More Bad Analysis re: The Big Aristotle

Everyone watch this. (Turn down the audio or plug in the ol' headphones if you're at work.)

OK. That should have gotten all the laughter out of your system. Now we can begin.

As if Scoop Jackson's disaster of an article (covered by PNoles, just two posts below this one) didn't adequately implicate ESPN as an employer of idiots, Bill Simmons felt the need to weigh in on the matter as well. Actually, NBA trades are the one thing not related to Boston that Simmons does a reasonable job of understanding. And this article isn't bad through and through. Still, why the fuck would he say:

If the trade doesn't work, Kerr gets canned. If it does work, he's a genius. There is no middle ground.

Oh yeah? What if Shaq performs very well in the playoffs, but the Suns still lose to the Spurs/Lakers/Mavs in seven in the conference finals? What if Shaq blows out his knee tomorrow and they still somehow win it all because the Warriors knock off two of the Spurs/Lakers/Mavs while the Pistons and Celtics beat each other to pieces in the Eastern Conference finals? What if Shaq turns into an unstoppable presence in the postseason, but Stoudemire, Diaw, and Barbosa forget to show up and Phoenix bows out in the second round? What then, Mr. Simmons? All of those outcomes, by my very subjective estimation, constitute a middle ground.

I know it's more fun to sensationalize things, because heroes in action movies are always like: "This ridiculous plan could either be the stroke of genius that helps us defeat the bad guys... or it could be totally insane and lead to the end of life on Earth as we know it! What if it's BOTH?!?!?!?!" But that doesn't mean events that happen in real life can be viewed through the same lens. Some trades end up being essentially meaningless. Some players don't do a whole lot to either help or hurt their new teams. And some sportswriters should be fired from ESPN and go back to riding Adam Carolla and Jimmy Kimmel's coattails. (Or trying to, anyways.)

Presenting: Punchlines that Write Themselves, Vol. 2

Ryan Dempster Predicts the Cubs Will Win the World Series

Is God playing MadLibs with Cubs pitchers every year, inserting a random name before a stupid comment? I bet next year Ted Lilly will guarantee a Cub dynasty.

"I think we are going to win the World Series. I really do," Dempster said.

"And [last year] we were close, maybe we need some more guys saying it"

I think you need more guys who are good pitchers. Like - not you, Mr. Career 89 ERA+. Maybe you need more good players instead of more below-average pitchers.

Jeter says hearings "a bad time for the game"

Yeah. You said it, Derek. Those assholes, trying to ascertain the truth about what could be a huge steroid-case - probably even bigger than McGwire, second only to Bonds.

"But it's disappointing for everyone who plays baseball -- not just the players, but the management, ownership, commissioner. It's a bad time for the game."

1. Wait a minute - the managment, owners and commissioners play baseball?

2. When would be a good time, Derek? Maybe, like, in the middle of the Yankees' season? I'm pretty sure, of all the times in the year, early February is a pretty damn good time for a story to come out about the Yankees' past - inasmuch as it's the time when the frenzied media is least likely to fall upon the present Yankees.

3. I'm not sure it's a bad time for the commissioner. I think getting to the bottom of the steroid business might be the only think that can save all of baseball fandom from thinking he's a complete moron.

4. It's not like the game is suffering. MLB revenues crossed $6,000,000,000 this past season - nearly catching the NFL. Derek, 1920, 1972 and 1994 were Bad Times for The Game.

2008 is not a bad time for the game.

And yes, it's a total coincedence that Ryan Dempster and Jeter rank near the bottom of my personal favorite baseball players list.

Scoop Jackson Has An Announcement: Scoop = Right, World = Wrong

If that sounds unbelievable, that's because it is. It starts out relatively inoffensive, then gets stupid.

Shaq will thrive on solar power

Incredibly, incredibly cute.

Guess what? The Suns just made a fantastic trade

Fantastic? You're going to tell me that this was "fantastic"? The best argument I've heard involves "Marion is a malcontent so the Suns did the best they could by shipping him out for Shaq." But fantastic? Read on....

The world has finally given up on Shaq.

Because his PPG and RPG have dropped rapidly over the last 3 years, perhaps? The fact that he has only played in 99 games the last two seasons and has only played in 32 during this one?

Many feel the gimmick is up, there's no room left for the games, that he's not worth his weight or contract on anyone's roster anymore. "Damaged goods," is how one man described him. "Stupid," "Dumb," "Doesn't make any sense," and "What in the #@$% were they thinking?" are some of what's being said. If you've read ESPN.com or any blogs, listened to any sports talk radio or had time to peep the sports pages, you'd know that the Suns are catching heat for bringing Shaquille O'Neal into their almost perfect basketball universe.

The same kind of heat the Lakers caught when they gave him up and gave up on him almost four years ago.

Right. Because 4 years ago, Shaq was still pretty damned good. He was a 20 points, 10 rebounds kind of guy. Very very productive. And those critics were right, he went on to win an NBA title. Got news for ya scoop, they're still right.

Shaq doesn't fit into their style of play. Even if he's in the best shape of his life, he can't get up and down the floor with the Suns. He'll be worthless on offense, and he's going to destroy their flow. He's lazy. He's not going to work hard. He's injury-prone. He's not worth the money. They still won't win a championship with him there.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Sorta wrong. Maybe. Yes. Wrong. Wrong.

Correct answers: Yes. Wrong. Sorta wrong. Sorta wrong. Maybe. Yes. Yes. Impossible to determine.

Since you have 1/2 credit on some of these, you get 4.5/8 right for a 56.25% score. Lets look at where you screwed up!

Shaq absolutely does not fit into their style of play. A large, old player does not fit into a run-and-gun fast-break style offense. Absolutely not. This should be obvious. He won't be completely worthless on offense, but not worth very much considering Amare is a better option almost every time, and he probably will disrupt their flow. Shaq is nowhere near the 2nd best player in the NBA, so no, he is not close to worth 2nd best player in basketball money. And you have no idea if they will win a championship with him there or not. That's bullshit.

In Miami (and in L.A. and Orlando before) Shaq was Option 1 or 2, and over the past two seasons that became a problem. In Phoenix, he'll be Option 4, maybe 5. Mike D'Antoni should have no plans to depend on Shaq for any offense -- heavy emphasis on "depend." Not in the conventional way that everyone is thinking. The pressure on him to score 20 and grab 10 is finally over.

Read what the hell you just said! You're basically arguing "Shaq will totally help propel Phoenix to a championship, my reasoning is that 1) he's not that good anymore, and 2) but that's ok, because he won't be expected to be that productive." Cleanup on aisle common sense!

Now he'll be the Big Decoy.

Which will totally work, because other teams have no sense for evaluating if he's still as good as he used to be. You know, I hear the New Orleans Hornets and San Antonio Spurs prepare for games by looking at tapes of the 1999-2000 season.

And because he won't be double-teamed (remember he's still one of the best-passing post players in the game, and the Suns are one of the best outside-shooting teams in the League, hitting 38.7 percent on 3-pointers along with four players capable of dropping 20 to 30 every night), Big stands a chance of being more valuable by doing less in Phoenix.

Big Decoy, 2007-2008 season: 1.4 APG, good for 14th in basketball among centers. He's behind Zydrunas Ilgauskas for fuck's sake. His assist to turnover ratio is .47! Not as comically bad as Eddy Curry, but still awful, even for a center.

The beauty is -- again, if the Suns play this right -- Shaq doesn't need to be a part of their transition game, he just needs to ignite it.

Get ready for this guys, it's pretty funny.

Rebound, turn, outlet! Rebound, turn, outlet! Precision. Execution. Buckets. Only six seconds off the shot clock. Back on D. Repeat. So unfair.

Sounds exactly like what Shawn Marion did for them! Only Marion grabbed rebounds more often and actually was able to run the floor to contribute anyway even if he wasn't the lucky fella to whom the rebound bounced. FANTASTIC trade! I guess if you're arguing that Shaq "wouldn't be completely dismal" to the Suns, you've done a C-minus job. But that the trade was FANTASTIC!?!?! Gimme a break.

It will be so systematic that no one will be able to stop it once it gets perfected.

For crissake all you're saying is that he can grab the farking rebound and pass it. The rebound is the hardest part, and he's not even very good at that anymore. Ben Wallace is way shorter and lighter and having a terrible season and he STILL gets more rebounds per game than Shaq, who is 40th in the NBA.

And for those who think it's predictable and defenses will be able to shut it down, here's one to grow on: Whenever teams played the 49ers, they knew where, when and how Jerry Rice was going to get the ball. Yet for years, the best defenses in the game could not do anything to stop it. Nothing. The Niners won four rings with Rice, proving that predictability when perfected, works.

Football....that doesn't happen to be a completely different sport with different dynamics than basketball....does it? Chalk another one up to the "anecdotal bullshit" category!

On defense, all Shaq needs to do is breathe, partially because Amare Stoudemire is so active. As long as Shaq doesn't move (and get in foul trouble, which my be a bigger problem on offense), no one'll get hurt. Remember Chief from "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest"? That's Shaq all day on defense. Just play the paint, don't protect it.

So, what does Amare Stoudemire's man do when Amare goes to help out Shaq? Run into the stands and buy a hot dog? No, he stands right under the fucking basket for easy points if the ball can get to him. An awful defender can bite you in the ass, regardless of how good the help defenders on your team are. And I'm so gonna think of a Cuckoo's Nest-related label.

There's more grief from the world about this. Grief of how "the Suns should have kept Shawn Marion," how he was "their best defensive player and best rebounder" and how "there's no player in the league like him." All true. But Marion wanted to go. He wanted out of everyone's shadow and the organization's underappreciation of him. And before the Suns ended up like the Grizzlies after trading Pau Gasol and getting "the twin of nothing" in return for the Matrix, they decided to get someone who, if you checked his history, guarantees your team will either get to the NBA Finals or win a ring.

Orlando? Finals in three years. L.A.? Finals in four years, three rings in eight. Miami? Finals and ring in his second season.

Sir, a coke-addicted moron could fine serious, serious flaws in that logic. For starters, you just represented something that has historically happened 53.3% of the time as a "guarantee." Hey guys, 53.3% of the time, Shaq gets to the finals EVERY TIME. Second, you just assumed that things like the state of Shaq's career (currently the severe decline phase), Shaq's teammates (ones who play a vastly different style of basketball than he does), and the conference and division in which Shaq is competing (both pretty tough) are irrelvant.

Get ready, this is about to become dismal.

See, the Suns are outthinking all y'all.

You're a professional writer. "Y'all" should not appear in your sports column.

They know that one thing comes almost assured with this trade: They will win a title with Shaquille O'Neal in the lineup. It's just a matter of whether the one ring they get with him is worth the years they won't win while he's still there.

Could you be more completely and totally irrational? First of all, as you just discussed, Shaq didn't win a ring with Orlando. Second, you are talking like the Suns are 100% completely and totally guaranteed to win a title either this year or in the next two. If you can say this with confidence, Scoop, head to Vegas right now, bet the farm on it, and start living the good life. And third, if the Suns absoluetly will win at least one ring with him there that they wouldn't have won without him, then it's not a "matter" of whether the other two years are worth it, because the Suns are absolutely dying for a title, and it's a very difficult title to win. If this trade guarantees them ONE title (which it absolutely doesn't), then it's no fucking question that it's worth it. Period.

The Suns have never won an NBA championship -- just like Miami before Shaq arrived. And if they're smart, they can take the one they'll win and milk it for 30 years -- just like Portland. The question is if $20 million per for the next two seasons is worth getting the one year of ring service they're going to get from Shaq.

It's official, you've fallen off the proverbial cliff harder and more dramatically than the little Price is Right mountain climber guy with an idiot contestant playing. If there is a fucking team in the NBA that wouldn't pay a guy $20M for two years with the stipulation that it would guarantee them one championship in the next three (hell, it's probably true of the Knicks), that team shouldn't have a fan in the world, and the GM should probably be drowned. And you continuously hammer home the "fact" that Shaq in some sort of divine way "guarantees" a championship in Phoenix, which is a "stupid" "thing" to "say."

There are so many other variables that play to the Suns' favor in this: a front line of Stoudemire, Shaq and Boris Diaw that no squad in the West can match -- not even the Lakers, when Andrew Bynum comes back with Gasol in the slot. Amare will be able to play his natural position, power forward, which causes matchup drama for any other team.

For the 20 minutes per game you'll get out of Shaq, that's true. Stoudamire is currently running at 23.1 PPG and 9.4 RPG. We'll see if those improve. My guess: not significantly.

Steve Nash is going to get open looks because of Shaq's presence and how coaches automatically forget about other players on the court because they are still afraid of getting killed by Shaq in the playoffs.

Those teams must still have the image of Shaq dominating the Bulls last year fresh in their minds. Oh wait....

Shaq's and Grant Hill's passing ability in the half-court will be more dangerous than Nash's, which will now increase the assist-per-game ratio for the team, which is the most difficult stat in the League to alter and one that correlates most to a team's ability to win.

Are you fucking kidding me? Shaq and Grant Hill better passers than Nash? Even though Nash is overrated, he's at the very least one of the three best passers in basketball. Shaq can go ahead and add his 1.4 assists per game at the expense of Marion's 2.1. Grant Hill averages 3.3 assists. Nash averages 11.7. How many of Nash's are in the half-court, I can't say for sure, but it's still way more than Shaq or Hill get. Mark my words, Scoop, the Suns' APG will not be seeing a significant boost from this trade, and you couldn't overrate O'Neal's ability as a passer any more than you have. You know what else correlates to winning? Not turning the ball over. Shaq does that a lot.

Big might come to town rejuvenated. He probably hears everything that's being said about him, which could send him back into 2005-06 mode. Just being gone from Miami with all of the hot mess surrounding his divorce will give him a new lease on his life. Robert Horry might think twice about running a Suns player into the scorer's table next time.

So....all the Toronto media needs to do to get Frank Thomas to hit like he did for Oakland 2 years ago is start talking shit about him! Totally makes sense!

Variables that no one outside of Steve Kerr's office and Robert Sarver's bank account could possibly comprehend. The fact is, by attaining the services of Shaquille O'Neal and not expecting or needing much from a productivity standpoint in return, the Phoenix Suns may have made the most ingenious move in the NBA in the past 10 years. Only time will tell. It's just a matter of how wrong they -- and he -- really want to prove the world to be.

Most ingenious move in the NBA in the past 10 years!??!??!?!?!

::faints::

A++

After reading larry b's Easterbrook piece below, I encourage everyone to check this out, about the backstory between Tony Gwynn Jr. and Trevor Hoffman. It's very interesting and well-done. Kudos, Tom Friend.

WMTMQR: Oh, The Irony

I had been stretching to find material for a post tonight. Clark Judge of CBSSportsline wrote a real piece of crap about five NFL teams he boldly suggests will make a run at the playoffs in 2008 after not finishing 2007 with a winning record. All of them were 8-8 or 7-9 last year, and have plenty of talent on their rosters. Yawn. And Jemele Hill checked in with her usual piece of garbage minus the race card. But neither of those pieces really warranted a full breakdown.

So imagine my elation when I stumbled upon the final TMQ column of the year. I'll say this much- you can't fault Easterbrook for not having any balls. This is a guy who regularly serves up some of the worst football analysis you'll ever read, and yet here he is, devoting an entire column to the perceived missteps of his colleagues. There is so much wrong here, I can't even begin to cover it all right now. I might pick up wherever I leave off for a separate post tomorrow, but here's a sampling that should have you shaking your head in anger for the time being.

How hard it is to defend the predictors Easterbrook names (many of which are regular punching bags here at FireJay), I cannot fully put into words. But this guy is such a pompous douche that I have to go through with the post anyways. That's life I guess. You spend 99% of it talking about how much [X] sucks, and then in the end, it turns out that [X] really isn't that bad when you compare it to what an asshole [Y] is.

Peter King predicted, "It'll be stunning if the Chargers can dig their way out of this horrible web of mismanagement to finally be a playoff factor next season."

They were 5-5 at one point. I'd have to say that their ensuing 8 game win streak (including a win over Indy in the RCA Dome in the divisional round) was indeed "stunning."

Ron Borges, then of The Boston Globe, predicted that Jeff Garcia, Patrick Kerney and Leonard Davis were "free agents to avoid." All made the Pro Bowl.

We'll see how much Dallas/Seattle enjoys paying Davis's/Kerney's contract in 2012 when he's 34/35 years old. I know, the teams can always just cut them. But good chunks of those contracts are guaranteed. By this logic, the contract the Giants gave Barry Zito in 2006 would have been a great idea had he won 16 games in 2007. Oh, and Jeff Garcia apparently looks and smells like a rat.

"JT the Brick" of MSNBC predicted, "The Oakland Raiders are back. They are drastically improved."

They won two more games than they did in 2006. Their point differential improved by 50. Six of their losses were by a touchdown or less (compared to four in 2006). Only three were by more than two touchdowns (compared to six). Do they still suck? Yes. Did they suck a whole lot less? Even as someone who fucking detests the Raiders, I have to say yes. To be fair, "JT the Brick" is still a shitheaded nickname.

Brick also predicted that, in early 2008, Bill Parcells would become coach of the Giants or Chargers; neither team changed coaches, and Parcells went to the front office of the Dolphins.

Take that, JT. Idiot. You were only able to predict that Parcells would return to a prominent role with a team, and almost the exact time he would do so. Way to dick up exactly which team and role it would be.

Andrew Perloff said Jay Cutler will "lead the Broncos back to the playoffs."

The Broncos' struggles had nothing to do with Cutler, who had a very good year (88.1 QB rating). Maybe being ranked 30th against the run and 28th in scoring defense were slightly larger factors in their struggles.

Then there were the Jake Plummer predictions. ESPN.com's Jeremy Green speculated, "If Plummer ends up in Houston, he might have to sit behind David Carr." Plummer did not come back, and Carr wasn't in Houston either.

That prediction is not incorrect at all; it couldn't be much less incorrect. That's a quadruple negative.

Then there were the Rex Grossman predictions. "There is no question the Bears are committed to Grossman as their starting quarterback next season," Pompei of Sporting News predicted. The Bears benched Grossman twice, starting three different quarterbacks.

Grossman started the season as QB. After he was benched, they gave him another chance. Sounds like at least some level of horribly misguided commitment to me.

Gene Wojciechowski of ESPN.com predicted, "Grossman will be fine. No way does he throw another 20 interceptions." Grossman threw only seven interceptions -- because most of the time, he was benched.

He was obviously not "fine" overall, but if you project his totals out to a full season, he'd have thrown about 15 picks. Just saying.

Vic Carucci of NFL.com predicted the Super Bowl would pair the Patriots and Eagles; Philadelphia did not make the playoffs.

Nice one, Miss Cleo. Way to only pick one of the two Super Bowl teams before the season started.

The Boston Globe ran five sets of Super Bowl predictions, none of them mentioning the Giants.

Every other newspaper in the world totally saw the whole Giants thing coming. Where were the Globe's writers when we all agreed it was inevitable? Shooting up HGH with Rodney Harrison? Losers.

Dan Shaughnessy of the Globe predicted San Diego over New England in the AFC Championship Game.

How preposterous! There was no way that could have happened at all. It's not like San Diego had more scoring drives than New England, while being without their two biggest offensive weapons due to injury and playing a QB with a shredded knee.

USA Today offered eight dueling Super Bowl predictions, none of them involving the Giants.

Hey USA Today (and the Boston Globe), if your hand is bigger than your face, it means you've got a tiny penis. *Slap* I can't believe you fell for that!

None of ESPN television's "Sunday Countdown" crew -- Chris Berman, Tom Jackson, Chris Mortensen, Keyshawn Johnson, Mike Ditka or Emmitt Smith -- predicted the Giants would reach the Super Bowl.

Hey guys, there's a dickfor on the ceiling. (pause) Well I don't know, maybe you should ask your sister! Everyone get a load of these people who didn't think the Giants would make the Super Bowl. Can you believe they didn't see that coming? Talk about obvious.

Of the 22 predicted Super Bowl participants, 12 failed to make postseason, and no Pro Football Weekly analyst predicted the Giants would reach the Super Bowl.

Might as well ask them to try to bite their own ears!

ESPN The Magazine ("Published on Earth, the Planet") predicted a Super Bowl of Chargers over Cowboys.

Not even close! (Actually, somewhat close.)

None of the four dueling Super Bowl predictions inside The Mag mentioned the Giants.

OK, I'm running out of jokes to play on stupid people. Maybe gluing a quarter to the ground and seeing if they try really hard to pick it up?

Then there was the astonishing ESPN.com meta-forecast. Your faithful servants at ESPN.com offered no fewer than 16 dueling complete NFL forecasts for division winners, wild-card teams, Coach of the Year, MVPs and the like. And along the lines of the dog that didn't bark, if you check the link to the meta-forecast, what team name don't you see?

This is getting ridiculous. Other things Gregg Easterbrook wants to point out weren't predicted correctly by pundits:

George Mason in 2006 Final Four
Cardinals win 2006 World Series
Warriors knock of Mavericks in 2007 NBA playoffs
US 1980 Olympic hockey teams beats USSR
Appalachian St. beats Michigan

Honestly, the odds of the Giants winning 3 straight road playoff games weren't that much worse than any of those events happening. And I know Pittsburgh did exactly that just two years ago, but history still says its nearly impossible.

Trust Him, He Used to Run the Economy: In February 2004, Alan Greenspan, then chairman of the Federal Reserve, praised adjustable-rate and interest-only mortgages, the gimmick loans that triggered the 2007 default wave. In October 2004, Greenspan said a sudden drop in housing values was "most unlikely."

I hate to play this card, but honestly... hey asshole, let's see you do a better job of managing one of the world's largest economies. Greenspan couldn't have been more wrong, but his words were molded by the politics of reelection. I'm going to go out on a limb and say he's probably a pretty intelligent guy when his behavior isn't being dictated by the selfish powers that be.

Sports Illustrated forecast a Rose Bowl of Michigan versus Rutgers; neither made the BCS. The magazine forecast Ohio State would not make the BCS; it made the national title game.

Rutgers? That's bad. Michigan? They came within a decent offensive showing against OSU of making that happen. OSU themselves? Well, they probably deserved to be in the BCS... probably. Maybe. They certainly didn't deserve to be in the title game. And if they played Missouri 10 times on a neutral field, who do you think wins 6? I say it's a tough call. Of course, Hawaii apparently didn't deserve to be in the BCS either.

Bad College Predictions No. 2: "West Virginia is certain to win, and they will play in the BCS championship:" Doug Flutie on ABC, a few hours before No. 2 West Virginia lost to 4-7 Pittsburgh, forfeiting its shot at the BCS title.

Way to not see that coming, Elf-man.

Note: After West Virginia kept its first team on the field and kept throwing deep despite a 31-point, late-third-quarter lead against woeful Syracuse, reader Peggy McMahon of Rockport, Maine, e-mailed me to predict the football gods would exact vengeance on the Mountaineers. And yea, verily, it came to pass.

Hmm. Those Gods must've missed LSU throwing the ball deep numerous times during the second half of a 58-10 win over Louisiana Tech on November 10th. Unless you count their loss to Arkansas as "revenge," which you probably shouldn't, considering it didn't keep them out of the SEC or BCS title games.

Profootballtalk.com forecast the Giants to finish last in the NFC East. Paul Zimmerman of Sports Illustrated forecast the Giants to finish 6-10. The New York Times predicted the Giants would "take a step backward" in 2007. Eric Allen of ESPN foretold, "The Giants are a team that could disappoint." Don Pierson, whose MSNBC column is called "Ask the NFL Expert," forecast Jersey/A to finish last and added, "The Giants are having a hard time convincing anyone they are on the way up."

Bill Williamson, on MSNBC at the start of the season: Jersey/A "cannot go to the Super Bowl. The Giants have to just hope their quarterback progresses and there isn't a mutiny of the coaching staff. The Super Bowl is too much to ask for."

Dude, stop. You're fucking killing me.

Gregg Easterbrook, Tuesday Morning Quarterback: "I am not sold on the Giants." Spoken on "The Max Kellerman Show," November 2007.

Oh. Well alright then.

Peter King, Please Shut Up

First, let's briefly hand out the Reader Extra Participation Friday award for last week. Lots of good submissions, and thanks to everyone who threw their hats into the ring, but I'm going to award the title to Jones.

Moon launch: rockets make it possible

I mostly laughed at this because I could see it actually being on the cover of Popular Mechanics sometime in the early 60s. And without rockets, we wouldn't have this moment.

Next, let's do something painful and review why Peter King is annoying. From his "non-NFL thoughts of the week." (Yes, I know this blog is allegedly about sportswriting. But if this dummy is going to pop off at the mouth about other things while in the process of writing a football column, it's fair game.)

b. Finally saw Michael Clayton. Very good movie. Not as good as No Country for Old Men, or Charlie Wilson's War, but I believe if I were writing a blurb for the newspaper ad for Clayton, I would write: "Taut legal thriller.''

Wow. You have a way with words, my friend. How long did it take you to come up with that? It's so simple... yet so accurate. Watch your back, guy who currently writes newspaper ad blurbs for movies. There's a new guy who wants to do what you do (if you actually exist) in town.

c. Len Pasquarelli was up and about and feeling well in his Phoenix hospital room Sunday, just seven days after his bypass surgery. "Let me tell you something,'' Pasquarelli, the ESPN.com pro-football maven, reported from his bed Sunday afternoon, after his first post-bypass shower. "There's no better feeling in the world than your first shower after a heart attack.''

What does that mean? Len? Maybe you should just lie back down for a couple more days.

d. Coffeenerdness: No coffee news this week. None. Had a lot of tea, actually, coming off my bronchitis/virus/ear infections. Filled to the gills with the green tea, just like Phil Simms advises.

Phil Simms- health adviser to the stars. Does he have any recommendations as to how I should deal with my scoliosis? What about acne? Scurvy? Rickets?

e. Do people realize how silly they look and sound, even with Bluetooths (Blueteeth?) in their ears, to be cackling and talking loudly and gesturing with no one around.

Apparently King is still familiarizing himself with the concept of cellular telephones. Given how often he claims to text players, this is surprising. Either that or he wants to draw some meaningless distinction between hands-on cell usage and bluetooth-enabled usage.

OK, I think that was sufficiently awkward and painful.

Presenting: Punchlines That Write Themselves, Vol. 1

So I'm watching "1st and 10," or as I like to call it "Skip Bayless's Fun-Time Happy Half Hour." The panelists start discussing this stupid non-story about Pedro Martinez attending a cockfight in the DR. One of the no-names on the show tepidly compares the situation to Mike Vick and his dogfighting ring. In response, Skip steps up to the plate in Martinez's defense by pointing out that dogs are much different animals than roosters.

"Dogs are considered to have human-like personalities. I mean, some dogs are smarter than their owners!"

How much do you want to bet Skip owns a dog?

(insert laugh track)

I'll be here all year.

If David Eckstein Played NCAA Basketball, Which Current Duke Blue Devil Would He Be?

Small. White. Really White. Frail, at least in appearance. Comically overexposed and overhyped. Considered by millions to be good at his sport. Not actually very good at his sport. And the real clincher- when confronted with facts about his inadequacies, his defenders immediately fall back on the intangibles he allegedly brings to the field/court/surface/area. Hmmm.... who could it be? Come on, keep guessing. You'll get it eventually. Think overrated. Really overrated.

Give up?

Thank you, Gary Parrish of CBSSportsline, for helping me establish the validity of this comparison with one of the worst puff pieces I've ever seen.

Never asking for comparisons, Paulus just wants to be Paulus

You're off to a puffy start- already making excuses for the guy before the article even starts.

Greg Paulus cannot do a lot of things other people can do.

That's not really true if taken literally. If you replace "people" with "college basketball players," however, it's definitely true.

He cannot run like Ty Lawson. Or jump like Derrick Rose. Or see the court like D.J. Augustin. Or lock down an opponent like Darren Collison.

Oh God, no. No no no no no. Combined together, all these things are the equivalent of saying that Woody Paige cannot win a Pulitzer Prize.

And I could spend a long while writing about what Paulus can't do, but hasn't that been done enough already?

As long as people like you keep writing articles like this? Absolutely not. Before I really start trashing on him, let me take this opportunity to explain to the potentially uninformed masses what kind of player Paulus is.

We'll start with his defense, which is sub-mediocre. Then we can get into his offensive numbers. I'll round when possible for convenience's sake. In 2005-06, amidst levels of preseason freshman hype that matched anyone in recent memory save Greg Oden, he went for 7 points, 5.2 assists, 3.3 turnovers, and 37% shooting (!) from the floor in 32 minutes a game. In 2006-07, he went for 12 points, 3.8 assists, 3.1 turnovers (look at that A/TO ratio), and 46% shooting in 32 minutes per game. This year, as a junior, he's putting up a line of 11 points, 3.5 assists, 1.7 turnovers, and 46% shooting in 26 minutes a game. That's paltry at best for a starting PG. I won't list the stats of the four other guys Parrish listed above, but you can look them up if you want. Rose is already marginally better and he's only a freshman. Collison (jr.), Lawson (soph.), and Augustin (soph.) are so much better that it's not even worth comparing them to Paulus.

Who else can we throw into the discussion? Sean Singletary is better. A.J. Price is better. Levance Fields is better. Taylor Rochestie is better. Mario Chalmers is better. Dominic James is better. Kyle McAlarney is better, and he's probably playing high half the time. Do I need to keep going? My guess is that Paulus is somewhere around the 40th or 50th best PG in the country. Does it seem like a guy in that range should get the press he gets? How many of these guys I listed come even close to his level of hype? I know, I know, it's because he plays for Duke. But that's the whole point of this rant. This. Guy. Isn't. Very. Good. Please, if we must talk about THE DOOKIEEEEEEEESSSSSS, can we talk about someone else on their team? Someone who's actually good?

I mean, we've spent the better part of two-plus years discussing Paulus' deficiencies, which is only natural when dealing with the person who plays point guard for the premier brand in college basketball. Paulus gets that. And though it's easy to point out how he's not the second-coming of Bobby Hurley-

This is where the nonsense starts.

it's worth pointing out he never actually staked that claim, never asked for the comparison or the criticism that comes with it.

That's so very relevant to the discussion as to whether or not Paulus is good. Thanks for bringing it up. Let's make some comparisons from other sports. Maybe Ryan Leaf didn't end up being that good. But did you ever heard him claim to be better than Joe Montana? And I'm so tired of hearing people trash on Cedric Benson. Has he ever explicitly said he would be as good as Walter Payton? Everyone can laugh at what a flop Corey Patterson has ended up being. I don't remember him telling the media he was going to make everyone forget about Willie Mays! No, Danica Patrick has never won a race. (And yes, she is much less attractive than advertisers would lead you to believe.) But as far as I know, she doesn't consider herself to be as good as Mario Andretti in his prime. And blah blah blah.

Honestly, that might be the worst puff piece defense ever. A really hyped up player... has never told anyone they were great... and this is supposed to be a big point in their favor? Wow. Just, wow.

"Comparisons will be made," Paulus said. "But if you stay true to yourself and don't try to be something you're not then everything will take care of itself."

"Admitting the obvious. But cliche about being mediocre and cliche about being mediocre, very untrue cliche about results."

Duke entered the Dean Dome with doubters Wednesday night and exited with an 89-78 victory against North Carolina that should finally convince everybody the Blue Devils are the favorites in the ACC.

Despite not being quick enough on the perimeter or big enough on the interior -- those were the thoughts in the preseason, weren't they? -- the Blue Devils will head into their game against Boston College on Saturday with a 20-1 record and a two-game lead in the league standings, and among the reasons is that Paulus character everyone (except Duke fans) loves to hate.

In the sense that he is on the team, gets significant minutes, and plays well about once every four or five games, yes. He is "among the reasons" Duke is cruising though the unusually crappy ACC. Don't forget their impressive non-conference schedule, which included Wisconsin and Marquette (their only quality wins besides UNC), Pitt (their only loss), and... uh... mid-major darling Davidson? Albany? Princeton? New Mexico State?

No, he's not up for All-America honors.

Probably won't make all-conference either.

Nor should he be, and nor should he.

But Paulus is a key component on this team, a veteran part that makes things work.

And heeeeeeeeeeeere cooooooooommmmmmmmmme the intaaaaaaaaaaangiblesssssssssss!

And the wild thing is that while he's generally despised by opposing fans, he's really everything we claim we want our sports figures to be.

You mean, like good at sports? We've been over this. He's really not.

He plays hard and plays hurt.

Oh, I see. You mean he's gritty.

He maximizes his ability, claps his hands and cares.

And gutty.

He laughs when things are great.

He plays the game the way it was meant to be played.

He cries when things are bad.

He's not a robot? He's like Dwyane Wade?

He doesn't get arrested at clubs or suspended for missing workouts.

He is able to maintain his scholarship by not committing crimes or doing things that would get him kicked off the team.

He loves representing Duke while performing for his coach, and you get the sense there is nothing he'd rather do than play college basketball forever and ever and ever.

He brings his lunchpail to the arena every night. He takes the extra base. He gets his uniform dirty. He's a dirtbag. The fans love him because he is small and white like they are. See how the Eckstein comparison works?

So why am I writing this column now?

Because you <3 Duke? Because Paulus reminds you of yourself back when you were playing on your high school's JV team? Because mediocrity intrigues you?

Because it occurred to me while watching Paulus make six of eight 3-pointers to finish with 18 points against North Carolina that the outside expectations on him have always been unfair,

Hooray for small sample size! Furthermore, re: outside expectations. Think back. Way back to November 2005. Do you know what people were saying about this guy? Gatorade National High School Player of the Year. Not for basketball. For everything. (Partially because he was a 2-sport athlete, admittedly. But that's obviously not 100% of the reason.) Um, I think it's probably fair to expect a guy like that to be pretty good in college.

and that the second I typed any kind words about the former two-sport star I would get a dozen e-mails explaining how he's overrated and an arrogant little prick.

I have no idea what his personality is like, but he's beyond overrated. He's basketball's answer to Torii Hunter. Actually, that's an insult to Hunter. Paulus is more like basketball's answer to Juan Pierre.

That's what Paulus can do to your inbox, case you didn't know. He's a polarizing figure. And if the past year has taught me anything it's that when I write something unpleasant about him Duke fans will defend him, and when I write something nice about him everybody else's fans will criticize the point while calling me stupid and insisting Paulus isn't one of the top players in the nation.

Are you implying he is? He isn't. Unless you mean, like, one of the top 250 players in the nation.

But guess what?

You think Greg Paulus is just swell.

He never said he was!

We already went over that. Exactly as relevant to a discussion of Paulus's value or perceived value as what his favorite Beatles album is. (Mine is Revolver, but if you want a dark horse candidate, I'd go with Rubber Soul. See how sophisticated I am? Ooooooh, look at me.)

And that reminds me of a story about Ryan Adams, the acclaimed singer-songwriter from the state of North Carolina, oddly enough.

Ryan Adams? The guy who for some reason bothered to cover "Wonderwall?" Why are we talking about this?

When Adams first broke into the scene in the mid-1990s he was a critic's darling, just a brilliant young performer who wrote smart songs that connected with fans, particularly fans who had ever experienced a break-up.

Becoming the first musical artist in history to endear himself fans in such a way. Poison tried so hard, but they just couldn't quite get it right.

The guy was really, really good. But at some point the perception turned, and the same critics who hailed him were suddenly calling him overrated, insisting he wasn't the next Bob Dylan or anything else.

Adams addressed the criticism in a 2004 magazine interview.

His reaction: "I never said I was any good."

Great anecdote, really. But here's the problem. Ryan Adams doesn't have any statistics. He doesn't have a good song per album average, or a clever lyrics to cliched lyrics ratio. You might think he sucks, but you couldn't really do much to objectively prove it. You might think he's the greatest artist ever to lay hands on a guitar, and you also couldn't objectively prove that.

But Greg Paulus does have statistics. You can see, very clearly, that he's an inefficient point guard. You can see that while he's become a better shooter than he was his freshman year, he still doesn't bring much to the table offensively. And although there aren't any solid raw defensive statistics, you can tell objectively from looking at game film that he's not very good at that. See how that works? You can't compare the value of athletes to the value of performing artists. It's not allowed. Unless that artist is Foreigner, which is objectively the best band of the 80's. Yes, better than Guns n' Roses, The Cure, or REM.

Which brings me back to Paulus, Wednesday night and the verbal assault he endured. It started early and lasted late and included words I will gladly relay as soon as I get a show on SIRIUS Satellite Radio and am thus free of FCC regulations. I cannot repeat them here. The whole thing was nasty and typical, just a bunch of people telling him what he can't do even though he has never spent a minute trying to tell people all the things he can do.

You mean the verbal assault he endured from the fans of his school's most bitter rival? Shock. Flabbergastion. Confusion. Where do those North Carolina ragamuffins get off booing Duke players? How dare they. That is so rude. This reminds me of the time I heard that Texas fans and Oklahoma fans are often less than cordial to each other. What is wrong with the world? It's just a game, people!

"He's not Bobby Hurley," Duke freshman Taylor King said in an attempt to set the record straight. "He's Greg Paulus."

"Two part cliche," said teammate who of course isn't going to say anything bad about player.

Yep, he's Greg Paulus.

Just Greg Paulus.

Just a pretty mediocre and comically overhyped player.

And with any luck, one day that might just be good enough.

Well, he's a junior right now. He's more than halfway though his college career. He probably has less than 50 games left. He might want to get around to being "good enough" to somewhat match expectations reasonably soon.

Or did I take that too literally? I guess when he graduates from Duke and goes into the real world, maybe he'll become an excellent salesman or consultant or something. And in that case, being Greg Paulus would probably be good enough.

Reader Extra Participation Friday: Impending Recession May Hurt Economy

Charley Rosen writes about the NBA for Foxsports.com. He's usually pretty informative and entertaining. I often find myself enjoying his work. His analysis of the recent Miami-Phoenix trade, however, is titled in a fashion that should come off as insulting to anyone who knows how basketball is played and who this "Shaquille O'Neal" fellow is.

Shaq will force Suns to alter run-and-gun style

Really? You think? Subtracting Shawn Marion, and replacing him with a 450 pound center in his mid 30s who runs like he's wearing ski boots, is going to hurt their fast break? Pssssh. Now I've heard everything. Next, you'll be trying to con me into thinking that:

-Adding Santana strengthens Mets' rotation
-Tomlinson disappointed he was unable to play in AFC Championship game
-Crosby's injury will cause problems for Penguins
-Yao enhances Rockets' ability to market themselves in China
-Dropping bid for Republican nomination hurts Romney's chances of becoming president
-Ledger's death mourned by females aged 13 to 60
-TV writers' strike prevents sitcoms from being filmed
-Lil' Wayne releases album focused on drugs, sex, occasional gun violence
-Bloggers live in basements, fear sun

And so on and so forth. Anyone else have any breaking news they'd like to share with the group? I don't think I took too many of the obvious ones.

This week's prize is an unopened Slim Jim. I've got too damn many of these things down here to eat by myself. They really make you thirsty, especially if you try to wash them down with Cheez-Wiz.

Suprise! Celizic Overrated Something!

HatGuy recently wrote this. It's really bad. Like, really, really bad.

Joba off to pen; Yanks should leave him there

Because minimizing the innings pitched of a pitcher with a shot of being pretty damned good is smart, right?

The plan announced by Yankees general manager Brian Cashman is to start the 2008 season with Joba Chamberlain in the bullpen. That should be good news to the team’s fans.

Because they don't want to put a lot of strain on Chamberlain's arm at a young age. That makes perfect sense.

The long-range plan for the season is to move the sensational young pitcher into the starting rotation. That news might not be nearly as good.

Ah. Because of some interesting statistical/scouting evidence that Chamberlain would be less effective as a starter, right? Right? (I'll bet millions that HatGuy gives reasons that have nothing to do with this, if he even gives reasons.)

It’s a tough call the Yankees have, one that I wouldn’t like to make. Chamberlain, Philip Hughes and Ian Kennedy are the kids whom the Yankees have groomed to form the core of the team’s rotation for the next decade or longer. And there’s no question New York needs the lift that strong, young arms can give a starting rotation.

I'm sorry, were you giving an argument AGAINST Chamberlain becoming a starter?

The plan all along had been to use the 22-year-old Chamberlain as a starter, the role in which he excelled as a minor leaguer. But last year he proved to be an exceptional reliever, and in this era of ball, there’s no one more important to a team than a great closer.

Why Michael, you are just, just so totally wrong!

He's more important than a 3B that can hit 54 homers in a season?
He's more important than having a great ace starter, who throws way more innings than a closer?

Ask the Angels if they'll do A-Rod for K-Rod straight up. I bet they'll say no!

The Yankees know that as well as anyone, having had the luxury since 1997 of the services of Mariano Rivera, arguably the greatest closer ever. We spend inordinate amounts of time every year talking about the mighty Yankee offense, but the reason they’ve been in the playoffs every year since 1995 is their closer, first John Wetteland and then Rivera.

No, it's their offense. Trust me. And in the late 1990's, it was good starters supplementing that offense. If like, Rafael Soriano closed every closable game for those Yankees, you think that they don't still make the playoffs every single fucking time? Am I reading this right? Do I need glasses? With all due respect to Mariano Riviera, the inequality "Rivera > Yankees' offense" completely results in the collapse of mathematics as we know it.

I guess other than that, this paragraph wasn't completely and totally horrible.

Rivera got his start as Wetteland’s set-up man, and after the Yanks won the 1996 World Series, they let Wetteland go to Texas and handed the job over to Rivera. He’s done pretty well with it ever since.

And that, friends, is why Joba Chamberlain should be in the bullpen, and not a starter.

Get to the point, please.

But Rivera is 38 years old, and even though the Pinstripes gave him a three-year contract in the off-season, it’s foolish to think he’ll still be the Sandman at age 41. I’ve been wrong on Rivera a lot, and I don’t think there’s been a season in the last three or four when I haven’t said his end is near. So I’m not going to make any dire predictions other than to point out the obvious: he’s getting old and won’t last forever.

What’s notable about Rivera is that the Yankees brought him up through their farm system. They’ve gone everywhere for starting pitching and position players, but Rivera has been there year in and year out.

Still looking for Chamberlain-related information.......

Lord knows where the team would have been if they didn’t have them and had pursued their usual course of hiring over-the-hill free agents with bloated salaries to do the job. But I’d say you can get an idea by checking out what Billy Wagner has done for the Mets — or is that to the Mets.

Billy Wagner, in 2 seasons as a Met: 2.43 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, 74 saves. Time to start earning that bloated salary, Billy. Stop doing things to the Mets and start doing things for the Mets.

(::sigh::, this is truly pathetic, and almost getting boring actually. He's wrong like every paragraph. HatGuy takes all the thrill out of searching the internet 30 hours a week for a dumb sportswriter comment.....there's no suprise element here.)

Last year, as Rivera’s set-up man, Chamberlain pitched 24 innings in 19 games. He gave up just 12 hits and one earned run while striking out 34; his ERA was 0.38. I submit those are better numbers than he would have had as a starter.

You mean that if Chamberlain threw 200 or some other amount of innings that wasn't a ridiculously small sample, he WOULDN'T have lower than a 0.38 ERA? Bravo, Cappy Hattington, you're a king among writers!

And you know what? If Chamberlain stays in the bullpen, I'm sure his ERA will never rise higher than that, because 24 innings is a totally reliable and perfect sample size to determine the true quality of a pitcher's performance in his role.

(I almost wonder if he tries to be stupid this much, because he never gives an interesting viewpoint, and I only read his columns beacuse of said stupidity. Maybe that's how he achieves a following. Kinda like a less angry Mariotti.)

I understand the Yankees thinking. They’re tired of old and overpriced starters like Kevin Brown and Randy Johnson who are no longer reliable and spend too much time on the disabled list.

Equivalent to saying, "Listen Yankees, I understand your thinking. You have tons of past precedent to warn you against using awful, old guys in your starting rotation, but..."

Going into this season, they have two old-timers — Mike Mussina, whose effectiveness has been declining,

That's generous even for Mussina.

and Andy Pettitte, still a premier left-hander.

Above-average. Not premier. Ask me how long he's going to keep a 4.05 ERA with a 1.43 WHIP. Not gross luck, but still lucky.

The rest of the starting rotation will be Chien-Ming Wang, Hughes and Kennedy. Chamberlain is supposed to be there to step in when someone gets injured or proves ineffective.

Read: After Mike Mussina turns in like 5 horrid starts.

The bullpen needs him from the get-go. Rivera is the one reliable arm out there, with the mercurial Kyle Farnsworth as his set-up man. After him is LaTroy Hawkins, signed from the Rockies in the off-season, who returned the favor by signing the Yankees’ reliever Lius Vizcaino.

Except starting pitching is way more important. You forgot that, Mikey. Unless there's something with Chamberlain's style or mechanics that makes him personally a better pitcher as a reliever, he should start if he's good enough to. Except you aren't arguing those things. So I am not required by law to listen to you.

And that’s about it for the Yankee pen. Oh, there’ll be plenty of bodies out there and there’ll be plenty of people who’ll get to try out in camp, but the pen was thin last year and it’s not really better this year. It’s not nearly enough, especially if anything happens to Rivera

The rotation was noticably thin last year too. It's perfectly reasonable to think that randomly, one of the Yankees' 5 relievers besides Rivera will turn in an adequate set-up-man-ish season. It's much harder for a starter to "luck" into having a good season.

As long as Chamberlain is starting the year in the bullpen, why not keep him there? He can set up and he can save Rivera from having to pitch in back-to-back games or in three games in four days. And he can learn at the foot of the master himself.

Alternatively, he can save Mike Mussina or whoever else might be ineffective from causing every 5th game to be a highly probable loss.

If Rivera goes down, Chamberlain’s there. If Rivera keeps rolling, Chamberlain can help keep is that way by taking some of the load off of him. Keep Mo’s innings and appearances down, and the chances that he’ll last to the end of his contract improve.

So that's the motive. Sacrifice innings pitched for a good young pitcher so that a closer on his last leg has slightly greater odds of pitching out his contract. Because Joba might spell him 5 separate instances throughout the season.

I know it’s a huge sacrifice in the short term to put a potentially great starter in the pen at the age of 22 to be a back-up and an insurance policy. But I’m not sure how smart it is to have three kids in the starting rotation of a team that wants to win – now.

It's smarter to have Mike Mussina, who seems to have lost all his talent in the rotation, than to put in a pitcher who would probably do much better than him. The reason? Because of Joba Chamberlain's age. Having 3 young kids in the rotation destroys your team, regardless of pitching ability. Make a note, GMs.

And before you start asking about how smart it is to sacrifice a potentially great starter to the bullpen, ask yourself where Boston would be without closer Jonathan Papelbon, a highly promising young starter who was forced to the closer role by injury and then chose to stay there.

They're still a team with very good offense and very good starting pitching. Then they have Okajima close, and Manny Declarmen/Brendan Donnelly sets up. Where does that put Boston? If it's not the same place, it's damned close.

It’s the most important job in baseball.

Completely and totally false.

The Yankees got a kid who’s showed he can fill it. Leave him there.

I can't wait to see what you write when Chamberlain puts up a 4.00 ERA over his next 24 innings.