You Missed A Good Game or A Crying Shame

Finally, after all these years of mediocrity, Rutgers' men's basketball team was in a position to beat a ranked St. John's team in the Big East tournament...but unfortunately for them the Big East must have decided to use the refs from the WWE, who totally blew off or conveniently disregarded the last 1.7 seconds of the game after a St. John's player walked and threw the ball into the seats, depriving Rutgers of a chance to win and advance in the tournament. Now that would be something to cry about.

After seeing Paul Pierce fly down the lane and slam one on multiple people the other night , I'm left to conclude that perhaps Paul isn't showing his age after all. I don't know...maybe that's why Tiki Barber wants to return to the NFL - after four years of retirement - at the age of 36...but is he not considering the fact that in his sport people would be slamming him? Michael Vick took off two years, so to speak, and just got the franchise-player contract, but he's a little younger and a lot faster than Tiki.

Giving an extra billion dollars off the top of the pot to the NFL owners...who are not getting slammed, concussions, etc...makes about as much sense as Wisconsin governor Scott Walker giving a deficit-creating tax break to the rich. I sure hope President Obama's coattails are long enough to bring the House of Representatives back to Democratic control when he wins re-election in 2012. I'm about as tired of the Republicans as I am of Charlie Sheen. More, actually. I was going to ask how many strikes Sheen gets, but then he got fired...so I see the answer is 10.

Speaking of 10s, as crazy as Blake Griffin's dunk over the Kia was, I'd have given him the same score for some of his in-game dunks, especially the ones over Timofey Mozgov and Danilo Gallinari while they were Knicks. And speaking of these two new Nuggets, my first thought when the trade was announced was of the old USFL and Herschel Walker, who post-USFL joined the NFL with the Dallas Cowboys. Of course I couldn't understand why my then-beloved Cowboys could not figure out how to use Walker and Tony Dorsett together...but that said, I began to think about how Walker was subsequently traded to the Minnesota Vikings for about a dozen players...and shortly thereafter, the Cowboys' resurgence began. Could this be in the works for the Nuggets...who are looking really good after the trade? They certainly seem to be enjoying themselves in the absence - according to one player - of someone with "sticky fingers."

Of course, the other piece of this is that from a marketing standpoint it was a trade that the Knicks had to make, no matter how many good young players they gave up. With Carmelo Anthony and Chauncey Billups - who had been the best newcomer before his injury - in Knick uniforms, the Knicks have become must-see TV again in the Big Apple and surrounding areas. The league must be overjoyed that the team in the number one arena in the biggest city is relevant again...even if they are still just title pretenders as opposed to contenders.

Hey Philadelphia Phillies, hope you're watching the Miami Heat games, 'cause the way everyone brings their "A" game when El Heat are the opponent is the same thing you guys are going to see beginning next month. Then again, if they can't score off your pitchers it won't even matter.