Monday Morning Coffee

April 19, 2021

The Lakers are surviving without their stars. It’s been weeks without Lebron James and Anthony Davis. Yet the Lakers haven’t had a free fall to the play-in tournament like many predicted. They’ve also been fortunate that teams like the Jazz, Hornets, Nets, and Raptors were missing their own star players. Heck, these Laker games have been missing so many stars that they should just be decided by which team has more style: Kyle Kuzma, or the oppositions most fashion forward player. I’ve also been impressed with Markief Morris, who Dennis Schroeder also says is “tough and needs to get paid.” I know Dennis is worried a lot about money these days, including everyone else’s, but this time he doesn’t have to worry about Markieff. He’s getting paid millions by Steve Ballmer. That’s the benefit of having a joint bank account with your brother.

Speaking of the Lakers, after 13 months they let some fans back in the building last week vs the Boston Celtics. My special thanks to Fox 11’s Liz Habib for interviewing me as part of her coverage on the first game with fans on Thursday night. Her story aired on Thursday’s Night Fox 11 News at 10. However, you can find her story and the interview below.

Meanwhile, the Clippers seem to be content with whatever seed they get, but are doing everything they can to build momentum and chemistry. They beat up on the T-Wolves yesterday, and they had won 7 in a row going in Friday’s game with Philadelphia. Win or lose though, you can always guarantee that Paul George is going to have an excuse prepared. On Friday, he was complaining of a sore throat. A sore throat? Has this guy never heard of a cough drop? I’m sure he has plenty of excuses lined up if thing go south in the postseason. I’m also a little surprised that DeMarcus Cousins can’t get any consistent minutes with this team. The Clippers need size and more offense at the rim. DeMarcus is still trying to find his game with all the injuries he’s suffered, but to me, he’s worth giving minutes to in order to find out if he can re-discover that form. Given that Patrick Patterson is seeing more minutes than Boogie, it doesn’t look like he’s going to get that chance.

To baseball, where the Dodgers took 2 of 3 from the Padres over the weekend. It was a much hyped series that lived up to the excitement. Even though the Padres won yesterday, for all the talk that the Padres are ready to challenge the Dodgers for the division, they are just 5-11 against LA since the start of last season. Zack McKinstry has become Joc Pederson + Kike Hernandez, except with pants that aren’t quite as tight. The starting pitching has been sensational, and for all the talk about Kenley Jansen, he and the bullpen have been good enough. There’s a lot of baseball left to be played, but right now I have no reason to believe the Dodgers are not the team to beat in the MLB, especially with Mookie making plays like this.

https://twitter.com/MLB/status/1383795809418833924

Tough weekend for the Angels. The Twins screwed it up for them by not following COVID protocols, so two of their games got cancelled. At least that gives Shohei Ohtani more time to get right before his next start. The 6-man rotation seems to be working out ok so far. What doesn’t seem to be working out though is Albert Pujols. The Halos would be wise to start “social distancing” themselves from Pujols, and start using Jared Walsh as much as possible. Walsh is clearly a more capable all-around player right now, not to mention the first baseman of the future. Knowing Arte Moreno though, he’s probably yelling at Joe Maddon to play Pujols more because he believes he can sell more merchandise with Pujols like it’s 2010.

The LA Kings are returning to becoming a sad and disappointing franchise again. Remember when the Kings won a pair of Stanley Cups in 2012 and 2014? Now there’s only four players remaining from that run, after Jeff Carter was traded last week. Rebuilding for any franchise is ok, but there is no end in sight to this rebuild. The Kings have by far the best farm system in hockey, with so much depth, they don’t even have space in the organization for more draft picks. However, they refuse to put those high end young players in their lineup to develop them, and they also refuse to trade any of them to get their remaining veterans help. I don’t know if anybody has told the Kings, but they play in Los Angeles, where this kind of extensive rebuilding crap isn’t tolerated by fans. We’ll miss you Jeff Carter, and I’m sure all the ladies in LA will miss you too.

Finally, I can’t believe some of you actually paid for that UFC Fight over the weekend. After losing to Jake Paul in less than a minute, Ben Askren should announce his retirement, then move somewhere nobody will ever recognize him again. If Nate Robinson saw that, he had to smile and get a good laugh knowing that he lasted longer vs Paul than Askren. I wonder what Uber Driver Paul is going to fight next? Here’s a look at the money all you UFC fans spent on that fight….

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *