While Matt McHale: Technical Writer is being inundated with training at his Clark Kent job, I figured this would be a good time to take a look at current events in the basketball world. (Don't worry -- the Pickup Diaries will resume before you know it)

Before we get started, a brief FYI. Several of you faithful Bawful readers have noted in the comments that a bogus redirect script has been affecting the site. After doing a little research, it appears to be related to the script used for the tag cloud that was on the navigation bar on the right side of the page. Many other bloggers who used that Technorati script are seeing the same issues with certain browsers. One particular release of Firefox seemed to be the most generally affected, and I personally have not been able to replicate the problem. However, I have temporarily removed the script from the site's template HTML, so hopefully the problem will be fixed. If you are still having troubles, let us know so we can look into it further.

Getting on the news...

Update! Warriors purchased. For way, way way too much money.

Update! Do you want to see David Kahn squirm when being pressed by Chris Webber and Matt Winer about throwing so much money at Darko friggin' Milicic? Do you want to see C-Webb get pissed at Kahn for comparing him to Darko? Of course you do. In fact, I'll even embed the video here for your convenience:


We are still countless weeks away from the beginning of the season, and the Warriors' top draft pick Ekpe Udoh has already torn a ligament in his wrist and will miss six months of action. Did anybody inform him that he was drafted by the Warriors and not the Clippers? He wasn't contractually obligated to injure himself like he would have been if Donald Sterling was cutting his paychecks.

Speaking of injured Clippers, Shaun Livingston's back! After destroying his knee in pretty much the worst possible way against the Bobcats in 2007, he has now inked a 2 year, $7 million deal with... the Bobcats. Livingston's agent Henry Thomas commented "yes, how ironic," when this was pointed out to him. Technically that isn't irony; it's just a coincidence. Irony would be getting drafted by the Clippers and staying perfectly healthy and leading the team to a championship. But no matter. It's still nice to see Livinston getting another break after a horrible injury and struggles to regain his form in subsequent years. And now if you'll excuse me, I need to go throw up about eight times after remembering his ligament-ravaging fall.

Oh, and Knee-Mac to the Clippers? Maybe. You can't make this shit up.

In yet another example of NBA teams refusing to learn from history's mistakes, the Nyets have found a new general manager in... Billy King?? Don't they remember how he murdered Philly's 76ers, rolled its body up in a carpet, and tossed it off a bridge? (After that, Philly really could have used Superman -- oh, wait, they got him!. After Superman is done saving Philadelphia, he's trekking over to Detroit to attempt to save it before crippling depression sets in and he decides to just end it all. And I'm only making up part of that sentence.) In any event, there is a nice opportunity here. Not only are we likely to be treated to some comedic mismanagement, but we might even see another example of the team's GM being overruled by its owner. If Mikhail Prokhorov wants to pay eight bajillion rubles for some random scrub in an ill-advised trade, you know Billy King won't be able to say nyet. (Hmm. Maybe they should have gotten Isiah Thomas...)

After all the talks about Kobe Bryant's defensive nemesis Raja Bell coming over to the dark side and joining the Lakers, he's actually now going to the Utah Jazz instead. I feel like re-reading Seven Seconds or Less just to relive Kobe being frustrated by Bell's defense.

(I just realized that after Leandro Barbosa's move, Steve Nash is the only 7SOL era Suns player left. Holy crap, where doe the time go? Meanwhile, the Suns now have... Hedo Turkoglu Turkododo. Sigh. Erm, I mean, ball.)

Yahoo! Sports' Adrian Wojnarowski ran some surprisingly harsh smack on Twitter last night over several tweets:

Just hung up the phone with agent Mark Bartelstein, who's irate over Hornets empty suit Hugh Weber reneging on a contract for Luther Head.

After firing Jeff Bower as GM, Weber is trying the slimy trick of 'failing' a healthy player on a physical to back out of a deal Bower made.

Weber is one more clown act running a team who doesn't know if the ball is stuffed or blown. With Shinn, he undermined Bower at every turn.

Ouch...

Update! I just stumbled on this link: Ron Artest having a "Fuck LeBron" party?

Did you know -- or care -- that the ESPY Awards were held last night? Yeah, neither did pretty much anybody else in the free world. The ESPYs haven't been any fun since this high point some twelve years ago. Anyway, Phil Jackson and Kobe Bryant both won awards. Sigh. However, the one bright spot? "Denver Nuggets coach George Karl received the Jimmy V ESPY for Perseverance. He missed games and practices last season while battling neck and throat cancer. A thinner Karl appeared well, although he didn't come backstage." Crap. Now I actually wish I would have watched a few minutes of the ESPYs now just to see that. Glad to hear George Karl is feeling a bit better.

By the way, hope you're ready for the lockout! Goddamnit.

One last non-NBA item I need to share: holy hell, John Daly is back! I'm sure this won't last, so enjoy it while you can.

Update! Andy Gray just posted this picture on his SI Vault Twitter feed. "Bret Michaels, John Daly, John Daly's son and John Daly's son's middle finger." Enjoy!

Labels: Golden State Warriors, Knee-Mac, New Jersey Nets, nobody gives a damn about the ESPY Awards, Phoenix Suns, Shaun Livingston