Howard Schultz’s Biggest Failure Turns Into Oklahoma City’s Greatest Success

The Oklahoma City Thunder are in the NBA Finals after fittingly eliminating the team who represent the final playoff opponents for the old Seattle Supersonics. San Antonio’s era has one of the best teams in the league is probably finished, and a Thunder squad led by a 23-year-old Kevin Durant is now the clear favorite to win a title after opening their first season in OKC with a staggering 3-29 start.

All of this should’ve been Seattle’s. Durant, James Harden, Nick Collison, and GM Sam Presti were all here when the Sonics were packing their bags and leaving Seattle and bolting for Oklahoma City. Howard Schultz took one of the NBA’s top franchises and ran it into the ground. He took a championship-winning side who had been to 3 NBA Finals in the past, and when he couldn’t get his way towards a new arena deal, he gave up and sold the Sonics to Clay Bennett, who had no intentions of keeping the team here. So what if Bennett lied? He’s a businessman … it’s practically in his blood to do so! And here he is now, NBA franchise in one of the smallest markets imaginable, and the former Sonics have matured into playoff contenders and see themselves just four wins away from winning a championship.

I’ve got no real ties to any NBA team, but it would’ve been nice to see the euphoria you saw in Oklahoma City tonight occur in Seattle. This place hasn’t been that electrified with any sports team since the Seahawks made it to the Super Bowl, which was my first year living in Washington. Now, the Seahawks are promising but for now they are still mediocre, the Mariners are terrible per usual, and the Sounders are still underachieving in MLS playoff competitions (and frankly soccer is never going to grip an American city like baseball, basketball, or football).

Howard Schultz made his money and fortune off of the vastly overpriced coffee in Seattle, and he became a mere demigod in these parts. Now? He should be vilified by Sonics fans and sports fans alike, not Clay Bennett, not the Seattle government, and not completely David Stern (who is all about relocation). Schultz doesn’t care about you and never cared about the Sonics. For businessmen like him they see all of these sports franchises as a plaything, and will bail as soon as they aren’t turning over a profit or aren’t having their demands met by whomever they yell at. It’s sad for the Sonics fans, but it’s pure delight for Oklahoma City, who have shown some fantastic support for their team the last couple of years.

As for the actual basketball? The Oklahoma City Thunder are what the Nash-era Phoenix Suns should’ve been. They’re my favorite team to watch right now. It’s not just their talent, they’re so young, so entertaining, and could easily be a perennial contender over the next several years as long as they keep the core lineup of Durant, Harden, and Westbrook, no matter how often the role players and specialists like Thabo Sefalosha change.

I really can’t bring myself to cheer for the Boston Celtics and probably not the Miami Heat, so I say this without hesitation – Go Thunder!

Miami Heat Up 2-1-1 in Best of 7 After Tying With Boston Celtics Last Night

There was no overtime last night in Boston. Your eyes were playing tricks on you. Portland, Maine’s WMTW has sorted everything out for you! Sports anchor Meghan Torjussen and her equally dimwitted producer deduced that like any other NBA game, an even score after four quarters of basketball means it ends in a tie!

The Heat avoid going back to Miami tied 2-2, instead they take their talents back to South Beach up 2-1-1. But wait! Game 2 also ended in overtime didn’t it? So that means this series is DEADLOCKED at 1-1-2 and if it even reaches the 2-2-3 line after game 7, they might have to go to a game 8, 9, and beyond until they find a winner!

And no, there is no defending a SPORTS ANCHOR for not having the immediate common sense to know no NBA game can end in a tie. I’m not passing that off as a Donovan McNabb-esque mistake, that entire clip reeks of not knowing the game. This is another one of several high-profile goofs by local TV stations across the country, including an LA anchor who was certain the Kings had the ball in the NHL playoffs, and a New York affiliate believing the New York Islanders are playing the Kings in the Stanley Cup Final.

Now if you’ll excuse me, the Oklahoma City Sonics are playing the San Antonio Spurs in game 5 of the NBA Western Conference Final……

The Los Angeles Lakers Are Old, So They Reportedly Sign Rasheed Wallace

If you wonder why the Lakers have a worse record than the Clippers and a paltry 6-12 road record as we head into the NBA All-Star Break, it’s because they’re just old. Kobe Bryant is old and surrounded by several journeymen even older. There are only 5 players on their roster under the age of 30. When you realize that Devin Ebanks (22 years old) is on D-League assignment, it’s really just 4 who are in their 20s. So what do they do? Sign the youthful Rasheed Wallace!

However, a front office executive whose team has had both internal and external discussions about Gasol, said the addition of Wallace will only be to strengthen their bench.

“His days as a starter in this league are gone,” said the source. “I think he knows that, and so do the Lakers. But think about it. Of the big men that are available, is there one that’s really better? And if he’s gotten himself in shape, adding him becomes a huge get for them.”

As for the Celtics, Boston had no interest in reuniting with Wallace when word spread that he was planning to make a comeback. And that lack of disinterest, CSNNE.com has learned, was mutual.

Wow. Rasheed and Ron Artest Metta World Peace on the same team? After all of these years away from that infamous brawl in Detroit? That should be fun. It’s certainly the only reason this signing is any bit of interest to anyone. Especially an LA Lakers team arguably with less personality than the Clippers just on their extremely boring coach.

If you’re keeping score, once this signing is official (probably after All-Star weekend), the average age of the Lakers subtracting Ebanks due to his D-League assignment would be…..

30.0 years

Amazingly, that still would not make them the oldest team in the NBA, and currently they’re behind the Atlanta Hawks and Dallas Mavericks in that department. That’s absurd. But in fairness, they’re going to make the playoffs bar a collapse and the Mavericks did win it all as the oldest team in the 2011 NBA postseason. Maybe the difference is that the Mavericks aren’t reliant exclusively on Dirk Nowitzki like the Lakers are with Kobe Bryant. Who is going to save that ship? Josh McRoberts? Jason Kapono? Troy Murphy? Give me a break. I eagerly await Rasheed Wallace’s backup role before Kobe Bryant’s inevitable “I want out of LA” yell.

 

 

ESPN Wins Race to Make Racist Jeremy Lin Headline

Caught up in all of the hoopla over New York Knicks sensation Jeremy Lin was the race (heh heh. Get it?) to see which major news website would make some stupid headline based on Lin’s Asian background. If you had ESPN in your office pool, you won.

Late last night ESPN’s wisecracking writers needed to find a way to sum up Lin’s nine turnovers in the Knicks’ 89-85 loss to the awful New Orleans Hornets. Well sure enough they picked the worst possible racial slur to use.

I’m sorry, but this is intentional. The whole mystique of Jeremy Lin being good at basketball and Asian seems to be throwing these journalists off. Just the fact that this headline didn’t go through any checks and balances and was actually published should result in a firing. “Chink in the Armor” is a fairly common phrase, but the slur “Chink” is one of the worst racial slurs for people of Chinese descent. The headline couldn’t have possibly been a remark about a potential flaw in Lin’s game. It reeks of pure ignorance and insensitivity if you ask me.

ESPN apologized for this “gaffe” and removed the title earlier this morning, but it’s a fairly empty apology when you think about it.

If it’s not Jason Whitlock making “Asian men have tiny penises” joke, it’s ESPN trying to write a clever headline and turning it into a racist statement. This is the kind of thing that comes when a player of a certain race/ethnic background comes into a sport where their race/ethnicity does not traditionally perform well, and then proceeds to play impressively. Tiger Woods being a golfing star in a predominantly white sport to this day still brings out racist remarks from people like his ex-caddie Steve Williams. And golf is probably the most exclusionary sport on the planet. Black hockey player Wayne Simmonds of the Philadelphia Flyers had a banana thrown his way in a preseason hockey game in Ontario last October in the middle of a penalty shootout. Lin is an Asian-American playing guard –as opposed to many other Asian basketball players who have played center — in a sport now dominated by black players, and is performing beyond anyone’s expectations for an undrafted player out of Harvard. It seems to be stupefying to people because they have a preset stereotype that Asians aren’t good at basketball.

It’s not a shock that this kind of issue is now being discussed because chances are most Americans seem to skirt around talking about the racial issues we still have today. No, it didn’t go away just because we elected Barack Obama as President. This is still an ongoing problem and needs to be addressed as such. And it applies to every race from black to white to Asian to purple people eaters.

The media needs to lay off of Jeremy Lin for just one second. They act so childishly and that’s exactly why you can’t even blur the line from what bloggers write compared to credentialed, supposedly qualified journalists. Drop these dumbass “Linsanity” puns and actually write something interesting about him for once. Let his impressive play in a revived career speak for itself instead of trying to force-feed lame jokes and cheap puns and pass it off as reporting.

Between Tebowmania and Linsanity I think it’s evident to me that American mainstream media is just too incompetent to actually report. These last few months are exactly why the average person looks towards blogs and other outlets for their news and sports information. The media is not good at their job and they’ve shown zero signs of improvement.

NBA Cancels First Two Weeks of Regular Season

David Stern canceled the opening two weeks of the 2011-12 NBA season due to the lockout between owners and the increase in money they want.

…..And with the Detroit Lions improving to 5-0, the ALCS and NLCS on the same day, plus the endless talk of Tim Tebow, not a damn was given.

Seriously, if you need your basketball fix, go watch college hoops to fill up the time.

Congratulations to the 2011 NBA Champions – Dallas Mavericks!