Bawful After Dark: March 30, 2010

This picture has nothing to do with anything
We just need something to take our minds off the Nyets' victory
(Via Andy Gray's SI Vault)
While I am currently not too happy with the San Antonio Spurs, I still like them, and still root for Tim Duncan. In related news, I just got done reading this article by Dan Shaughnessy about Tim Duncan. Basically, Shaugnessy gives Duncan almost no credit simply because he isn't exciting to watch and plays for a small market. What??

Look, I hate trying to rank players, especially since generational differences make it impossible to truly compare people in a fair fashion. (Thanks to rules changes, defenses reacting to offensive trends and vice versa, etc., the style of ball played in the '60s is vastly different from the style of ball played now. Likewise, the style of ball played today is vastly different even from the style played just five years ago!). That being said, when a player has 20,000 points, 10,000 rebounds, 2,000 blocks and 2,500 assists, you can pretty safely call them one of the best players of all time. (Fine, maybe not "Top 10," but you don't just immediately dismiss him!) Tim Duncan has won a ton of hardware and rings with the Spurs, and him controlling the paint and simply dominating the glass for years is a big part of the equation. No flash, no frills, just pure excellence.

Shaugnessy decided to go watch Duncan play in person the other night (at Boston, natch). Of course, watching Duncan now to form your opinion about him isn't very wise when obviously that'll skew things because Duncan's past his prime, and is declining rapidly, as all basketball players -- and particularly big men -- are wont to do after so many years in the league. It's sad. I still love Timmy D, and he's still a good player, but he's fairly obviously not the same player he was just two or three years ago. But ridiculous articles like Shaugnessy's just make me die a little inside.

In lighter news, I'm sure you've often wondered why I don't watch women's basketball. (What do you mean you've never ever wondered that before? Just humor me for a minute.) This is just one more reason for me to ignore it. This goes beyond your standard bawful fare and goes straight into "EPIC FAIL" territory:


Yes, Xavier senior Dee Dee Jernigan missed two consecutive wide open layups to blow an easy trip to the Final Four. Missing free throws is bad enough, but missing two straight layups when nobody is within the same zip code as you to defend the shot? Come on.

Worst of the Night in Pictures:

The reach-around for the nipple grab is just the icing on the cake

Of all the awkward, mildly homo-erotic high fives I've seen over the years, this has to be near the top of the list
Nationally Televised Games:
Suns at Bulls: Okay, I feel bad about stat cursing the hell out of the Spurs last night and ruining history. However, as noted by godhimself48 in the comments, Derrick Rose just pulled a Devin Harris and may have stat cursed the hell out of his Bulls in an interview with ESPNChicago.com after Tuesday morning's shootaround.

"We're still going to make it. You can't think about stuff like [not making the playoffs]. In my mind, we'll be making the eighth spot. We'll be playing LeBron -- playing Cleveland."

Ruh roh.

All The Other Games:
Kings at Pacers: Eww. The Purple Paupers are injury-riddled (Dominic McGuire's out for the season! Oh no!) and the Pacers are rolling. This could be their longest home winning streak since the '03-'04 season. And I still can't explain it.

Thunder at 76ers: Speaking of bad teams winning for no obvious reason, the Sixers have taken down the Hawks and Bucks in their past two games. What gives? Are the playoff-bound teams being hypnotized into thinking they're really just the Nets by some broke guy who does hypnotizing comedy shows who is trying to make up for some earlier gambling losses? I'm ready to believe almost anything at this point.

Clippers at Bucks: John Salmons is the East's sixth-leading scorer in March. Conversely, he only averaged like 4 points per game when I had him on my fantasy team a couple seasons ago for a few weeks. What's the deal, Fishman?

Wizards Generals Bullets at Rockets: The Bullets still haven't won a game in the month of March, and they only have two more chances: this game, and tomorrow night at New Orleans. It's like the Nyets and Bullets did a Trading Places-esque switch for an entire month, except one team is downtrodden and awful, and the other team is slightly less downtrodden and slightly less awful. Not quite the Winthorpe/Valentine difference, but still a decided class difference.