Monday, the Nets faced practice without Devin Harris (groin), Courtney Lee (groin), Chris Douglas-Roberts (swine flu), Jarvis Hayes (hamstring), Tony Battie (knee), and Yi Jianlian (knee). That's six guys, three of whom are considered vital components of the young and struggling team, leaving the squad eight players available for practice. And practice they did. Fortunately, one of Yi Jianlian's old nemeses was available to fill in and help out.
That's right. The Chairman was replaced by The Chair.
As we settle back into the season, the have-nots have not only firmly cemented their positions on the bottom rungs of the NBA ladder, but the always predictable worst-case scenarios have befallen not the privileged and entitled but the poor and needy. The Nets are not a good basketball team when at 100 percent health on a good day when the sun is shining and they took their vitamins.
So to have to start the season without their number one (Harris), number three (Yi Jianlian), and number four (CDR) options, is just cruel. These are the hands of fate, and they craft their art most cruelly.
Meanwhile, the Nets coaches are apparently getting a workout, as is the video maven for the team. Perhaps you didn't know they had a video maven. Perhaps you don't know what a video maven is. That doesn't matter right now, because today, he's helping teach weak-side off-ball containment and trying not to get knocked unconscious or worse by the dreaded curse of the 2009-2010 Nets.
On the bright side, if this team was looking for an advantage to legitimately sneak their way to the top of the lottery and the acquisition of John Wall (wait, he's a point), Derrick Favors (wait, they have Lopez), more things to trade for cap space in order to sign LeBron James (there we go), they've certainly found one. Becoming a M*A*S*H* unit isn't good for morale, or ticket sales, but if it gets you where you need to go...
The lottery is painless, it takes on many changes, and the Nets can't do anything but lose...
Comments (Page 1 of 1)
"As we settle back into the season, the have-nots have not only firmly cemented their positions on the bottom rungs of the NBA ladder, but the always predictable worst-case scenarios have befallen not the privileged and entitled but the poor and needy."
Really? Because if the playoffs started today, the L.A. Clippers that all the sportswriters love to hate would have the seventh seed in the Western Conference, despite being a have-not last year.
The media is unconcerned about evidence there is epidemic sexual harassment in the Nba/Sports/society, but gets its panties in a snit over a team excusing the absence of an athlete. Shows what the media`s priorities are, doesn`t it? Retiring, baiting and bashing, blacks, and/or older players, and reporting made for tv marital publicity stunts as if they are real. Allen Iverson could help the Nets, with both their starting guards out injured, and lots of other teams, but the media is too preoccupied with baiting the racists into bashing Iverson to think of trying to make anything better for anyone this season, and only care about signing James to the Knicks next season so the can starting bashing and baiting him for failing to be their savior.
Don Ameche is officially the only gay male in Nba history (other than Rudy Gay`s last name). But the guy who missed a dunk, allowing Ameche to be the first to score in the new millennium, Alonzo Mourning, has been kissed in public by his coach, Pat Riley. And while Michael Jordan didn`t flee after Doug Collins came up behind him and kissed him in public, Terry Mills played out his option after his coach, Collins, kissed him in public, and signed with Riley, who benched him, forced him back to Detroit, which he had left. So coach Brown coming up behind LeBron James and kissing him in public is not the first time this sort of thing has happened. It is not affection. It is not in private. It is sexual harrasment by a boss, not between consenting adults. It is illegal, on video, and they get away with it. But abuse of power, and not just by homosexuals and lesbians, is not new, but shouldn`t be tolerated just because it has been going on forever. You can guess from how many male athletes wear female jewelry in public how rampant/epidemic it is. When it is consensual, adults, affectionate, in private, it is, by law, not the public`s business. But where are the prosecutors when it is public and/or not consensual and/or against minors, and/or by abuse of power/money? Even when the prosecutors can show video of the crime they do not do their job, they do not prosecute. True homosexuals, lesbians, bisexuals, if there are any, folks who do care about their romantic partners, should be furious when these crimes are committed by straights and gays alike. So should true straights. But the crimes remain flaunted in public. Prosecutors continue to do nothing. But these prosecutors who won`t prosecute need to be jailed. Aiding and abetting mentally disordered sex offenders by deliberately refusing to enforce the law, against straight and gays alike, is a crime, being an accomplice, at least after the fact. And if folks are being falsely accused, their names need to be cleared, too. We need to be able to reasonably trust our government to obey the law and enforce or change the laws they don`t want to enforce. Criminal sexual harassment on live television is not a person`s private, personal life.
at the media`s priorities are, doesn`t it?
1. Iverson is not being "bashed" for being black. He is being criticized for the way he is conducting himself. The Grizzlies have OJ at the 2, an undersized shooting guard with a promising future, and Mike Conely at the 1, a player they are hoping can reach his considerable potential. He had to have known he was coming off the bench, I mean honestly where does an aging volume scorer who lacks a consistent jumpshot fit in with either one of those players. The only way he can be effective now, is to come off the bench and alleviate some of the offensive pressure for the second unit. Kind of like Ginobli or Jason Terry. But Iverson is an egomaniac, he has never fit in with a team that wasn't custom built to deal with his defensive deficiencies and horrendous FG% aka the 2001 Sixers, with Eric Snow (lock down defender.) Tyrone Hill (offensive rebounder.) George Lynch (Shawn Marion role) and Aaron Mckie (deep threat and defensive role player.)
2. Your comment about the media "baiting" Lebron just so they can "bash" him when fails to be their savior is ridiculous, it's laughable really. It's probably 50-50 as to where the sports writers want to see Lebron end up. The only people who want to see Lebron fail are Wizards fans and Kobe lovers, of which I am a latter and am also able to maintain an equal appreciation for Lebron's game as well.
3. Sexual harassment? Really? Where did that come from? I'm sorry, let me say that again...Sexual harassment? Really? Look buddy, you might be a homophobe who can't understand the relationship a coach carries with his team, especially with their favorite players, but there is nothing inappropriate about a man kissing another man. It is the norm in a lot of cultures. If you see Phil Jackson reach over and give Kobe a hand job during a timeout then you can complain about that one, but a kiss? I kiss my did everyday I see him. My Puerto Rican boss has kissed me and my dad both, yet here I am a perfectly healthy, married, straight man. You need to keep your nose out of other people's business, if any of those players have an issue with their coaches in regards to sexual harassment I'm sure they have enough resources to file a law suit themselves. I doubt they need you and Tim Hardaway running to their defense with you sack full Gay repellent.
1) Of course Iverson is an egomaniac, he is an aging superstar. All the folks listed by the Iverson haters whom they also hate are black. That is NOT coincidence. 2) Ask Bob McAdoo what it is like to be MVP, wooed by the Knicks, scapegoated, waived, and go on to win championships, with the Lakers. He knows all about it. 3) You have the right to consider nothing inappropriate about men kissing men. I didn`t say there was (or that there wasn`t). There are gays in more or less every culture. 99 to 97% of folks disagree with you. Maybe they are wrong. Public flouting of laws against employers sexually harrassing workers IS the public`s business.
Give me examples of a media bias against blacks in basketball, and please make them more recent than Bob McAdoo. Of course the 60's and 70's were a time of public racial hostility, but Magic and Jordan changed the game in the 80's and 90's. Of course racism still exists in America, but among the not Rush Limbaughs of the media world it is much less prevalent.
You're the racial champion here, you remember a period where segregation was not only acceptable, but even desired among both blacks and whites? That a mixing of the races was an abomination? That was a popular opinion, but hey we progress as society and look at us now, black, white, asian we all have an opportunity at the same lackluster education.
Do you think that Pat Riley is gay? Do you think that Mike Brown is gay? If I kiss a man does that make me gay? You say 97-99% think it is wrong for a man to kiss another man, but I beg to differ. Look at many cultures in the world, it is the norm for everyone to kiss everyone as a sign of respect, not to mention the progressive cultures (including some Americans) who find nothing wrong with homosexuals. You do of course understand that percent means of one hundred, so by your estimation that only 3 out of 100 people think that a man kissing a man is okay? I bet you couldn't find a subject that 5.8 trillion people agree on even if you resorted to questions like, "do you like food?"
I can't believe I'm repeating myself, but hey I don't have anything planned until 8. So why not, right? Sexual harassment cases are only relevant when the action is non-consensual. Mike Brown could mount Lebron on the scorer's table in the middle of the Eastern Conference Finals, and as long as Lebron wants to take it, Coach Brown will have nothing to fear except for indecent exposure charges. And since no such charges have been brought up between a player and a coach I would bet that no controversy exists.
Apparently, the police, prosecutors, and ACLU, are under the same misapprehension you are, being beaten down by abuse of power, by an employer forcing him or herself on an employee, or an adult forcing her or himself on a child, is consenual. The victimization is not a crime if the victimizer is a homosexual, because they think there is nothing wrong with it. A shame.