June 19, 2017
Now that the Warriors have won the title and assembled what’s going to be a tyrannical dynasty for the next five years, NBA super teams are about to go to a whole new level. This starts and ends with whatever Lebron James decides. Rumors are swirling that he’s going to leave the Cavs in 2018 to join either the Lakers or Clippers. Lebron has clearly expressed an interest in playing with his banana boating buddies before his career ends, but ultimately, he needs to decide if playing with his buddies and living in a better city is more comfortable, or winning championships. Lebron, CP3, Carmelo, and Dwyane Wade still aren’t going to beat the Warriors, and it would be that much tougher playing in their division. If Lebron is really serious about adding more rings, he’d stay in the East and figure out a way to team up with All-NBA players like Kawhi Leonard and Russell Westbrook. Still, it sounds more and more like he’s LA bound in 2018, and given CP3 and Carmelo’s likelihood of landing with the Clips this summer, it gives them the upper-hand getting Lebron next summer. By the way, check out this interesting stat. As Alabama football goes, so does Lebron……
The NBA Draft is already getting wild after the Celtics traded the #1 pick to Philly over the weekend. Boston wants Josh Jackson, but it would be great to Magic screw Danny Ainge and the Celtics by taking him with the #2 pick. However, Lonzo Ball is the guy the Lakers should take with that #2 pick. Shooting and ball handling can be improved upon by every NBA player, but you can’t teach the intangibles and leadership that Lonzo will bring to the table immediately. The Lakers should also feel pretty good about the fact that suddenly, more and more players are interested in joining the franchise again. In addition to Lebron’s rumored interest, Paul George has informed the Pacers he’s leaving in 2018, and prefers the Lakers, and Damian Lillard said if he ever left the Blazers he’d strongly consider the Lakers. It’s clear that the new Laker leadership is very appealing to stars around the league.
Speaking of leadership, the Clippers shocked us by getting Jerry West to join them as a consultant last week. Every team West has joined, he’s rebuilt from the ground up due to his greatness as a talent evaluator. The Clips don’t have any draft picks to work with, so how West guides them from here will be a huge challenge. The biggest issues with West’s hiring for the Lakers, is that it means they will likely lose the talented Ryan West, Jerry’s son, from their front office. The Clips are also making headlines by attempting to build a new arena in Inglewood. Despite all this, it would be extremely “Clipper-esque” of them to make these moves and then lose Chris Paul and Blake Griffin in free agency in a couple of weeks. I still think both of them are re-signing, but when Adrian Wojnarowski says that there will be meetings with other teams and that both are going to look at their other options, I’d be a lot more nervous about losing them if I were the Clips.
Did you watch the ESPN 30 For 30 on the Lakers and Celtics rivalry? It was spectacular. It’s funny how we have all forgotten that early in Magic’s career, he was actually booed by Laker fans for getting Paul Westhead fired. We also forget some of the horrible crunch time mistakes that Magic and James Worthy made in the ’84 NBA Finals against the Celtics. I still have no idea how LA managed to lose that series. They had so much more talent and we’re a far better team. The Lakers never disrespected the Celtics the way they disrespected the Lakers. I also still feel horrible for Jerry West, who lost eight straight times in the finals to Boston. You can tell how much it bothers him to this day. Finally, there were some horrible trades in the 1980’s! The Jazz gave the Lakers the pick that gave them Magic. The Cavs gave the Lakers the pick that gave them Worthy. The Sonics gave the Celtics the pick that gave them Len Bias (despite his tragic passing). It’s almost like every NBA team had Andrew Friedman working as their GM at the time.
The Reds took more abuse from the Dodgers over the weekend than Tiger Woods took from his ex-wife beating him with a golf club. Cody Bellinger is looking like one of the best power hitters in baseball. With 19 home runs coming into Sunday, only Gary Sanchez had a better 49-game start to his career. Sanchez is only a couple of years into his career so it’s hard to benchmark Bellinger against him. I’m not sure if Bellinger is among the likes of Mark McGwire, Frank Robinson, and Albert Pujols, or among the likes of James Loney and Lance Niekro. In all likelihood he’s probably somewhere in between complete greatness and complete bust. He’s certainly helping the Dodgers more than I thought this season, but they still need pitching. Then again, so does every contending MLB team. There’s just no real quality pitchers out there that can make a difference. For those of you that say Alex Wood is an ace, let’s see if you still feel that way come October when LA actually has to give him the ball to start playoff game.
I’m not a big fan of over-analyzing the MLB draft, but considering the Angels have one of the worst farm systems in baseball, their latest draft has to be criticized. Considering the Halos have one of the best players in the history of baseball playing on their team, they should take advantage of that. Instead, they spent their 1st pick on Jordon Adell, an outfielder who probably won’t make it to the big leagues before Mike Trout hits free agency in 2020. Also considering the fact the Angels have no good young pitching, it’s disappointing that two of their first three picks were not pitchers. However, considering that the one pitcher they did pick, Santa Margarita and UCLA product Griffin Canning, has injury concerns in his back, he should fit right in with all the other injured Halos pitchers.
So we’re actually going to get a Mayweather vs McGregor fight? The only thing dumber than this fight is the people that actually spend money to watch in on Pay-Per-View. Floyd Mayweather will probably receive a $10 million bonus if he can read one page of a Dr. Seuss book during the weigh in. This is what boxing has become. A sport that has absolutely no star power anymore. A sport where nobody can even identify who the heavyweight champion of the world is. The sport is dying, and in order to save it they are giving us a boring fighter coming out of retirement against a guy who doesn’t even box. Some are saying that it’s not the fight that’s going to be entertaining, but all the talk we will have leading up to it. Those people must really enjoy funerals, because we might as well be talking about the death of what was once a great sport between now and then.
Finally, the Bachelorette will return tonight on ABC, but the real headlines have been made over the last week with the taping of The Bachelor in Paradise. As many of you probably heard, taping was suspended over some alleged sexual misconduct between the infamous Corrine and the infamous DeMario. I will spare you the details of this encounter since this is a family blog, however, keep this in mind. If you have watched The Bachelor and The Bachelorette none of this is “allegedly” surprising. Is it hard to envision Corrine engaging in wild drunk behavior and passing out? Nope. Is it hard to envision DeMario as a total player who feels “entitled” to any woman he wants and engaging in that type of behavior? Nope. Once this all gets sorted out, bring everybody back and safely resume the taping. We all watch this stuff because it’s like watching a live train wreck on television. ABC wants drama and they got it, so let’s bring it back and not complain.
