Summer league round-up: Los Angeles Clippers

View the Clippers summer league roster. It's frigging stacked.

- Sean Banks: Sean Banks was in the NBA once, believe it or not. It's a period of time easily forgotten, but it did happen - after declaring too early and going undrafted in the 2005 draft, the Hornets signed him as an undrafted free agent, and assigned him to the Tulsa 66ers. He was the sixth player ever to be assigned to the D-League, but he didn't do much there, averaging roughly 12/3. The Hornets waived him before his contract became guaranteed, and he never appeared in an NBA game. He hasn't made it back since. However, in the 2007.08 season, he averaged 21.7 points, 5.4 rebounds and 3.0 assists per game for the L.A. D-Fenders, which got him back into NBA contention, and he signed with the Raptors summer league team last year as a result. After that, he went to Turkey and played for Darussafaka, averaging 13.1 points and 5.1 rebounds. Banks would do himself a big favour if he either improved his jumpshot, or put it away; he shot 101 three pointers in 30 games last season, accounting for one in every three of his shot attempts, yet he hit only 21 of them.

More importantly, Banks is rumoured to be trying to become a British national. His father was born in England, and still lives here, which entitles Sean to a British passport. He may soon be one of us. If he is, expect me to get biased.

- Nik Caner-Medley: Caner-Medley spent last year in Spain, playing for Cajasol Sevilla in the ACB. He averaged 10.7 points and 8.0 rebounds in 25 minutes a game during domestic competition, but he still hasn't developed a great outside shot, shooting 23% from three point range on the year. More notably, Caner-Medley was kicked off of the team at the end of the year for getting into a drunken fight with a team mate at a party thrown by the team to celebrate their season. The team mate, Michel Diouf - who reports say came off worse - was also suspended but later reinstated. Considering that the Clippers other small forwards are the specialist Steve Novak, the past-it Ricky Davis and the frankly crap Al Thornton, I'd like to think that Caner-Medley had a chance. But he doesn't, really.

- Dionte Christmas: Temple graduate Christmas averaged 20 points per game on 46% shooting in his sophomore year, then 20ppg on 43% shooting in his junior year, and then 20ppg on 41% shooting in his senior year. If he'd done them the other way around, he might have been drafted. His turnovers also trended the same way, which isn't good, although his assist numbers also got better, which helps. Christmas might be able to carve himself a nice career as a catch and shoot specialist, but he'll first have to improve on his 35% three point percentage from last year.

- Eric Gordon: Way too good to be in summer league again. Way too good.

- Blake Griffin: Same. But I suppose everyone has to have at least one year.

- DeAndre Jordan: DeAndre Jordan sucks, and a lot of people don't seem to know it. A lot of the time, you hear about players who are just athleticism and no technique, but rarely is it more true at the NBA level than it is with DeAndre Jordan. Yet some people still think he's good for some bizarre reason. The evidence says otherwise; Jordan's PER of 14.1 is quite good, but his PER against is 23.5, his win share rating was 1.5, his Roland Rating -7.6, his +/- rating a mere -7.5. His FG% and eFG% are both a tidy 63%, but that's easy to do when 58% of your field goal attempts are dunks (almost all assisted) or tip ins - he shot 18% on jumpshots, and 38.5% from the free throw line. Even on the night that he put up 23 points, 12 rebounds and 4 blocked shots, he let his matchup Andrew Bynum score 42 and 15. For him to ever be a backup calibre NBA centre, his effort will have to roughly double, and his skills will have to improve about tenfold. If he doesn't, then the guaranteed contract that he has for next season might be the last one that he ever sees.

- Marcelus Kemp: Kemp played on the Lakers, but totalled only 13 points in 3 games. He spent last year in Italy, playing for Basket Livorno, a team fortuitously sponsored by a wicker basket making company. (Not really.) Kemp averaged 20.7 points and 4.9 rebounds on the season, but must have had a bad Christmas or something, because he only recorded 6 assists in the whole of 2009 (assistless in 10 of his last 11 games). He had 265 field goal attempts in that time as well. He's a one on one type of player, and apparently it shows. Nevertheless, if he wanted NBA attention, he seems to have gotten it.

- Kyle McAlarney: Kyle McAlarney's great. His offensive game is solely three pointers, from between 21 to 34 feet, and the limit of his point guard play is driving baseline every one in a while. He's a little shooting guard with a dynamite shooting stroke, and no other complimentary skills. He's awesome. He's going to be a brilliant player next year. Guaranteed. It just won't be at the very highest standards of basketball.

- Kevinn Pinkney: Pinkney is a fine scoring big man, particularly from the mid range game and within. It's annoying, then, to see him take more and more threes. Pinkney averaged 14.2 points and 7.2 rebounds for NGC Cantu last year, shooting 71% from both inside the arc and at the foul line. But he shot only 335 from three point range. Why, then, did he take two and a half three pointers per game? I don't know. But stop it, Kevinn. And Google your own name if you need to know how to spell it.

- Mike Taylor: Portland drafted Mike Taylor very late in the second round last year, then traded his rights to the Clippers for L.A's second rounder this year. That was quite a high price to pay, considering that the Clippers then proceeded to suck and the pick wound up being number 33 (which the Blazers then used on Dante Cunningham, another fringe Brit). Taylor showed some ability to score last year, although his defense is quite a way short and he's not going to become a pure point guard at any point (his turnover numbers are still huge). He should make the team again, given that the Clippers don't really have any alternatives to explore, but his contract is unguaranteed until the end of the month. And therefore, so are his chances.


Additionally, it was expected that Sofoklis Schortsanitis was going to join the team. He tried to, at least. But FIBA ruled that, because he was still under contract to Olympiakos, he wasn't allowed to play in summer league. This only appears to be a rule that applies to him, and not anyone else, so I must be missing something here. But that's the gist of it, at least.

It is obligatory that any mention of Sofoklis Schortsanitis is accompanied with a progress report on his weight. So, here goes.

The latest reports out of Greece state that Sofoklis has lost a staggering 105lbs since the start of last season, which is a huge amount to lose. Their target weight for him is 340, which he's damn nearly at, supposedly. Yet those reports also state that he now weighs 349 pounds.

You can do that math yourself. That's a formerly 454 pound man we're talking about. That's documentary worthy-big. It's unfathomble.

Those reports also claim that Sofoklis is down to 12% body fat, which seems like it can't be plausible when talking about a guy that size. But be honest, I kind of believe them. It's obviously impossible for a 6'8 350lb guy to be carrying around anything less than a crapload of excess fat, but I'm also willing to believe that the guy is chiselled underneath the wobbly bits. Watching several Olympiakos games last year, I never quite got used quite how spectacularly massive Sofo is. He would go up against players like Nikola Pekovic, giants amongst men, and yet he'd dwarf them all. He'd be shorter, and obviously fatter, but it's not just weight; the guy is freaking.....huge. I can't really explain it, really. There's a better way to explain it then this half hearted attempt I've just managed, but I don't know what it is. He's just magnetically massive. He's also pretty spritely for such a giant, pretty smart and highly skilled. He's an enigma.

But Sofoklis is still not going to be a factor at that weight. He's too big. And this weight cycle has been going on for at least six years. It's fun to be optimistic about how good he could be, but maybe we just shouldn't bother trying to be any more.

Like a Camby in the wind

Fuck the NBA.

Seriously, fuck it. Fuck it hard. Right in the face.

The Denver Nuggets traded former DPOY Marcus Camby to the L.A. Clippers yesterday, for absolutely nothing. The Nuggets got no more than the right to swap second round picks with L.A. in 2010, a year in which the Clippers will have the lower pick anyway, meaning that Denver won't be exercising the option. That's it. That was their return. That was what they got.

That was what they got for Marcus, freaking, Camby.

I am really annoyed by this.

Marcus Camby is a former DPOY award winner. He may have another one left in him yet, too. Camby is a high calibre player - last year, he averaged 13.1 rebounds and 3.6 blocks a game. 3.6 rebounds per game is a lot of rebounds. And 3.6 is a hell of a lot of blocks. He can pass, and also shoot 20 footers, if you give him a week and 40 feet of elbow room.

Camby is a rare commodity in this league; he is a centre that isn't crap. He is at the peak of his career, and strangely also at his peak physical conditionm having set his new personal best for games played in a season, with a commendable 79 games last season. Without wanting to go overboard and do something silly, such as calling him a dynamic two way player, it's safe to say that Tampon is one of the best at his position, the position that is so hard to fill that General Managers will consistently try any old shit to try and strike gold. In a league where most executives would willingly sacrifice their closest family memebers to get an elite centre, the Clippers now have two. And they're not even overpaid.

They got one of them for freakin' nothing.

How does Marcus Camby fit alongside Wolfgang Kaman? I don't know, but it doesn't matter. He's going to better their team simply by not being Aaron Williams. The Clippers just bagged a huge infusion of quality to their team, and all they had to do was not overpay Luol Deng. If they can now trade for Vince Carter using little more than Cuttino Mobley and Tim Thomas to die, then suddenly they're dancing. A front seven of Carter, Camby, Kaman, Baron Davis, Al Thornton, Quinton Ross and Eric Gordon could break 50 wins, even without Elton Brand or a bench.

And yet, somehow, Denver couldn't even get a first round pick for him? Is that even possible? Is instant salary relief really THAT important? Why has this come up now? Why could they not use the Warriors' and Sixers' cap room, before they spent it, as leverage for a better deal? Not even Memphis's? They couldn't take back even a BIT of salary if it meant getting soem assets, like young players or draft picks? Not a bit? Really? You mean to tell me that a team heading in no particular direction and capped out like buggery can afford to give away its best players for absolutely no return whatsoever? How can any team out there justify spending $23 million on a fourth choice power forward while already nursing one of the league's highest payrolls, paying $60 unnecessary million to a guy who played 3 minutes the season before, as well as giving Chucky Atkins $13 million to do big fat Fanny Adams, can now somehow justify giving away its first round draft picks and frittering away quality players like confetti? This from a team that made the ultimate let's-give-this-shit-a-shot trade only 18 months ago?

Sod that.

Somewhere, somehow, someone is systematically wrong. Either Nuggets owner Stan Kroenke woke up with the arseache and ordered General Manager Mark Warkentein to do a dramatic about-face and cut payroll immediately at all costs, or Warkentein is a pillock. Or both.

Whichever it is, they have a problem. They're still cap strapped, they're still a lottery team, they still have no exciting internal future, they're still a badly assembled veteran team that isn't getting anywhere, and they're still being mismanaged. I'd feel bad for them, but they've annoyed me, so I owe them nothing.

The fans, however, have my sympathy. When teams make bad personal moves to save money, purely as collateral damage from their own previous stupid move, then the fans become the victims to the folly that is the NBA and its old boys network. Believe me, as a Bulls fan, I know that pain. I miss Tyson Chandler every day.

However, in a rare but special first here at eddiebasdenslegacy.com, I'm going to try and think positively. The sole solace for the Nuggets in this deal is the $10 million traded player exception that this deal created. Then again, it will probably go unused. However, if the Nuggets let Allen Iverson expire this summer, they will finally be out, barring widespread changes, from the tax territory in which they currently reside. If that happens, they will still have the TPE to use until July 15th, 2009. And at that point, they'll be able to add salary again. Whether they do this or not is another matter, but the ability to do so remains. And that's a small solace that Nuggets can take away and keep.

Who knows, they might even use it to bring Camby back.



By the way, while we're sort of on the subject of the Clippers and Elton Brand, let us tangent for a minute as you explain something to me. As I understand it, the time line of events in their negotiations go like this;

1 - Brand opts out.

2 - The Clippers and Brand verbally agree to a new deal rather quickly.

3 - The Warriors top this offer, just to see if they get lucky. The Sixers follow suit.

4 - Brand and his agent David Falk take news of this new offer to the Clippers, looking to use it as leverage with the Clippers to make them increase their offer slightly.

5 - The Clippers say no.


Now, why would the Clippers do this? By all accounts, they had a verbal agreement for a very reason 5 year, $65 million offer. Why would they be so inflexibile in renegotiating that slightly? $13 million is a good price for Elton Brand - if you're overpaying him at the end of the deal, you're underpaying him at the start, so it works out fine. Why wouldn't you add a few million if it kept him here? Why wouldn't you discuss a sixth year? Why would you extend qualifying offers to Marcus Williams and Nick Fazekas, keep the unguaranteed Josh Powell around unnecessarily, and even more unnecessarily sign first round draft pick Eric Gordon before compelting your cap space adventure, needlessly costing yourself almost $1.5 million in cap room, a figure which could add over $10 million to the value of a 5 year contract? A $10 million that would have meant the re-signing of your best player, and a hell of a good starting five to build upon?

The answer: I simply don't know. Maybe they didn't know the rules or something. Maybe they didn't know signing Gordon would cost them cap space. Maybe they think Fazekas actually matters in some why. I couldn't say. But I think the Clippers, in doing this, nearly managed to one-up The Juan Carlos Navarro Experience of this past season. And for that, I salute, pity, humilate and disown them. At least they got Camby as a backup plan.

I will never get over how such multi-million dollar business franchises can be mismanaged by the whims and misinformation of those in charge. All the damn time, too. Fucking dumbfounding.



(Readers note: Never listen to Elton John and blog. It leads to the creation of stupid post titles and slightly aggressive opening gambits.)

Incest Is Best (Also titled: Sham's Draft Novel, Pt 1)

I have a confession to make. I have an addiction.

It took an intervention of sorts, but I am willing to admit it: I am addicted to the NBA. Even when it's boring. Even when it's corrupt. Even when my team sucks. Even though I'm in the wrong continent. Even when doing so is to the direct detriment of my sleep pattern and general health. I am addicted to suckling every molecule of informative fecal matter from the grand protuding arse of NBA factoids, garnering even the most boring information about these people that I'll never meet, who just so happen to play a sport that I love, despite my never having played a game of it. This isn't something I'm proud of. I'd definitely rather have a sex addiction, or a relatively sedate heroin problem. But, so be it.

Nothing is more indicative of the grip of my addiction than the annual NBA Draft. I make no secret of the fact that I don't know anything about the potential draftees. I do not get to watch NCAA games, and so I will not pretend to know about them, and formulate broad sweeping generalisations of these players based off of the opinions of others. No, that would just be silly. Instead, I prefer to typecast people based off of my first impressions, a fleeting couple of minutes to judge the worth of the person presented to us. Who doesn't love doing this? This is why, as a species, we go speed dating. We are all prone to prejudice based on appearance. Let's just learn to accept it and make sure that we take it out on sportsmen - the ultimate punching bag, serving only as an outsource for our prejudice, immune from retribution.

This year, I went for a slightly different approach. Instead of spending the evening before the draft starts smearing my body in the veritable bounty of rumours made public, Scrooge-McDucking it up amongst their unmeasurable riches, I decided to stay off of the internet until the draft started so that there'd be an element of suspense for me in an otherwise increasingly predictable experience. (The other reason for this is that I fell asleep.)

Added drama hit the ShamBulls household on this particular draft night, as an as-yet-undiagnosed internet problem has left us with an annoyingly slow DSL connection, which meant that I wouldn't be able to watch the draft online, or even listen to it. (You wouldn't believe the number of Americans who told me to "go to a bar or something", as their remedy for this crisis. Oh you silly, silly fools. If it were possible to watch the draft on a TV set, don't you think I'd start there?) So, to watch the draft, and to be able to write the following anti-climactic piece, desperate measures were called for.

As a result, I drove to my friend's house at 1am, let myself in, and watched the draft in her front room for 5 hours as she slept upstairs. Now THAT'S how you feed an addiction.

(I then sold her TV for crack.)

I finally got a stream working about 90 seconds before the Bulls made the first pick of the night, and it is from there that My Totally Boring Draft Diary begins. (Written in realtime, even though it isn't. Not sure why.)

---

- The first shot I see is one of the Bulls "War Room", in which General Manager John Paxson can be seen sitting down, biting his nails, surrounded by a lot of anonymous men in anonymous suits. I have only four questions:

a) Why do we have to do this War Room tradition every year?
b) Why are we pretending that some intense last minute decision making is going on in there, when it's clearly a bunch of men in suits watching themselves on the telly, their minds made up hours ago?
c) Why do we only get the War Room for the team picking first, when clearly that's the ONE room in which nothing frantic is going to be happening?
d) What the hell is wrong with Vinny Del Negro's ears?



- Also, where is Steven A. Smith? He seems to have been bumped from the analysts panel, and regardless of how much or how little you think of Mark Jackson, you surely know that this Smith's removal is a good thing. Less of a good thing are Stu Scott's glasses, recently borrowed from Tampa Bay Rays manager Joe Maddon on what we can only assume was a lost bet. Which is pretty much how Maddon got them from Joe 90 in the first place.



- Pick 1: A few seconds after leaving the war room shot, Commissioner David Stern walks up to the podium - to more cheers than he got at the NBA Finals trophy presentation - and, sure enough, he announces that the Bulls take Derrick Rose first overall in a move that shocks literally no one. Instantly we are thrown back to the green room, just in case the cameras accidentally caught something interesting. They didn't. The Bulls men in suits awkwardly clap themselves, and a single handshake is offered up by whoever sat nearest the camera. Yep, that green room camera was TOTALLY worth it. Let's do it again next year.

- Derrick Rose's interview offers up four interesting discoveries.

a: Steven A. Smith is seemingly doing the interviews this year. So we weren't finally free from him after all.

b: Rose's nickname is "Pooh", which is odd, but somewhat synonymous with roses at least.

c: He talks like a complete and total weirdo: slowly, deeply, extremely simple and formulaic diction, and not one single solitary word worth remembering.

d: His mum has exactly the same voice as him.

This was enough to make me apprehensive about the pick. Name the last player who was completely impersonable to lead his team to a championship. Seriously. It's quite hard, isn't it? Garnett, Shaq, Rasheed Wallace, Jordan.....I guess you have to go back as far as Olajuwon to find the most recent example, and he wasn't THAT bad. And Hakeem has the ol' English-as-a-second-language fallback that Rose will never have. This bugs me. (Tim Duncan doesn't count, by the way, because he's brilliant in ways that Derrick Rose never will be, and also because counting him invalidates my already-tenuous point.)

This brings us neatly into pick number two.....

- Pick 2 .....where the highly personable Michael Beasley is taken by Miami, who idly threatened not to pick him for a few weeks. If you bought into any of that bobbins, shame on you. Really. A plague on both your houses. It was the least convincing acting job since Val Kilmer in Top Secret, and if you thought there was any legitimate chance of them picking anyone other than the instant 20ppg scoring forward, then you really need to re-think how much you trust people.

Jay Bilas chimes in, touting Beasley's "second jump ability" as soon as he opens his mouth, which seems like a weird place to begin praising the most surefire star in this draft. (Well, so I've heard.) Beasley bounds up confidently to the stage, but then lets us all down by not signing David Stern's head. Shame.

Doris Burke - who is to spend the whole evening conducting green room interviews, flexing her biceps, and looking genuinely concerned and/or relieved at all times - interviews Beasley's mother, Fa-TEE-ma Smith. Doris congratulate Fa-TEE-ma on raising five kids by herself - the obvious connotations of this aside - but neglects to mention how stupid the infection in her first name is. (Also note: this instance marks the first time tonight in which the mother being interviewed has a different surname to the player just drafted. It's also not the last.)

- Pick 3 sees the Minnesota Timberwolves - who didn't have to try hard to suck this year - pick O.J. Mayo, who treats us to the first three piece suit of the night, as well as Sam Mitchell's glasses. This news breaks Jay Bilas's heart, as his "Best Available" list sees Brook Lopez confidently listed as the third best player in this draft. As Jeff Van Gundy comforts Bilas off-camera (maybe), Stu Scott asks the panel about the Jermaine O'Neal trade.

Woah, hang on: WHAT Jermaine O'Neal trade? Can someone please elaborate? Some of us were asleep and missed this. Don't assume that we know. Help me!!!

(No one elaborates. I am left floundering.)

There follows a brief O.J. Mayo interview, in which he awkwardly stares directly at the camera while describing how he will do whatever it takes to help the team win (a cliché that's currently appeared in all three draftee interviews), before we cut to a video conference with an extremely tired looking Pat Riley overdubbing a video clip of Michael Beasley's vertical leap test. Hasn't anybody told them? Beasley is 6'9! He's too small to be a power forward in the NBA! Even I know that, and I don't know anything! (Note: that bit about 6'9 being too short? That was satire.)

- Russell Westbrook is chosen by Seattle with Pick 4, in a move that draws audible stares from the panel, and a startled noise of bewilderment from the crowd. Jay Bilas confidently weighs in to fill the airtime void, exclaiming "who would have thought, this time last year, that Westbrook was a possible top 4 draft pick?". He probably could have changed "year" to "week".

Stephen A's interview with Westbrook lasts for precisely one question, before he is forced to throw it over to Doris Burke, who is subconsciously challenging Kevin Durant to an arm wrestle. The television executives believe that we, Joe Public, really want to hear Kevin Durant's views on his team's decision to draft Westbrook. And if Durant had something negative to say, they'd be right. Something like this, maybe;

"What? WHAT??? Russell Westbrook? Are you f***ing kidding me? Russell Westbrook? Who the f*** is Russell Westbrook? Here I am, stuck on my arse playing out of position, trying to win games single handedly as Chris bloody Wilcox is the second option right now......and you get me Russell f***ing Westbrook? RUSSELL WESTBROOK???!?!?? Don't just move the franchise; fold the f****r."

But, unfortunately, this didn't happen. Durant smiled, said words so meaningless that I can't even remember them, and the world continued to spin. While I love the drama of the draft, purely for the way that the entire NBA landscape can change within 4 hours, it could definitely be better television. Maybe there could be some monster truck racing between picks.

- Pick 5: Kevin Love goes to Memphis. I guarantee you, GUARANTEE YOU, that I thought of the Gay/Love jokes before you did. That shit was instantaneous, I swear to God. As was the subsequent Hakim Warrick for Luther Head trade idea. Stern hadn't even got the word "Love" out and I was concocting "Love Gay Head" blog posts. Good times. Between Kevin Love and Lopez twins, we have the outlines of a fine All-Porn Star Rookie Team here.

The subsequent Kevin Love analysis has warning flags all over it. Bilas begins the ultimate he's-not-that-good cliché round-up ("he knows how to play the game, he has a great feel for the game, and he's strong"), and as footage, ESPN choose to show Love's ability to hit 80 foot three pointers, before flashing up the polarizing caption "Must Improve: Explosion Ability". Is that even possible? Or is "explosion ability" just a soubriquet for "skin pigment"? I'd be worried about this pick right now if I was a Grizzlies fan. Add it to the list of things to worry about down there.

Then, things improve. First, we learn that Kevin Love's uncle Mike is the lead singer of the Beach Boys (I looked up whether Mike's name was Mike Love, and it was, so that's good news), and then both Kevin and the rest of "The Love Family" are interviewed. Kevin shows himself to be eloquent, friendly, and not firmly adhered to the interview chair like most other draftees, while his father Stan Love nervously twirls what looks like an iPod during his turn, apparently threatened by Doris Burke's hulking beauty. Following this, Stu Scott tries to build up the drama, for the hometown Knicks are picking next, but he is undermined slightly by the camera cutting to a shot of a Knick fan yawning. This was a good montage.

- Pick 6: The Knicks surprise and thoroughly piss off their travelling faithful by picking Danilo Gallinari to a resounding chorus of boos, which Gallinari overlooks with good grace. Even the panel had to backpedal, having talked about the Knicks selecting every candidate other than Danilo before the pick was made. Fran Fraschilla interjects with the soothing declaration that Gallinari "will not be a superstar", which didn't help to assuage the rising angst of the gathered New Yorkers. (Seriously, at number 6, wouldn't you at least pick a guy with an outside chance of this happening? If only a faint one? Especially if you're the Knicks? And why another small forward when they can't shift two of the four that they already have? Still, it's good news for the current Jared Jeffries bet that I have got going, which I stand to win unless Jeffries averages 9.5 points a game. Basically I've won it already.)

Stu Scott tries to brighten proceedings, by announcing that Gallinari already has a personalised shoe, called the "Reebok Rooster", helpfully pointing out that "Galli" is Italian for rooster. Thus, if you didn't already know, Gallinari is forever after known as "The Italian Cock". Good times.

(EDIT - "Nari" is an Italian name, meaning "Happy". Thus, Danilo Gallinari is, literally, Cock Happy. I'm going to tell this joke over a million times in the coming days.)

SAS's interview with Gallinari focuses on little else but the booing Knicks fans, which seems unfair. (You could say that Steven A. Smith was trying to manhandle The Cock. In fact, I will say that.) Gallinari copes with it well, citing the fact that he will win them over when they see that he "plays hard", a cliché now invoked of 5 of the 6 interviews so far. I'd like to see more "I will give it only the merest token effort during my time here" interviews, just to mix it up a little.

- Eric Gordon is chosen by the L.A. Clippers as Pick 7, taking to the stage in a get-up that I originally wrote in my notebook as "sharp", before crossing it out in favour of "shit".



White jacket, black trousers, black and white stripey shirt with a plain white collar. How very.....something.

It is pointed out that 5 of the first 7 players chosen are college freshman, but at no point does anyone mention why. (Has this 19 year old age limit really changed anything?) There follows an Eric Gordon montage, featuring him shooting jumpshots from around his right ear, a commentary that describes him as a small two guard, plus a screenshot that cites "ball handling" as a weakness. So my first impressions of Eric Gordon are unflattering at best.

We leave this high octane moment to cut to someone called Wendy Nix interviewing new Knicks president Donnie Walsh (oh, I see what they did there!) who is wearing Pacers colours. Walsh, looking a lot like a Mafia capo, lets down this image when he speaks without an Italian American New York drawl. Still, he's in the right place for it now. Maybe he can develop one.

Jeff Van Gundy explains that the Knicks don't need point guard help because they have Stephon Marbury. Everybody is stunned into a submissive silence.

- Pick 8: Joe Alexander goes to Milwaukee. I don't know who he is, or what he's about, but I'm calling him "Diamond", because all people with the name Joe get that prefix. Similarly, all Petes are "Pistol", all Daves are "Dynamite" and all Marios are "Super". These things write themselves.

The compulsory montage offers the viewer the chance to see Joe Alexander's baby pictures, which must be something that he consented to, but for reasons that I cannot possibly fathom. Clips of his play show that Alexander is a keen proponent of The White Guy Run™, the ultimate warning sign for any draftee. (FYI, The White Guy Run™ is a run defined by absolutely no arm movement, even when running at full tilt.) Name two players who star in this league, even when burdened with The White Guy Run™. You can't. Yao Ming is one, but the second.......he just doesn't exist.

Alexander then changes the very fabric of society in his interview, by saying that he will "work hard", as opposed to the usual "play hard". SAS responds, saying "you know the trade that the Bucks made today", and before I have time to excitedly mouth "NO!".....my online streams cuts out. Terrific. So I'm still none the wiser. Note to self - don't miss the build-up next year.

- Pick 9: After a quick scramble, the feed comes back barely in time to see Jay Bilas plugging Brook Lopez once again, just for Charlotte to disappoint him by picking D.J. Augustin. The pick is greeted by a consesus congratulations from everyone except Jay, who openly wonders why Charlotte wouldn't go big, but instead went for the 5'11 guy. Jeff Van Gundy begins his analysis with the sentence "the big thing is, what are they going to do with Gerald Wallace," thereby making it painfully obvious that he knows absolutely nothing about D.J. Augustin. By the way, I always get a jolly when I find out that I'm taller than an NBA player, and I don't know why.

The fact that Richard Jefferson was traded earlier today is idly mentioned in the build-up to the Nets picking 10th. Would someone please put me out of my bloody misery and tell me about all these trades, please? Was Jefferson traded to Jermaine O'Neal or something? What have the Bucks got to do with this? Don't ever assume the public are clever. We're not. And we have afternoon naps sometimes.

- Pick 10: Brook Lopez goes. Jay Bilas lives.

Here's what I know about big men from Stanford - Mark Madsen is one. As are the Collins twins. I shouldn't hold their towering shitness agaisnt the Lopez brothers, but I will.

Jay Bilas's main selling point on Brook Lopez is how "tough" he is. One question - if you're far bigger than all of your peers, more athletic, and also "tough", why would you only average 8 rebounds a game?

A lot is also made of the fact this twin brother Robin Lopez will be drafted at some point tonight too, making them the third set of brothers currently in the NBA (but soon to be one of four - read on, captivated viewer!). This, when combined with the well defined fact that half of the NBA is in some way the other half's cousin, makes the NBA one great big family love-in. Who said that the sport had lost its appeal to the white American audience?

Brook and Robin Lopez both strike me as complete frat boys, by the way. This is not good. At least Robin tries to be funny, even if he fails.

Someone FINALLY throws up a caption showing the Bucks trade mentioned earlier: Milwaukee acquires Richard Jefferson for the corpse of Bobby Simmons and the Chinese anticlimax, Yi Jianlian. Wow. In the unlikely event that you hadn't noticed, that trade is staggeringly bad for New Jersey. You mean to tell me a 21-foot jumpshooter and a contract so bad that it's not even expiring is the best value that you can get for a 28 year old 22ppg scorer in the prime of his career? Really? You couldn't even get a future pick out of them? Not even a second? M'kay.

Oh wait, they hired Kiki Vandeweghe, didn't they? Never mind then. Makes some sense now.

- Pick 11 sees Jerry D. Bayless go to Indiana, in a move that baffles the announcers, who proclaim that Indiana doesn't need a point guard. Either they weren't watching last year, or Jermaine O'Neal was dealt for a point guard. Rather than wait it out like the Jefferson thing, I looked it up, and saw that O'Neal had been traded to Toronto for T.J. Ford, Rasho Nesterovic, Macy O'Baston, and the number 17 pick. Good trade for Indy, that. Too much from Toronto, but it might be all right. Scott helpfully points out that Jamaal Tinsley is now "for sale", the implication being that he wasn't before.

In his interview, Bayless says he'll play wherever he is needed. So that's nice. Bayless is apparently really good at golf. So that helps. He's also apparently not very good at passing, but really, which of these two skills do you need more in your point guard? It's clearly the golf.

- Pick 12: Jason Thompson is picked by Sacramento at number 12.

Now, when I say that I don't know anything about the draftees in any given year, I've usually at least HEARD of them. With Jason Thompson, I am stumped. I've never heard of him, nor his college (Rider), nor even his conference (the MAC or something). It would be immature of me to hold my ignorance against Thompson, but what else am I to do? This is a night for predjuce and first impressions, after all.

David Stern tells us that Thompson is "not here". So it follows either this wasn't a 'promise pick' by Sacramento, or Thompson declined the offer to turn up, as he didn't want several thousand people staring at him, mouthing "who the hell is that?". That seems reasonable, I guess.

A table is quickly fashioned by ESPN, showing us that the selection of Thompson ties the record for the lowest that the first senior in any draft has ever been drafted. His company on that table is made up of Melvin Ely, Rafael Araujo and Acie Law. A list with those three in it can't ever be good.

- Pick 13: Brandon Rush is selected by the Portland Trail Blazers, ostensibly to back up the backup to his namesake, Brandon Roy. So confusing is the names thing that Stephen A. Smith immediately asks Rush what it will be like to back up Brandon Rush, which I claim as vindication. This marks the second time tonight that a pair of brothers have joined the league, as Brandon's brother Kareem Rush is an Indiana Pacer for at least 5 more days.

At this moment, my feed cuts out again, freezing irrepairably on a screen that shows "Sacramento: Pick 12 (Jason Thompson). Fan Grade: F". Tough crowd.

(You know, there's only been one Euro drafted so far. Maybe that trend of picking completely unready Euros way too high is finally gone for good.)

- Pick 14: I missed pick 14, busy trying to find a new stream, when Golden State drafted somebody named Anthony Randolph. This marks the second straight year that they have drafted a 6'10, 200lb forward. But at least he has the same surname as his mum.

Dick Vitale makes his first appearance of the evening, in one of draft night's more annoying traditions. I have no problem with Dick Vitale - his name is Dick Vitale, after all, and no amount of deliberate mispronounciation of his surname will hide this fact. But....you know? Do people really have to encourage the "baby" thing? Let the baby have his bottle, but don't make the problem worse. We may as well get Scotty Nguyen in the booth if this is how it's going to be.

- Robin Lopez goes to Phoenix at Pick 15. That leads to this happening:



And that's unfortunate.

Also, let's get this out of the way now. Robin Lopez has big hair. OK? We get this. As a result, it is now obligatory to compare him to the other players with big hair, Anderson Varejao and Joakim Noah. So let's get it all out of the way early so that we need not bother with it again.

(By the way, his mum is called Deborah Ledford. I'm not keeping an official Mum's Surname count, but if you are, chalk this one up. Also, Ledford is a baaaaaad name for a basketball player.)

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Coming up soon: Part 2. I only broke it down into two parts because, as you can see - it's way, way too long. But I'm not sorry.


Part 2