Artest drops bombs like Hiroshima

I’m a couple days late on this, but if you haven’t seen how Artest handles his post-series press conference, it’s worth checking out.

It’s refreshing to see a professional athlete engage in self deprecating humor after years of harsh barbs from The Big Insecurity and primetime smug-rule Peyton Manning commercials.

If Stan Van Gundy had called Shaq The Big Insecurity when they were feuding a couple months ago, it would have stuck forever and Van Gundy would have been a more unanimous winner than That Bird and Pacquiao put together.

Also, Simmons is now on twitter, for those of you who care about that sort of thing.  It’s thesportsguy33.

Oh, I almost forgot.  Cry me a river, Joakim Noah.  Woot.

Van Gundy Strikes Again

If you were a dead ringer for Ron Jeremy, you'd be emotive too.

Stan Van Gundy (The portly Magic coach, not the skinny ex-coach-turned-broadcaster), has hot fire to spit at all times. After taking on Shaq less than a month ago (and 100% without a doubt winning when he said, “Shaq’s a sensitive guy”), he’s going after the Knicks organization for not hiring Patrick Ewing as their head coach.

Okay, this is not really much of a story. It’s mostly an excuse to talk about the Van Gundy’s. Patrick is probably equipped to be a big man coach (Yao Ming and Dwight Howard are his most notable projects, and theyre the consensus 1-2 centers in the league), but he’s not yet ready to be a head coach, probably. He seems to not have Van Gundy’s own brand of externally directed competitiveness yet. And Phil Jackson he aint. I’m sure he’ll get hired in a few years. Meanwhile, let’s bring him to DC and have him cut his teeth on JaVale McGee and the rest of our clowns (I think an ESPN article alludes to this possibility, but I can’t remember which one).

Anyway, I love the Van Gundy’s, they are an endless font of criticism and vitality. This is part of what makes the NBA so great … in the NFL, the only off-field discourse involve steroids, cheating, crime, and whiny players quitting on their teams. In the NBA, there’s constant internal criticism, conspiracy theories, and trash talk. All Star Weekend, long known as the Black Super Bowl (Thank you Simmons & Adande), is incredibly entertaining, and clearly designed for the fans’ enjoyment, as this year’s inclusion of a HORSE game between KD, OJ Mayo, and Joe Johnson obviates. It is the opposite of the No Fun League. I hope this doesn’t die when Shaquille retires and Kobe loses his vitriol. Though with this supremely unfunny bowling clip, The Big Insecurity is definitely showing his age.

Update: Totally forgot to make my primary point … the Knicks got Mike D’Antoni, only the wizard behind the most entertaining playstyle on the planet.  What did they want Patrick Ewing for?  Defense and rebounding can go to hell, this is New York City.

Shaq vs Kobe II

Van Gundy (I think) said Nash looked like a Jonas brother. This bears repeating. (AP Photo/Paul Connors)

It’s tough to look at the box score and not feel that Shaq & Kobe were kind of trying to make statements.

Also, the Lake Show seems to enjoy running with the Suns.  Watching them stop exerting effort altogether on defense as soon as the Suns SSOL2 got going can’t have made Phil Jackson particularly happy.  Is there something better to call that than SSOL2?

This is also a game in which the Lakers probably missed Bynum.