerebral, predictable, and teachable prospect. Whatever the truth may be, the stories remind us how close the decision was. And they also suggest the importance of a given team's organizational culture.

Logic breaks down whenever one considers the sport counterfactual: Would Rodgers have flourished with the Niners without those years of solitude and the humiliation of draft day? Would Smith have been better served by sitting and learning during his rookie season rather than reinventing himself on the fly and getting repeatedly pummeled? All that matters for now is that these are questions a Niners fan might finally ask without contempt. The comparisons between the two are still lopsided. But the possibility of Smith authoring a new ending to his story is one of the more unusual things to happen in the NFL in some time. It's not too late for a rivalry between Aaron and Alex — the disgraced and the triumphant, the top dog and the underdog, at least for now.

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The Sixth Day of NBA Christmas

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:10 GMT le 10 décembre 2011

Norm MacDonald's Comedy Central show may not have lasted long, but it left behind my favorite two-word phrase of 2011: "Wait, what?" The bit went like this: Norm would read a completely insane story with a totally straight face, milk it for a beat, then do a double-take and scream, "Wait, what???" It always slayed me.

See, life is full of those "Wait, what???" moments … you know, like yesterday, right after the Lakers pulled off a three-team trade for Chris Paul, when everyone was still digesting that stunning news through phone calls, e-mails and tweets. I had just tweeted a joke about coming to grips with my favorite point guard — Paul, a true artist, maybe the best pure point guard who ever lived — playing across the street from my office, for the team I hate the most, ultimately deciding that I just needed to get drunk. Not even a minute later, my cell phone rang. A friend of mine was on the line. He's never steered me wrong. And now, he was about to put me into a freaking stupor.

"The trade's off! The NBA vetoed the trade!!!"

Wait, what?

"The NBA vetoed the trade! They said it wasn't in the best interests of the league."

WAIT, WHAT?

"You heard me. They said it wasn't in the best interests in the league. Chris has to play out the year in New Orleans."

You know the rest. One of the strangest things about loving sports: Those random moments when you're sitting in your house, your office, your classroom, wherever … and suddenly you get blown away by a legitimate bombshell. This was crazy. This was insane. This made no sense. By blocking the trade, David Stern was willingly creating his own Watergate and validating every critic who ever claimed, "That guy stayed too long." Tim Donaghy was just one guy acting alone — we think — and tampering with dozens of games before they caught him. Blocking the Paul trade? This was different. This was Big Brother stuff. This was one of the biggest conflicts of interest in sports history. This was a league intentionally jeopardizing its own credibility. This was a scandal popping out of thin air, self-created, almost like a man-made lake or something.

These are the facts: Twelve months ago, the NBA bought the New Orleans Hornets for a little more than $300 million. Every other owner (29 in all) split the price for the franchise, the same way you'd split a meal 12 ways for your buddy's birthday or something. Stern and his cronies claimed this wouldn't be a problem, that Hornets GM Dell Demps would be able to swing moves just like any other general manager. When Mark Cuban flipped out in February after a Carl Landry/Marcus Thornton swap caused New Orleans' payroll to rise, nobody really cared. When the lockout dragged on for five months and nobody ever seriously considered contracting the Hornets — a franchise that lost money AND couldn't find an owner — nobody really cared. When the Hornets stole the spotlight after the labor agreement by immediately being involved in 50,000 different trade rumors, nobody really cared. We all assumed things were "on the level."

And why not? We had no reason to think differently … right? The league made a point of saying that Demps had been empowered to make any trade (without interference). Every team dealing with New Orleans believed that Demps was in charge — without any question — and that they weren't wasting their time spending their days batting around ideas with him. On Wednesday morning, when I was working on my column about Paul trades, I sniffed around on Stern's role in the trade talks and got the same answer from different people: It's Dell Demps' call. I ended up joking in that column that Stern might block a Clippers/Paul trade to avoid having Donald Sterling own one of the league's signature franchises. Everyone read that and got the joke.

I mean, Stern wouldn't actually BLOCK a trade. That's preposterous. Right?

Fast-forward to Thursday night: Those first few minutes after word spread (not only that the trade was canceled, but that Paul would probably remain in New Orleans for the entire season), as everyone came to the same sobering conclusion. The old man finally lost his mind. Sure, he was pushed there by a cluster of bitter owners, but the old Stern never would have rolled over like that. Twenty years ago, 10 years ago, maybe even five years ago, Stern would have brushed them off in his endearingly condescending way, quelled the fire, called in a favor or two, acted like the politician he always secretly was. Not this time. The old man doesn't have the same sway. We just witnessed it during that lockout. Few people understood how much time and effort he spent pushing his holdout owners toward that final compromise. He barely got there.

If you want to know the truth, Stern started losing control of the league during the middle of last decade, when a new generation of wealthy billionaires started paying full boat for franchises. The days of Abe Pollin and Bill Davidson were long gone — family guys who bought in early, stuck with their investments and watched their league flourish into something much bigger than they ever expected. Stern's favorite owner was Larry Miller, a dynamic Salt Lake City businessman and philanthropist who bought the Jazz in 1985, then ran the franchise with his family for the next 24 years. A year after diabetes claimed Miller in May of 2009, Stern met the press before a playoff game and spoke earnestly about his affection for Miller. Someone asked the commissioner about Jerry Sloan's longevity. At the time, Sloan was still coaching the Jazz at 67 years old, six months older than Stern.

"We're a dying breed," Stern admitted. "It's not happening anymore. But it sure is reassuring to look there and expect to see him, and darn, he's there. It's kind of neat."

That's probably how Stern thought people saw him. Or, how he hoped people saw him. And in some cases (like with me), it was true. Little did he know that Sloan was losing control of his players — in 2011, an ongoing clash with star Deron Williams caused Sloan to resign — just like Stern was slowly losing control of his owners. The newer generation of guys wasn't indebted to him. They found him to be increasingly obstinate, stuck in his ways, more of a condescending bully than anything. After paying full sticker price for their teams, they weren't interested in answering to some aging know-it-all. Stern's control slowly started to erode, whether he realized it or not.

Leaders thrive when they feel creatively empowered, when they trust the people around them, when their confidence is swelling. Leaders make mistakes when they lose that same confidence, when they're fretting about their power base, when they're reacting instead of acting. The worst kind of leaders hang on too long, get seduced by their own voice, start doing things from memory — because that's the way we've always done it! — stop thinking outside the box, start playing checkers instead of chess. Stern reached that point last night. I think he caved because of the whining owners, but also out of exasperation: because yet another superstar was trying to push his way to another big city, because he's in charge, because THIS IS DAVID STERN'S LEAGUE. It's like the old Will Ferrell/Dodge Stratus SNL sketch:

You don't talk to me like that! I'm David Stern! I make the rules here! You don't get to pick your team, I do! I'm the commissioner of the NBA! I DRIVE A DODGE STRATUS!!!!!

Fact: That trade was totally, undeniably, 100 percent defensible.

Fact: Of the three teams involved, New Orleans made out the best. Repeat: the best. By my calculations, it landed one of the better offensive big men in basketball (Luis Scola), one of the better scoring 2-guards in basketball (Kevin Martin), a playoff-proven forward who can play either spot (Lamar Odom), a scoring point guard with upside (Goran Dragic), and a 2012 no. 1 pick (via the New York Knicks). Can you do better for someone who was leaving in seven months anyway? I hate trading superstars, but if you HAVE to trade a superstar? That's pretty good.

Meanwhile, the Rockets spent the past three years stashing enough pieces to make that trade: Acquiring the second-best center in basketball (Gasol) while leaving enough cap room to sign a marquee free agent (and yes, they were closing in on Nene). And the Lakers paid the steepest price: giving up their best low-post guy and all of their frontcourt depth, giving Andrew Bynum an immense amount of responsibility (you know, the same guy who stormed off the court half-naked during the playoff sweep last spring) and reinventing their team around Paul's aching knee and Kobe's aching knees. It would have been a brilliant move had it worked and a legendary disaster had it failed — especially if Kobe rebelled against sharing the ball with Paul — only now we'll never know.

Once word leaked of the deal, rival owners started rebelling almost immediately. What was the point of that lockout, and all the talk of competitive balance, if the Lakers were allowed to immediately acquire Chris Paul? Dan Gilbert sent a scathing e-mail to a few of the other owners that, of course, was leaked on the Internet last night.

The best part of the letter: "This trade should go to a vote of the 29 owners of the Hornets."

(Translation: "Let's cut Demps' balls off, throw the last few weeks of negotiating out the window and go back on our word. Also, I'm thinking of starting a support group for small-market owners who overpaid for their teams, don't have the balls to sell and would rather whine, bitch and bully about their lot in NBA life. I'm going to call it O.A.: Overpayers Anonymous.")

The second-best part of the letter: "I just don't see how we can allow this trade to happen. I know the vast majority of owners feel the same way that I do. When will we just change the name of 25 of the 30 teams to the Washington Generals?"

(Translation: Boooooooo hooooooo.)

There it was, in all its Comic Sans MS glory, that whopping conflict of interest that had been staring at everyone for 12 solid months. How can a league own one of its own franchises? What happens if it has to, you know, make important trades and stuff? The league always knew that, at some point, the Hornets might have to trade Chris Paul. They claimed they had a plan in place. And they did. Until O.A. started bitching with even more fervor than usual. That's when Stern's eroding power finally sank him. Instead of backing a decision he had already made, Stern choked like Nick Anderson. The unthinkable happened.

He blocked the trade.

Wait, what?

Was it the worst moment of David Stern's entire tenure? I never thought anything would top an official fixing games, but man … how can anything be worse than this? Imagine this happened in your fantasy league. Imagine spending weeks shaping a deal, executing it, then having your commissioner waltz in and say, "Nah, I'm vetoing that one." Would that ever happen? And now this is happening in a PROFESSIONAL SPORTS LEAGUE?

Just know that I'm a die-hard Celtics fan and die-hard Lakers hater … and even I am appalled. I hope Chris Paul sues. I hope the Rockets sue. I hope the Lakers sue. I hope Dell Demps resigns and makes a sex tape with a stripper wearing a David Stern Halloween mask. Whatever happens, the season has been irrevocably tainted — we just watched FIVE teams have their seasons screwed up by this debacle. Houston's three-year plan just went up in smoke; now the Rockets have to make up with their two best players. (Good luck with that.) The Lakers need to determine if their relationship with the notoriously sensitive Gasol and the even more notoriously sensitive Odom is salvageable; and if it's not, what then? The Hornets are just plain screwed. It's a basketball catastrophe for them. As for the Celtics, Pinocchio Ainge's ill-fated pursuit of Paul ruined the team's relationship with Rajon Rondo, only its best young player. Even the Knicks got screwed — supposedly they closed the deal with Tyson Chandler yesterday, never expecting Paul to become available this summer (and now they can't chase him).

The total tally: Five teams were screwed by one cowardly decision.

Here's what saddens me: We should have remembered December 8, 2011, as one of the best random basketball days in years. It was like climbing on a Twitter/e-mail/phone call/texting roller coaster from the moment I woke up. First, Boston was in the lead for Paul as Golden State and the Clippers were falling out. Then, Boston fading as the Knicks were gaining steam. Around lunchtime, I called a Knicks buddy who was gleefully planning a future with Chandler, Carmelo and Paul, with poor Amar'e headed to New Orleans, Orlando, Houston … who the hell knew? And then, boom! That went up in smoke. The Lakers came roaring back, word of a three-teamer spread … and my Knicks buddy went from euphoric to despondent in less than three hours. My Laker fan buddies were crowing, my Boston peeps were freaking out, my dad was practically having a heart attack about the Kobe/Howard/Paul possibilities, Twitter was blowing up … I mean, could that have been a more fun day to be a basketball fan?

The best point guard of his generation was switching teams, in his prime, to the Los Angeles Lakers … and only after the Celtics and Knicks failed to get him. Read that sentence again. It's what Dan Gilbert and the other Overpayers Anonymous owners will never understand. In professional basketball, history trumps everything else. It's not just about playing in Los Angeles. It's about playing for the fucking Lakers. It's about following the footsteps of Magic, Kareem, Wilt, West, Baylor and Shaq. It's about Showtime, Nicholson, the yellow jerseys, the Laker Girls, even that awful Randy Newman song. It's about that buzz before a big Laker home game, when the place is packed with celebs and eye candy, when you're the best guy on the team, when you might as well be the king of the world. When these idiots complain about a "big market/small market" disparity, it's almost like they never followed the league before they bought their teams. Of course there's a disparity! What kid doesn't grow up wanting to play for the Celtics, Lakers or Knicks?

Remember what pissed us off most about LeBron picking Miami over New York? It wasn't just that he tried to stack the decks with a superteam; it's that he walked away from New York, the city with the most basketball fans, the city with the biggest spotlight, the city that would have either made him immortal or broken him in two. He didn't want it. He copped out. He could have picked loyalty (Cleveland) or immortality (New York); instead, he chose help (Miami). That killed us. We hated him for it. What was telling about Chris Paul's choice was that he eschewed the Clippers (a safer basketball situation for him; he would have been able to grow with Eric Gordon, DeAndre Jordan and Blake Griffin) for the Lakers (a much more volatile basketball situation with Kobe's miles and Bynum's knees) for the simple reason that he wanted to be a Laker.

For the right players, it's not about cities as much as teams, uniforms, histories, owners, fans, titles … and Chris Paul cares about the right things. He's the best teammate in the league. As much as it killed me that my least favorite team landed him, the "basketball fan" side of me loved it. Chris Paul and Kobe Bryant … together? Playing across the street from my office? How cool was that? I remember when KG landed on the Celtics, one of my Lakers-fan buddies told me, "I hate KG and I hate the Celtics, but this is going to be cool."

That's how I felt about Chris Paul and the Lakers. If you love basketball — if you truly love it — you appreciated what was happening. And it had nothing to do with the Washington Generals. Believe me.

Of course, that's not how December 8, 2011 will be remembered. Years from now, I won't remember anything about that day except for David Stern losing control of his own league. Once upon a time, it was reassuring to look there and expect to see him, and darn, he was there. It was kind of neat. Those days are long gone. The National Basketball Association has lost its way. I feel like crying.

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5 things

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:23 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

Great rivalries don't always produce great matches. We were reminded of that this past weekend when Liverpool hosted Manchester United. The opening 70 minutes were drab, almost snooze-worthy. Fortunately, it picked up in the final 20. The 1-1 draw allowed Manchester City, which defeated Aston Villa, to go top of the table by two points. And, rather quietly, Chelsea continues to win.

Here are five takeaways from the Premier League weekend.

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Michael Regan/Getty Images
Mario Balotelli continued to strengthen his case that he should be a starter after his sublime overhead kick put City ahead 1-0 against Aston Villa.
1. Nothing the Mata with Juan

That Chelsea, three points behind the league leader, is keeping pace with Manchester City and Manchester United is largely down to youth. New signing Juan Mata and Daniel Sturridge, back from his loan spell at Bolton, have sizzled. Without the duo the Blues would be struggling.

Every time Arsenal fans watch Mata, they must want to pull their hair out. He was supposed to join the Gunners, not Chelsea, in the summer, but his high wage demands reportedly scuppered a deal. They'll get a chance to see Mata up close and personal at the end of the month, when Arsenal makes the short trek to west London.

Mata, likened to Chelsea icon Gianfranco Zola by "Match of the Day" analyst Alan Shearer, pulled the strings in the 3-1 win against penniless Everton on Saturday. His vision and creativity were there for all to see on the opening goal. Mata unlocked the Everton defense with a ball over the top to left-back Ashley Cole, whose cross was then converted by an eager, onrushing Sturridge. Indeed, the two Chelsea players complement each other nicely. Sometimes Sturridge's control in tight spaces can let him down, whereas Mata is a maestro with the ball in the final third. On the other hand, he doesn't have Sturridge's pace. Together, they're making things happen at Stamford Bridge.

For Chelsea to maintain the title challenge into 2012, Mata and Sturridge need to keep it up -- and Fernando Torres (serving the second of a three-game league ban) and Didier Drogba need to start scoring.

2. Mario was super on the day

The last thing Roberto Mancini wanted in the wake of the Carlos Tevez saga was for his other strikers to start slumping. Then, pretty soon some of the fans would likely want Tevez back in the lineup, and if that was to happen, Mancini's authority would be undermined.

The manager was probably relieved to see Mario Balotelli put in another strong performance in a 4-1 victory against previously unbeaten Aston Villa. It was a typical Balotelli outing: He clashed with the away fans, scored a theatrical overhead goal (after which he stared down Villa fans and gave them the "shhh" sign), quarreled with teammate Yaya Toure and didn't shy away shooting from distance. The Italian, who netted for the fourth straight match, will be pushing for a starting spot when City travels to United on Sunday. Mancini has to decide whether Balotelli can be trusted to keep his emotions in check in what's sure to be a hostile environment.

Balotelli's presence in the starting XI was testament to Manchester City's depth. With Sergio Aguero out injured and Tevez frozen out, Mancini could afford to rest Edin Dzeko and Samir Nasri, coming off intense Euro 2012 qualifiers, and not start midfield playmaker David Silva. Expect at least two of the three to start at Old Trafford.

James Milner scored one of the goals of the weekend by curling a shot past Shay Given. The hard-working midfielder began the move with a long, cross-field pass to Adam Johnson before covering ample ground to get into a shooting position. Then, with the ball served up to him at the top of the 18-yard box, Milner kept his head down and hit through the ball with sublime skill. It isn't often the former Villa player gets into the scoring act, but this shot was worthy of any world-class player.

3. No second-guessing Fergie

Some would say United manager Alex Ferguson lost the plot last week. First, he suggested that Liverpool versus Manchester United was a bigger game than El Clasico. Then for his team's trip to Anfield he sent out an under-strength side, naming Wayne Rooney, Nani and Javier Hernandez on the subs' bench, and not including Nemanja Vidic and Dimitar Berbatov in the squad at all.

But Ferguson isn't losing it. He's still got it, in fact.

Fergie had the last laugh as United rallied for the 1-1 draw. Had Ryan Giggs not broken away from the wall to protect his privates (jokes aplenty on Twitter) on Steven Gerrard's mediocre free kick, United could have left Liverpool with all three points.

Ferguson introduced Rooney, Nani and Hernandez late in the second half, and all three contributed. Hernandez's instinctive finish from Danny Welbeck's glancing header in the 81st minute got United level, and Rooney preserved the point. His aerial challenge on Luis Suarez prevented the ever-lively Uruguayan from scoring a winner. United keeper David De Gea made a flurry of fine saves -- yet it wouldn't be De Gea if he didn't flap at a corner kick.

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Suitably pleased after the game, Ferguson wasted no time belittling City. "We've faced all the top sides really now, Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham and now Liverpool …" Ferguson told the BBC.

4. Canaries leading the promoted pack

It's still early, but all three promoted teams -- Norwich, Swansea and QPR -- aren't being outclassed. None are in the relegation zone.

Norwich, however, is the team in form, winning three of its past four after a worrying 0-2-2 league start. Tall, imposing striker Steve Morison and Anthony Pilkington, who blew a golden chance against Manchester United on Oct. 1 with the game scoreless, impressed in Saturday's 3-1 win against Swansea. Morison, interestingly, now appears to be the first choice up top instead of Grant Holt, a goal machine in recent seasons. Swansea, meanwhile, is the only side not to have collected a point on the road. It needs to fix that to survive.

Following a flying start, QPR is stumbling, winning one of its past seven after a 1-1 draw at home against Blackburn. QPR manager Neil Warnock finally lost patience with ineffective striker Jay Bothroyd, dropping him to the bench in favor of veteran Heidar Helguson. Helguson duly found the back of the net with an exquisite chip (which perhaps was meant as a cross). More bad news for Warnock: DJ Campbell, part of Blackpool's free-flowing lineup in 2010-11, will be sidelined for about two months with a foot injury.

And up next for Rangers? Only an intense west London derby against Chelsea.

5. This will be a long, long season for Wigan

Credit Roberto Martinez. Despite Wigan continuing to lose, he looks so positive and upbeat in post-match interviews. That didn't change Saturday, when the Latics fell 3-1 to slumping Bolton to suffer a sixth straight loss. By far, it was the shoddiest defensive display of the weekend. All three Bolton goals came as a result of Wigan giveaways, two by central defender Antolin Alcaraz (send him to soccer's Alcatraz), who should know better. Keeper Ali Al Habsi, overall a positive for Wigan, saved a Kevin Davies penalty, but his inability to scoop up a weak shot indirectly led to the spot kick. Devoid of midfielders Tom Cleverley and Charles N'Zogbia, who helped the team last season only to move on, Martinez would trump himself by keeping Wigan in the Premier League for yet another season. To do that, however, he'll have to abandon any notion of playing beautiful football and just try to play winning football -- long balls, set pieces, whatever it takes.

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Comparing MLS to other leagues

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:22 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

It's an oft-asked question. Just how good is Major League Soccer?

With 16 seasons in the books, the league has risen to 10th in the world in attendance for all soccer leagues, with 17,872 fans per game, recently passing the second tier of English football, the Championship (17,388). There is no argument to be had over whether MLS has gotten better. It unequivocally has. The quality of play has improved; high-quality foreign talent has started arriving; serious international prospects are steadily emerging.

But where exactly does the league rank in the hierarchy of the world's biggest leagues? I set out to answer that question.

First, I asked English Premier League veteran and recent Los Angeles Galaxy recruit Robbie Keane. "It's very different to compare this league and especially the Premiership, which is obviously the best league in the world," said the Liverpool and Tottenham veteran. "So it would be silly of me to compare the two."

"You can't compare this," echoed New York Red Bulls goalkeeper and German Bundesliga alumnus Frank Rost, before adding with a grin: "It's not good if I make a comparison."

I asked several other experienced foreign players. The answer was the same.

But if they were dodging the question, it dawned on me, they were nevertheless making a valid point: You really can't compare.

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For one, MLS is a total outlier. In most leagues, clubs pay players what they can afford to pay them -- and oftentimes more -- spreading the wealth relatively evenly among the squad. In MLS, because of arrangements like the salary cap and the designated player (three of which are the only players allowed to earn over $335,000 annually on each team, counting only partially toward the salary cap), there is a wild disparity between what the best- and worst-earning players on each team earn. This distorts the talent curve.

Secondly, because there is no free agency, those homegrown players who aren't among the few designated players often earn less than they're worth while the DPs are often wildly overpaid relative to their value, further corrupting the mean. Players aren't paid their market value, because there is no market.

In their seminal book "Soccernomics," Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski prove that there is a very reliable correlation between a team's payroll and how well it places in the standings, that unequivocal measure of quality. They found that among 40 English professional clubs between 1978 and 1997, the salary expenditure explained 92 percent of the variation in league position. From 1998 to 2007, it was 89 percent. What this means is you can more or less tally what a club spends on player salaries and, by comparing it to others, rank where it ought to place in the standings at the end of the season. Logically, the same goes for leagues as a whole, given that players are free to move to the highest bidder in the rest of the soccer world. Salaries are highest in England, Spain, Italy and Germany, and therefore those are the leagues where the level of play is highest.

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Bob Levey/Getty Images
Dynamo goalkeeper Tally Hall credits MLS for being stronger than many people think.
In MLS, which has an outlandish appetite for big foreign names but no free market, there is no correlation between expenditure and quality -- not until 2011 did a team that employed a designated player, first allowed in 2007, even win the league. This means you can't rank MLS among other leagues around the world based on the salaries paid to its players.

The band of talent is wider in MLS than in any other league that comes to mind. The difference between those making $30,000 and the ones making $6.5 million is enormous. David Beckham can still hang with the best of Europe, as he proved in two loan stints to AC Milan. So can several others. But a late-round draft pick out of a local college is lucky not to be embarrassed in MLS. And in no other league in the world is the disparity between the best and worst players so large. This is partly to blame on the lack of promotion or relegation to a second tier or easy movement of players between different American leagues, preventing the natural selection of talent. Yet at the same time, the talent difference between a player who makes $50,000 and $500,000 is often quite small, much smaller than the difference between one player and another making 10 times as much would be anywhere else in the world.

Houston Dynamo goalkeeper Tally Hall, who never came off the bench in two seasons at Danish club Esbjerg, exposes this in his following comment: "I think people discredit the league quite a bit," he said. "I think the Dynamo beats my Danish team more times than not." Yet why have American MLS players for years flocked to Scandinavia? Because salaries are high -- even if, according to Hall, the talent level on certain teams is lower.

Is Major League Soccer just another entity whose quirks will have to be filed away under the uniqueness of American sports? Because how do you even begin to objectively measure MLS against any other league if you can't follow the money?

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Could Drogba replace Beckham in L.A.?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:21 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

With David Beckham making amorous glances toward Paris St. Germain and vice versa, it was only a matter of time before speculation began about who might be the Englishman's marquee replacement with the Los Angeles Galaxy.

Thierno Seydi was only too happy to oblige.

Seydi is the agent for Chelsea striker Didier Drogba, whose contract runs out at the end of the season. It's understood that Drogba wants a new two-year contract, while the Blues are insisting on a one-year deal, which naturally displeases Seydi to no end.

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Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images
Didier Drogba has taken part in Chelsea's summer excursions to the U.S. in recent years.
"[Drogba] will go where he is offered the most money," Seydi told The Guardian. "It could be the United States, Russia, Qatar or somewhere else in Asia. Once you are well into your 30s you have to go to a club where you can be certain you'll be able to pay your bills. L.A. Galaxy are a possibility among many others."

Now, it's entirely possible that Drogba could end up stateside, but Seydi's comments mark the umpteenth time that an MLS club has been used as leverage in a contract negotiation with an overseas club. And it's important to remember that in most cases, the more an agent talks up MLS, the less likely a deal is in reach.

There's another reason the possibility of Drogba taking his talents to Manhattan Beach is unlikely, and that has to do with the traits of the man he would be replacing. It's not Beckham's goals that will be missed -- he had only two in 30 league and playoff appearances this season -- but rather his 15 assists. And for all the talk about how a proposed partnership of Drogba and Robbie Keane would play out, the bigger issue is who would get them the ball. Sure, Landon Donovan and Juninho -- assuming his loan from Sao Paulo is made permanent -- are crafty enough. But Beckham's play in the center of midfield will be especially difficult to replace should he depart. So for all the talk about Drogba, a player like Bayer Leverkusen midfielder Michael Ballack -- who is also rumored to be looking at MLS -- would be a better fit for the Galaxy. Not only can he impact games from the center of the park, he can chip in with goals as well.

Solid marks for Montreal: It's almost an annual rite of passage in MLS. An expansion team makes its first forays into acquiring players, and when the dust has settled from the expansion draft, the impulse is to think "That's not a bad team." Of course, as last season proved with Portland and in particular Vancouver, what actually happens on the field is a different matter entirely.

But the early returns from the efforts of Montreal manager Jesse Marsch have been largely positive. The team now has some good experience in midfielder Davy Arnaud, defender Nelson Rivas and goalkeeper Donovan Ricketts. There are some intriguing younger prospects like Bryan Arguez and Collen Warner, with more to come in January's SuperDraft. But Marsch is well aware of how tough expansion teams have it, having gone through it with the Chicago Fire in 1998.

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Kyle Rivas/Getty Images
After reaching the conference final with Kansas City, influential midfielder Davy Arnaud has been dealt to the Montreal Impact.
"We're committed to putting a competitive team on the field that wants to win, no question," he said. "But I would be arrogant to say that we think we can just get players and put them on the field and be a winner immediately. This takes time. I don't care whether everyone wants to talk about what we did in Chicago when we won the double the first year. There was a process there as well. It wasn't, from the beginning, all magical. It takes time, and becoming a team isn't just about the players; it's about a mentality and how the group comes together and pushes themselves every day to get better. That's what we want to be about."

That said, Marsch has taken a poker player's approach to the last few weeks, keeping some signings in his back pocket to better disguise what his team's needs are.

"The marketing team wants me to announce every player, every day," he said. "We've just tried to be shrewd about the kind of business that we are."

Hard questions in Houston: Marsch's approach has won him few fans in Houston, where the Dynamo is taking some deserved heat for its handling of what is now known as the Brian Ching Affair. Mindful of Ching's age, as well as his $400,000-plus yearly salary, Houston manager Dominic Kinnear gambled that Marsch wouldn't select the Dynamo forward in last week's expansion draft. That strategy backfired when Marsch made Ching the first overall selection.

"I was surprised he was taken," Kinnear said. "It's something we as an organization have to own up to. Montreal viewed Ching as an asset, and they were within their rights to do that."

Now, Houston is faced with the possibility of opening a new stadium next year without its icon. But just how much this will end up hurting the Dynamo is open to debate. Certainly it's a public relations nightmare, and while the Impact will no doubt try to extract a king's ransom from Houston, the likelihood of Montreal getting defender Andre Hainault seems very low. And the Dynamo could very well call Marsch's bluff and stick him with Ching's hefty salary, tendency for injury and declining production. Look for an 11th-hour deal involving a player not named Hainault and a draft pick to get Ching back.

The backlash against Kinnear continued Wednesday when the list of players eligible for next Monday's re-entry draft was released and it contained starting defender Bobby Boswell. In this case, however, the ire was misguided. The obvious question is: Why protect Boswell if he was going to be made available in the re-entry draft? The answer is simple. The move was merely a way of restructuring Boswell's contract. The final touches were applied Thursday, and resulted in him being removed from the re-entry draft.

"We've always wanted Boswell to return," Kinnear said. "His play with Geoff Cameron in the center of defense was a big part of our playoff run."

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Victor Decolongon/Getty Images
Paulo Nagamura, formerly with Chivas USA, will add some depth to the Sporting Kansas City midfield.
Kansas City reloads: It's been a busy offseason for Sporting Kansas City manager Peter Vermes. Out are midfielder/forward Ryan Smith, Arnaud and defender Seth Sinovic. Coming in are former Chivas USA midfielder Paulo Nagamura and, yes, Sinovic, who was initially lost in the expansion draft and then reacquired in the trade that sent Arnaud to Montreal.

Combined with the waiving of Jeferson, Milos Stojcev and Craig Rocastle, Vermes has recaptured over $500,000 in cap space plus the allocation money obtained from Montreal. Not a bad bit of work, considering that the core of the squad has remained intact.

"Not only did we get Seth back, but if you look at the true trade value itself we were able to get something for Davy," Vermes said. "That's the beauty of the expansion draft and the protected list. You should be protecting value, and if any of your guys are gone, you still have the ability to get some value for those [protected] guys. I do believe Seth was used a little bit as a pawn to get to Davy, and that's part of the business. I think it worked out the best for everyone."

The end result is that with the addition of Nagamura, Kansas City now has some depth in midfield to go along with Julio Cesar, Roger Espinoza and Graham Zusi.

"Julio Cesar isn't a spring chicken, but he has experience that's invaluable," Vermes said. "He understands his place in the team. Then you look at Roger and he has international duties. So to have a mix of guys like we do who have experience, I think is very good for us. It's probably harder to deal with from a management perspective, but I do think it's important to understand that we have so many games and so many events that players need to be available for. It's highly important to have a deep roster."

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Chelsea lives (for now)

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:21 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

As disappointed as I was that the height of Mario Balotelli's crowd-pleasing antics consisted of simply using his shoulder to knock the ball into an open net when any other player on the planet would have banally slotted home with either foot or head, I guess the naughty Italian had a reason to be on his best behavior. Balotelli hopes to play Wednesday in Manchester City's most important Champions League match in the club's history since, well, the last one, in which it contrived to lose to Napoli and likely resign itself to another bout of Europa League purgatory.

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Gareth Copley/Getty Images
Andre Villas-Boas and his players lived to fight another day after beating Newcastle, but can they survive their mid-week Champions League clash?
But here's a scary thought: If the Sky Blues don't make it past the group stage -- either a defeat to first-place Bayern Munich or a Napoli victory over winless Villarreal would eliminate them -- they can, as Roberto Mancini likes to say, "concentrate on winning the league."

Isn't it nice to know that they've been playing with one foot tied behind their back through the first 14 games while rampaging to a five-point lead atop the Prem?

On the other side of Manchester, there's an entirely different vibe, as it's squeaky-bum time for Sir Alex's men, who must draw away against Basel on Wednesday to be sure of qualification for the knockout stages of the Champions League. They'll also be without their Mexican hit man Javier Hernandez, who tore ankle ligaments in United's 1-0 bore-fest with Aston Villa this past weekend.

Meanwhile, there's one EPL team that has banked a place in the Champions League knockout round, and it resides in London. Hint: It's not Chelsea, which needs either a win or scoreless draw against Valencia on Tuesday at Stamford Bridge to advance, and it's certainly not Tottenham, which wasn't good enough to qualify for the CL and is facing the unspeakable indignity of being bounced from the Chumpian's -- sorry, I mean Europa League.

So that leaves Arsenal, which showed off its sense of liberation with a footloose and fancy-free exhibition as it rolled 4-0 over the dead muskrat on the relegation highway that is Wigan.

But enough about my beloved Gunners. Instead, let's take a look at how the other 99 percent live, as we review this weekend's key games while Steve Bruce's body is still warm.

Blues cruise

This is how nerve-jangling it was to be a Chelsea fan before the start of the Blues' surprisingly relevant game at Newcastle: The man in blue on the barstool next to me drained six pints of Guinness between the 7:45 a.m. kickoff and the 89th minute, knocking them back with awe-inspiring regularity until Salomon Kalou and Daniel Sturridge's efforts allowed him to relax -- or black out, as the case may be.

Six friggin' pints! That's twelve ounces of beer every seventeen minutes -- or 6 minutes longer than Fernando Torres' latest stumbling cameo.

Even on my worst day -- when Arsenal blew a 4-0 halftime lead to Newcastle -- I never had more than three Stellas before 10 a.m. But, of course, there was no danger that Arsene Wenger's job was riding on the outcome, whereas in some quarters this game was being billed as Andre Villas-Boas' Second-To-Last Stand.

General Boas Custer's true reckoning happens when Chelsea hosts Valencia in that Champions League game that is shocking only in that it is important. Usually by the last match of the group stage, Chelsea scrapes the bottom of the squad barrel, as first place has long been secured -- how else would Nicolas Anelka, Alex and Florent Malouda ever hope to get a match?

David Hirshey
For more from David Hirshey, check out his columns on all things soccer.
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• A primer on eve of EPL
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• One Michael Owen speaks
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• Air Wambach
• Red, white and blew it
• Barca broke my heart
However, judging by the inspired way Villas-Boas' team responded Saturday to reports that owner Roman Abramovich was polishing his managerial eject button, if I were Guus Hiddink I wouldn't be booking any private jets to London just yet. You see, the Blues proved over the 90 minutes that they can indeed play well and thrive in intense, controversial games -- though it didn't hurt that referee Mike Dean provided them with a fifth-minute assist by failing to brandish the right color card in David Luiz's face for the most professional of denying-an-obvious-goal-scoring-opportunity fouls on Demba Ba.

Had Dean not gagged on the call and rightfully dismissed the Chelsea "defender," the result -- and AVB's fate -- could well have been different. If nothing else, Villas-Boas should make sure that Dean has a little something special in his Christmas stocking.

Who knows how a 10-man Chelsea would have coped with the resurgent Magpies -- who, despite last weekend's loss at Man City, are playing with a confidence that belies manager Alan Pardew's just-happy-to-be-invited-to-the-party pose? From an almost-neutral's point of view, I was pleasantly surprised that Dean didn't send off Luiz, because it would have ruined what turned out to be a hugely entertaining match that was well worth watching at an indecently unfair hour. After all, if I want to catch up on my Z's I'll put on any match featuring Aston Villa (see below).

But this was always going to be a jolt of early-morning caffeine, considering the quality on display. For one thing, I'm developing a serious man-crush on Juan Mata, who, perhaps more than any other Chelsea player, seems both worthy of wearing Gooner red and hell-bent on saving AVB's job.

It was the mini-Mourinho who signed him, and they certainly bear an eerie physical resemblance to one another. But it was Villas-Boas' decision to make the Spanish playmaker the creative heart of his team that continues to pay off. With Mata at his fluent best -- his elegantly clipped left-flank cross teed up a vintage Didier Drogba power header to give Chelsea the lead -- the Blues looked ever-dangerous going forward. In fact, if you were to try to divine any discernible drinking pattern to Mr. Six-Pint, it would be that he appeared to only order his beers when Chelsea was defending.

To be fair to John Terry -- something I'm not genetically programmed to do -- he was immense in the back, baby-sitting for Luiz and even chipping in a goal-line clearance in the 74th minute. Like a steady and loyal bull mastiff, Terry knows that Luiz is about as comfortable defending as he is with a comb, so the Chelsea captain stayed doggedly home to guard the Blues' front porch.

As for Newcastle, Pardew made it frothingly clear that the Brazilian should not have been on the field for the final 85 minutes. Once Dean pulled his colorblind act by flashing a yellow, the Newcastle manager went "Full Fergie" on the fourth official. What made his tirade all the more comical was Pardew's ability to seemingly forget that last week against United, his Magpies reaped the benefit of a similarly boneheaded call when Rio Ferdinand was deemed to have fouled Hatem Ben Arfa in the penalty box on what was, in fact, a clean challenge -- pot, kettle, etc.

With Luiz magically escaping the hangman's noose, Chelsea was free to flow forward, and its ebullient attack -- rounded off neatly by Sturridge's injury-time strike, his third consecutive game with a goal -- should keep Roman's victory-lust sated for now. But how long will the Russian remain quiet about AVB's stubborn insistence on playing Luiz, while exiling Torres, Abramovich' s most highly prized vanity purchase?

And now with perma-sullen Anelka and sloth-heeled center-back Alex (there is room on Chelsea for only one mainly useless Brazilian defender) all but out the Stamford Bridge exit, the AVB evolution continues unabated. That is, unless the Blues lose Tuesday.

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Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images
Against Aston Villa, Wayne Rooney saved his most intimidating best for the refs.
Rooney's hairy season

It used to be that you had the pick of the Prem litter -- Stoke, Sunderland, Wolves -- when it came to anointing the dullest team to watch in the EPL. No more. That dubious honor belongs to any club managed by Alex McLeish. Since his impressive trophy haul with Hibernian and Rangers, the flame-haired Scot has adhered to a singular philosophy -- first with Birmingham City and now Aston Villa -- to play an utterly joyless, miserable style of soccer in an effort to grind out points. So it was no surprise Saturday that Villa was, yet again, overly defensively minded in front of its home fans, displaying neither a hint of desire nor ambition.

Is it really that unbearable to play for the former manager of your crosstown rival (both Villa and Birmingham share the same beautiful, gray, smog-choked city)? Not only did Villa fail to muster a single shot on goal in the first half, but the only time United's Danish keeper, Anders Lindegaard, had to put down his Kindle was in the 76th minute when he was called on to tip over a James Collins bullet header.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but I don't think I've ever seen a more wretched home performance in EPL history than the steaming pile the Claret and Blue deposited on their own turf. And I say this as someone who was at Highbury in 1998 when a team of Arsenal reserves -- where have you gone, Nelson Vivas? -- plus Dennis Bergkamp allowed Chelsea to walk all over them in a 5-0 humiliation.

It's fair to say that had Villa been hosting the other Manchester and played in the same abject fashion, Sergio Aguero & Co. might have broken double digits.

By contrast, the once-fearsome United attack seems incapable of squeezing more than one goal past its Prem opponents these days -- four 1-0 wins in its past five league games -- or even mid-table Championship fodder like Crystal Palace, which stunned the Red Devils 2-1 in the Carling Cup.

Saturday's limp effort will no doubt embolden FC Basel, United's hosts in their critical midweek Champions League game, to believe it can accomplish the unthinkable -- preventing the Red Devils from reaching the knockout round of a competition they won in 2009. Personally, I can't see it happening, but then I never imagined how toothless they would look against Villa.

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Whatever hope Sir Alex Ferguson may have had of seeing more attacking brio in his side went the way of the latest Paul Reiser show within 12 minutes when Chicharito -- scorer of four of United's past seven Prem goals -- was stretchered off with a shredded ankle. Ferguson moved Nani up to partner Rooney and, despite the occasional moment of slick interplay between the two, neither player offered much venom -- unless you consider Rooney's sporadic ref abuse a threat.

You could make the case that with Villa offering so little resistance, United cruised to victory without physically taxing any of its key players. But after issuing a rare public apology to United supporters midweek for his team's woeful performance against Palace -- normally Fergie delegates the postgame remarks following a bad result to his deputies so he can continue "chatting" with the players in the privacy of the dressing room -- Sir Alex could not have been overjoyed by what he saw at Villa Park. And he must be starting to fret about Rooney's latest goal-scoring slump, particularly with the Little Pea out for the next month.

On the Fernandy Carroll scale of barren, goalless ineptitude, Rooney's drought -- eight scoreless Prem games and counting after tallying nine goals in his first five -- is a blip. Hell, it's neither as long or as panic-inducing as his last one, which went on for 14 Prem games after the World Cup, and can also be seen as a reflection of the different roles Rooney has been asked to play, including central midfield.

But given United's ambitions and City's indisputable title credentials, the Red Devils simply can't afford for their best player to go on another midseason goal-scoring holiday. For a guy whose club and country are seemingly convinced that he and he alone holds their fate in his Shrek-ish paws, Rooney's recent everything-but-the goals-form is a legitimate concern, especially when neither United (Dimitar Berbatov's last Prem goal? April 9 versus Fulham) nor England (think the Spaniards, Dutch or Germans are afraid of the likes of Nacho Crouch, Bobby Zamora or Jermain Defoe?) have any saviors-in-waiting.

Until Rooney's impotence in front of goal is rectified (and I doubt Pfizer can help with this one), the Old Trafford faithful had better learn to embrace the old Arsenal chant: One-nil to United.

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Can Barcelona stop rampant Real?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:20 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

If Jose Mourinho has had a more toxic, infuriating and damaging series of results in his entire career than those against Barcelona since managing Real Madrid, I can't recall them.

Since the Portuguese took over at the Santiago Bernabeu, there have been seven Clasicos -- which is the noun Spain uses to describe the tribal football war between Madrid and FC Barcelona. They have been a thorn in Mourinho's side not merely because his team, more often than not, has been bettered. What has exacerbated his annoyance is how much he wanted the job that belongs to Pep Guardiola and, quite naturally, how much he wanted to show the Catalan club what it missed by not signing him to replace Frank Rijkaard in 2008.

Graham Hunter
For more Graham Hunter, check out his columns on all things La Liga and Spanish soccer.
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• Positives from Clasico
• The mind of Mourinho
• Barca's net asset
• Now or never for Real
• Barca vs. Arsenal

Last season, it was occasionally hard to tell whether Mourinho, for all his vast skill and experience, was a help or a hindrance to his squad. What was once Machiavellian scheming, and often successful during his other appointments, intermittently seemed to become howling at the moon. When his team went toe-to-toe with Barca, attacking the Catalans, it resulted in a brutal 5-0 thrashing. And when he chose to man-mark, cede possession and try to counterattack at the Santiago Bernabeu, even Madrid's greatest icon, Alfredo Di Stefano, called them a team "without personality" and "like a mouse to Barcelona's lion."

But things have patently changed. Mourinho is, as sportsmen and -women put it, "in the zone." For weeks his decisions and his leadership have been like catnip for the Real Madrid players. Team rotation, playing style, fitness, mood and democracy within the squad-coach relationship: the Special One is special again. His presence in the Spanish media has been, for some months now, low-profile, noncontroversial and the antithesis of how he chose to act last season. That, added to FC Barcelona's deep uncertainty away from the fortress Camp Nou, has led not only to Madrid hitting the top of La Liga but also unquestionably deserving the status of the in-form team coming into Saturday's eighth Mourinho-Guardiola Clasico.

Will that be sufficient to defeat the reigning Spain and European champions and open a definitive lead at the top of the Primera Division? Perhaps these points will help guide us to that answer.

1. Self-discipline will be key

During the seven previous La Liga, Copa del Rey, Champions League and Supercup matches since Mourinho and Guardiola faced off, there have been 21 goals, 52 bookings and nine red cards. Barca have won three, Madrid one and there have been three draws. The balance of trophies in that fevered series has been three to Barca and one to Mourinho's club.

We are now just over a year after that utterly remarkable 5-0 destruction of Real Madrid by a wonderful Lionel Messi and Xavi-inspired "dream team," since which the pattern has been noticeably different. The results since that mauling tell a tale -- three score draws, a 1-0 cup final victory for Madrid, a 2-0 away win for Barca (once Pepe was sent off and Messi was unshackled), plus a 3-2 last-minute Supercup win for Barcelona at Camp Nou. Things are tight.

Mourinho's perpetual moaning about having to play Barca with only 10 men, which dates back to when he coached Chelsea and Inter Milan, has no foundation. At all. It's a tactic, nothing else, from a man who has always admitted that for him the match "starts during the buildup," not when the whistle blows. Sadly, last season some of his Real Madrid players began to be sucked down by self-delusion and a victim mentality, which made them less competitive. Even though the red card for Angel Di Maria in the cup final didn't eventually cost Madrid a dramatic victory, the teams are now so evenly balanced that whichever of the two maintains better self-discipline and retains 11 men on the pitch will have an exponentially improved chance of taking what they want from this Clasico.

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Lluis Gene/AFP/Getty Images
Once again, Pepe will be deployed to try to stop Lionel Messi.
2. Messi, Pepe and Marcelo should be the pivotal players

Given that the pitch will be replete with a large percentage of the world's absolutely greatest footballers, it would be naive to pretend that I know, specifically, who will win or lose the match for either team. There are too many jack-in-the-box geniuses playing to do that. But it is worth highlighting three players -- all of whom should start -- who have been absolutely key to the most important results in the seven-game series until now.

It was Messi who scored that late Supercup winner this season, and it's notable that he's the leading player in the seven-game series -- six goals and four assists. Recently, only the greatest player in the world has separated the sides. His form has been a little odd lately -- still producing goals at an abnormal rate, but also missing chances that would normally be meat and drink and, occasionally, choosing the more selfish option instead of automatically feeding a better-placed teammate. The white shirt of Madrid has tended to be a red flag to him since he made his Clasico debut in that brilliant 3-0 win at the Bernabeu, which will forever be remembered as "Ronaldinho's game." If Mourinho's team can legally patrol Messi more effectively than it has in the past, it will be a massive step toward a victory that could, even now, push the title out of Barca's grasp.

For parts of last season, Pepe was Messi's tormentor. It was a Road Runner-Wile E. Coyote story as far as their relative levels of success went, but Pepe was an important player in the battle to stop Messi. In his midfield destroyer role, he was effective -- albeit straining the letter of the law. The extent to which he posed questions for Messi was demonstrated in that the Argentine was driven deeper and deeper to gain possession with some space to work during the cup final defeat, and it was only after Pepe was sent off that Messi was unleashed and scored twice in the Champions League semifinal first leg. And it was a tiny slip by Pepe that allowed Messi to make it 2-1 for Barcelona at the Camp Nou Supercup first leg in August. Playing in midfield, Pepe hit the bar with a header, and has produced two assists in the seven-match series. Not an outright success for Mourinho thus far, but still a threat to Messi.

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Denis Doyle/Getty Images
The Supercup was a physical encounter that Barcelona won over two legs back in August.
Then there is Marcelo -- adored by Madridistas, causing defensive organizers everywhere nightmares with his concept of positional sense. He carried out Mourinho's battle instructions to the very limit during the previous seven games, but his impish forward runs and his warrior spirit often obscured his flaws. Marcelo's work with Di Maria helped produce the winning goal in the cup final, and his thumping finish at Camp Nou in the Champions League semifinal second leg was emblematic of what he does well. But just look at his defensive work on both of Messi's goals in the first leg and his positional sense, plus his lazy attitude to tracking back, when Pedro put the tie out of reach at Camp Nou, 3-0 on aggregate. Shoddy from Marcelo. Poorly placed, slow to react, self-indulgent. Can he address those flaws and only produce the flamboyant, daring work down the left wing that renders him so valuable to Madrid?

3. Barca have failed to hit their high notes this season

The core concept of Barcelona's excellence under Guardiola is much more prosaic than many people imagine. We, on the outside, venerate excellence but we tend to see it in individual portions. "Xavi is this good," "Messi is perhaps the best ever," "Andres Iniesta should be the Ballon d'Or winner" -- yada, yada, yada. Guardiola put a massive premium on two things when he came to power. First, that the team should be more important than any individual. Second, that his players would run and run and run -- in training and in matches. He wanted his players to be fitter, hungrier, sharper than anyone else on the planet and thereby to unleash the footballing excellence they possess.

Irrespective of their astonishing record at Camp Nou this season -- 47-2 in terms of goals for and goals conceded -- I don't think Barca have hit their top notes in any game since the Spanish Supercup second leg at home in August. They press less voraciously, they regularly give the ball away upward of 25 times more per game than when they were at their absolute peak in 2009, and they appear incapable of passing the ball at the ice-hockey speeds that can make them irresistible to watch. Unless Guardiola has magically found a way to re-establish all these damaged elements for this match -- and Lord knows what a powerful motivational tool a bitter rivalry can be -- Madrid deserves to start as favorite.

4. Don't underestimate Valdes' importance in goal

Although it would be a harsh judge who attached blame to Jose Pinto, it remains the case that the only Clasico that Madrid has won since Mourinho took over was the Copa del Rey final, in which Guardiola loyally stuck with the backup goalkeeper who took Barca that far. Thus the stats, even if you consider them lies and damned lies, state that the only time Madrid beat Barcelona in the past seven meetings is when Victor Valdes was absent.

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Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images
Barcelona's keeper has been its most consistent player from 2005-11.
I bring this up only as context for something that should be vital Saturday. Such has been the excellence -- indeed, dominance -- of Guardiola's team since May 2008 (the last time Madrid won a La Liga Clasico), that I think many neutrals forget the number of times when a Real Madrid counterattack has been snuffed out one-on-one by Valdes. I'd venture to say that the Catalan keeper is Barca's single most consistent player in the period from 2005-11, and it has often been the case that his remarkable ability to stay utterly focused while his team prevents him from having much work to do and then to react, perfectly, on the one or two vital occasions when he's truly needed is underestimated -- at least by everyone aside from his teammates and coaches. He even deserves an "assist" credit for the sublime pass he played to Dani Alves, practically on his own goal line, to set Barca en route to their first goal in the Champions League semifinal Clasico second leg at Camp Nou.

Is Valdes on his best form? Can he turn the tide by excelling when, as is likely, he's the busier of the two keepers for a change? The answer to those questions will go a long way toward determining superiority at the Bernabeu.

5. Prepare to be entertained

At the end of it all, I'd counsel against listening to those who tell you that some of the Clasicos last season were a let-down because of the patent nastiness that tainted them. Every match of the seven-game series thus far has been completely absorbing for its own reasons, and none of them has been short of some moments of complete footballing brilliance. I'd also be wary of anyone predicting that this might be the greatest-ever Clasico, the best in 10 years, etc. Accept the beast for its nature: There will be nerves, there will be vindictiveness and score-settling, there will be flare-ups and there will be tension. Only the hypocrites fail to accept that, without that kind of bad feeling, this wouldn't be a match to attract the eyes of the world. So just sit back, open a beer or a bottle of wine and prepare for another enthralling installment of this long-running serial.

Every episode is a cliffhanger.

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Is Albert Pujols Really Worth $250 Million?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:17 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

Baseball is not basketball.

When a gingham-shirted LeBron James told the world he was leaving Cleveland to go play for the Miami Heat, two franchises — two entire cities — were irrevocably changed. The Cavaliers went from fringe title contenders to odds-on favorites for the no. 1 overall pick in the next draft. Cleveland reacted with seething anger, burning LeBron jerseys by the thousands and reaffirming their status as the most tortured sports city in America. In Miami, we got LeBron and his new teammates Wade and Bosh, standing on a catwalk wearing Heat home whites, smiling for the cameras, tacitly declaring their supremacy. They didn't win in year one, of course. But future rings seem inevitable.

Albert Pujols is not LeBron James. The Angels are not odds-on World Series favorites. And the Cardinals should be damn good in 2012.

Let's start with the man himself. Pujols is the proud owner of a 10-year, $250 million contract from the Angels. Only Alex Rodriguez has ever signed a richer contract (twice). From a pure baseball standpoint, this is probably an overpay.

A brief primer on how to value a player: A replacement-level player is the kind of bench jockey or Triple-A veteran who's readily available and does nothing to improve a major-league team's win total. A player worth one or two wins above replacement level has some value, but he's typically a better bench player or marginal starter. A five-win player is an All-Star. An eight-win player is an MVP candidate.

The cost of a marginal win on the open market is about $5 million right now. Players tend to get a little worse every year after they pass their prime. Plus we have to account for inflation, since the prices paid for players pretty much always trends upward. With all those factors considered, Pujols would need to be 6.5 Wins Above Replacement in 2012 to make the deal worthwhile for the Angels. (Given the Halos gave Pujols a full no-trade clause, this really is the Angels' burden, since sneaking out of the deal wouldn't be easy.) A 6.5-win player would be just a notch below the game's superelite, not quite an MVP candidate, but still up there. In 2011, 6.5 WAR would have made Pujols the 15th-most valuable position player in baseball.

So here's the $250 million question: Is Pujols a 6.5-win player in 2012?

If he is, that would be a substantial bump from his 2011 production. Pujols hit .299/.366/.541 in 2011. That netted a .385 Weighted On-Base Average, the worst mark of his career by a substantial margin. Pujols hit 37 homers, tied for the third-lowest mark of his career. Only once in his career did he post a lower Isolated Slugging (slugging percentage minus batting average) mark than he did in 2011, another sign of diminished power. Even more stark was the dive in his walk rate: Pujols walked just 9.4 percent of the time in 2011, the worst mark of his career.

Let's assume that Pujols is in fact the age he says he is, despite some rumblings within the game that he might be older than his listed age of 31 (32 next month). Studies by Bill James and numerous other baseball scholars have found that players tend to peak in their mid-to-late 20s. There have certainly been plenty of outliers on that front, from Barry Bonds (suspicious circumstances) to Jamie Moyer (a Satchel Paige-like pitching freak). But more often than not, once you hit your 30s, it's not going to get any better from there. Pujols went from 9.1 WAR at age 28 to 9.0 WAR at age 29, 7.5 at age 30, and finally 5.1 WAR at age 31 this past season. That's a scary trend for a team that just shelled out $250 million.

But here's the thing: Players don't produce based on bell curves, and they're not predictable, stat-generating robots. A fractured wrist caused Pujols to miss 15 games, and may have sapped his power for considerably longer than that. With the June injury coming after a slow start, Pujols had no chance to finish the year with his usual numbers.

It's entirely possible that a healthy Pujols will bounce back in 2012 with a season worth around 6.5 wins (or more) to the Angels. By contrast, LeBron James was worth nearly 26 wins to the Heat last season, per ESPN's John Hollinger. If you want to use the simplest math possible, Pujols adding six or seven wins to last year's 86-win Angels team could make them a 92- or 93-win team in 2013. If baseball were basketball, and one superstar could single-handedly turn a terrible team into a killer, we'd be talking about the Angels looking good for 100-plus wins right now. But that's just not how it works in baseball, where no one player has anywhere near that kind of impact.

Can the Angels then be World Series contenders in 2012? It's certainly possible. The Angels' runs scored and runs allowed totals last season suggested a team that, all things being equal, should have won 85 games. (The Halos also have a track history of outperforming their expected record, having done so eight years in a row.) This is a team that featured two premium starters in Jered Weaver (6.4 WAR) and Dan Haren (5.6 WAR) last season, with a solid third starter in Ervin Santana (3.2 WAR). That rotation just got a lot stronger, with news that C.J. Wilson (5.9 WAR, higher than Pujols) has signed a five-year, $77.5 million deal to play for his hometown team. Wilson's got some command issues and less of a track record than some of the game's other top starters. But he certainly gives the Angels rotation a big boost.

There are still some holes on the roster. The bullpen's a little thin after closer Jordan Walden and lefty setup man Scott Downs. Vernon Wells is terrible, having posting a .248 on-base percentage last year that was one of the worst for any starting outfielder in baseball history. Third baseman Alberto Callaspo is likely to regress after a strong, out-of-nowhere 2011 campaign. Bobby Abreu and Torii Hunter are getting old, and less productive. This is a good but flawed team.

On the other hand, the Angels upgraded their catcher offense by trading for Chris Iannetta. They have attractive trade chips in Mark Trumbo and Kendrys Morales, the two slugging first basemen now seemingly out of a job with Pujols in town. Super-prospect Mike Trout could make a significant impact at some point next season. And the Angels should field another strong defensive team and do whatever it is that Mike Scioscia-managed teams do. As an added bonus, they poached Wilson from the rival Rangers, pulling a reverse-Mike Napoli on them by transferring a very good player from one roster to the other.

The Rangers should still be loaded, the Yankees, Red Sox, Rays, and Tigers project as good-to-excellent teams, and more moves lie ahead for AL contenders. The Angels will be very good, and certainly in the mix with those other teams. Just don't plan the parade yet.

The same word of caution that applies to the Angels should foster some optimism in St. Louis. The Cardinals just won the World Series. They did it without staff ace Adam Wainwright. They did it with old retreads Ryan Franklin and Miguel Batista anchoring the back end of the bullpen early in the year. They did it with Pujols playing worse than he ever had before. With playoff hero Allen Craig likely to crash the lineup (and Lance Berkman moving to first base), this should still be a strong offense. The Cards also suddenly have a big chunk of disposable income, which they could use to do anything from pursue Prince Fielder (the last elite free agent on the market), go after Jimmy Rollins to play short, or trade some of their pitching depth for a big-ticket player whose salary might be weighing on his current team.

Just as you can't plan a parade just yet in Anaheim, you shouldn't discount a potential repeat run for the Cardinals. One player can certainly nudge a team toward a championship. But he can't guarantee it. Not even close.

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Hockey's Fighting 'Problem'

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:17 GMT le 09 décembre 2011

If there's anything that signifies how broad of a hot-button issue the fighting-in-hockey debate has become these days, it might be the fact that Dan Rather, of all people, recently appeared on a TSN sports talk show to provide his opinion. "The fans want to see violence," he lamented to TSN's Michael Landsberg, as I wondered what the hell Dan Rather possibly knew about the sport. But after doing some digging, I see that Rather's not new to covering violence in hockey. As a CBS Evening News reporter in 1982, he explained the significance of the Islanders' winning the Stanley Cup in a bit that segued into the following report from his colleague David Culhane, according to a summary of the program on Vanderbilt's Television News Archive website:

(Vancouver, British Columbia) Issue of violence in hockey examined; scenes shown. Philadelphia Flyer Paul Holmgren shown hitting referee Andy van Hellemond; significance of event considered. Criticism by referees of National Hockey League's inaction against Holmgren discussed. [NHL president John ZIEGLER - defs. penalty.] Separate incidents involving player Terry O'Reilly, and referee Bob Hall described, shown. [HALL - is alarmed at increase in violence.] NHL, at referees insistence, said forming panel to discuss attacks on officials.

Four years later, in 1986, Rather was again part of a segment decrying violence in the sport. His involvement served as the same flood marker then that he is now: Whenever fear about hockey's goons and enforcers and their fierce physicality rises high enough, it breaches whatever Rather's serving. Fifteen years ago, same story as today:

(Studio: Dan Rather) Report introduced.

(Boston, Massachusetts: Ned Potter) City's threat to take legal action against violent athletes such as hockey players examined; details given, scenes shown. [Mayor Raymond FLYNN — defs. crackdown.] Reaction of head of National Hockey League quoted. ["Sports Illustrated" spokesperson Mark MULVOY — thinks fights attract fans.] [PEOPLE — agree; want Flynn to mind his own business] Irony in situation considered.

"Irony in situation considered": I like that. It's a useful way to describe the impossible process of trying to justify the relationship between hockey and violence, that circuitous feedback loop of contradictions and seeming hypocrisies. Try explaining to someone why an errant elbow to the head is a cheap shot that will earn a player a suspension, yet a fist to the face is not only OK, it's solemnly honored.1 Check out their reaction when you point out that Paul Holmgren, the very man once featured by CBS as the violent assailant who caused "the formation of panels to discuss attacks on officials," is now the Philadelphia Flyers GM. Good luck watching a game with a casual fan and getting them to see why you're applauding, for fantasy purposes, a player who gets whistled for roughing. "See, if it were a real hockey team, you'd want players to take penalties sometimes, as long as they're not stupid penalties …" O-K.

And when you find yourself with longtime hockey fans who know full well what the elusive "code" is and what it means, and who also know that they don't (they can't!) agree with a good swath of its clauses — have fun handling that. Because no matter how much you think you get it, no matter how nuanced you find your position to be, you'll ultimately be boiled down by big-picture talking heads like Dan Rather, reduced to statements like: "The fans want to see violence" — even if that's not how you see it at all.

The other thing Dan Rather had covered, much more recently and in much greater depth than his mid-'80s dalliances with hockey, is the brain. Specifically: What can go wrong with it. More specifically: What has so often already gone wrong with it thanks to sports. In a series of Dan Rather Reports shows on HDNet in 2009, Rather examined the long-term ramifications of repeated head injuries among athletes. At the time, Malcolm Gladwell compared football to dog fighting in the New Yorker and the New York Times' Alan Schwartz continued his work on an endless number of pieces linking athletes to CTE and CTE to early-onset depression, dementia, and death. His work was cited by Congress in hearings they held on the matter. The NFL came under scrutiny once again in the New Yorker when Ben McGrath asked: "Does Football Have a Future?"

The NHL got one paragraph out of McGrath's 10,000-word New Yorker piece, which was published a few weeks after Sidney Crosby, in old athletic parlance, had his bell rung in the Winter Classic.2 "Hockey may now have a concussion crisis on its hands," McGrath wrote. It sure does: After a summer in which one former and two current NHL players were found dead, each under very different circumstances but all after having played hockey, and having played hockey rough, it's now alarm bells that are being rung. And few have pealed louder and clearer than John Branch's devastating three-part New York Times series on the life and death of Derek Boogaard, one of hockey's biggest and most fearsome "enforcers" and one of this summer's deceased.

Branch's work is brimming with heartbreaking detail and heart-racing media — it has attendant fight videos, player and family interviews, and interactive graphics — and yet it's also summed up with chilling elegance in just 11 words, the sum of the titles of each of its parts:

"Learning to Brawl"
"Blood on the Ice"
"A Brain 'Going Bad'"

The third section contains the news that the pugilistic Boogaard's brain, donated to researchers by his family, showed not just signs of CTE but the kind of full-blown deterioration usually not found until decades down the road — and even then to devastating effect. While, Branch writes, everyone had always been most worried about another part of Boogaard's body, his gnarled, crumbled hands, it was his mind that was becoming most broken. We're now at the point where the big fears about athletes are no longer whether they'll be able to crouch down to play with their children, it is whether they'll even be in the right mind to want to.

It's hard to read Branch's work and not come away feeling sickened by the concept of fighting in hockey and the toll it can take on a human. On the other hand, elsewhere on the New York Times website is a piece called "A New Worry for Soccer Parents: Heading the Ball" about the brain damage found in since-childhood soccer players, which is "similar to [that] seen in traumatic brain injury." Do the people who want to end fighting in hockey want children to stop heading soccer balls, too?

Really, the scarier story revealed in Branch's Boogaard article isn't the stuff about instigators and punches, it's the parts about institutions and pills. Boogaard ultimately died of an overdose of Oxycontin and alcohol; his appetite for the painkillers — often eight at a time — was well sated, Branch writes, by NHL doctors, many of whom either didn't know or didn't want to know what other NHL doctors had already prescribed. Branch alleges that Boogaard was given a heads-up when NHL drug tests were coming. When he died, he was on leave from league-sponsored rehab. The New York Rangers have put their players under a gag order on the topic. "We've been told not to talk about it," Sean Avery said. "I certainly have opinions on it, but we've been told not to comment."

Todd Fedoruk, another fighter whose face was shattered by Boogaard's fist before the two ended up teammates, suffered from drug and alcohol addictions of his own. Quoted extensively in Branch's article, Fedoruk agreed to answer follow-up reader questions. Since he's not on the Rangers, he shared his opinions freely. Asked about his current thoughts on the place of fighting in hockey, he said:

"Now, understand that my take on fighting in hockey is my opinion. I feel that injuries from dangerous hits and stick infractions are best dealt with amongst the players. There are certain players who have no respect for the opponent. A fighter enforces that respect amongst players. Without the enforcer, the free reign for dangerous plays on key players is not kept in check — no matter how many rule changes or suspensions you hand out."

Asked about whether he's considered the consequences for kids, he responded:

"Let's get one thing straight: Violence is not encouraged in hockey; physical play is. Protection seems to be a byproduct. My kids understand this, and so do hockey fans."

There we go again with that circular, inexplicable logic. The fans don't want to see violence, they want to see physical play. Physical play means protection. Protection maybe means violence. Hockey fans understand this. Irony in situation: considered.

Lighting the Lamp: The Week's Sickest Snipes

As happened last time, two of the week's best goals were traded in the same game.3 As the final seconds of an Ottawa power play ticked down Wednesday night against Washington, the Senators' Nick Foligno blew past exhausted Dennis Wideman, who was trapped on the ice in a long defensive shift on the penalty kill. Foligno maneuvered around traffic in front of the net and scored what I can only describe as a reverse wraparound goal to give Ottawa a 2-1 lead late in the second. (Just about the only thing he didn't do on the play was his father's signature leap.)4

But in a response straight out of a production of Ovi Get Your Gun, Alex Ovechkin would create the space for a go-ahead score of his own in the third period. Just about four minutes after Nicklas Backstrom tied the game 2-2 on a Capitals power play, Ovechkin received the puck all the way back at the right face-off dot in his defensive zone, flew down the left side of the ice and all the way behind and around the net, began heading back up the right side, and then stopped on a dime, shedding his defender by several body lengths.

The whole sequence looked like a high-speed chase, with Ovechkin veering into a getaway side street as a pursuing police car skidded helplessly past. He faked a slap shot, slowed it down to a snap shot, and finally became the Ovechkin of old — the one whose disappearance this season has caused whispers ranging from "everyone's on to his game" to, more recently, "he must have stopped taking steroids."5 I'll take Old Ovi, please — at least until the Rangers join his division next year.

Piling on the Pylons: The Week's Worst Performances

With the way he's been playing this season, no one could have imagined that Tyler Seguin might appear in this space. But the Bruins' young cub hibernated a bit too long Tuesday morning, missing a mandatory team breakfast in Winnipeg that earned him a healthy scratch in the team's game against the Jets later that night. Both Bruins GM Peter Chiarelli and coach Claude Julien remarked that this wasn't the first offense of this nature for Seguin, the team's leading scorer. "He's had a couple of incidents before over the course of his career," Chiarelli said, while Julien noted, "It's not based on just one thing." The small mistake set off the predictable (but no less enjoyable) wave of minor absurdities: Seguin claimed to have made the screwup because his alarm was still set to Boston time, an excuse that, as Matt Kalman pointed out, defied simple math.6 And CSN's Joe Haggerty jokingly implied that perhaps it was all an evil scheme hatched by Jordan Caron, Seguin's "Odd Couple" roommate in Boston and, ostensibly, on the road. Caron did end up taking Seguin's place in the lineup, after all, though any plan didn't exactly work out: With Seguin watching uncomfortably from the press box, the Bruins lost to Winnipeg, 2-1.

Taking It Coast to Coast: A Skate Around the League

Speaking of Winnipeg, Mark Sanchez isn't the only one who's been the target of Jets fans' booing of late. The crowds assembled to watch the hockey Jets have taken to expressing their displeasure — not with their own team, however. During last Thursday's game against the Phoenix Coyotes (née … Winnipeg Jets), the crowd at the MTS Centre booed any and every Phoenix player. (This included Shane Doan, the last active player to have been a part of the original Jets franchise; Doan was momentarily cheered, however, during one break in action when he was welcomed back on the JumboTron.) The New Jersey Devils' Ilya Kovalchuk, who formerly played for the Atlanta Thrashers and bolted two seasons before the team relocated to Winnipeg, had the most amusing reaction to the Jets crowd after they jeered him every time he touched the puck Saturday: "They should support me," he said. "Maybe I'm one of the reasons they moved here."
Not sure which I like more: this guy's handcrafted, chain mail San Jose Sharks jersey or the commenter who coolly weighed in: "The only thing I don't like is it fits too tightly … I live by the rule that if a jersey cannot fit equipment underneath, you are a tool for wearing it … that being said, a larger size would have added 150 hours of labor, so I'll cut him some slack."
I wrote a post for The Triangle about the aftermath of the NHL Board of Governor's sweeping realignment decision. One point to mention: It was almost on cue that the Buffalo Sabres and the Philadelphia Flyers played a satisfyingly see-sawing, physical, goal-happy game on Wednesday night, a game that ended in a 5-4 overtime win for a Philly team that had been down 3-0 in the first period. Those are exactly the sort of almost-rivalries that are going to be made less intense by realignment. The two teams will see each other only twice a season from now on, down from four. In contrast to last year's intense seven-game first-round playoff series, they'd now have to both make it all the way to the Cup semifinals for the possibility of a rematch. (Perhaps one day we'll get a rematch of the 1974-75 Flyers-Sabres Stanley Cup finals, though.)
OK, IS THERE ANYTHING DAN BYLSMA CAN'T DO? I MEAN, COME ON.
Things are starting to really get hectic for NHL VP of player safety Brendan Shanahan. On Tuesday, the league suspended Nashville's Jordin Tootoo for flattening Buffalo goaltender Ryan Miller in Miller's first game back since he was last flattened by Milan Lucic. While Lucic got zero games — a decision that is looking more and more like Shanahan's biggest misstep7 — Tootoo was assessed a two-game penalty. A day later, the NHL levied a controversial three-game suspension on Dallas' Mark Fistric for a hit on the Islanders' Nino Niederreiter.8
Here's a look inside the NHL's video replay "Situation Room." The soundtracks the league puts on these videos are beyond insane. I keep waiting for Bruce Willis to tell Liv Tyler he loves her before blowing himself up, or for Gotham City to rise again.
After missing most of last season and the first couple of months of this one recovering from a concussion, a popular NHL player returned and scored a goal on his very first shot in his first game back. Nope, not the one that you're thinking of! It was the St. Louis Blues' David Perron. Stick taps to him.
Meanwhile, Dion Phaneuf (legally) doled out a concussion, and in the Toronto Maple Leafs' luxury box full of fathers there was much rejoicing.
Looking at special teams play around the league, one stat immediately jumps out: The New Jersey Devils have allowed only five power-play goals, the fewest in the league by more than half. (Toronto has allowed five times as many.) Accounting for the Devils' league-best penalty kill percentage of 94.7 is the fact that the team plays so aggressively with a man down, not just in its scheme, which emphasizes forechecking to pressure the puck and cause turnovers, but also in its personnel. Rather than send out defensive-minded grinder-type players to kill penalties, the Devils counter with some of their top players — guys like Zach Parise, Dainius Zubrus, and Patrik Elias, all of whom are averaging more than two minutes of shorthanded time on ice per game. Mark Everson makes the compelling argument in the New York Post, however, that the system might be wearing the team out, pointing to their ugly third-period goal differentials.
After an Edmonton Sun writer waxed historical about the Oilers loss to Carolina last night ("Canes stunning assault on Rexall Place and the Oilers comes on the 70th anniversary of the sneak attack on Pearl Harbour") I tried thinking of other strange day-of-infamy comparisons. But I just keep getting stuck on a mental image of Dustin Penner as a slow-moving white Bronco.
I feel like I now know more about Chris Higgins than I may have wanted to.
For anyone interested in discussion of the recently announced Canadian and U.S. World Junior Championship team rosters, The Hockey News' Ryan Kennedy and The United States of Hockey's Chris Peters have got you covered.
Former junior hockey coach Graham James plead guilty yesterday to charges of sexual abuse against Theo Fleury, who went public with the details of his molestation in his 2009 book Playing with Fire, and another unnamed former player. Given the nature of his crimes and the Canadian criminal justice system, James' punishment has been disturbingly light. (Previously, James had served 3½ years in prison for abusing former NHLer Sheldon Kennedy upwards of 350 times, crimes for which he was pardoned in 2007.) He will remain out on bail until his sentencing in February; an article in the Winnipeg Free Press raised the grim possibility that James could avoid additional jail time. Charges of abuse against a third man, Greg Gilhooly, were stayed, with Gilhooly's blessing, in order to expedite James' conviction.9
Chirping Like a Champ: The Week's Best Mouthing Off

Remember in high school and college when two of your friends would put up cryptic but coordinating away messages on AIM and you'd get all paranoid that they were maybe referring to you? That's basically the relationship right now between the Maple Leafs' coach/GM and the Toronto media. Friday evening, Leafs coach Ron Wilson was asked who would be starting in goal Saturday: no. 1 netminder James Reimer, newly recovered from an "upper body injury"10 or backup Jonas Gustavsson, who had been playing in his absence? "I'm not being definitive on anything, but we've told Gustavsson that he's going to be playing tomorrow," Wilson said.

The next day Reimer was in net against Boston.

The media was not at all happy with this, particularly when they asked Wilson when the decision had been made and he responded, "Three days ago." Missives were penned. LIES! FILTHY LIES! The next day, Wilson tweeted: "Favorite movies: Liar,Liar; The Invention of Lying; Big Fat Liar. HaHa!" Later, GM Brian Burke weighed in: "I love the quote about liars in sports. Many gainfully employed in the media." Tip-top trolling, gentlemen.

Look, the NBA has their wine-and-paddle-playing drunk dials; the NHL has a coach and a GM whom you can just imagine sitting in their respective offices and occasionally knocking on the wall separating them. "Hey, did you see what I tweeted?" "Ha ha! I'm gonna write something, too." And you can work yourself into a tizzy about the importance of truth-telling in these situations, you can maybe find a sensible middle ground, or you can sit back and giggle a bit about the wonder of it all.11

Me, I'm going to choose to believe that Ron Wilson was making a scholarly point about the dangers of ambiguous pronouns, and leave it at that.

Hockey Haiku

A new commercial,
A new "Good Old Hockey Game,"
Hey! It's Will Arnett!

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UFC 140 Preview: The Main Card

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:54 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

One more victory can add the proverbial icing to the cake of what has been a very memorable year for Jon Jones. Solving the always-vexing Lyoto Machida on Saturday at UFC 140 will give the light heavyweight champion wins over three former 205-pound titleholders, as well as one of the division’s top prospects, within 12 months. It is pretty heady stuff when considering that many 24-year-olds are simply trying to adjust to life after college, if they have gotten that far.

Many believe Machida’s elusive style is tailor-made to knock Jones off his pedestal. In front of what is sure to be a rabid crowd at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre, “The Dragon” will have his chance. Holding on to light heavyweight gold is an accomplishment in itself, as Jones looks to become the first person to defend the belt twice since Chuck Liddell did it three times in 2006. A look at the UFC 140 “Jones vs. Machida” main card, with analysis and picks follows.

UFC Light Heavyweight Championship
Jon Jones (14-1, 8-1 UFC) vs. Lyoto Machida (17-2, 9-2 UFC)

The Matchup: It was not long ago that Machida was the UFC’s unsolvable riddle, an elusive karate expert who did not drop rounds, much less fights. A steady diet of kicks to the legs and body from Mauricio Rua at UFC 104 exposed a chink in the armor of “The Dragon,” and “Shogun” shattered the aura of invincibility with a first-round knockout in their rematch at UFC 113.

Now Machida, like the rest of the light heavyweight division, finds himself in the considerable shadow of Jones. The 205-pound champion has run roughshod over his competition, blending reach, creativity and athleticism to near perfection. In many ways, Jones is now the puzzle for foes that Machida was once viewed to be. The 33-year-old is a dangerous foil for Jones, an intuitive counterstriker who is equal parts patient and intelligent.

In recent bouts, opponents have not had an answer for Jones’ quickness, but Machida will demonstrate that he has much more mobility than the likes of Quinton Jackson, Rua or Ryan Bader. The Brazilian is excellent at creating space between himself and his opponent, attacking and retreating while moving in and out of harm’s way. This task will prove much more difficult against Jones, who owns a 10-inch reach advantage over the former champion. Against “Rampage,” Jones landed a variety of kicks and punches to his opponent’s head, legs and body while avoiding the potential one-punch knockout counter. Meanwhile, Machida, perhaps wary from his recent knockout loss to Rua, allowed Jackson to control the cage in a split-decision setback at UFC 123. He will have to be willing to take more chances here.

Machida is an excellent tactician, but he will find his affinity for the counter tested, as Jones lands kicks from what seem like impossible distances. He will also have to be on alert for Jones’ takedowns, which tend to come from all angles and directions. The karateka’s best plan of attack involves using unique angles and feints while constantly changing directions in the Octagon. He must keep his back away from the cage at all costs, because Jones’ Greco-Roman skills will allow him to take the bout to the ground at a moment’s notice, at which point he can launch his vicious elbows and ground-and-pound. Machida is competent fighting from his back, but Jones’ superior size and length will make him extremely difficult to defend.

The one downfall to being so dominant is that Jones has yet to experience serious adversity inside the cage. The Jackson’s Mixed Martial Arts product has yet to be rocked or planted on his back in a fight, raising questions about how he would respond. More than mere good fortune, Jones’ ability to avoid precarious situations is a testament to rapid improvement. The New York native’s reach allows him to be more creative than most fighters would be willing to, all while still picking his spots with incredible timing and balance.

Machida began his run in the UFC with the label of a boring fighter because his bouts often went the distance. He changed that perception, starting with his knockout of Thiago Silva at UFC 94, and his ability to throw odd combinations will be unlike anything Jones has seen. That said, Machida will need to wade through danger to test the champion. Simply fighting from the outside will allow Jones to methodically pick him apart for five rounds.

The Pick: The bout could begin slowly, with both fighters feeling each other out over the first five minutes. Expect the action to pick up considerably by round two, as Jones begins to time his opponent and connect with creative combinations. Absorbing punishment will force Machida to abandon his preferred style and take more risks. Machida has only been finished once in his career, but Jones has made a habit of defying expectations. Jones, with a barrage of elbows and punches on the ground, wins by third-round TKO.

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Reyes' Deal Shows That the Marlins Aren't All Talk

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:42 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

Let's start with this: The Marlins signing Jose Reyes to a six-year, $106 million contract is a welcome sight, if only because it means they're finally spending money, after years of claiming losses that didn't exist.

Those allegedly phony loss claims, coupled with hoodwinking local government into building a new stadium in a deal so shady that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is now investigating, had become the public image of the organization. With one big deal, all that's been set aside, leaving us to talk about the actual baseball team and its chances for success.

So what are those chances? Better, that's for sure. When the Marlins signed Heath Bell to a three-year, $27 million contract, that looked like just another overpay for Closer Pixie Dust, a smaller version of the Jonathan Papelbon megadeal that could help the team, but at the cost of making moves to address bigger needs. Turns out convincing taxpayers to fork over hundreds of millions of dollars allows you to go well beyond a simple closer buy, and to snag one of the top free agents on the market.

Take Reyes' contributions for the 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2011 seasons and you get a player who averaged more than six Wins Above Replacement per year. For some context, a 5-WAR player is roughly All-Star level, while an 8-WAR player gets you into MVP discussions. The problem, of course, is that Reyes played two other seasons in the middle of that stretch. He played just 133 games and didn't hit all that brilliantly in 2010 (.282/.321/.428), and played in just 36 games in 2009; in those two seasons, Reyes was worth less than four total wins.

Gauging a player's current health can be a daunting task, much less predicting the next six years. It's possible that Reyes' hamstring injuries resurface, but only enough to knock him out for 15-20 games a year and not affect his performance. If the Marlins are getting that Reyes, given the going rate of about $5 million per win on the open market, this could be an excellent buy.

But that's a big if. Reyes turns 29 in June — young for a free agent, but not young in the life of a baseball player. The natural aging process could start to eat into Reyes' speed and quickness, which could affect his value on the base paths and on defense. Never one to walk much (6.9 percent career walk rate), Reyes' batting average could take a hit too, if legging out hits starts getting more difficult. Reyes' power has improved over the years, to the point where he's a triples-hitting machine who can also bag 30-plus doubles and double-digit homers in a healthy season. But those doubles and triples could also start to erode if age, injuries, or both ding Reyes' speed, especially in the second half of the deal. They're not identical players, but there's still a fair bit of Carl Crawford in Reyes' game: Identical isolated power, with low walk and strikeout rates for both (Reyes is a little better in both cases), Crawford showing more of a platoon split, and Crawford being a more valuable defensive player relative to his positional peers (though less valuable overall, being a left fielder and not a shortstop). As much as injuries are the biggest worry, there's some risk of regression that could see Reyes post a season or two that approaches Crawford's dreadful 2011, even if it doesn't quite match that nightmarish level.

Over at FanGraphs, Dave Cameron posted a nifty table that shows what the Marlins would need to get out of Reyes to justify his contract. It all makes sense from a distance, but the holes in Reyes' health (and to a lesser extent, his game) make him a bigger downside risk than a smoothed-out chart can convey. Where the Marlins might get an All-Star season or two out of their new shortstop, but also a couple years where they get next to nothing, you make the move because he's one of the best guys out there, and if Reyes can find a way to stay healthy throughout all or most of the deal, the Marlins will end up with a steal of a deal.

Still, the Marlins look like they're one more move away from becoming legitimate contenders. Jayson Stark reports that the Fish now have their eyes on Albert Pujols, exactly the kind of move that would put this offseason over the top. Sign Pujols, and you've not only added two elite players, but also set the stage for a follow-up trade, where Gaby Sanchez could be cashed in for a badly needed starting pitcher.

If the Marlins stop with Heath Bell and Jose Reyes, they've ignited some new interest in the team and set themselves up to draw fans to the new park — a noble goal. Sign Pujols and trade for a solid starter, and October baseball becomes not possible, but even likely. Kudos to the Marlins for putting themselves in position to make that happen, and for silencing idiots like me who thought all their supposed courting of free agents was just an attempt to draw interest in the team and its stadium drive. They're trying to win. This is a really good thing.

As for the now Reyes-less Mets? The Marlins' huge offer took GM Sandy Alderson off the hook, allowing him to avoid committing a huge sum to a very good player, but one with all those risks, and also one who might not get to play on a contender until he's well into his 30s, given how weak the rest of the Mets' major-league roster and upper minors look. Yes, they're going to get raked over the coals in a yuuuuge way by certain members of the media — even more so if they now trade David Wright in his walk year for younger talent. But mediocrity wasn't getting the Mets anywhere. An influx of prospects and new funds very well might (especially for a team that claims to have lost a jarring $70 million last season).

This is going to be a bad Mets team in 2012, and probably 2013, too. But the sooner they can commit to stripping down, starting over, and rebuilding in earnest, the sooner they might be able to assemble a contending team that's built to last. They'll miss Jose Reyes, just as they'd miss David Wright if he were traded or allowed to leave after next season. But the bitter feelings over their departures will eventually fade if the Mets eventually come back stronger than ever.

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The Case for Baylor's Robert Griffin III

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:41 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

Robert Griffin III should win the Heisman Trophy. From Baylor’s first game this year, when he shredded Gary Patterson's vaunted TCU defense for 359 yards and five touchdowns, Griffin has consistently been the best performer in college football. He’s only a couple of yards shy of 4,000 for the season, he's set an NCAA record for passing efficiency, and the former track star has rushed for 644 yards and nine touchdowns just for good measure. (Keep in mind "track star" isn't just a way to say he's fast; Griffin is literally a track champion.) Oh, sure, stats are stats — what matters is whether he's a winner, right? Well, he won nine games at Baylor, a team that hasn't done that since 1986. But is he clutch? Oh yeah, that. He's clutch.

Let's look at Griffin's first touchdown this past weekend, which came in a 48-24 maelstrom delivered on a Texas team that led the Big 12 in total defense. On the second play of the game, Griffin hit his top target, inside receiver Kendall Wright for a 59-yard score.

On this play, Texas lined up in a Cover 2 look with two deep safeties back, but the key for Baylor began in the backfield. Baylor faked one of its best run plays, the "inverted veer." Many think the play is like the zone read, but it's not the same. Instead, the line leaves the defensive end or outside rusher (here, a linebacker) unblocked while the running back, the dangerous Terrance Ganaway, takes a wide path toward the outside. The quarterback reads the defensive end, and if he stays put or flies into the backfield, the quarterback simply hands the ball off. But if the end widens for the running back, the quarterback keeps it and runs a power play inside behind a pulling guard. It was Cam Newton's best play at Auburn last season.

By showing this look, both Texas safeties find themselves peering into the backfield, particularly Blake Gideon. Wright helps sell the run by running (or "stemming") his pass route inside rather than immediately running straight down the field.

The result of the run action and Wright's inside release is that Gideon, the near safety, is way too close to the line of scrimmage to be an effective deep-pass defender. At this point, Griffin knows he should be able to hit the deep ball, he just needs to figure out where to place it. That depends on where the safeties are located.

From the wide view you can see Gideon has no chance, because he was fooled by the run action, while the far safety has widened so far to the opposite sideline that he is not in position to help on the deep pass to Wright. This might have been his responsibility — he might have expected Gideon to cap Wright's deep route and prevent him from getting free — but in any event, that's not Griffin's concern. What is his concern is that his pass protection has broken down a bit, but no matter: He shuffles in the pocket, buys a little time, and throws one of those beautiful deep passes.

The result: 7-zip, Baylor. I hope the other result is that Griffin takes home the Heisman. But as Matt Hinton recently noted, whether he wins or not, Griffin is undoubtedly the best to ever put on a Baylor uniform, and, ultimately, that’s the most impressive — and meaningful — distinction of all.

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North Carolina-Kentucky: From a NBA Scouting Perspective

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:40 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

The University of Kentucky rolled out the red carpet for NBA general managers Saturday in Lexington, as eight of the top 18 players in the DraftExpress Top-100 Prospects Ranking (and 15 likely future NBA players total) faced off at Rupp Arena for the most hyped game of the college basketball season.

No one embraces the NBA in the college ranks more than Kentucky coach John Calipari, and it showed in the way the GMs and assistant GMs were treated. They were given some of the most desirable seats/vantage points in Rupp, on the baseline behind the cheerleaders, as well as a work station with special, individualized credentials with photos, names and team logos.

This game was originally slated to be attended by no less than 30 GMs/assistant GMs, eight director of player personnel/directors of scouting and 10 scouts, according to Kentucky. Because of the end of the NBA lockout, many were forced to change their plans. NBA personnel who were present included: Masai Ujiri (Denver), Chris Grant (Cleveland), David Griffin (Cleveland), Scott Perry (Detroit), Kevin Pritchard (Indiana), Bryan Colangelo (Toronto), Ed Stefanski (Toronto), Kevin O'Connor (Utah), Larry Harris (Golden State), Ryan Carr (Indiana), Kevin Grevey (L.A. Lakers), Adam Simon (Miami), Billy McKinney (Milwaukee), Maury Hanks (New Jersey), John Treloar (Phoenix), George Felton (San Antonio), Milt Newton (Washington) and Dave Pendergraft (Atlanta).

Saturday’s game certainly was deserving of the pageantry — both scouts and die-hard college hoops fans must have left Rupp in a state of euphoria as North Carolina and Kentucky put on a rare display of pace, length and talent.

Here are the game’s key matchups and how they might have translated out on the scouting side.

Point Guard: Marquis Teague (7 points, 4 assists, 1 turnover, 3-11 FG, 30 minutes) vs. Kendall Marshall (8 points, 8 assists, 3 turnovers, 3-6 FG, 35 minutes)

While this certainly wasn’t a vintage performance from Marshall, he showed his phenomenal ability to read the floor, find the open man (particularly passing ahead in transition) and make the correct play consistently — the reasons he’ll play in the NBA for a long time. Kentucky clearly attempted to bait him into scoring (something he’s often reluctant to do) and Marshall responded with a season-high eight points, knocking down multiple 3-pointers for only the third time in his career.

Teague, on the other hand, continues to be the weakest link in Kentucky’s starting lineup, again showing many of same issues he has throughout his career with his wild style of play in the half-court and inability to make open shots. On many of Kentucky’s most important possessions, Calipari elected to have his shooting guard Doron Lamb bring the ball up the floor and/or initiate the offense, which tells you everything you need to know about the lack of confidence he has in his freshman point guard.

Teague was bailed out by the referees in a major way when they elected to ignore a blatant traveling violation as he prematurely began celebrating with a second left on the clock, which could have cost his team the game. He also missed the front end of a crucial one-and-one. As Calipari said he told Teague after the game: “You hug Anthony (Davis) because he saved you.”

Advantage: Marshall

Shooting Guard: Doron Lamb (14 points, 2 assists, 4 turnovers, 6-12 FG, 34 minutes) vs. Dexter Strickland (5 points, 5 assists, 2 turnovers, 2-6 FG, 28 minutes)

A battle of forgotten McDonald’s All-Americans, this was an intriguing matchup as both Lamb and Strickland could very well end up being much better NBA players than collegiates.

While Lamb is Kentucky’s clear-cut second option (after Terrence Jones), Strickland ranks dead last (8th) in usage amongst UNC’s rotation players.

Nevertheless, with his outstanding speed, lockdown defensive potential and increasingly improving decision-making, he could very well carve a niche for himself in the NBA as a sparkplug off the bench.

Considering how much UNC’s starting lineup lacks an knockdown shooter to take pressure off their towering front line, don’t be surprised if he eventually shares that role on this team with freshman P.J. Hairston.

As for Lamb, which NBA team couldn’t use a super-efficient, smart, pesky defender who shoots 50 percent from beyond the arc and rarely turns the ball over?

Advantage: Lamb

Small Forward: Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (17 points, 11 rebounds, 6-10 FG, 5-7 FT, 33 minutes) vs. Harrison Barnes (14 points, 2 rebounds, 5-12 FG, 4-5 3P, 24 minutes)

If any player was able to elevate his NBA draft stock through this one game (an unlikely proposition), it was Kidd-Gilchrist, who needed a big outing after some early offensive struggles. NBA scouts got a great feel for the many ways he can impact a game with his sheer toughness and desire. His tenacity attacking the rim and locking down on the defensive end were huge difference-makers in this game.

Barnes, on the other hand, had a very representative showing of his strengths and weaknesses.

All of his five made field goals came on catch-and-shoot jumpers. He was not able to get to the free throw line. These are distinct patterns we’ve seen in his time at North Carolina thus far, and should draw some pause for those who project him as a sure-fire Top 3 draft pick.

Through eight games this season, Barnes has made just one field goal (a runner against Tennessee State) inside the paint in non-transition, post-up or offensive rebound situations — highlighting his struggles as a shot-creator.

As a catch-and-shoot jump-shooter, Barnes has been terrific, converting 47 percent of his attempts. Unfortunately he’s taken twice as many shots off the dribble than with his feet set, and has converted those at half the efficiency (.65 points per possessions versus 1.36).

It’s early to draw too many conclusions from this limited sample size, and there are plenty of mitigating factors -- North Carolina’s poor spacing stemming from their lack of 3-point shooting in the starting lineup being the main one. But this is definitely something to keep an eye on as the season moves on.

Advantage: Kidd-Gilchrist

Power Forward: Terrence Jones (14 points, 7 rebounds, 3 blocks, 2 steals, 5-14 FG, 1-5 3P, 35 minutes) vs. John Henson (10 points, 8 rebounds, 3 blocks, 4-11 FG, 33 minutes)

Terrence Jones showed why so many scouts love him. In the first half, he created shots from the perimeter and inside the paint, and finished with phenomenal touch around the basket. He was fairly invisible in the second half, though, primarily settling for 3-pointers. There’s no question that Jones is one of the best scorers in college basketball, but he remains somewhat of an enigma from a NBA standpoint due to his tweener status and inconsistent approach.

John Henson’s game played out somewhat similarly, but considering what we already know about him, his performance is far more notable from a NBA perspective.

One of college basketball’s elite rebounders and shot-blockers, Henson was always considered 15 pounds and a go-to offensive move away from being projected as a Top 5 draft pick. Well, the bulk is starting to come, and his offensive skill-level is improving rapidly, as he displayed in this game with a variety of smooth up-and-under moves, mid-range jumpers and jump-hook shots with both hands around the basket.

While he’s still not always physical enough in the paint (on both ends) to play up to his full potential, Henson is the kind of tantalizing talent a GM can easily fall in love with. If he continues to play with this type of confidence offensively, he very well could be the highest player drafted on this North Carolina team.

Advantage: Henson

Center: Anthony Davis (7 points, 9 rebounds, 2 steals, 2 blocks, 3-6 FG, 34 minutes) vs. Tyler Zeller (14 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists, 4 turnovers, 4-9 FG, 6-6 FT, 28 minutes)

For those who hadn’t seen Anthony Davis before, this game was a pretty representative sampling of what he brings to the table as a prospect.

On one hand he struggled to keep Tyler Zeller outside of the paint, repeatedly giving up deep post position due to his lack of strength.

His unpolished skill-level offensively was fairly evident as well, even if he looked very aggressive trying to prove otherwise, often to mixed results. The overwhelming majority of Davis’ offense is created by others at this stage, be it running the floor in transition, cutting and finishing around the basket, and crashing the offensive glass — all things he does incredibly well.

On the other hand, Davis showed his upside with a number of huge plays, including the game saving block at the end of regulation. There just aren’t that many players in the world right now who can pull off plays like this, and that’s what makes Davis so special.

Considering how much of a late bloomer he is, and the fact that this was the first time in his life playing in a game of this nature, he’s well ahead of schedule.

The needle didn’t move much in Zeller’s case either, as he confirmed many of the things scouts liked and disliked about him going in. His ability to establish position and score inside the paint is elite at this level, but will he able to be quite as effective against grown men and without the most prolific passing collegiate point guard in the past decade spoon-feeding him? Either way, Zeller’s activity level on both ends of the floor will have to improve, as the question marks about his toughness remain.

Advantage: Davis

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Icing the Kicker Doesn't Work

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:38 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

Yes, Jason Garrett deserves our "Thank You for Not Coaching" recognition for an awful decision he was involved in during the fourth quarter of Dallas's crushing loss to Arizona. The only problem is that he's getting criticized for the wrong mistake.

At the moment, Garrett is being pilloried for "icing" his own kicker, rookie Dan Bailey, as he attempted a 49-yard field goal to break a 13-13 tie with six seconds left. Bailey's initial kick went through the uprights, but after the icing, his second field goal attempt went short and wide of the uprights. The Cardinals promptly won the game in overtime without the Cowboys ever receiving possession of the football.

With a stopped clock, it's hard to figure out what Garrett saw to justify a timeout. After the game, he said that his team was "still settling in" and that there were only six seconds left to go on the play clock, but the blockers didn't look particularly unsettled when Bailey attempted the first kick. Furthermore, Cardinals head coach Ken Whisenhunt said afterwards that he was about to call a timeout himself, noting, "I was glad they iced their kicker so I didn't have to."

Even if we think that Garrett was stupid to call the timeout, the question here then becomes whether icing the kicker really has any effect, regardless of which coach does the icing. It's easy to point to a situation where the kicker hits the first kick and misses the "iced" one and suggest that icing is a tangible effect, sure, but there are also situations where an iced kicker gets a second chance to win the game. In fact, this exact situation came up the very last time the Cowboys and Cardinals went to overtime in Arizona! With a 24-21 lead at the end of regulation in Week 6 of the 2008 season, Whisenhunt called timeout right as Cowboys kicker Nick Folk missed a 52-yard field goal. Given a second chance, the "iced" Folk promptly booted the field goal through, moving the game into overtime.1

By all accounts, the evidence in favor of icing the kicker is scant at best. Kickers like Adam Vinatieri have suggested that they actually appreciate getting a practice kick in a game situation. And even if you chalk that attitude up to the famed garrulous swagger of kickers, the statistical evidence suggests that icing really has little to no effect on kickers. A study conducted by Tobias Moskowitz in the recently published book Scorecasting compared the success rates of iced kicks and non-iced kicks in key fourth-quarter situations after adjusting for the distance of the field goal. With nine years of field goals to study, Moskowitz found that when an opposing coach iced the kicker with 15 seconds or fewer left to go in the game, those kickers actually got more accurate:

ICE, ICE, BABY
Time left on the clock All kicks Iced Not Iced
1:59-1:01 76.2% 74.2% 77.6%
1:00-0:31 75.5% 74.3% 74.6%
0:30-0:16 76.5% 76.0% 76.9%
0:15-0:00 76.4% 77.5% 75.4%
Despite the evidence, coaches will continue to ice the opposing kicker at the end of games because it's a play with no downside for them. If a team ices a kicker and that kicker hits the field goal, no one ever comes out to suggest that the team was wrong to ice the kicker. Heck, even if the kicker misses the first one and then hits the second kick, like Folk did against Whisenhunt, the coach rarely gets blamed. If the opposing coach ices the kicker and that kicker misses the ensuing field goal, though, he's lauded as some sort of coaching savant. It's nonsense. Garrett's timeout was unnecessary, but it didn't cause Bailey to miss the field goal. A bad kick caused Bailey to miss the field goal.

So if Garrett deserves a pass for his timeout, why should we be excoriating him? Well, because of what Garrett did before the timeout. On Dallas's final offensive play, Tony Romo hit Dez Bryant over the middle for a 15-yard gain to pick up an essential first down on third-and-11. When Bryant hit the ground, the Cowboys still had 23 seconds left on the clock and two timeouts to work with. The ball was on the Arizona 31-yard line, which is within makeable range, but far from a chip shot; the average kicker will boot that through less than 65 percent of the time.

The clear play for Garrett (or Romo) is to call a timeout immediately after the first down conversion. No one is suggesting that the Cowboys needed to try to score a touchdown, but with two timeouts left and a difficult field goal ahead of them, the Cowboys clearly would have benefited from getting at least a couple of yards with one or two extra plays. Even picking up five yards and turning the field goal into a 44-yarder would have increased Bailey's chances of making the kick, based on how kickers have performed over the past several seasons, from under 65 percent to greater than 77 percent.

Garrett claimed after the game that he was inside the " … yard lines that we use as guidelines before the game," which doesn't pass the smell test; just because you're inside a range doesn't mean that Bailey's chances of success are equal from any spot within that range. Garrett also added, "You see so many situations where you have negative plays in those situations." Sure, negative plays can happen if you try to move the ball forward, but a missed field goal is a pretty negative play, too. Did Garrett really have such little faith in his offense that he couldn't trust them to get a few yards without screwing up? If he puts the ball in Romo's hands and rolls the quarterback out, Romo has the option of throwing the ball away or running for a few yards and then using Dallas's final timeout to set up an easier field goal. A conservative fullback belly handoff would have probably netted a yard or two with little chance of making the field goal significantly tougher. Garrett's quote speaks to the risk involved in giving your offense a chance to improve your situation, but it ignores the risk associated with putting your kicker in a difficult spot.

Two for Nine

Why don't teams go for a two-point conversion when they score a touchdown and go up seven points (before the extra point) in the fourth quarter? There were two teams on Sunday that each had a chance to make that decision and chose against it, and in each case, it's hard to understand why.

First, the logic. Of course, going for a two-point conversion in every situation doesn't really make sense unless you're a team like Carolina or Denver that is capable of being dominant in short yardage. In a vacuum, this play only really makes sense if you think your chances of picking up a two-point conversion are greater than the other team's chances of picking up a two-pointer later on. It's probably not worth the aggravation.

In a situation where time is limited, though, it becomes an extremely valuable gambit. Let's think about this in the prism of that amazing Giants-Packers game from Sunday afternoon. When the Packers scored on a Donald Driver catch with 3:34 left, they went up 34-27 before the extra point. Kicking would give them a 35-27 lead, forcing the Giants to drive down the field and pick up a two-point conversion just to tie the game. Tough, but as the Giants ended up exhibiting on that very drive, not exactly impossible.

Now, what if the Packers had gone for two in that situation? If they don't make the two-point conversion, they're still up by a touchdown with less than four minutes to go. The Giants still have to drive the length of the field, just like they do in an eight-point game, but they only have to kick an extra point to tie it up as opposed to going for two. That's easier, but the long drive is still more difficult than the two-point conversion, which an average team will pick up 47.9 percent of the time. Furthermore, while the other team could theoretically go for two and win the game with a two-point conversion, they never will; teams in a one-point game will kick here virtually every time and tie it up, even if they should go for two. So whether the Packers kick an extra point or go for a two-point conversion, the worst result for them is almost surely that the game will be tied.

The upside, though, is massive. A two-point conversion puts the Packers up nine with 3:30 left. That's a two-possession game, and it simply leaves the Giants with too much to do. First, they have to score a touchdown. They'll obviously tack on an extra point down three with virtually no time left, so it'll be a two-point game with whatever time is left after the touchdown drive. Now, the Giants have to either recover an expected onside kick (success rate: 21.1 percent) or stop the Packers from picking up a first down in order to get the ball back. And they're still not done! If they get the ball again, they have to drive down the field and set up for a game-winning field goal, and that field goal has to go through the uprights. All of this has to happen in 3:30 with one timeout and the two-minute warning for the Giants. The Packers' chances of winning with a successful two-pointer have to be in the high nineties, and their chances of getting a two-point conversion with Aaron freaking Rodgers on the move are surely greater than 48 percent.

Let's go back and envision that final 3:30 in a scenario where the Packers pick up a two-point conversion and go up nine. The Giants have to march downfield and score, which took them 2:36. Even if we assume that they'll go into a no-huddle and drive faster, they're unlikely to score before the two-minute warning. After that play, the Giants have to attempt an onside kick versus a team of freakish athletes at wide receiver. And if the Giants do somehow score before the two-minute warning, all Aaron Rodgers needs to do is get one first down — at most, two — to end the game. Instead, when the Giants scored eight points and tied up the game, Rodgers had to march the Packers 68 yards downfield to set up a game-winning field goal attempt.

Again, the only way the Packers increase their chances of losing by going for two in this scenario is if the Giants score and then decide to go for two and get it. The reality is that coaches aren't brave enough to do that. By our memory, no team has been bold enough to try that move since the Bucs successfully pulled it off against the Redskins in 2005. Obviously, it's easier to win against a team that has to pick up a two-point conversion to tie as opposed to a team that only needs an extra point, but the tradeoff of creating a two-possession game with limited time seems far more valuable.

The other time to pull this move out of mothballs would be against a team that should be extremely effective on two-point conversions. The Vikings faced just that sort of team on Sunday, and when Christian Ponder hit Percy Harvin for a 48-yard touchdown pass with 9:41 left, they led the Broncos, 28-21, pending the extra point.

You can probably see where this is going already. Obviously, the time situation isn't as big of a concern, since it's pretty clear that Denver was going to be able to get two drives in, even at the glacial speed normally required for long Broncos drives before the final three minutes of the game. The bigger quandary here is that if the Broncos do score and you're up eight, well, are you really going to be able to stop Tim Tebow from getting into the end zone on a two-point conversion?

We quoted research from Brian Burke earlier in noting that two-point conversions have made it through 47.9 percent of the time. That's the overall rate, but if you didn't click the link, there's a pretty mean split between running plays and passing plays. Teams only call running plays for the two-point conversion about 35 percent of the time, but those running plays succeed 61.7 percent of the time. Furthermore, the most successful type of running play on two-pointers has been … runs from the quarterback, which were converted 35 of 47 times, a whopping 74.5 percent success rate. And those figures are from 2000 through 2009, so Tebow isn't even included!

The Broncos had converted on 14 of 23 runs with two yards to go or less since they installed the option with Tebow, a 60.8 conversion percentage in a small sample. The Vikings had stopped the Broncos on two different third-and-short carries earlier in the game, so it's possible that they thought they might have been able to stop Tebow or Willis McGahee if the Broncos ran for a two-pointer, but … it's Tim Tebow!

The logic for this one ended up being a lot less relevant than it would have been in the Packers game, since the Broncos drove down the field and almost instantly scored before converting the two-pointer to tie it up. The defenses on both sides were playing so poorly that a nine-point lead for the Vikings with 9:41 left probably wouldn't have had a huge impact on the final score. But if you think the odds of Tebow converting are in excess of 70 percent, we get to the point where an eight-point lead isn't really that meaningful, either, so why not try to get a possession ahead?

Of course, NFL coaches shouldn't do this in every situation. Players and situations aren't numbers or percentages, and criticism of aggressive play-calling like this tends to suggest that people like us are saying they are. It's not true; that's where the coaching comes in! A coach needs to know when the right time to make this sort of decision is and actually implement it. In Leslie Frazier's shoes, there wasn't really much to be gained by going for two with nine minutes left, although there also probably wasn't much to be lost. Mike McCarthy, though, could have sealed up a game that his team very well could have lost. No coach is going to be able to analyze every situation in his head and spit out an exact probability to three decimal points of every possible scenario from then on to make an optimal decision, but every coach should be trying to create scenarios with their decisions where their team's chances of winning increase. And if they're too busy to do that in the middle of a game, they need to hire someone and entrust them with the ability to make those decisions on their behalf.

Fear the Mammals

The Dolphins are not to be trifled with, people! A laughingstock of the league after an 0-7 start, Miami has promptly gone 4-1 in their five most recent games, with a one-point loss against the Cowboys in Dallas on Thanksgiving Day offset by four wins. The Dolphins have held their opponents under ten points in each of those four victories, and they have prevailed in those games by an average of 21.5 points. Considering that four of the Dolphins' losses were by a total of eight points, it's pretty clear that Miami is a team that's underrated by their record. In fact, some are wondering whether the Dolphins are the best 4-8 team ever. Is that the case?

We don't have advanced stats like DVOA going back through the '70s, so we'll make do in comparing teams across different years by using point differential. As we've mentioned in the past, point differential does a better job of predicting a team's win-loss record in the future than that team's actual win-loss record does, so it stands that point differential is probably a more accurate indicator of how that team is playing.

As you might suspect, with four big wins and four very close losses in 12 games, the Dolphins have a pretty solid point differential. After the 20-point win over the Raiders, they have now outscored their opposition this year by 26 points. That produces an expected winning percentage of .571, or roughly equivalent to a 7-5 record. It leaves the Dolphins as just the fifth 4-8 team since the merger to have a positive point differential, and among those five, Miami has the third-best differential.

This is all irrelevant statistical trivia, of course, unless it means something for the Dolphins going forward. If we look at those four 4-8 teams who had a positive point differential, there's some reason for Miami fans to be hopeful. Those four teams had a total of 14 games to go in their season (since one, the 1971 Bengals, played a 14-game schedule) and went a combined 10-4. That's not bad.

Even more impressively, though, those teams were able to hold on to their gains in the following season. Each of them were .500 or better in the following year, and they combined to go 39-23. The last team to pull off the feat was the 2008 Chargers, who started 4-8 and still won the AFC West when the Josh McDaniels-led Broncos collapsed. A year later, they were 13-3 and picked up a first-round bye.

The Dolphins might not have that kind of turnaround in them next year, but with a crop of young talent on defense, they're not as far away from contention as it seems. Matt Moore's been an effective quarterback since taking over for the injured Chad Henne, but the Dolphins could choose to upgrade the position further in the offseason by drafting a quarterback (although they are now out of the hunt for Andrew Luck) or acquiring a veteran to compete with Moore. If they can get average play at quarterback and the veteran rosters of the Jets and Patriots slip some, they could win the AFC East next year. Certainly, they're going to be one of the playoff sleepers heading into 2012.

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The Reducer: Week 14, Spurs of the Moment

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:37 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

Sometimes there are Premier League weekends where it's all paradigm-shifting, faith-questioning madness that makes The Reducer pull off Johan Cruyff Turns in his living room and Zidane-headbutt the drywall. This was not one of those weekends. So rather than deep dive on one match, let's speed race through several different results.

Tottenham 3, Bolton 0

There's something about watching Spurs play at home — from that strange, vertigo-inducing television angle at White Hart Lane — that makes the matches look like a video game. Well, if that were the case, that kid from The Last Starfighter is currently controlling the Tottenham team. They are playing absolutely cosmic football.

Spurs played most of Saturday's match against Bolton with a one-man advantage after Bolton defender (and Spurs transfer target) Gary Cahill was sent off. It was a harsh decision, and one that let any competitive air out of the game, but what was worth noting is how the red card was a product of Tottenham's relentless pressure on Bolton, with Emmanuel Adebayor hounding Cahill into giving up the ball to Scott Parker, whom Cahill brought down for the red-card offense.

The Reducer keeps watching Spurs, and every week they make the simple look sublime. They are steady and stoic at the back, led by their one-legged (not that you'd know by watching him) captain Ledley King, and their Master-Blaster midfield of Parker and Luka Modric are brilliant precisely because neither is married to some kind of brains or brawn role. Parker is a subtly sharp passer and Modric is no shrinking violet when it comes to getting stuck in. Elsewhere they have the most athletic, quick wing play in the league with Kyle Walker and Aaron Lennon's breathtaking relay runs every weekend, and with the combo of Adebayor, Rafael van der Vaart, and Jermain Defoe, they have a wonderful mixture of hustle, creativity, and luck.

Watching Spurs score a team goal is one of the great pleasures in sports right now, and their second goal, which came off the boot of Lennon but was the product of a very smart little Parker pass, a brilliant diagonal from Walker, a great run by Adebayor, and some brilliant off-the-ball movement from Defoe and Modric, was one of The Reducer's favorites this season. Those white shirts moved in harmony, like they were controlled by some benevolent god of football … or a very, very good gamer.

Chelsea 3, Newcastle 0

If The Reducer were Newcastle boss Alan Pardew, I would (a) really think about never wearing black on black again, (b) take heart in having possibly the best keeper in the Premier League in Tim Krul, and (c) burn down an entire forest as an act of vengeance against the cruel goalposts that seemed to reject countless Newcastle efforts.

As for Chelsea, David Luiz continues to use his time on the field to do his best imitation of John C. Reilly sleepwalking in Step Brothers, and he should have been sent off early in the game when he hauled down Demba Ba. Daniel Sturridge had the run of the right side of the field all game, but seemed far more interested in trying to knock Krul's hands off with his shot rather than squaring it for the centrally located Didier Drogba (Sturridge finally got his goal in the 94th minute against a 10-man, deflated Newcastle). For years Drogba has been Chelsea's dependable battering ram, and he did get a goal on Saturday, but it might be time to play Sturridge up the middle; it's pretty clear he doesn't have the passing instincts to play on the flank. Andre Villas-Boas, for his part, disagrees and intends to keep Sturridge out wide.

There was a lot of interesting body language on and off the pitch: Frank Lampard cut a figure disturbingly similar to a kid listening to Tool in the mall food court when he was substituted after an hour, and Villas-Boas looked a lot like a man who knew he'd just seen his job saved when Salomon Kalou knocked in Chelsea's second goal. Sometimes analyzing this kind of stuff is for suckers, but with Chelsea there's always a secret history bubbling up at the surface, and part of the fun is piecing together all the clues. For instance, isn't it interesting that the same week that the Daily Mail ran a critical piece calling Villas-Boas Jose Mourinho's "DVD guy," Lamps, notoriously chummy with the Fleet Street press, gets yanked after an hour? It is interesting, but The Reducer may very well need to stop viewing Kevin Costner's JFK monologue before watching football.

Look, The Reducer likes Villas-Boas and likes the idea of someone finally changing the way Chelsea plays and operates, but if he doesn't beat Valencia this week and take the Blues into the next round of the Champions League, he probably won't be the one to complete (much less start) that project. If the Portuguese boss makes it through Christmas, expect a clearing-out of unhappy faces at Stamford Bridge, including Nicolas Anelka (who might play anywhere from PSG to the Montreal Impact), Alex, and possibly even Lampard.

Arsenal 4, Wigan 0

The last time Arsenal lost in the Carling Cup was at Wembley Stadium to an inferior Birmingham team. Losing out on a trophy that was in touching distance was too much for the North London team, and the rest of the league season saw the side collectively storm off to its room, listen to the Cocteau Twins, and make mood boards full of desolate images of abandoned factories and polluted beaches (by which I mean it lost a lot and barely got into the Champions League).

So why was this year's exit, in the quarterfinals at the hands of Manchester City, so different? Well, for one thing, Arsenal played a team of kids, featuring the likes of Emmanuel Frimpong, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, and Ignasi Miquel, and held its own against, yes, a reserve City team but one that still included Sergio Aguero, Nigel de Jong, Edin Dzeko, and Samir Nasri, a player who was thought to be essential to Arsenal's future before he was sold to City over the summer.

After the game, rumors swirled that Frimpong and Arsenal striker Marouane Chamakh had gotten into an altercation with Nasri (who endured 90 minutes of Arsenal taunts like, "Are you happy on the bench!?"). Arsenal may have lost the game, but you had to appreciate the fight it put up.

Arsenal's A-Team was back in action against Wigan, but it had the same swagger its reserve side showed against City. And this time it got a result to match its attitude.

After an early Wigan scare, courtesy of red-hot Spanish midfielder Jordi Gomez, Arsenal shut this thing down. Over this run of eight unbeaten matches, the Gunners, always known for their possession game and their precise passing movements, have been playing with a refreshingly unpredictable and free-form style. Nowhere was this more evident than on Mikel Arteta's goal, which was born out of a long, albeit totally unmarked run by Laurent Koscielny.

Back in the Cesc Fabregas/Samir Nasri era, Arsenal always seemed to wilt not only from bad luck but from the pressure, perhaps applied by manager Arsene Wenger, to play beautiful football full of patient, perfect passing. Now, with expectations lowered, the Gunners seem to just be going about their business and really enjoying their work. Arteta's long-range goal, Thomas Vermaelen's getting a header off a corner (yes, Arsenal scored off a set piece. It's also 60 degrees in December in New York. I don't even know anymore), a Gervinho tap-in off a rebound. The Gunners used to be criticized for not doing the little things; people used to say they played like certain elements of the game were beneath them. Now, with a solid, veteran lineup, the hottest striker in Europe (Robin van Persie's late-game knife twist makes it 38 32 goals in 2011), and an increasingly staunch defense, Wenger's team seems to finally have figured out that if you take care of the details — the set pieces, defending, and positional awareness — the beautiful football is a lot easier to play.

Step Overs

• Manchester City put another five spot on a team, this time drubbing Norwich at home. Micah Richards again looked like an absolute gladiator down the right-hand side, Samir Nasri scored one of the more soft-batch, weak-sauce free kicks The Reducer has ever come across, and, naturally, Mario Balotelli scored a goal with his shoulder. One thing worth noting is City's plus-35 goal difference. If a team, be it Spurs, United, or perhaps Chelsea, is going to make a run at City, it's going to have to eclipse City in the table, not go neck and neck. This occurred to The Reducer when looking at that April 28 Manchester derby on the schedule. United needs to be even on points going into that match if it wants to win the title, because there's practically no way it'll make up the 17-goal differential between the two sides.

• Especially without Javier Hernandez. United lost its brilliant Mexican forward for four weeks when "Chicharito" went down with an ankle injury against a terrible Aston Villa team. This could mean Sir Alex Ferguson might need to bring Dimitar Berbatov in from the cold, or he could alternatively play Nani up the middle or rely more on a returning Danny Welbeck. Of course, after the match against Villa, maybe Phil Jones can just do everything all of the time.

• A lot of the attention on Northeast football has been focused on Newcastle and its excellent start, but expect a lot more scrutiny on Sunderland in the coming weeks. The Magpies replaced Steve Bruce with the enigmatic, Yorkshire-Ripper-obsessed Northern Irishman Martin O'Neill.

It will be interesting to see whether O'Neill sticks with an old playbook, the one he used at Aston Villa — namely, signing veterans, playing basic, counterattacking football, and motivating extraordinary performances out of ordinary players — or if he deviates a bit, playing youngsters like Connor Wickham and Ryan Noble.

• If Blackburn fans took a break from their unrelenting protests over Rovers' ownership and management, they might just enjoy their totally schizophrenic team. The Reducer understands it's a lot easier to say than do, especially if you're not a Blackburn supporter, but Steve Kean's team has been involved in some insanely fun games this year (recall its 4-3 win over Arsenal). Ruben Rochina and Junior Hoilett are bright, young things, and you never know what you're going to get when they step out on the field — as was the case with their 4-2 victory over Swansea, featuring four goals from Yakubu Aiyegbeni. Blackburn might go down, but it's not going to be a boring ride.

• It's always a shame when a Premier League player goes down for the season, but it's especially rotten that Liverpool's Lucas Leiva injured his knee against Chelsea in the Carling Cup. Lucas was having a career year, arguably playing the holding role better than almost anyone in Europe and finally making Pool fans forget about Javier Mascherano.

Transfer Talk

About now, the rumors surrounding possible transfers for the January window will start to heat up and get more and more insane. The few that caught The Reducer's eye so far have been related to the two main North London clubs, with Arsenal being linked with Lyon's midfielder Yoann Gourcuff, German striker Lukas Podolski, and Borussia Dortmund wunderkind Mario Goetze. It could definitely use some reliable backup for Robin van Persie. Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp seems to be parked outside of Stamford Bridge waiting to see who gets jettisoned in the rumored clear-out at Chelsea. He's already talked about his affection for Nicolas Anelka and Didier Drogba, but perhaps the most compelling move could be made for Frank Lampard. Redknapp is, after all, Lampard's uncle. It's been suggested that Lamps could go to Spurs with Modric completing the move to Chelsea that he agitated for earlier in the summer, but at this point, why would Modric want to go to West London when the North is treating him so well? (Oh yeah, lots of money might do it.)

Goal of the Week: Aaron Lennon, Tottenham

1:15 in. If you ever need to show anyone what a counterattack looks like, there you go.

Quote of the Week: Harry Redknapp

Ending off this Spurstastic week on The Reducer is the Tottenham boss, in an act of both raising and playing down expectations at the same time: "I never said we would win the league, I just said it's not impossible."

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The People Who Hate Tim Tebow

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:36 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

If you've lost interest in thinking about Tim Tebow, don't read the rest of this article. It will only make you crazy.

I've just watched the Denver Broncos defeat the Minnesota Vikings, 35-32. Tebow was awful in the first half, passing for just 13 yards. He was quite good in the second half, finishing 10-of-15 for the game and completing three passes of more than 20 yards, a minor achievement he hadn't accomplished all year. The Broncos won by intercepting a pass in the final minute and kicking an easy field goal, so it would be misleading and reactionary and inaccurate to say that Tebow won them the game. But Tebow won them the game.

When the score was deadlocked at 32 and the Broncos were kicking off with 1:33 remaining, FOX idiotically broke away from the tie in Minneapolis to show us the opening kickoff of the Giants-Packers game. Since I couldn't see what was transpiring in Minnesota, I just had to sit in my chair and wonder what would happen next. Did I believe Denver would win? I shouldn't have. Minnesota was getting the ball with multiple timeouts. It'd been the better team for most of the afternoon. Chris Ponder had outplayed Tebow, and the best athlete on the field was Percy Harvin. The worst-case scenario for the Vikings should have been heading into overtime with a home-field advantage. Yet I believed Denver would win.

My reasoning?

I had no reasoning. And I did not like how that felt, even though I'm trying to convince myself that it felt good.

Imagine that you're a detective, assigned to investigate a murder in a community of 1,000 people. There's no established motive for this crime, and no one saw it happen. By the time you arrive, the body has already been cremated. There are no clues. There is no forensic evidence. You can't find anything that sheds any light whatsoever on who committed this murder. But because there are only 1,000 people in town, you have the opportunity to interview everyone who lives there. And that process generates a bizarre consensus: Almost 800 of the 1,000 citizens believe the murderer is a local man named Timothy.

Over and over again, you hear different versions of the same sentiment: "Timothy did it." No one saw him do it, and no one can provide a framework for how he might have been successful. But 784 people are certain it was Timothy. A few interviewees provide sophisticated, nuanced theories as to why they're so convinced of his guilt. Others simply say, "I can just tell it was him. I know it." Most testimonies fall somewhere in between those extremes, but no one has any tangible proof. You knock on Timothy's door and ask if you can talk to him about the crime. He agrees. He does not seem nervous or distraught. You ask what he was doing the evening of the murder. He says, "I was reading a book and watching a movie." He shows you the book. You check the TV listings from the night of the murder, and the film he referenced had aired on television. You say, "Many people in this town think you are responsible for the killing." Timothy says, "I have no idea why they would think that." You ask if he knew the man who died. "Yes," he replies. "I know everyone in town." You ask if he disliked the victim. "I didn't like him or dislike him," he says. "I knew him. That was the extent of our relationship."

After six months of investigating, you return to your home office. Your supervisor asks what you unearthed. "Nothing," you say. "I have no evidence of anything. I did not find a single clue." The supervisor is flummoxed. He asks, "Well, do you have any leads?" You say, "Sort of. For reasons I cannot comprehend, 784 of the citizens believe the killer is a man named Timothy. But that's all they have — their belief that Timothy is guilty."

"That seems meaningful," says your supervisor. "In the face of no evidence, the fact that 78.4 percent of the town strongly believes something seems like our best case. We can't arrest him, but we can't ignore that level of accord. It's beyond a coincidence. Let's keep the case open. I feel like we should continue investigating this Timothy fellow, even if our only reason for suspicion is the suspicion of other people."

Do you agree with your supervisor's argument?

A survey by the Pew Forum on religious and public life suggests the 78.4 percent of Americans identify themselves as Christians.

I'm not interested in forwarding a pro-Tebow or anti-Tebow argument. I have my own feelings, but I don't think they're particularly relevant. What I'm interested in is why he's so fascinating to other people. I've spent the past two months traveling around the country, and Tebow was the only person I was asked about in every single city. I even had one debate over whether or not the degree to which Tebow is socially polarizing has been overrated by the media, a debate whose very existence seems to provide its own answer. I feel compelled to write about him, even while recognizing that too much has been written already.

The nature of sports lends itself to the polarization of celebrity athletes. But this case is unlike any other I can remember. In 1996, when Denver Nuggets guard Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf refused to face the flag during the national anthem, it was easy to understand why certain people were outraged (and why others saw that outrage as hypocritical). It was predictably polarizing. There are certain (crazy) things about human nature that everyone accepts, and Abdul-Rauf's controversy fit into that understanding. But this "Tebow Thing" is different. On one pole, you have people who hate him because he's too much of an in-your-face good person, which makes very little sense; at the other pole, you have people who love him because he succeeds at his job while being uniquely unskilled at its traditional requirements, which seems almost as weird. Equally bizarre is the way both groups perceive themselves as the oppressed minority who are fighting against dominant public opinion, although I suppose that has become the way most Americans go through life.

This, I think, is what makes Tebow so maddening to those who hate him: He refuses to say anything that would validate the suspicion that he's fake (or naïve or self-righteous or dumb).
Obviously, religion plays a role in this (we live in a Christian nation, Tebow is a Christian warrior, non-Christians see themselves as ostracized, and Christians see themselves as eternally persecuted). But the real reason this "Tebow Thing" feels new is because it's a God issue that transcends God, assuming it's possible for any issue to transcend what's already transcendent. I'm starting to think it has something to do with the natural human discomfort with faith — and not just faith in Christ, but faith in anything that might (eventually) make us look ridiculous.

Just because a bunch of people believe something does not make it true. This is obvious, even to a child. People once thought the earth was flat.1 But here's a more complex scenario: If you were living in Greece during the sixth century, and there was no way to deduce what the true shape of the earth was, and there was no way to validate or contradict the preexisting, relatively universal belief that the world was shaped like a flat disc … wouldn't disagreeing with that theory be less reasonable than accepting it? And if so, wouldn't that mean the only sixth-century people who were ultimately correct about world geography were unreasonable and insane?

Trust the insane!

Tebow is a faithful person. He's full of faith — filled to the top and oozing over the side. It's central to every part of him. When someone suggested that he mentions God too frequently (and that this repetition is what annoys his critics), Tebow said, "If you're married, and you have a wife, and you really love your wife, is it good enough to only tell your wife that you love her on the day you get married? Or should you tell her every single day when you wake up and have the opportunity? That's how I feel about my relationship with Jesus Christ." This is probably the smartest retort I've ever heard an athlete give to a theological question. What possible follow-up could the reporter have asked that would not have seemed anti-wife?

And this, I think, is what makes Tebow so maddening to those who hate him: He refuses to say anything that would validate the suspicion that he's fake (or naïve or self-righteous or dumb). My guess is that Ryan Fitzpatrick or Aaron Rodgers would blow him away on the GRE, but Tebow has profound social intelligence, at least when he speaks in public. It's not that he usually says the right things; he only says the right things, all the time. As a result, he fuels a quasi-tautological reality that makes his supporters ecstatic, even if they don't accept it as wholly valid. This reality is as follows:

1. Tebow is a good person who loves God.
2. Tebow throws many incompletions and makes curious, unorthodox decisions.
3. The Broncos' defense keeps every game tight. Underrated RB Willis McGahee eats the clock.
4. The Broncos inevitably win in the closing minutes.
5. Tebow humbly thanks God for this achievement (and for all achievements), thereby crediting God for what just happened (and for what happens to everyone on earth).
6. Tebow connects God to life.
7. Tebow is a good person who loves God.
I doubt many Christians believe that God is unfairly helping Tebow win games in the AFC West. I'm sure a few hardcores might, but not many. However, I get the impression that especially antagonistic secularists assume this assumption infiltrates every aspect of Tebow's celebrity, and that explains why he's so beloved by strangers they cannot relate to. Their negative belief is that penitent, conservative Americans look at Tebow and see a man being "rewarded" for his faith, which validates the idea that believing in something abstract is more important than understanding something real. And this makes them worried about the future, because they see that thinking everywhere. It seems like the thinking that ran this country into the ground.

It's difficult to take an "anti-faith" position. There's no pejorative connotation of the word faithful. The only time "faith" seems negative is when it's prefaced by the word "blind." But blind faith is the only kind of faith there is. In order for someone's faith to be meaningful, it has to be blind. Anyone can believe a hard fact that everyone already accepts. That's easy. If you can see something, you don't need faith. Faith in the seeable is meaningless. But meaningful faith is dangerous. It simplifies things that aren't simple. Throughout the 20th century, there were only two presidents who won reelection with a bad economy and high unemployment: FDR in 1936 and Reagan in 1984. In both cases, the incumbent presidents were able to argue that their preexisting plans for jump-starting the economy were better than the hypothetical plans of their opponents (Alf Landon and Walter Mondale, respectively). Both incumbents made a better case for what they intended to do, and both enjoyed decisive victories. In 2012, Barack Obama will face a similar situation. But what will happen if his ultimate opponent provides no plan for him to refute? What if his opponent merely says, "Have faith in me. Have faith that I will figure everything out and that I can fix the economy, because I have faith in the American people. Together, we have faith in each other."

How do you refute the non-argument of meaningful faith?

You (usually) don't. You (usually) lose.

Since Tebow was installed as the Broncos' starter, they are 6-1.

Trust the insane?

The toughest quarterback in the NFL is Ben Roethlisberger. He's not the best, but he's the toughest. He stands in the pocket longer, absorbs more punishment, exhibits a higher threshold for pain, and plays his best in the clutch. Roethlisberger is also, by all credible accounts, either a jerk or a "former jerk." At best, he has a highly checkered past and an unsympathetic persona. He's the least popular player in the league who hasn't slept on a prison cot.

It's difficult to separate those qualities. "Toughness" and "meanness" are always intertwined, often coalescing into "grit." When I think about my own life, the toughest people I've known have (often) been bad, bad citizens. Would you rather fight two super-nice guys simultaneously, or one solitary, diabolical reprobate? It's not a difficult question. So when I see Roethlisberger unfazed by a busted nose or a broken foot, it makes sense to me. He seems like the kind of semi-terrible person who is flat-out harder than those around him.

But try to imagine Tebow as a jerk. Let's say his performance on the field was unchanged, but his off-the-field personality was totally different. Let's say he was alleged to have sexually assaulted a few coeds and electrocuted a few dogs and fired an unlicensed handgun in a nightclub. If all this were true, he would not be polarizing; he would just be unpopular, particularly with the people who currently adore him. Sales of his jerseys would fall through the floor. But what would happen after he guts out an ugly 17-13 win against the Jets? What would be the perception? The perception would be that his victory was due to his toughness. That's how the media would explain it. It wouldn't necessarily be true, but it would immediately make sense to people: We are comfortable with the idea that extra-bad people possess something intangible that helps them win football games. There is a long history of this, especially in places like Oakland.2 But it's less comfortable to think that extra-good people possess such qualities, because that suggests they're being helped by virtuous forces outside of corporeal reality. And that's too much to handle/accept/consider, unless (of course) you already accept that premise unconditionally in every day of your life.

Right now, whenever Broncos vice president of football operations John Elway3 gets asked about Tebow, he effectively says, "We have no choice but to play him. He wins games." It's not really a compliment. It's almost a criticism. But if Tebow did all this with a prison record, Elway would say the same thing in reverse order: "He wins games. We have no choice but to play him." Which is similar, but not the same.

There are quantifiable aspects of Tebow's game that get ignored, mostly because everything else about him is so uncanny. His proficiency as a short-yardage bulldozer on third-and-3 compensates for his defects as an intermediate passer on third-and-8. The fact that Tebow only runs selectively gives Denver a psychological edge (for example, they seem to believe he simply can't be stopped on two-point conversions). More than anything else, he's very hard to tackle. All of these qualities are significant in the Broncos' success. But they're not revelatory, and I don't think they have a big impact on why people feel so passionately about this person.

The machinations of his success don't matter as long as they're inexplicable.

The crux here, the issue driving this whole "Tebow Thing," is the matter of faith. It's the ongoing choice between embracing a warm feeling that makes no sense or a cold pragmatism that's probably true. And with Tebow, that illogical warm feeling keeps working out. It pays off. The upside to secular thinking is that — in theory — your skepticism will prove correct. Your rightness might be emotionally unsatisfying, but it confirms a stable understanding of the universe. Sports fans who love statistics fall into this camp. People who reject cognitive dissonance build this camp and find the firewood. But Tebow wrecks all that, because he makes blind faith a viable option. His faith in God, his followers' faith in him — it all defies modernity. This is why people care so much. He is making people wonder if they should try to believe things they don't actually believe.

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The Second Day of NBA Christmas

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:34 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

In Day 1 of the 12 Days of NBA Christmas, we covered how the lockout somehow didn't address the whole "Hey fellas, let's stop overpaying guys who don't deserve it" problem (which, you know, was the whole reason we had the lockout) and predicted we were headed for three weeks of extravagant contracts that would rank among the dumbest in NBA history (which, you know, defeats the whole purpose of why we had the lockout). If you want to see …

A. The spending ramifications of the new labor deal
B. The wrinkles that should cause teams to spend more money than they expected
C. Which 17 teams will be "spenders" this month

… please, check out Day 1's column again. For Day 2 and Day 3, we're zipping through the available free agents and figuring out who will be overpaid, underpaid and properly paid.

Know this: The 2011 free-agent class isn't sexy at the top like 2010's class (LeBron, Wade, Dirk, Amar'e) or 2012's class (Howard, Paul, Williams). It's more sneaky-hot. Think Anna Paquin in True Blood, or Brody's wife in Homeland. We're writing about centers today because, by my calculations, there are six quality NBA centers in the entire league. (For the record, I'm talking about TRUE centers, not power forwards playing out of position like Al Horford, David Lee or Luis Scola.) Coincidentally, three of those six (not counting Dwight Howard, Andrew Bogut or Tim Duncan, and yes, I have Andrew Bynum ranked seventh until he starts playing 82 games a year and acting like an adult) happen to be the three most coveted free agents this month.

Most Coveted 1a. Marc Gasol
Most Coveted 1b. Tyson Chandler
Most Coveted 1c. Nene

Because that's the case, DeAndre Jordan creeps into the second level of "top" 2011 free agents for the same reason that Saab lingered in the relative proximity of BMW and Mercedes for all those years even though it was an inferior car: People overpaid for Saabs because they wanted a European car and couldn't afford a BMW or Mercedes, just like a team will overpay for Jordan because they didn't get Gasol, Chandler or Nene. Here's what Level 2 looks like:

4. David West
5. Arron Afflalo (restricted)
6. DeAndre Jordan (restricted)
7. Thaddeus Young (restricted)

Important note: I like DeAndre Jordan!!! Trust me, I'm a Clippers season-ticket holder — I watched that dude transform himself into a Kendrick Perkins-type starter for the right contender. The numbers back it up.

Jordan, age 22 (2010-11): 25.6 MPG, 7.1 PPG, 7.2 RPG, 1.8 BPG, 68.6% FG, 45.2% FT
Perkins, age 25 (2009-10): 27.6 MPG, 10.1 PPG, 7.6 RPG, 1.7 BPG, 60.2% FG, 58.2% FT

He's also one of the best chemistry guys in the league — one of those happy dudes who somehow knows every single guy on every other team even though he's been in the league for only three years.1 And D.J. works his ass off; you don't have to worry about paying him and having him go Eddy Curry on you. Blake Griffin, a famously hard worker and Jordan's closest friend, had an enormous impact on Jordan's career in that respect. Sadly, D.J. has a fatal flaw: He's just about useless offensively unless he's throwing down an alley-oop, finishing off a nice assist or putting back an offensive rebound. Actually, he's worse than that: Jordan shoots free throws soooooooooooooooo poorly (41 percent for his career, 45 percent last season) that you could actually see him shrink away from the ball in close games. If you're afraid to get fouled, that changes the way you play — just ask everyone who rooted for Antoine Walker.

Here's the reality: Perkins signed a four-year extension with Oklahoma City for $32.55 million (and got paid an extra $2 million last year as something of a signing bonus). That means Jordan's next contract should pay him about $32 million over four years in a world that makes sense. But because of the Saab corollary, because too many teams have money to spend, because restricted free-agent offers skew high (so they don't get matched) and because it's the NBA and teams just can't help themselves, get ready for a team to make Jordan a restricted offer around the "four years, $42 million" range.

First of all … yikes.

Second … Kendrick Perkins just threw his iPad through a window at 95 miles an hour.

Third … what do you do if you're the Clips? You can't just let Griffin's best friend leave with the whole "Will Blake stay or go two years from now?" situation looming. You also can't pay Jordan and Chris Kaman a combined $22 million to share your center spot this season. (Not even Mark Cuban in his reckless heyday would have done that.) Here's the move: You match that Jordan offer (or quickly make one yourself) then give Kaman away to a team with a ton of cap space, whether it's Indiana, Sacramento, New Jersey, Toronto, Denver or whomever. Getting Kaman as a one-year, $12.2 million flier and salary-cap stopgap for next year's free-agency extravaganza isn't the worst thing in the world.

Fourth … any Jordan suitor knows the previous paragraph will probably play out that way. Which means … (you better hold on to something so you don't fall over) … well … (I'm telling you, hold on to something to be safe) … if someone really wants Jordan and wants to force the Clippers' hand … (maybe drink a glass of water to prepare for these next few words) … if they really want Jordan, they should offer $50 million for four years.

Fifty million! For DeAndre Jordan!!!! It's not totally far-fetched!

Hold that thought. And remember, no team has won a title without a solid center since the '98 Bulls. The past 12 champs had David Robinson, Shaq (three straight Laker titles), Robinson (and really, Duncan), Ben Wallace, Duncan again, Shaq (Miami), Duncan a third time, Kendrick Perkins, Pau Gasol/Andrew Bynum (twice) and Chandler (with Brendan Haywood). That's why teams place such a premium on centers … and, many times, just choose to overpay them. Let's go back to the top three available centers again.

1a. Marc Gasol
My favorite pick because of his age (26), his all-around skills (he's just one of those "fun to play with" guys), his big-game experience (thanks to international play) and his sterling 2011 playoff performance (13 games, 40.0 MPG, 15.0 PPG, 11.2 RPG, 51.1% FG). Gasol played so well last spring that he single-handedly transformed the Pau Gasol/Memphis/Lakers trade from "one of the most lopsided basketball trades of all time" to "a one-sided trade that swung two titles but won't be remembered as a historical atrocity." I'm fine with overpaying Gasol with a lavish restricted offer. Four years, $74.3 million (the max offer allowed) for Indiana, Toronto, New Jersey, Houston or Sacramento? Sure. Done. He's worth $15 million a year and you're paying the new-car sticker tax for him (that restricted fee). No-brainer. You can win the NBA title if Marc Gasol is your third-best player.

1b. Tyson Chandler
You know what you're getting with the 29-year-old Chandler, the emotional leader and defensive anchor of the 2011 champs. Basically, it's a slightly poor man's version of 2008 KG without a low-post game. Because of his injury history, I wouldn't go higher than four years, $55 million for him (and even that would make me nervous). Of course, someone will creep closer to that $74.3 million limit … and at that point, you're crossing your fingers and hoping for four healthy years from Tyson Chandler.

You know what really fascinates me? Dallas, a team that normally throws money at centers like Pacman Jones making it rain at a strip club, doesn't seem that interested in overpaying Chandler. What do they know? Do they have inside info? Do they think he might break down soon? Note to potential Chandler suitors: If there was ever a time to "pretend" you're in Dallas for the night, invite Mark Cuban out for dinner, put a few drinks in him and eke out his inside Chandler info, it's this week.2

And yet … I still feel like the Mavericks are playing possum here. They wouldn't have beaten Miami without Chandler last year. They know this. They also know that they need to get by Miami THIS year, and if anyone knows how to protect the rim against Miami and get into LeBron's head, it's Tyson Chandler. I can't see them turning that specific responsibility/need/specialty over to Brendan Haywood when they already have that guy and he wants to stay. They just need to get creative; you can't overpay both, but you can overpay one. More on this in a second.

1c. Nene
This one scares the hell out of me. What am I getting, exactly? He's 29 years old and has a surgically repaired knee. He played nearly as many games the past three years (260, including playoffs) as he did for his first six seasons (315, including playoffs). He's not exactly an emotional leader — those Nuggets teams melted down as much as anyone, and you'd have to consider it at least somewhat telling that Carmelo Anthony pushed his way off a team that had a top-five center on it. The biggest thing for me: If he's a top-five center, then why is Nene such a lousy rebounder? These past three seasons, he averaged 32.6, 33.6 and 30.5 minutes per game … and 7.8, 7.6 and 7.6 rebounds. He wasn't even a top-25 rebounder last year. (FYI: LeBron nearly outrebounded him!) He also doesn't protect the rim that well; for instance, Dwyane Wade (1.14) Channing Frye (1.01), Shane Battier (0.99) averaged more blocks than Nene (0.97) last season.

With Nene, you're getting an athletic big man who makes 60 percent of his shots, as well as someone who makes opposing teams say, "They have a center" … and that's about it. At 29, you are who you are. He can't quite take over games; he's never going to do what Chandler did in last year's playoffs from a protecting-the-rim standpoint; he needs extra rebounding help or you're getting killed on the boards; he's never won anything; and oh, you better hope his knees hold up. For me, it's no contest — not only would I rather have Gasol or Chandler, I'd rather overpay Jordan (at least he's an up-and-comer) for 50 to 60 percent of what Nene will probably cost (four years, $74.3 million without a sign-and-trade).

So who's willing to splurge on Nene? Not to go all Hubie Brown on you, but we know the Nets will pay whatever it takes for a center and they're already "all in" after the Deron Williams trade. We know Houston is getting an above-average center come hell or high water. We know Indiana, Denver and Sacramento have a crapload of cap space, and we know Toronto and Washington are an executed amnesty clause away from getting there. We also know that Memphis is vowing to match any restricted offer to Gasol.

That means seven teams might be bidding for Chandler and Nene … and two (New Jersey and Houston) are desperate. Even if they're worth $55 million apiece for four years, they'll end up getting $20 million more; I wouldn't be shocked if the Nets pulled off a sign-and-trade with Denver to give Nene $100 million for five. You think Mikhail Prokhorov cares about overpaying the fifth-best center in basketball? You think he cares about dropping an extra $50 million per year with the tougher luxury tax? I don't think Nene's next contract will be remembered on the Rashard Lewis/Gilbert Arenas level as a historical abomination, but at the very least, it will join Joe Johnson's extension as this decade's defining example of a team overpaying a good player who isn't great (or even close to great).

Hold on, we're not done. We just overpaid Chandler, Nene and Jordan and properly paid Gasol (extravagantly, but still). Don't forget about these centers …

Kaman:
Sitting there for one year, $12.2 million if the Clippers pay Jordan. Here's what I would do if I ran the Clippers …

Step 1: Pay Jordan. You can't mess around with Blake. And by the way, the Clips are only at $44.9 million right now. It's not like they don't have the money.

Step 2: Make the following phone call.

"Hey, Maloof brothers … you need to spend $17.5 million just to hit the league's salary floor ($49.3 million). You give us Jason Thompson (one year, $3 million remaining), we'll give you Kaman and the chance to have a secretly beastly low-post combo of the K-Man and Boogie (DeMarcus Cousins). That brings you within $8.3 million of the salary floor. Any interest? Any? (Listening.) What? You're asking me how much money I have in my wallet right now? Um, I have about $400 bucks. You want me to throw that in the trade? (Listening.) Fine, I can go to an ATM and get another $500. Would $900 do it? You want 20s or 100s … ?"

Sam Dalembert: Past two seasons: 160 games, 25 MPG, 8.1 PPG, 8.9 RPG, 1.7 BPG, 51% FG, 73% FT … wait, what? Isn't that what I'm getting from Perkins/Jordan/Haywood? Start preparing emotionally for a "Team X has reached agreement with center Samuel Dalembert for a four-year, $44 million deal." It's coming.

Greg Oden: By all accounts, a good person and someone who's legitimately tortured about letting the Blazers and their fans down. Looks like he's accepting their one-year qualifying offer for $8.9 million. Still … if I'm Indiana, I'm offering the hometown kid a three-year deal for $33 million that goes backwards ($12 million, $11 million, $10 million) with Year 3 kicking in only if Oden plays 65 games or more in Year 2. If anyone needs a change of scenery, it's Greg Oden.

Brendan Haywood: Totally, horrendously overpaid, and yet not overpaid at all. Haywood's 2009-10 numbers (a contract year, but still): 30.6 MPG, 9.1 PPG, 9.3 RPG, 2.1 BPG, 56.2% FG, 62% FT. Sure sounds like what I'm getting statistically from Perkins or Jordan, right?

If you're Houston, would you rather overpay Chandler, overpay Jordan … or pretend you want to overpay Chandler, get Dallas to overpay him, then trade for Haywood instead? Even something like "Patrick Patterson ($1.9 million this season) for Haywood ($7.4 million this season)" works under the cap. Hmmmmmmm. If you're Dallas, let's say you offer Chandler a four-year, $69 million deal starting at $15 million in Year 1, then save $5.7 million with a Patterson/Haywood swap. Are you better off? As long as Chandler doesn't break down over these next four years … actually, you are.

Andris Biedrins Available for free (just assume the past three years and $27 million of his deal), or as a potential amnesty guy (if Golden State gets Chandler or Nene). And why? Because he can't stay healthy (past three years: 92 missed games), can't shoot free throws (32.3 percent last year!) and lost every single shred of his offensive confidence. If I had a quality point guard, I'd wait until Biedrins gets amnestied and take a flier on him for this reason: Biedrins looked good only once during his professional career, when Baron Davis was driving to the hoop and setting him up for layups and dunks. That's his best professional skill other than his ability to look like a skinny Ivan Drago. Stick him with a slashing point guard (say, John Wall) and he'd be better than he actually is.

Josh McRoberts: That's right, the same Josh McRoberts who was nearly dealt to Memphis with a no. 1 pick for O.J. Mayo at the trade deadline, only they didn't announce the trade in time (one of the most underrated NBA boners of recent years). He's not a true center (more of a power forward who can masquerade as a center on a non-contender, ala David Lee), but his numbers (22.2 MPG, 7.4 PPG, 5.3 RPG, 0.8 BPG, 2.1 APG, 54.7% FG and 73.9% FT) weren't bad last season. You know what that means? Ladies and gentleman, I present to you our most likely winner of the Amir Johnson Award for this year's "Wait, He Signed For WHAT????????" guy. Someone will give him the full mid-level or the financial equivalent. It's coming. A quick PS: Johnson exceeded everyone's expectations in Toronto last season, so be careful about making too much fun of Roberts for $25 million (or whatever it ends up being).

Spencer Hawes: Just never got better. You can't be an "offensive" center and make 45 percent of your shots. He's Chris Mihm 2.0. Will someone overpay him? Of course! Are you kidding me? In a heartbeat!

Aaron Gray: I've always liked him as a backup center, just not as someone making Darko Milicic money ($5 million a year). Unfortunately, he's headed for Darko money. Gulp.

Let's make some predictions for those 12 centers. Important note to Kendrick Perkins: Stop reading right now. Just trust me.

1. Nene
Prediction: Signs with New Jersey (five years, $100 million, thanks to a sign-and-trade with Denver3)
Verdict: COMICALLY OVERPAID

2. Marc Gasol
Prediction: Re-signs with Memphis (five years, $78 million)
Verdict: PROPERLY PAID

3. Tyson Chandler
Prediction: Re-signs with Dallas (four years, $69 million)4
Verdict: OVERPAID

4. DeAndre Jordan
Prediction: Re-signs with Clippers (five years, $46 million)5
Verdict: OVERPAID

5. Chris Kaman
Prediction: Traded to Sacramento (for Jason Thompson)
Verdict: One year away from being OVERPAID AGAIN

6. Sam Dalembert
Prediction: Signs with Denver (four years, $40 million)
Verdict: OVERPAID

7. Brendan Haywood
Prediction: Traded to Houston (for Patrick Patterson and a future no. 1 pick)
Verdict: ONCE OVERPAID, NOW SLIGHTLY OVERPAID

8. Greg Oden
Prediction: Re-signs with Portland (one year, $8.9 million)
Verdict: PROPERLY PAID

9. Andris Biedrins
Prediction: Stays put, much to the chagrin of every Warriors fan
Verdict: STILL OVERPAID

10. Josh McRoberts
Prediction: Signs with New Orleans (four years, $26 million)
Verdict: OVERPAID

11. Spencer Hawes
Prediction: Signs with Detroit (three years, $18 million)
Verdict: OVERPAID

12. Aaron Gray
Prediction: Signs with Indiana (three years, $15 million)
Verdict: OVERPAID

A quick recap: eight "overpaids," one "slightly overpaids," one "comically overpaid," two "properly paids" … and that's just the center position, (the team that, other than New Jersey, seems most desperate to irrationally overpay somebody). Come on out, NBA Groundhog … I have a feeling you're going to see your shadow.

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The Third Day of NBA Christmas

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:32 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

After Marc Gasol and Tyson Chandler, my favorite 2011 free agent is Arron Afflalo, someone who's already had a pretty strange career by NBA standards. In the past four years alone he's been undervalued (Detroit stole him with the 27th pick in the 2007 draft), overvalued (for two years, the Pistons never played him), dismissed entirely (to create enough room to comically overpay Charlie Villanueva and Ben Gordon in 2009, Detroit gave Afflalo to Denver with cash for a second-round pick), undervalued again (he became an effective bench player in Denver), and then totally undervalued (emerging as a reliable starter last season). He's also on pace to break the career record for "most times an NBA player's name has been misspelled or mispronounced."

Anyway, every NBA junkie scanned the list of free agents this month, made a few faces, laughed a few times, and at some point, had the same reaction: "Ooooooh, I like Arron Afflalo!"

How can you not like him? You're getting him at age 26, which means he still has a chance to get about 20 percent better. He's already a classic Table Test guy — he brings a few things to the table and doesn't take anything off it. On the right team, you can pencil Afflalo in for 30 to 35 minutes per night, excellent defense, 13 to 15 points per game, 50/40/80 shooting percentages (FGs, 3s and FTs), good chemistry and a general efficiency/consistency that makes you totally comfortable. You know what you're getting with Arron Afflalo. Almost to a tee.

So what's that worth? I believe someone will pay Afflalo $50 million for four years. I also believe that he's worth it.

Here's where you say, "Wait … what???" And I'm with you … on the surface, this seems nuts. Then you start peeling it apart like an onion. We know teams have too much money to spend this month (as we covered in Day 1), and we know restricted offers always skew high. So for Afflalo to reach that $50 million prediction, two dynamics need to be in play.

Dynamic No. 1: The 2-guard landscape needs to be much weaker than anyone realizes.

Hold on, I'm about to freak you out. We've taken the 2-guard landscape for granted ever since Jordan's heyday; there were always enough quality 2-guards to go around. That's not the case anymore.

FRANCHISE GUYS: Dwyane Wade (turns 30 in January), Kobe Bryant (33)

ALL-STARS: Joe Johnson (30); Manu Ginobili (34)

POTENTIAL ALL-STAR: Eric Gordon (turns 23 this month, please read this footnote1).

SCORERS ONLY: Kevin Martin (28), Monta Ellis (26)

SURE-THING STARTERS: James Harden (22); Wesley Matthews (25); Afflalo (26, free agent)

EFFICIENT VETERANS: Ray Allen (36); Jason Richardson (31 in January, free agent); Jason Terry (34)

We just listed 13 guys, not even a high enough number to cover half the league. Read the rest of these names and ask yourself the following question: If I had a chance to win the title this season, would I want any of the following guys as my starting 2-guard?

UP-AND-COMERS: DeMar DeRozan (22); Nick Young (26, restricted free agent); O.J. Mayo (24)2

COMBO GUARDS: Jamal Crawford (31, free agent); Rodney Stuckey (25, restricted free agent)

THE X-FACTORS: Rip Hamilton (33); Brandon Roy (27); Stephen Jackson (33)

POSSIBLE UPSIDE GUYS: Evan Turner (23); Marcus Thornton (24, restricted free agent); J.R. Smith (26, free agent); Gordon Hayward (21); Klay Thompson (21)

LUXURY ROLE PLAYERS: J.J. Redick (27); Kyle Korver (30); Anthony Morrow (26); JJ Barea (27, free agent)

ROLE PLAYERS: Shannon Brown (26); Ronnie Brewer (26); Francisco Garcia (29); Landry Fields (23); Vince Carter (34, free agent); Anthony Parker (36); DeShawn Stevenson (30); Michael Redd (32, free agent)

OVERPAID UNDERACHIEVERS: John Salmons (32 on December, 12); Ben Gordon (28)

That's a pretty motley list, right? By my calculations, Afflalo is the 12th-best short-term 2-guard (if you're trying to win a title this season), and the 10th-best long-term 2-guard (if you're looking at the next five years). And actually, if the goal is to WIN a title, I'd rather have two-way players like Afflalo, Matthews or Harden over Ellis or Martin (both one-dimensional scorers who couldn't guard Yi Jianlian's chair). But that's just me.

Regardless, it's not crazy to think Afflalo is worth $50 million. When you compare him to the other available 2-guards, he's four years younger than Richardson (and a much better defender); he's a much better all-around player than Young or Stuckey (two classic good-stats-on-bad-teams guys); he brings more to the table than Crawford (a valuable bench scorer, but that's it); he's a much safer bet than Smith or Thornton; and he's not washed-up like Redd or Carter. That brings us to Dynamic No. 2.

Dynamic No. 2: You'd need multiple suitors for a good 2-guard who would conceivably drive up the price.

Who might splurge on Afflalo this month? Let's see …

• We can safely cross off 15 teams for a variety of reasons: Atlanta, Dallas, Golden State, Houston, Memphis, Miami, New York, Oklahoma City, Philly, Portland, San Antonio, Toronto, Utah, the Lakers and the Clippers.

• Chicago can't afford more than a mid-level exception (starts at $5 million), making it difficult to snare Richardson (a perfect fit) unless he takes a little less than he's worth. (And he might.) Sorry, Bulls fans … you might be Vinsanity waiting to happen. Unless Richardson takes less OR Rip Hamilton gets amnestied (a possibility).

• Boston and Orlando can't afford anything higher than the mid-level, but they're both natural fits for an irrational confidence scorer, a combo guard off the bench, someone who can come in and flip a game around … you know, someone whose name rhymes with "Schamal Prawford."

• I'm crossing off Phoenix (a perfect match for Afflalo) because the Suns blew their cap space in the summer of 2010 by overpaying Channing Frye, Hakim Warrick AND Josh Childress. Well done, fellas.

• If I were running Minnesota and didn't have my no. 1 pick next summer, I would amnesty Martell Webster and offer Afflalo $50 million for four years, hope Denver didn't match, then build my team around Kevin Love, Derrick Williams, Wesley Johnson, Ricky Rubio, Afflalo and Anthony Randolph. (Sorry, Michael Beasley, you didn't make the cut.) I can't see the Timberwolves doing this, because it's actually logical. Let's cross them off.

• The Nets have spending room (more than $23 million if they amnesty Travis Outlaw), but they're targeting one of the big-money centers (Nene, Chandler or Gasol). Let's cross them off in pencil, not pen … you can never rule them out.

• It would be funny if the Pistons overpaid Afflalo after giving him away two years ago, but that's not happening because they're already paying $24.1 million combined for Gordon and Hamilton this season (not a misprint). Don't worry, they might overpay Stuckey instead.

• Even if the Kings are $26.2 million under the cap (and $17.5 million under the total salary minimum), I can't see them splurging on another 2-guard with Tyreke Evans, Jimmer Fredette, Garcia and Salmons already aboard. Splurging on Thaddeus Young (another restricted free agent everyone likes)? Different story.

• I can't cross off New Orleans ($12.6 million under the cap), but I wouldn't bet on the Hornets spending major money, either. Depends on how fast the Chris Paul trade gets done.

That leaves six candidates who have money to spend AND need a quality 2-guard. In descending order …

6. Charlotte

Status: $5.94 million under the cap ($13 million including DeSagana Diop's amnesty)
Current 2-guards: Gerald Henderson, Matt Carroll, Michael Jordan

Notes: Would the Bobcats make the playoffs with Afflalo, Corey Maggette, D,J, Augustin, Boris Diaw, Ty Thomas, Kemba Walker and (Marv Albert voice) "Bis-mack Bee-YOMMMMM-bo!!!!!"? Of course not. Are you crazy? Here's your logical home for Vince Carter: He could sign for more than he deserves, go home to Carolina and be a major part of yet another disappointing Bobcats season. More on this in a second.

5. Milwaukee

Status: $5.2 million under the cap ($12.2 million if the Bucks amnesty Beno Udrih)
Current 2-guards: Stephen Jackson (playing out of position), Carlos Delfino (ditto)

Notes: Could the Bucks make the playoffs with Andrew Bogut, Afflalo, Jackson, Delfino, Brandon Jennings and Drew Gooden? Actually, yes. Would they eat $14.3 million of Udrih's money to do it? Probably not. They'll probably go after Jason Richardson (and fail), then make Marcus Thornton a four-year offer and hope the Kings don't match it. If they do? Get ready for an inexorable crawl toward J.R. "I Need Jack Bauer to Get Me Out of China" Smith.

4. Cleveland

Status: $5 million over the cap ($8.9 million under if the Cavs amnesty Baron Davis)
Current 2-guards: Amazingly, none

Notes: Now we're talking. As soon as Cleveland dumps Baron, it can offer Afflalo a four-year deal for a little more than $38 million. I would do this yesterday. Unfortunately for the Cavs, he can do better … which means they're headed for Nick Young (maybe four years, $32 million)?

3. Washington

Status: $13.3 million under the cap ($34.4 million if the Wizards amnesty Rashard Lewis)
Current 2-guards: Nick Young (restricted free agent), Jordan Crawford, Joe House

Notes: Team up John Wall and Afflalo and you'd really have the makings of something. If I'm running the Wizards, it's a no-brainer: I'm doing the following three things …

A. Not using my amnesty on Lewis yet. He's still a serviceable shooter — why pay him the exact same money NOT to be on my team?

B. Offer Afflalo $50 million: $14 million in Year 1, $13 million in Year 2, $12 million in Year 3 and $11 million in Year 4. Anything lower and Denver is probably matching.

C. Get the Celtics to sign-and-trade me Jeff Green for Andray Blatche — a deal that, by the way, makes sense for Boston because Green struggled so mightily coming off the bench, and also because Blatche (a total head case, but possibly redeemable with the right veterans and the right coach) gives them young legs and some much-needed size.3 Wait until the NBA schedule comes out today — if you think this creaky Celtics squad is making it through a "seven games in nine days" stretch (and you'll see at least one on their schedule), I have some Brad Lohaus rookie cards to sell you.

Here's Washington's nucleus with those two moves (and one non-move): Wall, Afflalo, JaVale McGee, Jan Vesely, Green, Crawford and Lewis (as their vessel to a whopping amount of cap space). That's the foundation of something, right? (Waiting.) Hello? Are you there? ANSWER ME!

2. Indiana

Status: $20.9 million under the cap ($28.5 million if the Pacers amnesty James Posey)
Current 2-guards: Brandon Rush, Jimmy Chitwood

Notes: Since it doesn't look like they're getting Nene, Gasol or Chandler, why wouldn't they upgrade their 2-spot with Afflalo when he's the perfect fit for that team? Think about what we watched from Indiana last season: smart, efficient, overachieving, always played hard, very good defensively, and most important, flexible. Wouldn't Afflalo fit in spectacularly with Danny Granger, Darren Collison, Paul George, Roy Hibbert, George Hill, Tyler Hansbrough and Rush? What if the Pacers shelled out $50 million for Afflalo, then brought back Josh McRoberts or spent a little more for a center (DeAndre Jordan, Greg Oden, Sam Dalembert, etc)? That's a real basketball team! Especially for a kooky regular season like this one — 66 games in 120 days — when teams with depth and young legs might have a genuine advantage.

1. Denver

Status: $26.3 million under the cap ($32.6 million if the Nuggets amnesty Al Harrington)
Current 2-guards: Afflalo (restricted free agent), Trey Parker, Matt Stone

Notes: And … here's why Afflalo is going to get $50 million. Denver actually needs him. Indiana, Washington, Cleveland and everyone else knows this. You aren't stealing him for $35 million or $40 million or even $45 million. It's going to take $50 million. At least. And at that point, Denver's brain trust might blink — as we witnessed during the Carmelo negotiations, they're all about finding value, conserving cap space and making moves from a position of strength. If the Nuggets lose Nene — and I think they will — they're going to look at the West and say, "Where are we going here? We can't possibly compete with what we have."

So … why not save your amnesty, avoid overpaying anyone, target a couple of bargain free agents (say, Josh Howard and Carl Landry), become a dumping ground for teams that need to clear short-term contracts (say, Chris Kaman), position yourself to strike as soon as a team needs to dump a quality contract (say, Josh Smith or Al Jefferson), pick up a couple of extra draft picks for your troubles (especially if Golden State wants to overpay you to take Andris Biedrins off its hands), shop Andre Miller's expiring deal when the time comes, build around your young guys (Ty Lawson, Danilo Gallinari, Kenneth Faried and Wilson Chandler as soon as you can re-sign him), bottom out in 2012 for a high draft pick, and basically start pulling a Sam Presti circa 2007 and 2008?

Without further ado, my predictions for where the best free-agent 2-guards are headed this month …4

10. Anthony Parker

Team: Phoenix
Price: Two years, $6 million
Verdict: Properly paid

Notes: This won't exactly convince Steve Nash to retire as a Sun.

9. Vince Carter

Team: Charlotte
Price: Two years, $13 million
Verdict: Overpaid

Notes: Can't you see a slew of "Vince comes home!" and "Once considered the next MJ, now he's playing for MJ" stories, thousands of fantasy owners taking him too high … and then the inevitable eight-week DL stint, followed by either (a) Charlotte flipping him to a contender, then Vince sucking in the playoffs for that contender, or (b) Charlotte quietly exercising its $1 million buyout of Vince's deal before Year 2?

8. J.R. Smith (trapped in China)

Team: Houston
Price: Three years, $16 million
Verdict: Properly paid

Notes: I'm predicting a sign-and-trade here for Terrence Williams and Jordan Hill (two expiring deals). Oh, you don't think I can make up sign-and-trades in a hypothetical column? Think again. Semi-related: I still think Smith will have one — repeat: ONE — meaningful moment for a playoff contender before everything's said and done.

7. Jose Juan Barea

Team: Dallas
Price: Four years, $20 million
Verdict: Slightly overpaid

Notes: There's no way Mark Cuban would ever lose Barea, just like there's no way I'd ever lose Robert "Baby Bear" Mays from Grantland. There are certain guys you just need on your team, whether they're diminutive Puerto Rican gunners or bearded Bears fans who get their clothes stolen from the dryer in their own apartment building.

6. Marcus Thornton (restricted)

Team: Milwaukee
Price: Four years, $24 million
Verdict: Properly paid

Notes: I like this hypothetical signing!

5. Nick Young

Team: Washington
Price: Four years, $30 million (matching Cleveland's offer)
Verdict: Overpaid

Notes: I don't like this hypothetical signing!

4. Rodney Stuckey (restricted)

Team: New Orleans
Price: Four years, $35 million
Verdict: Overpaid

Notes: Chris Paul's semi-replacement for a trade that hasn't happened yet (but will). Couldn't you see the Hornets flipping Paul and Emeka Okafor for Andrew Bynum and Lamar Odom, saving $5.2 million (and dumping the last $40.9 million of Okafor's deal), using most of that money on Stuckey, then building your team around Bynum, Odom, Trevor Ariza, Stuckey, Jarrett Jack and a free-agent rebounder to be named (say, Kris Humphries)? How much fun would it be to have Odom and Humphries on the same team? Or two combo guards (Stuckey and Jack) just vacillating back and forth between the 1 and the 2 as our heads spin? For the record, I'll be making fun of this contract (or whichever team overpays Stuckey) in about three months.

3. Jamal Crawford

Team: New Jersey
Price: Four years, $36 million
Verdict: Overpaid

Notes: Just a gut feeling — the Nets are somehow ending up with Crawford and Nene this month. I don't think Mikhail Prokhorov can wait. He's like a degenerate gambler who hasn't been to Vegas for a while and can't even make it out of McCarran Airport without gambling on a couple of slot machines. I see the Nets spending recklessly every offseason and figuring out the consequences later.

2. Jason Richardson

Team: Chicago
Price: Four years, full mid-level ($22m)
Verdict: Underpaid

Notes: If you're taking less to win a title, you're doing it after you made a ton of money (Richardson's career earnings: $81 million), if you came close at least once (like Richardson did with Phoenix in 2010), and if you're a competitive dude (which he is). And by the way, that's a monster signing for the Bulls. Now we'll see if they can really pull off this supposed blockbuster for Dwight Howard that they keep leaking to everyone (probably as a tactical ploy with no basis in truth, but whatever). If you're Orlando, would you trade Howard and Hedo Turkoglu's carcass for Joakim Noah, Omer Asik, Luol Deng, a cap filler and $3 million to cover up the cap filler? You'd have to at least THINK about it, right?

1. Arron Afflalo (restricted)

Team: Indiana
Price: Four years, $50 million
Verdict: Properly paid (not really, but you know what I mean)

Notes: Perfect team, perfect fit. I love when this stuff works out hypothetically.

To recap: That's four "properly paids," one "slightly overpaid," four "overpaids" and one "underpaid." We actually made progress from Monday's center-bubble column — only 50 percent of these signings were bad. Until tomorrow.

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The Fourth Day of NBA Christmas

Posted by: timbersfan, 00:31 GMT le 08 décembre 2011

After I cranked out 10,200 words for the first three installments of my "12 Days of NBA Christmas," my editor, Philbrick, e-mailed me an intervention and reminded me that (a) it's nearly impossible to write 40,000 words in half a month, (b) I get violently sick at least once every winter, anyway, and (c) the combination of these two realities could lead to me single-handedly creating a a new strain of the Swine Flu that they'd end up calling "The Grantland Swine Flu." Considering I'm already coughing up oysters and wrote "Ray Felton" in yesterday's column when I meant "Ty Lawson," he's probably right. That's why we're keeping today's installment shorter than the other ones and writing it blog style, if only to prevent the filming of Contagion II.

All right, let's talk about Chris Paul …

By all accounts, New Orleans is going to trade him within the next few days. We always make fun of GMs and owners in this space, so I'm happy to praise one for a change: Hornets GM Dell Demps is playing this one perfectly. Why allow the "Where is CP3 going?" media-fueled drama to ruin your whole season? Why not shop him right now, before any free agents are signed, as the contenders are still shaping their teams? Isn't right now your best chance to get 90 cents on the dollar for someone who's leaving in seven months — repeat: for someone who's leaving in seven months — and before any (or all) of your potential suitors make a move?

It's hard to take every "report" seriously because we're currently living in a world in which people spent an entire day on ESPN arguing about whether or not the Lakers could get Chris Paul AND Dwight Howard. Wait, they'd have to give up Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum for Howard (and Hedo Turkoglu's contract),1 and they'd have to give up Andrew Bynum and Lamar Odom for Paul (and Emeka Okafor). Did you notice that Andrew Bynum was in both scenarios? This is why it's impossible for them to get Howard AND Paul (no matter how many ESPN shows are pretending we can). There's this little-known NBA rule that you can't put the same player in two separate trades. Please, everyone at ESPN, stop talking about this. I'm begging you.

Back to Chris Paul. Here's what we know through published reports, scuttlebutt, pure logic and even a few of my little birdies (yup, sources say I have sources) …

1. New Orleans wants to trade him within the next few days.

2. Paul will sign an extension only if he's happy with the team that acquires him; he doesn't want his new team to gut its roster to get him.

3. Paul would love it if the new team also signed Tyson Chandler (his old teammate).

4. Boston, Golden State, New York, the Lakers and the Clippers are chasing him. Those are the teams we know for sure.

5. Houston is chasing him … but even if the Rockets offer Kevin Martin, Patrick Patterson, Terrence Williams, Hasheem Thabeet, Jonny Flynn and two no. 1 picks for Paul and Okafor, why would New Orleans do that? I'm crossing them off. You're not getting Chris Paul (a two-dollar bill) for some quarters and dimes (everything Houston is offering).

6. I didn't want to rule out Dallas because the Mavs could re-sign Chandler and try to get creative — or so I thought — but when I tried to get creative for them with the Trade Machine, it became clear pretty quickly that they don't have the assets. They're out.2

7. We should add Oklahoma City because Paul played there when the Hornets temporarily relocated because of Hurricane Katrina, and because it has a natural trading partner for him (Russell Westbrook).

8. Minnesota can offer the best package (Ricky Rubio and Derrick Williams), but there's no way Chris Paul is signing an extension with the Minnesota Timberwolves. For old time's sake … KAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHN!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!

9. We can safely cross off the Knicks because a "Chauncey Billups, Landry Fields, Ronny Turiaf and Toney Douglas for Paul and Trevor Ariza" deal isn't exactly knocking Dell Demps' socks off. What's sad is that I've had to repeatedly explain this to every Knicks fan I know. And they're still in denial.

10. We're not supposed to talk about Chris Paul's pseudo-bum knee, or the fact that he played much of last season on cruise control to protect that knee before cranking it up for a few games in the playoffs, because it's a lot less fun to make up fake trades if you have to mention that the principal of those trades might be playing on one leg in two years.

All right, so what could the Hornets actually get for Chris Paul? Here are the five most logical scenarios, in order from "kinda logical" to "totally logical."

OKLAHOMA CITY

The Trade: Chris Paul for Russell Westbrook and cap fodder (Cole Aldrich, B.J. Mullens and Nate Robinson's expiring deal).

The Verdict: New Orleans says yes; Oklahoma City says no; Chris Paul probably says, "I loved my time in Oklahoma City, but I'd rather live in a big city, thanks anyway." Besides, the Zombies can't give up on the Westbrook/Durant partnership yet, even if there's mounting evidence that Westbrook has real bitterness about becoming the public fall guy during last spring's loss to Dallas. I continue to think we might be headed for an Avon/Stringer situation here … but both guys are so talented that you need one more year (and maybe a different coach) before you pick one over the other. (And by the way, the Zombies are picking Durant.)

BOSTON

The Trade: Chris Paul for Rondo, Jeff Green (sign-and-trade) and possibly one or two no. 1 picks.

The Verdict: No way. Why would you want to overpay Jeff Green if you're New Orleans? Why not just re-sign David West? How do we know Green even wants to play there? And if you're New Orleans, wouldn't you rather have Stephen Curry, anyway? For the record, Paul makes $16.359 million this season and Rondo makes $10.045 million; the Celtics have only six players under contract and, unless Green were involved, could include only Jermaine O'Neal ($6.226 million, expiring this season) to make the Paul/Rondo swap work … unless they wanted to get creative, use their amnesty on Kevin Garnett (knocking $21.2 million off their cap), then trade Rondo and O'Neal for Paul and Okafor. See? This is absurd. The Celtics aren't getting Chris Paul.

Quick Tangent: As a Celtics fan, I'm horrified by how they are handling this — publicly, they're saying they aren't shopping Rondo, and privately they're dangling Rondo to New Orleans and EVERYONE KNOWS THIS. Seriously, what are the odds they can pull that trade off? 20-to-1? That's worth putting Rondo in a funk for the entire 2011-12 season? Remember, this is the same guy who went into a shooting tailspin after one harmless Obama joke.3 And by the way, didn't Rondo take less money to stay last season? That doesn't matter at all? Really, it's all business all the time? That's the best way to run a basketball team?

In general, it feels like the Celtics organization has lost touch with what made that team special — the chemistry between their best guys and their coach — starting with Ray Allen getting shopped for two straight trade deadlines, continuing with last February's brutally cold Perkins trade, then cresting with this Rondo debacle. Why would any Celtic feel safe at this point? How can Doc Rivers preach "ubuntu" with a straight face after the past two years? Does ubuntu mean, "Togetherness … unless we're trying to trade you?"

Hey Danny? If you really want to blow this up, then have the balls to actually do it — use your amnesty on Garnett (who's never making it through that inhumane 66-game schedule they released yesterday, much less nine weeks of playoff games with one day's rest between each game), try to sign Tyson Chandler, then try to trade Rondo, O'Neal's contract, two no. 1 picks and $3 million for Paul, and hope that Paul and Chandler say, "Cool, let's play in Boston together!" Sure, you'd be taking a mammoth shit on Garnett — the guy who made basketball relevant in Boston again — but at this point, what's the difference? You shit on Perkins last February and you're shitting on Rondo now. Why not add KG to the list? Either way, the Celtics made their bed here: Chris Paul or no Chris Paul, they're probably going to have to trade Rondo this season just because they handled the entire year so poorly. If you were Rondo, would you want to remain with this franchise? I sure wouldn't.

L.A. CLIPPERS

The Trade: Chris Paul for DeAndre Jordan (extend-and-trade), Eric Bledsoe, Al-Farouq Aminu and Minnesota's unprotected no. 1 pick in 2012.

Additional Notes: There's a chance the Clips could sign Tyson Chandler (either with their extra cap space, or by dealing Chris Kaman to acquire that cap space) to reunite Paul and Chandler. Also, I'm proud of the Clips for refusing to include Eric Gordon (at least so far) in the discussions. (Something I worried about in a footnote of Day 3's column.) Their goal should be to end up with Blake Griffin, Chris Paul and Eric Gordon … and figure out everything else later. By the way, the thought of having season tickets for multiple years of Paul/Griffin alley-oops just made me soil myself. I pray to everything that's holy that this trade happens.

The Verdict: The Jordan piece worries me. What if he doesn't want New Orleans? What if he wants to stay with the Clips? What if some other team offers him crazy money ($50 million or more)? It's too shaky of a variable. Then again, would Bledsoe, Aminu, Minny's no. 1 pick and a second no. 1 pick be enough to steal Paul? It's possible, right? I'm as amazed as you are — there's a legitimate chance that the Los Angeles Clippers could get Chris Paul.

(Hold on, I have to change my pants.)

(Couple more seconds.)

(And we're back.)

One Other Variable That Scares Me: Everyone keeps forgetting that the NBA still owns the Hornets. I know the league gave Demps the authority to make every move, but still … if you're David Stern and Adam Silver, are you that excited about building a possible juggernaut for the Clippers, the same franchise that's owned by the single most loathsome NBA owner of the past 30 years (and someone who wasn't exactly pro-Stern during the lockout)? Do you really want Donald Sterling to own one of your signature teams? Wouldn't you rather steer Paul toward the Lakers or Warriors?

(You're right, I'm probably overthinking this. Please tell me I'm overthinking this.)

L.A. LAKERS

The Trade: Chris Paul, Trevor Ariza and Emeka Okafor for Andrew Bynum, Lamar Odom, Steve Blake and Derrick Caracter.

Additional Notes: I'm not sure the Hornets would keep Odom here — they could spin him to, say, the Clippers (for Aminu and Ryan Gomes) or Minnesota (for Michael Beasley and Anthony Randolph).

The Verdict: As a full-fledged Lakers hater, this one sends chills down my spine. The Hornets save $7 million this season, rebuild around Bynum (good luck with that) and dump the last three years of their Okafor/Ariza deals ($62.7 million). The Lakers get a true center back (Okafor, an underrated double-double guy who can protect the rim), a defensive swingman who knows how to play with Kobe (Ariza), and one of the biggest point guard upgrades in basketball history (going from Steve Blake and Derek Fisher to Chris Paul). They're reinventing their team AND making it better. Yikes.

If I'm The Lakers, Here's My Biggest Concern: We can't get Howard AND Paul. Is getting Paul a better course than getting Howard? My answer: Yes. Getting Howard requires a Bynum/Gasol package; getting Paul means you keep Gasol, which means you'd have three of the best 15 players in basketball (Kobe, Gasol, Paul) and some competent rotation guys (Okafor, Ariza, Fisher, Metta World Peace and Free Agent X). That's a no-brainer in my mind. I'd have a better chance of winning with Kobe, Gasol, Paul, Okafor and Ariza than Kobe, Howard, Odom and Turkoglu — not just this season, but the next two after that.

If I'm The Hornets, Here's My Biggest Concern: Do I really want to rebuild my entire team around Andrew Bynum, someone who missed an extraordinary number of games already, might be headed for more knee problems down the road, and seems to have the emotional maturity of a Real World roommate? Am I the only one who remembers him clotheslining little J.J. Barea last spring, then storming off half-naked? That's going to be my signature guy for the rest of the decade? Really?

(I gotta say … if I'm running the Hornets, I'd rather go with this next one … )

GOLDEN STATE

The Trade: Chris Paul for Stephen Curry, Ekpe Udoh and Klay Thompson.

Additional Notes: For Paul to agree, Golden State would have to use its amnesty on Andris Biedrins and sign Tyson Chandler for whatever it takes. That's a ton of money, but Golden State's new owners (Joe Lacob and Peter Guber) are your classic "I just bought an NBA team! I want to win now! Why can't we win now???? Let's win now!" guys. I know our pal Marc Stein reported this afternoon that the Warriors are hesitating to include Curry in any Paul deal, but couldn't that just be posturing? I think those owners would make all of the aforementioned moves (and spend the additional millions it took) without blinking.
When I spent time with Lacob last March at the Sloan Conference, I was stunned by how adamantly he wanted to win right away — part of it was admirable, part of it made me think, Oh, man, all bets are off for this guy from a Dumb Trade/Dumb Contract standpoint. The good news here: Turning Curry, Udoh, Thompson and $27 million of dead Biedrins money into the league's best point guard and the second-best player on last year's NBA champion isn't dumb.

The Verdict: This trade actually works AND makes sense. New Orleans flips Paul into three cheap pieces, saves $8 million, rebuilds around Curry and still has about $21 million to spend on free agents. Let's say the Hornets re-signed David West and used their extra cap space on a rebounder (say, Kris Humphries) and a one-year bid on an amnesty guy (say, Baron Davis). That's a pretty fascinating team, right? Curry, West, Okafor, Humphries, Thompson, Trevor Ariza, Jarret Jack, Udoh and Baron Davis??? Meanwhile, Golden State ends up with a nucleus of Paul, Chandler, David Lee and either Monta Ellis or whomever they get in a deal for Monta Ellis. (Andre Iguodala? Rudy Gay?) As Jack Horner's editor would say, that's a real team, Jack.

My Final Prediction: Chris Paul to Golden State for Curry, Udoh and Thompson, followed by Golden State using its amnesty on Biedrins and signing Chandler. Welcome to relevancy, Warriors fans. You deserve it.

(PS: Sorry, Philbrick, I have no idea how this ended up topping 2,700 words. I promise to take Day 5 of the "12 Days of NBA Christmas" off unless something HUGE happens. Like, really, really huge. Like Paul or Howard getting traded, or Rondo deciding to turn against his country like Tom Walker did in Homeland. In the meantime, let's warn the Centers for Disease Control about the Grantland Swine Flu ahead of time just to be safe.)

Bill Simmons is the Editor in Chief of Grantland and the author of the recent New York Times no. 1 best-seller The Book of Basketball, now out in paperback with new material and a revised Hall of Fame Pyramid. For every Simmons column and podcast, log on to Grantland. Follow him on Twitter and check out his new home on Facebook.

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The Reducer: Week 13, Northeast Passage

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:16 GMT le 02 décembre 2011

After a Saturday that saw Stoke and Chelsea recover from dips in form, Arsenal and Manchester United slip up, and Tottenham continue its fire-hazard win streak, a darkness descended on the Premier League.

Sunday morning, before the kickoffs of Liverpool versus Manchester City and Swansea versus Aston Villa, news broke that Gary Speed, a heroic figure in the recent history of British football and manager of the Wales national team, had been found dead in his home from an apparent suicide. He left behind a wife and two children.

Speed was a left-sided midfielder full of heart and industry. He played for several history-rich clubs including Everton, Newcastle, and Sheffield United. He was possibly best known as part of a classic, title-winning early-'90s Leeds United team, playing with the likes of Gary McAllister and Gordon Strachan. After retiring in in 2010 he went into management. Following a rocky start to his managerial career at Sheffield United, he oversaw something of a quiet revolution as the Wales national team manager, ushering along brilliant young talents such as Gareth Bale and Aaron Ramsey and guiding the team to a strong finish in their ultimately unsuccessful Euro 2012 qualifying campaign.

You didn't have to know Speed as a man or even a footballer to see the profound effect his loss had on so many people. All day Sunday, tributes flooded into British papers, makeshift shrines were erected at Speed's former clubs' grounds, and sports talk radio was turned into a kind of public gathering for mourners.

Speed's death was felt on the field as well. Liverpool winger and Welsh national team player Craig Bellamy, who knew Speed as a friend, teammate, and manager, was understandably devastated, leading Reds boss Kenny Dalglish to leave him off the roster when Liverpool faced league-leading City. "I took the decision for him, to say there are more important things than playing football," said Dalglish before the game.

There have been eloquent and moving tributes written by Speed's Leeds manager Howard Wilkinson and the BBC's Dan Walker, while Match of the Day pundit and former Liverpool defender Alan Hansen offered a compelling piece about the problematic nature of English football's celebration and reliance on resilience and what that can sometimes mask and The Score's Richard Whittall investigated the fine line between sports and "real life."

It's incredibly hard to articulate loss, especially so soon after someone passes, especially when they do so under such traumatic and inexplicable circumstances. To know the impact Speed's life and death had on those who knew him, you need only take one look at Aston Villa goalkeeper (and former Speed teammate) Shay Given's face during a moment of silence for Speed before Villa vs. Swansea. He will be deeply missed.

Games of the Week

Manchester United 1, Newcastle 1

The Reducer, like most pilgrims, spent much of the end of last week freebasing stuffing and trying to decide if buying an Xbox 360 could be explained with simply saying "Treat Yo' Self" into the mirror. So while this column felt like the football had a certain tryptophan-ish quality, that could very well be a personal projection.

If there was a storyline that jumped out from the on-field action, it came from the Northeast of England and Newcastle United's refusal to go away.

It seems as if every season, a team makes a surprising pre-Christmas run, upsetting the assumed order of things and causing its fans to dream big of Barcelona coming to places like Hull and Blackpool on European nights. The comedown is usually as bad as the high was good, and these sides tend to drop to wherever their economic resources have them slotted.

Most footballing addicts, this one included, thought Newcastle's season would, to invoke the new/old chestnut, regress to the mean over the next couple of weeks. The Magpies have had an incredible start to the 2011-12 campaign, holding down a top-four spot for much of it. They lost their unbeaten record to Manchester City on November 19, and many predicted another loss when they visited Old Trafford over the weekend. In all likelihood Newcastle would, over the next couple of weeks, get the memo and skulk back to the middle of the pack, making way for the traditional London and Northwestern powers to fight it out for Champions League spots and silverware.

Well, the Magpies never got that memo, or if they did, it was never translated into French. Alan Pardew's men just don't know any better. And the league is better for it.

You could see it when, early on in the match — one Newcastle ultimately drew, 1-1 — their brilliant no. 10, Hatem Ben Arfa, lost his shit on Wayne Rooney. The United forward had a kick at Newcastle captain Fabricio Coloccini while he was on the ground. It didn't seem to bother Coloccini, but Ben Arfa came storming in, screaming at Rooney. It's not surprising: Ben Arfa nearly had his career ended by a reckless Nigel de Jong tackle last season. But The Reducer was impressed just the same; Ben Arfa was standing up for his teammate, and making it clear that Newcastle wouldn't be pushovers.

The Magpies, possibly catching United with a little bit of European hangover (it drew with Benfica earlier in the week), went after the Red Devils, playing a high line, pressing United's increasingly creaky defenders, and relying on their brilliant young goalkeeper, Tim Krul, to save them when need be.

For such an open and athletic game, the two goals were pretty cagey. In the 49th, Javier Hernandez scored a very Javier Hernandez-type goal with his stomach on a Wayne Rooney free-kick rebound. Then in the 64th, Demba Ba scored a penalty after a controversial tackle of Ben Arfa by Rio Ferdinand in the United penalty area. Master of understatement Sir Alex Ferguson called the penalty decision "a travesty," but it looked really close. The result will be forgotten soon, but what the draw says about Newcastle's new identity should be remembered.

In a country, region, and sport in which history is always lurking, haunting, powering, and handicapping clubs, the Magpies have made the brave and brilliant move of moving on from theirs. At the beginning of thirsty scholar owner Mike Ashley's reign, he seemed to be alternately pandering to and alienating the Magpie faithful, hiring club legends such as Alan Shearer and Kevin Keegan to manage one minute, firing them the next. He was like some kind of demented ghost of football Christmas past, reminding Newcastle of the good old days and then tainting the memory.

Perhaps all this butterfinger handling of the club's legacy was somehow necessary to build a new Newcastle: one that can actually compete and sustain itself while still being adored by its fans. This Newcastle side — young, largely of French and African descent — with its bulldog midfield of Cheick Tiote and Yohan Cabaye and Jonas Gutierrez, its fleet-footed wingers Gabriel Obertan and Sylvain Marveaux, and brilliant keeper Krul, don't seem to play with the weight of all the success and failures that have worn black-and-white stripes before them. Hell, you had to wonder how many of the players who took the field on Saturday even knew about Newcastle's still-talked-about-on-Tyneside 5-0 victory over Sir Alex Ferguson's team in 1996. And maybe that's a good thing. To borrow a phrase from John Sayles' Lone Star, sometimes you gotta forget the Alamo.

Step Overs

• While Newcastle rolled out of Manchester with a point and sole possession of fourth place, its Northeast neighbor Sunderland continued its downward spiral. Steve Bruce has made a lot of mistakes since taking over the club in 2009, largely in the transfer market, where he seems unable to keep hold of anyone willing to score goals for him (see Darren Bent and Asamoah Gyan). But aside from blowing a small fortune on a collection of transient strikers, Bruce's biggest crime seems to be his origin story. Sunderland fans will never fully get behind the Newcastle native as their manager, and Bruce is sounding like he knows it. After Sunderland lost to the woeful Wigan on Saturday (at home!), Bruce commented on abuse he faced from the Stadium of Light crowd: "I just want to try to get it right. Hopefully the criticism has bottomed out today; I don't think it's ever been as bad as that. It borders on abuse. That's just the way it is, though, and I have to accept it. I cannot help where I was born." Odds on his departure have been slashed, unsurprisingly.

• Liverpool and Manchester City played out a pretty exciting 1-1 draw on Sunday that saw an incredible own-goal by Joleon Lescott and a Mario Balotelli sending-off (more on that in Quote of the Week). The Reducer actually thought this would be the perfect opportunity for someone to derail City's unbeaten streak. Roberto Mancini's team was coming off a harrowing midweek loss to Napoli in the Champions League (which seriously dented its masters-of-the-known-universe cred), where the Italian side may have discovered a plan for how to beat City. Namely, attack like a bunch of raiding barbarians and have Edinson Cavani on your team. Liverpool left its barbaric side at the (Anfield) gates and Dirk Kuyt is no Edinson Cavani (the hair, for starters). Still, The Reducer thinks and hopes City is bound to lose a match one of these days, if only for the sake of competition.

• Interesting to hear Arsene Wenger publically hand-wring over some of his players being fatigued. Arsenal has found success by settling on consistent lineup and Robin van Persie's consistent scoring. He sounded like a man who was willing to trade advancing in the League Cup, ahead of their clash with Man City, in favor of resting the likes of RVP, Theo Walcott, and a grieving Aaron Ramsey. The Reducer can't blame him. After last season's League Cup Final loss to Birmingham at Wembley, Wenger might think the competition is cursed

Goal(ie) of the Week: Joe Hart, Manchester City

Despite fine efforts from the likes of Jermain Defoe and Juan Mata, this week's honor must go to Manchester City and England keeper Joe Hart. Check out 2:10 into the above video. Andy Carroll is going to be replaying that header in his nightmares for a while.

Quote of the Week: Roberto Mancini

Upon being asked whether it was true that Mario Balotelli damaged a training room door after being sent off against Liverpool, Mancini responded: "I don't know this. If he damaged the door, he pays — like his house!"

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About Last Night: Who Dat Killing The Giants?

Posted by: timbersfan, 01:15 GMT le 02 décembre 2011

In case you were out living a life of leisure, here's what you missed in sports on Monday.

Drew Brees threw for four touchdowns and ran for another as the Saints routed the Giants 49-24. After the running touchdown, he tried to dunk the ball over the goalposts, but was forced to settle for a finger roll when his legs failed him. In related news, Drew Brees is now Jason Kapono's favorite player.

John Elway went on radio to say he was "surprised" by the reaction to his comments last week that despite Tim Tebow's success, Denver was no closer to finding the quarterback of the future. Mostly, Elway said, he was surprised by how fast a swarm of locusts could be summoned.
Sources have reported that Jim Boeheim has no intention of resigning in the wake of the Bernie Fine scandal. "Some things are more important than the well-being of our children," said Boeheim. "And one of those things is this dude, right here." Sources report that while speaking, Boeheim was pointing at himself with both thumbs.
In a message to poll voters, Nick Saban urged everyone to pick the "best two teams" for the BCS national title game. When asked to clarify which teams he meant, Saban said, "Alabama and San Jose State."
Penn State has named a six-person search committee tasked with finding a replacement for Joe Paterno. In a stunningly tone-deaf move, though, one of the members is Jerry Sandusky. Come on, Penn State! Wake up!
Ohio St. has introduced Urban Meyer as the Buckeyes' next head football coach. "He who hath supported the Tebow hath earned devotion undying," said Ohio St. athletic director Gene Smith, speaking in a loud monotone as though he was possessed. "And he shall guide us to earthly paradise. Also, f--- Michigan."
Buffalo receiver Steve Johnson apologized to Plaxico Burress for a touchdown celebration in Sunday's game that included a pantomime of Burress' self-inflicted gunshot wound from 2008. Despite the apology, though, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg has vowed to send Johnson away to state prison for at least six months.
Sources reported that Ndamukong Suh called commissioner Roger Goodell Sunday night to apologize for stomping on a Green Bay offensive lineman while he lay prone on the ground. "I'm a method actor," Suh explained, "in an ongoing film about a total a------. Sorry."
In college hoops, Tu Holloway scored 24 p