It’s difficult not to love April. Seasons end. Playoffs begin. The sun begins to shine. Cherry blossoms bloom. Life begins anew. John Canzano calls Paul Allen out.
A well-known harbinger of spring is the panic meter reaching seven on a ten-point scale for fans of the….
Boston Red Sox. The 2012 baseball season has yet to put 20 games in the rear-view mirrors of most teams, but Red Sox Nation is already keeping crisis hot lines busy. Second baseman Nick Punto described a Red Sox season as “162 one-game series,” or, for those of us who aren’t Red Sox fans, “162 games to revel in Schadenfreude at the expense of Red Sox Nation.”
JUMP!! JUMP!! JUMP!!
I’d suggest that New England needs to take a collective deep breath and relax, but it’s tough to do that when your team is managed by….
Bobby Valentine. It’s either feeding an outsized ego or brilliantly becoming the focus of criticism to protect his players, but Valentine’s never been a wallflower. His skill and sagacity when it comes to managing a baseball team is without question. His desire to play well with others…is often nowhere to be found. To call Valentine a lightning rod would be an injustice to lightning rods. Wherever he goes, he attracts scrutiny like a chocolate chip cookie in a room full of hungry Cub Scouts.Managing in hyper-passionate Red Sox Nation would test the sanity and balance of the most well adjusted minds. Hiring Valentine was akin to bringing gasoline into close proximity with a burning match. The only question was when combustion would occur. It didn’t take long, as Valentine seemed to publicly question the commitment of Kevin Youkilis, a virtual deity to Red Sox Nation. At least that’s how most fans took his statements. As challenging as things have been, at least Valentine doesn’t have problems like….
Ozzie Guillen, whose special gift is making Bobby Valentine look self-effacing. When Guillen was hired by the Marlins, no one warned about the few simple rules for living in Miami:
- Have a hurricane evacuation plan handy.
- Always wear sunscreen
- Learn to love Cuban food.
- Never, EVER say ANYTHING (positive or otherwise) about Fidel Castro in front of an open microphone. EVER.
I enjoy Guillen’s veracity and disdain for political correctness. He’s as honest as he is profane and entertaining. He’s also something of a loose cannon, and anyone hiring him had best keep a skilled PR guru on call 24/7.
The idea of Ozzie Guillen creating controversy is hardly surprising- just ask the Chicago White Sox. That he would so openly praise Castro in a city with the largest Cuban Diaspora in the world was stunning. Outside of Florida, Guillen’s praise of Castro was greeted with raised eyebrows and thoughts along the lines of “Well, that’s just Ozzie being Ozzie.” In Miami? Imagine the hue and cry if the mayor of Jerusalem had given an interview extolling the virtues of Adolf Hitler. Before long, people would be looking for ways to tear him apart, sort of like what’s happening to….
Robert Griffin III. Hey, didja hear that RGIII is selfish? Yeah, an “unnamed scout” has said that RGIII has “a selfish streak”…so it MUST be true, right? I have it on good authority (they wish to remain anonymous) that “unnamed sources” are never wrong. And so RGIII is rudely initiated into the pettiness and jealousy of professional sports. You’re either trying to work your way up…or stay on top while protecting your backside from those who’d love nothing more than to see you fall.
And why is “a selfish streak” even considered a bad thing? What top-flight athlete isn’t at least a little bit selfish? When last I checked, the one thing most highly successful athletes have in common is a single-minded focus and determination to be the best. If that’s selfishness, then most professional athletes are guilty as charged…and we as fans should be grateful for that.
If you’re willing to exit the realm of the selfish for the domain of the self-absorbed, say hello to….
Andrew Bynum. You can’t really call Bynum selfish, because that would imply a degree of focus and commitment this 24-year-old man-child lacks. When I think of Bynum, the first few words that come to mind are all variations of “immature.” When he applies himself, he can be a monster, as evidenced by his recent 30-rebound game. When he doesn’t, you get Bynum heaving up three-pointers in the late stages of a close game and costing his team a “W.” You also get Bynum speaking to the press after that game as if he didn’t have a care in the world, saying that he might just do the same thing again should the opportunity arise.
Can you say “coach killer?”
It’s surprising that Kobe Bryant, easily the most “selfish” player of this or any other generation, puts up with Bynum’s immaturity. Bryant has to know that the Lakers will go only as far as Bynum takes them. So why isn’t he riding the Lakers’ seven-foot head case like a rented mule? Or is it that Kobe just isn’t up to the task of babysitting Bynum now that Derek Fisher is plying his trade in Oklahoma City? The Lakers clearly miss Fisher’s professionalism. Without his ability to lead by example, Bynum seems far more likely to lose what little focus he has.
No one should be feeling sorry for the Lakers; things could always be worse. All they have to do is look 964 miles to the north (the distance between Staples Center and the Rose Garden) to see what a team in disarray really looks like. I’m referring, of course, to our very own….
Portland Trailblazers. To call the Blazers a mess would be doing a disservice to the disheveled. The Blazers are a team with no focus, no direction, and no point guard, dominant rebounder, or reliable shooter. Greg Oden and Brandon Roy were lost before training camp even started, yet somehow the team managed to employ enough smoke and mirrors to go 7-2 out of the gate. Life was good. Fans speculated excitedly about how far the Blazers would go in the playoffs. That the Blazers haven’t made it out of the first round since…what, the Reagan Administration?…seemed lost on everyone.
Then reality set in as the team quit on Coach Nate McMillan. Even with the exit of Gerald Wallace and Marcus Camby, on most nights the Blazers look as if they need a nap.
I could go on at length about how Paul Allen and Larry Miller have dropped the ball…but why belabor the painfully obvious? At least we have a team- inept, disorganized, and uncommitted though it might be. That’s more than might shortly be said about the….
Sacramento Kings. I regularly ridicule the Kings in this space…because I can. I poke fun at Sacramento’s lone claim to major league sports because the Kings are truly a bush-league operation which makes the Blazers look like a well-oiled machine.
Not so very long ago, hugs were being exchanged all around between the Kings’ owners, the Maloof brothers, and Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson (himself a former NBA star). Excitement abounded. A deal had been reached to build the Kings a shiny new playpen and keep the team in Sacramento for the next 30 years. [Insert joke about 30 years in Sacramento being a sentence and not cause for celebration here.]
Or had it?
It turns out that the backslapping and champagne toasts were a wee bit premature. Negotiations snagged on…well, I’m not really sure what, but the team and the city are once again at loggerheads. Fear not, though; one city’s loss might just turn out to be another’s gain.
That cheer you heard emanating from Puget Sound was from fans of the….
Seattle SuperSonics. With a new arena planned for Seattle’s SoDo neighborhood, fans of the dear departed Sonics are thinking that maybe, just maybe….
It’s way too early to assume that Seattle will once again have an NBA team. It’s not even the only city in play (Kansas City? Anaheim?). If the NBA will put a team in Oklahoma City, what’s to stop them from putting a team in Green Bay or Anchorage?
Wherever the Kings end up, at least they’ll be playing next season, which is more than can be said for the….
Lingerie Football League. Who would’ve thought that football could ever be described as NSFW? The LFL, which has around since 2009, is basically arena football with a healthy serving of T&A…and why not? Attractive, scantily-clad women wearing shoulder pads and hockey helmets playing tackle football?
The problem with that would be…?
To call the LFL a gimmick wouldn’t begin to do justice to the league’s business model, which is proof that sex can sell ANYTHING. That said, lingerie football aficionados (or, as I like to call them, horny dateless males) will be left adrift this season. The LFL has decided to devote 2012 to exporting its product to the rest of the world, and so the league is going on a one-year hiatus. The focus this season will be on games in Australia and LFL Canada, so why not head north to catch the B.C. Angels? Just tell your wife or girlfriend you’re…um, going helicopter skiing near Whistler. Yeah, that’s it….
I’d say something about how LFL quarterbacks throw like girls, but that seems as if it should be self-evident, no?
That’s all I’ve got this week, but tune in next week for my exclusive interview with Jessica Dorrell. She’s promised to bring along her pictures of Bobby Petrino’s….
OHMIGOD…MY EYES!!!
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