Blogrolling: You Down With Oh, Pee, Pee... Pee

Can you really break your penis? is the actual title and sum and substance of this real, actual page from Scientific American. Kudos to them for the image selection of the year on this, and by all means, go get yourself informed. The penis you save may be your own!

Nick Underhill drinks the Royals Kool-Aid. I'm pretty sure that he does this every year. Just make Greinke start every game!

Republican Answer Man Bobby Jindal is an exorcising machine. The power of Jebus compels you!

The Marbury Era for the Celtics with startlingly awful loss to the Clippers, and then a DUI for reserve Gabe Pruitt. Starbury Fever, Celtics Fan -- Catch It!

Just in time for the NCAA tournament, here's the site -- FanWagon -- that's a great directory for true-blue fan Web blogs of major colleges. Especially valuable for trash talking the opposition with time efficiency!

And finally, Punch-Out! comes out for the Wii on May 18. I predict many controller related injuries, and at least five frothing media reports with "IS THE WII KILLING OUR CHILDREN???" style headlines...

By Blogfrican Law, I Must Inform You...

1) Tiger Woods played golf today.

2) Celtic Fan is officially worried about the start of the Starbury Era, since he would be the first unlikable player to ever wear the laundry

3) Nate Robinson and Will Ferrell are Verry Verry Specail Fwiends!, and

4) A-Rod got booed, hit a home run, drove away with his shady cousin and then *totally* had sex with Madonna.

After Teh Sex was over, I heard they injected a baby seal with HGH until this happened...



Or maybe that was just me...

And Blogfrica Weeps

Where were you when Lennon was shot? The Challenger explosion? 9/11? And now, the new touchstone -- when you heard the news that Stephon Marbury was waived?

Me, I was at my computer, wondering how future generations would see us... for making such a grand hullabaloo over a terrible, terrible basketball player.

Anyway, he belongs to the ages now, along with the tens of millions of Spice Girls and Britney Spears CD buyers, everyone who camped out for "The Phantom Menance", and people who voted for Bush twice.

Good night, sweet prince, and may angels speed you to the Celtics, so that they too do not win a playoff series...

Hunky Blogrolling: Will Brinson, Starbury, Drunk Severed Leg Guy, Sexy Flanders and Hugo

I know for a fact that Will worked like a dog on these MLB previews for the Fanhouse for you ingrates. The least that you monsters can do is read them, and tell him that he looks cute in that apron. Is that so much to ask? WELL? IS IT?

I'm not prepared to live in a world where Stephon Marbury is kind of likable and doing improv with a blogger. But then again, he's got the money to buy a personality.

Quick Hit with the story of a drunk hockey fan winning a couple of million for a severed leg from a subway running over him. The blogger sees it as a clear case of drunk idiot gets paid, but personally, as a guy who rides the subway, I'm a little happy to hear that the train driver is actually supposed to watch for bodies on the tracks. Because I ride those rails, and sometimes you see neat stuff down there...

Is Ned Flanders the sexiest animated character on television? Some things that are clicked cannot be unclicked.

What Hugo Chavez watches when he's not big on the WBC; the man's big on those Georgia Dawgs. Included here just to make one regular reader's head explode, and to impress my fellow socialists by having a 2 Hugo Week. (Best week ever? Yes.) This also counts as my state-mandated one college football link per year.

Epic Drop: Top 10 ways for the Knicks to resolve the Stephon Marbury situation

I know, I know, the last thing you want from me is more about a guy that doesn't play, shouldn't play, and won't make any difference to anyone but the Dolan's bottom line... but there is something about this man and experience that makes people just go batshit loco. I've heard people actually talk about how this is the Knicks' fault for not just paying him to go away, and how since the Starchild Has Been Disrespected -- may we all find such moments of disrespect! -- the Knicks are merely reaping what they sow.

To which I have only one question...

Are Marbury's checks clearing, and being deposited?

Because, well, if they are... he has no standing. If it's that big of a problem, if the disrespect is so egregious, just refuse the payment and walk away from your contract.

He won't, of course, because he's a sack of crap. End of story.

"I'll decide what's right for me"

The words of Stephon Marbury, a non-playing NBA player who is going to make more in this single year of refusing to provide service than anyone reading this blog will make in their entire life.

The NY Times reports that the Knicks' refusal to waive Marbury outright, seeing how he won't play and they are on the hook for his $21.9 million this year, is "costing them in the court of public opinion." You see, the fact that there are only two healthy guards on the roster (Nate Robinson, the third, is banged up, and Cuttino Mobley, the fourth, hasn't reported since their salary dump move of Zach Randolph to the Clips since the Knicks have subsequently discovered that he's got a heart problem -- shocking, isn't it, that there is a player on the Clippers with a heart problem)... well, the public blames the Knicks for this whole thing.

If only they had treated a coach killer, team cancer, bad shooter and defensive liability better, he might be willing to deign the court with his presence right now. And if they only had decided to eat his entire contract so that he could go play for some other franchise (presumably while actually caring, at least in games where he could wreak his terrible vengeance on the Knicks), they could have some replacement level scrub to run around and provide bench minutes until they can get their roster straightened out.

Left out in this remarkable state of affairs -- seriously, have you ever heard of a situation in which the highest paid player in a league might also be its worst actual asset -- is any lingering bitterness or distaste for the people who are really to blame for this.

That'd be Stephon Marbury, who is personally destroying whatever positive public image the NBA might be hoping to generate during a remarkably competitive year with exceptional teams. It'd also be Isiah Thomas, the worst general manager in the history of sports, who traded for and paid out the nose for this waste of sperm and dignity. And it would be Knicks owner James Dolan, who cuts the checks for all of this, and gave Thomas the keys to the vault.

How bad has it gotten? Even Starbury's teammates (Quentin Richardson, for the record) are calling him out now. Funny, but leaving everyone else in the lurch while you make more money than all of them isn't exactly appreciated by the other folks who are, you know, actually attempting to win games. Who would have thunk it?

Oh, and one last thing... Dolan makes his money from Cablevision, the service provider here in the Shooter Space. So I'm to blame, too, and some part of my monthly bill is going to Starbury's coffers. Hell, maybe that's why they raised my bill last month. Damn you, Starbury!

Shameless

To left is frequent blog hero Stephon Marbury, owner of the largest contract in the NBA this year. He's also someone who, honestly, is authoring one of the greatest thefts in the history of American labor this year.

You see, Stephon isn't a very good basketball player, but he makes up for it by being a much worse human being. While the rest of his teammates have embraced new coach Mike D'Antoni and his up-tempo style to a 7-6 record and an outside shot at the playoffs a year after being unspeakably awful, Stephon's decided it's Time To Be Elsewhere. Mostly because, well, D'Antoni decided first, and didn't give him any minutes.

This week, the Knicks have decided to lose the high-priced parts of their team that had any market value at all (Zach Randolph and Jamal Crawford). With the new members of their team not yet present, D'Antoni went to Starbury and more or less gave him the opportunity for meaningful minutes, for the first time this year. It's obvious that there is no real role for him in New York, but what the hey, he's playing for his next contract. Best to show that he's still got something to offer here.

Instead, Marbury refused to play.

Yeah, let me repeat that. He's getting paid THE MOST MONEY IN THE NBA, but refused to play.

And to think, I thought that NBA didn't have a great union, given how badly they got played in the 50-game lockout year.

Now, a small question for the rest of the Knicks roster... is there some reason why you aren't, for starters, setting his clothes on fire in the locker room? Here you are, playing your guts out, and here's this morose sack of garbage just *sitting* there. How do you not, you know, go to work on that?

Only in New York

OK, let me get this straight... the New York Knicks have been a terrible, terrible basketball team for as long as Stephon Marbury has been there.

Mike D'Antoni, the new head coach of the team who is a dead solid lock to be there longer than Starbury, comes to town. His entire game is based on quick and good percentage shots and running. Starbury's game, such as it is, is based on breaking down his man one-on-one and showing the world how good he can be.

He's also, and this is important, an utterly terrible defensive player, and a guy who makes the players around him worse, since he's, well, a loon and a cancer. We won't even get into the volumes of off-court insanity that he brings to the table, or the contributions that he's made to the circus atmosphere that was the Isiah Thomas harassment trial. (Speaking of another guy the Knicks would be better off without being in the same time zone...)

So D'Antoni gets the win in his first game, at home. The Knicks score 125 and are entertaining for the first time in forever. And the story is... Idiot Knicks Fans chanting for Marbury, and the press hounding D'Antoni over the DNP-CD. Then, a day later, Starbury being placed on the inactive list.

Look, let me make this simple for everyone. Independent of the $22 million that Marbury will make this year, he's a terrible basketball player. If he's your starting point guard, you are going to lose. A lot.

If the Knicks want to win games, they should not let him anywhere near their basketball team. Oh, and the same goes for Eddy Curry, too.

D'Antoni knows this. Anyone who has watched the Knicks with a functioning brain knows this. So... why is anyone chanting for him to get burn again?

The New York Knicks In Microcosm

Actual true story -- Nate Robinson, the undersized back-up non-point guard for the Isiah Thomas Knicks, and the worst slam dunk champion in this or any other era, had his jersey retired.

In a summer league. The mind boggles.

I'm trying to figure out an equivalent moment to this in any other sport, and, well, failing. Anyone want to work out a Preseason Football Hall of Fame? The Hasselbeck Wing needs to happen. A Spring Training Ring of Honor? The Temp Employee Of The Off-Season Awards at Tim Horton's for the NHL?

(Yes, Canadian Reader, I know all about your shameful morning secret. I also know that you are a Bacon Donut away from being as obese as my fellow Americans. Feel free to respond with polite outrage with incorrect vowel usages in the comments.)

But getting back to Nate the Late... I can't think of a better single person to denote the Isiah Era. He's flashy, physically gifted, has no clue how to play, doesn't help you unless his shot is falling and a car wreck defensively. Oh, and he makes his teammates worse, since his 1 on the World forays make any big man think twice about running or covering for his man when he blows by him on defense.

But thanks to his extraordinary focus on piling up numbers in minutes (games, and as this fire alarm accented moment of honor shows, leagues) that don't matter, Nate's a fan favorite among the truly clueless. Thanks to the worst contract in professional sports (Stephon Marbury, the poster child for talent that doesn't win games), he's also a more intriguing option than the "starter." (I put that in quotes, because after last year's experience, I can't imagine any NBA team wants to give the Starchild the keys to the car ever again.)

And, most importantly, no one will ever wear the number four in that summer league ever again. That's Knick-tastic!

Waiter, Checks Please

This is how much fun the Knicks season has become... even on the very rare occurrence that they win, they lose. Starchild Marbury watched Sunday's game from the locker room with the Knicks' other inactive players, due to what the team first reported was a sore ankle, and is now starting to be More Than That.

First, I want to imagine the atmosphere around the Knicks' inactive players. Is it festive, since they are men of leisure, millionaires, relatively anonymous and living the high life in Funtown New York... or is it funereal and cutthroat, because not being good enough to play for this team has to be a grand and telling statement that you are Not Long for a career in professional basketball? I'm surprised someone hasn't written an excruciating ESPN teleplay about it, really.

Now, getting back to the Heart-Eating Bacteria that seems to be sapping the Knicks of their phenomenally expensive loser point guard... normally this would seem the kind of crap your kid would pull when they wanted out of school. But given how incompetent the Knicks are on and off the court, maybe it's more. After all, wouldn't Isiah hire medics of a like, um, for lack of better word, mind?

Finally, there's this: on most NBA teams, the veterans on bad NBA teams do not impress one with effort once they are out of contention. Injuries become chronic, day to day becomes week to week, and Gosh Darn It All, I want to get out there and help us finish the year strong, but this chronic condition is just making it impossible. But don't worry, I'm working out like a madman so that I'll be even better next year!

Now, even on the best of franchises that are not frequent visitors to the Seacaucus Bowl of Failure known as the Draft Lottery, this happens and no one much cares, because it's a nice way to see if the young players on the bench have anything to offer. But it usually happens in March and April... not mid-January, when a team is presumably still mathematically capable of making a run. But with this Knicks team, expertly engineered and managed to be heart-free on so many levels?

Well, let's just say that it's a good thing there's a development league. Because by the end of the year, I'm going to be surprised in the Knicks can field a team without it. (And no signing people from the stands. They won't be there either.)

We Are All Living In Isiah Thomas's House

In describing the latest attraction in the all-day circus that is the New York Knicks, Isiah Thomas had this to say about his starting point guard taking his $15 sneakers and going home, rather than stick around to get torched by Steve Nash and the Suns:

"Whatever matters we have in-house we'll try to keep in-house."

Now, I don't know if Starbury got permission to go, and won't get into the perks of a job where you get paid tens of millions of dollars and get to leave whenever you like.

But I do know this: Phoenix is nearly 2,500 miles away from New York, according to Mapquest.

Which means that Isiah's house, and the situation that he thinks has been kept in, IS THE BIGGEST HOUSE IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD... and from my seat here in New Jersey, I do believe that my house is *in* his.

Now, I have lots of papers that saw this house is my house. Which means that Isiah's claims of ownership are about as valid as his claims of competence, and that he should really be paying me money for rent. Lord knows that I'm not comfortable with Isiah having any management responsibilities in my life, but the pain of that status can fade quickly with monthly payments.

So pay up, Zeke! And none of those Red Lobster gift certificates. I want cash.

(Hey, look at it the bright side. With Jerome James, Jalen Rose, Allen Houston, Malik Rose, Steve Francis, Penny Hardaway and dozens of other travesties on your record, nobody will even notice this one.)

New Jersey Transit: Where Bad Sports Fashion Choices Live

Seen, in the last week, on my commute...

1) A guy wearing a New York Hitmen hat.

Yes, the last man in America to wear XFL gear. Wonder if there's a sub-Saharan village that's decked out in San Francisco Demon gear?

2) Two very obese guys, in their late '30s, wearing Jose Reyes and David Wright Mets jerseys.

The slightly less rotund one, being the speedier or the two, had the Reyes gamer. I'm betting he plays shortstop on his softball team.

3) A borderline homeless guy wearing a STARBURY jersey.

I checked to be sure. Not actually Starbury.

Stephon Marbury Can Not Teach All The Children

It's impossible! (Hat tip, Deadspin and SLAMOnline.)



Make sure you stay tuned long enough to hear him talk about what sounds exceptionally like incest. My flabber is gasted.