Monday Morning Coffee

January 6, 2020

The Lakers are back to beating crummy teams again, and everyone should be perfectly ok with it.  They lost 4 straight in the month of December, yet still have a 4 game lead in the West.  Kudos to the Suns on still clearly finding a way to enjoy New Year’s Eve in L.A. last week despite it being a work trip. That’s work/life balance we should all strive for.  Did Darren Collison find God already?  That was a quick retirement and search for the man upstairs, if he’s really coming back next month.  The Lake Show really needs him to help their bench.  ESPN is the new CNN when it comes to covering the Lakers.  Woj harped on the relationship Collison has with Doc Rivers because he played for him, but conveniently failed to mention he played for Frank Vogel too.

Meanwhile, The Clippers sure do have a lot of games where they don’t show up for a team whose entire ad campaign is built around how real they are.   “Earned, not given” is acting like a team in the 3rd year of a three-peat run?  Lay off Kawhi though.  He must be EXHAUSTED after playing 4 in a row!  WHY DID KAWHI PLAY 35 MINS IN A BLOWOUT AND A MEANINGLESS REGULAR SEASON GAME???  I still don’t get this bizarre load management schedule they have him on, and I’m not sure anybody other than Kawhi does because he’s the one telling the Clips what he’s doing.

My thoughts and prayers go out to the family of former NBA Commissioner David Stern, who passed away last week.  Stern’s legacy will always be remembered as the man who helped globalized the NBA, and taking it from a sport few cared about to one of the top sports leagues in the world.  Also, as much as Laker fans want to hate him for vetoing the Chris Paul trade, the Lakers are the greatest franchise in the NBA partially because Stern knew the importance of big markets during his tenure.

That was a shocking Wild Card Weekend in the NFL.  Bill Simmons is in tears right now trying to figure out how the Patriots loss is somehow like Rocky III or Road Rules Challenge.  Tom Brady was doing his best Jameis Winston impression on Saturday.  You think the dynasty is over until Belichik signs 13 new refs and finds a new way to cheat.  Patriots haven’t won a playoff game since they arrested Rich Hill.  Then there’s the Bills who choked away their game against the Texans.  Bills Mafia bought all those tables to break at the tailgate for nothing.  I feel terrible for Drew Brees, but you can always count on the Saints and their fans complaining that the refs screwed them instead of holding themselves accountable for missed opportunities.   The Seahawks won and that means Beast Mode gets to continue entertaining us for another week.

I don’t usually agree with Scott Kaplan on much, and definitely not when it comes to his feminine orders at Starbucks.  However, I do agree on the fact that the Charger franchise really screwed Philip Rivers, when he’s shown loyalty to them.   Rivers could have “Bolted” to a better situation, but instead, showed faith in a franchise that set him up to fail.  The Bolts never added the final pieces to even put themselves in position to get to the Super Bowl, and it wasn’t like it was only Tom Brady that prevented them from doing so.   Now Rivers’ frustration has boiled over with the move to LA, where he knows the team has no fans.  At this point you can only feel bad for the guy.

Although this is quickly looking like a down year for UCLA Basketball, I was really happy to see freshman Jake Kyman not only get some minutes, but also take advantage of them.  Kyman looked like Klay Thompson against Washington with all his clutch shooting, and made a solid contribution in the loss against Washington State yesterday. There hasn’t been a lot to get excited about, but as long as this kid continues to develop, he can be a really important player for the program for the next 4 years.

https://twitter.com/marchmadness/status/1212969555502477312

It’s January and as usual, the Dodgers have done nothing to improve their ball club.  Also as usual, Stan Kasten is in damage control mode with the media.  He’s trying to tell us this is a successful team already that is still determined to win the World Series.  You could have fooled me.  If the Dodgers were really concerned that Gerrit Cole wanted to be a Yankee, why didn’t they try to outbid them instead of telling us they could have?  Everyone knows Scott Boras clients always go to the highest bidder.  I have never blamed the Dodgers for making the TV deal they did, but I do blame them for not spending the money, and spending it the right way. They didn’t even spend the money to bring back Rich Hill, who is on the MLB equivalent of welfare. Kasten also thinks that just because we show up to his games we agree with how his team does things.  The man is simply out of touch with reality.  Here’s to proving me wrong Stan, but based on what you did in Atlanta, this looks like the sequel to a bad movie.

Finally, CNN is unbelievable.  I remember when they were a respectable network.  You knew that had a little bit of an agenda before, but it was professional.   Now they have become far more embarrassing than Fox News.  These people actually cried on election night in 2016 when Trump won.  Now they are getting drunk on New Years Eve, and talking about penises on the air.

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