A judge sentenced Denver Nuggets guard J.R. Smith to 90 days in jail Tuesday night for causing an auto accident that killed his friend, though Smith will likely end up serving only 30.
Municipal Judge Debra J. Gelson suspended 60 days of the sentence providing Smith performs 500 hours of community service consisting of visiting sick children at hospitals.
As a Bulls fan, I can safely say that J.R. Smith is someone I've discussed a lot over the years. J.R. was included by the Hornets, somewhat needlessly, into the Tyson Chandler/P.J. Brown swap that pissed me off for a good few years. And from speaking to my fellow Bulls fans, I know that a lot of you miss J.R. Smith. He has crazy range, athleticism, potential (if not much sense) and a special shot making ability. It would be easier to stomach his loss had the best returning player for him not been Aaron Gray. (The players were; JamesOn Curry, who never played a game for the Bulls; the unguaranteed contract of Howard Eisley, who also never played for the Bulls; and Aaron Gray, who needn't have.)
Scott Skiles didn't even take one look at Smith before deciding he wouldn't tolerate him. Smith never reported to the Bulls, and John Paxson tried to turn him around straight away. The Bulls couldn't get a first round pick for him, though, and instead settled on Eisley and the two second rounders .(They later waived Eisley and used the money opened up to sign Adrian Griffin. Yippeeeeeeee.)
Perhaps we needn't miss him too much, though. In his time with Denver, Smith has been charged with assault, disturbing the peace and destruction of property, had his drivers license suspended three times (all three of which came after the fail accident detailed here, amazingly), crashed teammate Carmelo Anthony's car, and has now seen his troubles culminate in this jail sentence.
In this incident, Smith was charged with of improper passing, failure to stop at a stop sign, reckless driving, speeding and failure to wear a seat belt, but mercifully not of vehicular homicide. He also failed to appear in court for his first hearing back in January, drawing a further fine.
That list of bad times also does not include consistent affronts with his coach, George Karl, whose tolerance for Smith's erratic play and mild entitlement is varied at best. Smith has been suspended twice for a combined 13 games, and benched numerous times on top of that. He has never managed to avoid trouble. Seemingly, he's never really tried to.
And he is, after all, just a backup shooting guard.
Still, it's not all bad news; Smith played sufficient minutes last season to earn himself a $600,000 bonus on his contract for next season. So, at the very worst, it's swings and roundabouts.
In the unlikely event that you haven't seen Charles Barkley's golf swing before, here it is. (Warning: if you like golf, don't even bother getting yourself worked up about this. We know. He knows.)
That wasn't just a one off, either. He's going to do it again here too.
And this time he's going to do it really slowly.
And now Tiger Woods, who's pretty decent, is going to have a go.
Fuck it, let's all have a go. In our kitchens. With a bowling pin. And our socks pulled up. And our very giggly English girlfriends who think we're great. And who can't hold a camera straight.
I can sympathise. It's weird how the mind games get in the way of a relatively simple action. Ask one of the many suffers of dartitis: sometimes, you just can't complete your action. (Kind of like me with my amateurish tenpin bowling abilities. Nowhere in the Book Of Bowling Technique does it advocate falling over to the right after letting go of the ball, or the slightly autistic arm lock that I do before each bowl. And in no way do I try to work those things into my game. But by God, they're there. It's a stupid bloody game anyway.)
Still, it's weird that a man willing to gamble so much money on his golfing ability doesn't get this slightly detrimental hitch in his swing looked at professionally. It seems worth the expense to avoid otherwise heavy losses.
(Well, that's one conclusion at least. Another more cynical theory would be to say that Barkley, a showman, has somehow honed that sack of shite over the years, purely to entertain the masses. Doubtful, but possible.)
Here's someone who DOESN'T do it for show, though - Chuck Hayes. You'll all seen the clips of his free throw shooting struggles, and by God, you're going to see them again.
Just because we can.
I wanted to follow that up with a montage of weird, awkward, incorrect and mental-block free throw techniques from players around the globe. (And by "around the globe", I mean "in the NBA".) I want to show a clip of Desmond Mason's "Shitting Dog", a montage of Tyson Chandler's various attempts over the years to overcome his own personal battle again free throw autism, the vast gaping chasm of difference between Tim Duncan's current technique and what he used to do back when he didn't suck at it, the Olden Polynice Experience (where every free throw is shot in a different style to the one before it. At least, that's what he used to do as his career ground to a halt in the ABA), and Bo Outlaw's persistently perfect attempts to draw a lane violation on at least two members of each team.
But, sadly, the NBA is really anal about things like that being on Youtube. There are no such videos out there. And it's a damn shame. Since there's no "Amusing Free Throw Technique Channel" on NBA.com, why can't we be allowed to improvise? Why be so miserable about this? Moanarses.
In place of this, here's a video of Bo Outlaw having his photo taken with some girl during warm-ups. It's not what I wanted to bring you when I set about this post with such gusto, but it's better than nothing. Maybe. She enjoyed it, at least.
Down one in the closing stages of a summer league game, new Wizards guard Dee Brown fouls Uruguay's finest, the insatiable Gustavo Barrera, sending him to the line. Barrera hits both foul shots, putting Houston up by 3.
Rockets forward Joey Dorsey - watching the game from the sidelines due to an ankle injury - briefly breaks away from his spontaneous "Who Can Wear The Worst Stripey Polo Shirt" competition with Rafer Alston, and decides to say something. The ref decides to T him up, demonstrating the elaborate technical foul calling technique that NBA scouts want to see from potenital refs. Dorsey sulks. Nick Young hits the technical free throw, and the Wizards have the ball, down two.
Andray Blatche, who has battled bravely against the desire to pass for a number of years now, throws up a tub of wank three pointer. It misses, but Brown tips it back in, and the game goes to overtime. The Wizards go on to win, and the Rockets don't. Joey Dorsey loses not only a game he wasn't in, but also the polo shirt competition, as he has no answer for Rafer's daring usage of deep red and sky blue on an otherwise predominantly white top.
(Also notice - Vladimir Veremeenko. Hooray! If these games are downloadable anywhere, then I need to know. Can't do streams, though.)
Here's what I know about Joey Dorsey - he's an idiot. Someone once told me that he's the next Ben Wallace, which re-affirms my belief on this. (And no, I'm not at all bitter about the spectacularly unsuccessful Ben Wallace signing and the collateraldamage that it caused. Nope. Not at all. Totally over it.) Admittedly I don't know much about Joey Dorsey - when he made headlines for "announcing" that his college team mate Derrick Rose was not going to be drafted number 1 by Chicago in a hilarious wind-up that everyone found hilarious, it took me two weeks to find out that Joey Dorsey was a player, and not an opportunist reporter. But still. I know he's a bit of an idiot. Wikipedia agrees.
During the 2007 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament, Dorsey famously called Ohio State center Greg Oden "overrated as a big man," said that Oden "might be as good as Joey Dorsey," and called himself Goliath and Oden the "the little man." Dorsey also predicted a 20 rebound game for himself. The Buckeyes defeated the Tigers by a score of 92-76 and Dorsey finished with zero points and just four rebounds. In fact, Dorsey was so overmatched during the game that he was not able to even attempt a field goal in the 19 minutes he was on the court. As terrible as he was on the offensive end, he was as bad or worse on the defensive end. Dorsey's defensive duty was to guard Oden. Oden shot 7 for 8 from the field for 17 points and also grabbed 9 rebounds.
And now this.
The evidenced is really piling up. Joey Dorsey = a mouthy git. A bit like Stephen Jackson.
It's hard to see quite what New Orleans planned to do going into this offseason. If their intention was to surround Chris Paul with shooters, as it probably was and definitely should have been, then it's a job well done. In retaining Jannero Pargo while bringing in Morris Peterson and Adam Haluska to replace Devin Brown and Desmond Mason, the Hornets outside shooting takes another step forward. And when combined with the returning Rasual Butler and Bobby Jackson, as well as the return from injury of Peja Stojakovic, the Hornets outside shooting will be a strength this upcoming season. The backcourt depth in general is pretty strong.
The frontcourt depth, however, is another matter.
New Orleans seems content to roll with only four recognised big men, two of whom are Hilton Armstrong and Melvin Ely. Ely's pretty bad despite one season of decency (and a contract season at that. How coincidental), whereas Armstrong is coming off of an incredibly raw rookie year. This seems to me as though it should be more of a pressing concern to Hornets management, given that the two players they're backing up (Tyson Chandler and David West) haven't exactly been the poster boys for healthy living at any point in their NBA careers.
Should injuries affect their frontcourt (and it will, because they're the Hornets), New Orleans is left with the salivating prospect of having to play one of their six small forwards in a small ball lineup. This might not be too bad if Julian Wright proves himself able to defend most power forwards in this league, but if he can't, Stojakovic may wind up having to do it. Which would be.....um....carnage.
Why you would bring in Morris Peterson for such an amount of money when you already had Rasual Butler, all the while letting Devin Brown walk for £1.2 million and letting Linton Johnson fall out of the NBA, seems a bit dumbfouding. Peterson is better than all of those players, but it seems silly to spend your mid level exception on a medium upgrade from Peterson to Butler of what is basically the same player. Especially when you could clearly use a big man that doesn't suck, just drafted a small forward, and also have the hugely overpaid former All Star Peja Stojakovic for the role.
And why they then effectively sell their 5th big man who they drafted not 18 months before (Cedric Simmons), trading him for an unguaranteed contract and nothing else, was flat out weird. There must be something seriously wrong with Cedric. Or Jeff Bower.
Nonetheless, despite my compulsory criticism, the Hornets did not lose a lot in these upgrades. Players such as Marc Jackson, Johnson and Brown made for some nice depth, but they weren't rotation players in an ideal world anyway. And the Hornets rotation as it stands is quite good. It's improved upon where it was, and this team would have been a playoff team last year with some better health.
But there's still flaws here. The injuries are going to happen again, even if it's to a lesser degree. You can't assemble and injury prone roster and then complain that injuries affect your season. You should know that in advance. The Hornets had it particularly rough last year with only Jannero Pargo playing more than 75 games, and he was supposed to be a third stringer. But numerous injuries is a situation that is almost certainly going to happen again. That's what happens when you spend big money on Bobby Jackson, Stojakovic and David West.
Also, there's quite a bit of irony to be found in wanting to assemble a roster of shooters and then signing Ryan Bowen. But never mind.
Next year:
So much - perhaps too much - of the season relies on the starting frontcourt trio of Stojakovic, West and Chandler. While Chris Paul is the star player around whom the team is rightly built around, he needs plenty of help to do so. Assembling a team of shooters around Paul helps, and the starting frontcourt pairing of Chandler and West is young and somewhat dynamic. But those two are also the only plus rebounders on the team, and only Chandler and Armstrong provide much interior defense. To rely on such fragile players and minimal depth is open to question, and so that's what I'm doing.
Having spent huge amounts of money on this trio last year, the Hornets didn't get too great of a return. Chandler enjoyed a wonderful bounceback season, but West and Stojakovic played only 65 games combined, leaving the Hornets short of offense for much of the season. That won't cut it if the Hornets are to crack .500 and make the playoffs, something which they have the talent to do.
Chandler, especially, needs to have an epic (or at least comparable) season. His career to date has gone:
1st year - Poor 2nd year - Decent 3rd year - Poor (injury permitting) 4th year - Really good 5th year - Utter shite 6th year - Really good
Last year he emerged as a an elite rebounder, and rediscovered some of his lost offensive skill. His offensive skill always peaked at mediocre, based largely around the unattractive but effective flail towards the rim, and an extremely mediocre jump/free throw shot. After taking the 2005 offseason off, though, Chandler lost these skills, and his subsequent confidence in his abilities. They look to be on the way back, which bodes well for the Hornets, but he needs to end this cycle for the Hornets to succeed this year.
And they can do that. They're not in the West's elite, and they're not all that young any more (West is now 27, and their wing players are all veterans). Nonetheless, it's a playoff calibre team, which isn't finished, but one which has an identity and is fairly well rounded.
Sham is a miserable and self-effacing little bastard, whose basketball opinions are often riddled with bias, insecurity, and rank immaturity. He has also never played the sport, and the only game he has ever been to see was a Ware Rebels game back in 2001. The night bus didn't show up and he had to walk the 9 miles home. It was after this that his passion for basketball really took off.
He considers himself to be Britain's foremost NBA expert, an arbitrary title that carries with it no basis in fact, or any worldly significance. He also wrote this section of the website in third person narrative, purely for reasons of arrogance.
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the really stupid ones that I wish I'd never written.
