New Jersey Nets 1-0 in court, 0-17 on the court

The Nets have tied an NBA record for the worst start to a season, dropping their first SEVENTEEN games (imagine the '07 New England Patriots, if they had won Super Bowl XLII, in reverse). Coach Lawrence Frank has been fired. (Really, it took that long?). They're scoring a league-worst 85.7 points per game, only slightly better than what Drew Brees and the Saints can do these days against the right opponent.

Expect them to lose at home to the Mavericks Wednesday and to the Bobcats Friday to drop to an historic 0-19 before getting a chance at glory at Madison Square Garden Sunday at noon in the NBA Misery Bowl against the Knicks (currently 3-14).

Despite the team's struggles, someone with a lot of money (in 2009, that could be no one else but a Russian billionaire like Mikhail Prokhorov) is interested in buying low. In an extremely challenging and complex real-estate deal, developer Bruce Ratner will construct the futuristic palace pictured below in Brooklyn (after scrapping an even crazier-looking but more expensive Frank Gehry design) and have Prokhorov rescue the team from the New Jersey swamp and have them play there instead.

Awkwardly, people currently live here. But not to worry: eminent domain to the rescue! In a 60-page opinion released last week (full text here), Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman of the New York Court of Appeals wrote, "It is indisputable that the removal of urban blight is a proper, and, indeed, constitutionally sanctioned, predicate for the exercise of the power of eminent domain."

I suppose it's up to Ratner and Prokhorov to prove that the Nets wouldn't be any worse a blight than the vacant rail yards that are there now.

Jimmie Johnson wins his fourth straight Sprint Cup championship. But do you know who he is?

Or for that matter, what the Sprint Cup is?

One could be forgiven for being confused about exactly what Jimmie Johnson just won. The Sprint Cup, formerly known as the Nextel Cup, Winston Cup, and occasionally just "Hey, you" is basically just code for the major leagues of NASCAR (as opposed to its AAA divisions) -- which, especially during a phase in which I watched it on TV every Sunday and started talking about cam-shafts and winches, my friends used to rightly mock as

The whole "Chase for the Cup" thing complicates things further. But three cheers for Jimmie Johnson anyway. A lesser man would spell his nickname with a Y.

Bud Adams wishes the f***ing Bills and their f****ing fans good f***ing luck today

Titans owner Bud Adams is trying to make good on his bad behavior last week as he watched his pathetic team beat the even more pathetic Bills. The crazy oilman, of course, was dinged by the NFL for flipping off the sad-sack Buffalosers from his press box in Week 10 (See the amateur fan video below, also amusing for the guy off-camera angrily asking "Who's THAT??!" while others cheer the wildcatter's antics.)

Personally, though, I think this full-page color ad in the sports section of today's Buffalo News would offend me if I were a Bills fan. Also, what's with the "we" in "we wish the Bills and their fans good luck"? There's only one crazy old man who needs to apologize.

UPDATE (8:30 p.m.) Adams' good-luck wishes go in vain as the Bills lose to Jacksonville, 18-15. Rough time of it lately for Marshawn Lynch and...uh oh.

Allen Iverson ain't talkin 'bout a game...or playing one for the Grizzlies

Practice. Not a game, not a game, not a game...

The Allen Iverson experiment in Memphis is reportedly over. Apparently he was supposed to be the franchise player, and the Grizzlies were just talkin' 'bout practice. Not a game.

Ugh, just watch the video.

Yes, Chris Coghlan was the second-half MVP for my fantasy team, but he's no Tommy Hanson in REAL baseball

Baseball writers have short memories, apparently.

In the National League Rookie of the Year voting, announced Monday, the BBWAA crowned Marlins OF Chris Coghlan as the senior circuit's top rookie. The speedy 24-year-old narrowly beat out Phillies pitcher J.A. Happ, who finished second.

What the hell, baseball writers?

No offense to Coghlan, but the NL ROY race had a clear winner, and that was Braves standout Tommy Hanson (scroll down to see the praise I recently heaped on him). The 6'-6" righthander had a truly unstoppable 2009 campaign, racking up 11 wins despite not being called up until June. It's not his fault the Braves' impotent lineup (filled with old-timers like Chipper Jones, who I think was actually drafted by the Boston Braves) wasn't able to help the team catch up in the NL Wild Card race.

In my book, Hanson's 2.89 ERA is more impressive than Coghlan's admittedly sweet .321 batting average. Both were standouts, but that kind of performance from a rookie pitcher is far more rare than what Coghlan posted in his short season.

So what happened? Looks to me like the baseball writers are crowning a second-half rookie, not a full-season one. Coghlan was absolutely on fire after a slow start, hitting for a phenomenal .372 average and .966 OPS after the All-Star Break -- better than teammate Hanley Ramirez, for one. Happ posted numbers similar to Hanson's admittedly, but I doubt he would have beaten the electrifying Braves rookie if not for the Phillies' postseason run (even though Happ and his 5.68 ERA were Crapp out of the Phils bullpen).

Look out for Tommy to get one back at the baseball writers by winning the 2010 Cy Young.

Going for it on 4th-and-2 from your own 29 with a 6-point lead: Always a good decision

In case you haven't heard, the Patriots suffered an epic 35-34 loss to the Colts Sunday night. After blowing a 24-7 lead and letting the game get to 34-28, the Patriots found to their disappointment that there was still time left on the clock. Trying to gain a first-down and run out the clock, Bill Belichick (at left) made a gutsy call and went for it -- on the Patriots' own 29. It didn't work, and the Peyton-to-Wayne Train won the game with seconds left. Game over -- ouch.

But the real lesson here is not that Belichick is a bad coach -- or even made the wrong call. Coach B, who has stood by his decision, felt his defense wouldn't be able to stop the Colts if they kicked it away, given the significant amount of time left on the clock. The fact that the Colts scored after the turnover on downs probably supports this point.

Rather, what we know after Sunday night's game is that there are downsides -- even in late-game situations -- to being a pass-focused team. The Pats were unstoppable in the air all game, but facing a 4th-and-2 situation, couldn't convert. The big what-if question after last night is not what if Kevin Faulk hadn't bobbled the ball before being tackled, but what if the Patriots had taken DeAngelo Williams, Maurice Jones-Drew, or Joseph Addai instead of Laurence Maroney in the 2006 NFL draft.

(Pats fans can still rest easy knowing that the blue-and-whites are still a lock to win the pathetic potato-sack race that is this year's AFC East.)

Fear the Atlanta Braves in 2010

The Atlanta Braves aren't worried about Tim Hudson. The other 29 MLB teams should be.

The Terrible* Tomahawks have just signed the aging hurler to a 3-year deal after deciding that exercising his option for one more year wasn't enough. You'll recall, unless you stopped watching baseball in September as I did, that Hudson returned from shoulder surgery late this past season to start 7 games for the Braves after missing almost 14 months. He was good, too.

If he really is going to stay healthy, Hudson can be counted on. Of his four full seasons in Atlanta (2005-2008), three were rock solid. In 2006, he blew up with a 4.86 ERA. But the new contract speaks volumes about whether or not the Braves expect that to ever happen again.

This year, with Hudson missing almost the whole time, the Braves compiled a 3.57 ERA, good for 3rd place in the bigs. And that was with Kenshin "Someone stop me" Kawakami tossing underhand for 156.1 long, painful innings.

Kawakami will probably still be pitching in Atlanta this spring, but he'll be a little bit more seasoned. With him or without him, here's a look at the remaining absurd starting pitching depth the Braves could have with a healthy Tim Hudson.

2. Javier Vazquez, RHP, 33
2008: 15-10, 219.1 IP, 2.87 ERA
Alas, the dominant, innings-eating, K/BB machine that the Yankees thought they were getting in 2004, the Diamondbacks thought they were getting in 2005, and the White Sox thought they were getting in 2006, 2007 and 2008 finally arrived in 2009! Do the Braves know something everyone else doesn't? Javy has one more year left on his contract, and his name has popped up in trade rumors yet again, but when you look at his erratic history pitching for different clubs, you have to think "If it ain't broke, don't trade it." (Because if you do trade it, it will surely become broke -- perhaps to the tune of a 4.91 ERA again.)

3. Tommy Hanson, RHP, 23
2008: 11-4, 127.2 IP, 2.89 ERA
This guy should win the NL Rookie of the Year award for 2009 despite some good competition from the likes of J.A. Happ and Chris Coghlan. A strikeout machine, he's only going to get better in a full season at the major league level. And the upside is there: in 5 of his 21 starts in 2009, he pitched 6 or more innings and didn't allow a single run. Um, wow.

4. Jair Jurrjens, RHP, 24
2008: 14-10, 215.0 IP, 2.60 ERA
This talented dude finally put it altogether in 2009 after an up-and-down performance in 2008. He went 9-1 against NL East foes, so it wasn't his fault the Braves didn't make the playoffs, and his 2.24 ERA after the All-Star Break was scintillating. How do you pronounce his name? Just go with "sir."**

5. Derek Lowe, RHP, 36
2008: 15-10, 194.2 IP, 4.67 ERA
Red Sox fans who saw Derek Lowe still pitching in Atlanta in 2009 and being serviceable felt about the same way they would if they saw Mo Vaughn tearing it up for the Rockies or Curt Schilling for the Blue Jays (or Pedro Martinez pitching in the World Series for the Phillies at Yankee Stadium, something equally absurd and impossible). That is to say, we wish Derek Lowe well, but we don't understand why he is not retired -- just like '04 teammate Manny Ramirez is, for example.

6. Kenshin Kawakami, RHP, 34
2008: 7-12, 156.1 IP, 3.86 ERA
You have to think the Braves are hoping they get better mileage out of Kawakami than the Red Sox have with their Japanese import, Daisuke Matsuzaka, the Camry to the Braves' Corolla. But if Kawakami followed Dice-K's path, that wouldn't be the worst thing that could happen to Atlanta. Following a mediocre rookie season, Matsuzaka was lights out in his sophomore '08 campaign. In 2009, of course, he was paid like a Saudi prince to "rehab" at a "facility" in "Fort Myers, Florida," a.k.a. to head to the frigid mountains of Nagano to wrestle a bear and throw 2,000 pitches a day in disciplined preparation for the Japanese national team's next World Baseball Classic game in 2013, by which time he will DEFINITELY be ready to pitch his heart out again, we're all sure.

7. Jo-Jo Reyes, LHP, 25
2008: 0-2, 27.0 IP, 7.00 ERA (AAA Gwinnett: 4-2, 66.0 IP, 2.86 ERA)
No, Jo-Jo wasn't good in 2009, and wasn't good in more innings in 2008, either. But he's still young, and he's the only lefty the Braves have. They'll want to give him every chance to win a starting spot for that reason alone.

8. Kris Medlen, RHP, 24
3-5, 67.2 IP, 4.26 ERA (AAA Gwinnett: 5-0, 37.2 IP, 1.19 ERA)
The poor man's Tommy Hanson, Medlen looked for a moment like he was even better than T.H., getting the call-up before him in May and showing at least one flash of brilliance (6.0 IP, 1 ER, 9K, 1BB @ARI on May 31). Of course, he's not as good as Hanson, but he'll be solid if he can crack this rotation.

*In light of the Braves' tepid but nevertheless respectable 86-76, it's totally unclear whether "terrible" is really best understood in the sense of "awful; pitiable" or "terrifying; threatening," isn't it? Well, it's called poetic ambiguity.

**Actual answer: pronounce all the J's like J's and emphasize the latter half of the ai dipthong in "Jair." Thus, Jah-YEER JUHR-jens.

The Red Wings put up a 9-spot on Columbus

Did the Mighty Ducks ever lose this badly? Maybe, like, back when they had Goldberg in net before letting the girl play? My Disney movie memories are foggy, but I do know that the Columbus Blue Jackets need an Emilio Estevez/Gordon Bombay boost after this one. (What sound does a blue jacket make, if not "quack"? What the hell is a blue jacket?)

Seriously, watch the highlights of Wednesday's 9-1 drubbing. Sure, the Wings seem to have dominated all facets of this one -- 39-26 shots on net -- but the worst offenders here are Columbus' goaltenders, Steve Mason and (in relief) Mathieu Garon. There are some ugly, ugly goals in this contest.

"We didn't play committed or hard against a genuine opponent," Coach Ken Hitchcock told reporters.

Uh, yeah, the defending Western Conference champs probably do qualify as a "genuine opponent," especially after they mopped the ice with your face in the playoffs last year.

Hey, next time you'll know.

Perhaps the strangest thing is that Columbus has been good this year -- 9-5-2 going into the game -- while the Red Wings have been slow out of the gate -- 7-5-3 before yesterday's Christians-Lions face-off. Even now, Columbus has 1 point on Detroit in the Central Division standings.

The fact that this game was played in front of Columbus' home crowd probably won't help the team with its financial struggles -- nor quiet the haters who say hockey isn't viable in this city. (In Jacksonville, where tax dollars are being used to subsidize ticket purchases for the 4-4 football team, they're already having issues with just this sort of thing.)

Nationwide Arena has a hockey capacity of 18,144 and will host 41 home games this year. That's 743,904 tickets that need to be sold to have a packed house. (15,304 attended the Wings game.) Since Columbus has a population of 754,885, this is totally doable as long as everyone (yes, you, nana! get out of bed!) does their civic duty and attends a game.

Maybe they should just raise taxes.

Who didn't deserve their Gold Glove in 2009?

An MLB offseason SAT-style analogy question:

Prince Fielder is to rotund as
Gold Glove award is to _________.

Bubble the answer in COMPLETELY. No stray marks.

a) deserved
b) arbitrarily bestowed
c) farcical
d) irrelevant
e) somewhat flawed

I think it's safe to say we can eliminate (a). Any of the other options are plausible and at least partially correct -- and I promise it's not just sour grapes since my Red Sox were completely shut out this year.

2009 Gold Glove Award Winners
Performance vs. League (AL/NL)

The above chart shows at a glance the performance of the 2009 winners versus their eligible counterparts. The results, which I'll get to in a second, are sobering.

Caveats (obviously): We don't know how to measure defensive ability with statistics, and in fact the only thing we do know is that errors and fielding percentages are misleading and give an incomplete picture. They only record bad plays, not good ones. They don't give us an impression of a fielder's range. True, true, and true. Fair points. I submit to you, however, that a league's Gold Glove winner should be above the 17th percentile at his position for errors made. Looking at you, Mr. R. "Bobbles" Zimmerman -- although your 18.1 Ultimate Zone Rating (UZR) impresses me enough that I shall spare you further ignominy and not include you in my bad-bet list below. (UZR, beloved by the statheads, is one of those metrics that just doesn't mean that much to me. I'll assume, rightly or wrongly, that having the best one at your position is worth at least something.)

Unlike, for example, the MVP awards -- voted by the Baseball Writers Association of America, which generally does a good job -- Gold Gloves are chosen by managers. Putting gut-instinct kinds of guys (all managers are) in charge here is a recipe for disaster once you look back at the numbers. Without further delay...

The Three Worst Calls of the 2009 Gold Glove Class

3. Orlando Hudson, NL 2B (8 errors, .998 fielding percentage, -3.3 UZR)
There really doesn't seem to be much of a defense for this one. As my chart above shows, Hudson's 8 errors this season makes him pretty much the median eligible NL second baseman. He did log a good number of innings (and thus fielding chances), so his fielding percentage makes him look a little bit better comparatively speaking. Even that would put him only 5th among the 15 NL second basemen with at least 500 innings. His UZR -- not only below average, but below zero (which I think means your team would have been better off putting a Tempurpedic mattress at your position) -- isn't going to bail him out.

Who should have won: Freddy Sanchez (5 errors, .990 fielding percentage, 7.4 UZR).

2. Adam Jones, AL OF (5 errors, .986 fielding percentage, 9 outfield assists, -4.7 UZR)
This guy had a breakout season offensively and provided a much-needed spark to a mostly uninspiring Orioles lineup. But that has nothing to do with the Gold Glove. The best-looking stat here is Jones' 9 outfield assists, which I've generously included in my analysis here. But come on: 10 AL outfielders had even more, including Jones' teammate, Nick Markakis. If not his arm, what's winning him this award? UZR in theory measures his speed in getting to balls, but his -4.7 mark is awful compared to the competition, so apparently he's not as fast as managers think. It's also entirely possible to complete a full season as a major league outfielder and make fewer than five errors -- there's only so much that can go wrong, really (cue mental reel of Matt Holliday's showstopping performance in left field in the NLDS).

Who should have won: David DeJesus (0 errors in 310 chances, 1.000 fielding percentage, 13 outfield assists, 15.1 UZR)

1. Mark Teixeira, AL 1B (4 errors, .997 fielding percentage, -3.7 UZR)
First-basemen have an easy job: catch the ball. Bonus points for fielding grounders when they're hit your way. Throw underhand to the pitcher covering the bag. Mark Teixeira does a perfectly good job of this. But why all of a sudden is he better than Youk?! Or a league-average first-basemen, for that matter. If I can throw UZR in here to serve my purposes, I'll point out that the Maryland Mauler had the third-worst of the 14 AL players considered in this analysis (only verifiable clunkers Billy Butler and Carlos Pena were worse).

Who should have won: The sweaty Boston guy with the beard. (He plays the game hard, what?)

Thoughts on the NFL standings, through Week 9

Best surprise team: Bengals (6-2).
It's still not clear whether this team is any good. On the one hand, three wins (Steelers, at Browns, at Ravens) came by just three points, and five of the first eight games were at home. On the other hand, this is a team that could be 7-1 if not for this insane play in Week 1, and that has played a tough schedule so far -- the combined record of the eight opponents at this point in the season (counting the Ravens twice, not counting games against Cincy) is 32-25 (.561).

Honorable mentions: Cowboys (6-2), Minnesota (7-1), New Orleans (8-0).

Most disappointing team: Titans (2-6). What the hell happened to this once-pretty-good-if-not-overpowering-and-admittedly-showing-signs-of-collapse-before-first-round-playoff-loss team? Last year's 13-3 season is a distant memory. Hopefully Jeff Fisher donning a Peyton Manning jersey can be for Titans fans, too. (Seriously, WTF Jeff Fisher?)

Honorable mentions: Panthers (3-5), Giants (5-4) over the last four games.

Underrated and not out of it yet: Texans (5-4). After nearly upsetting Indianapolis on the road last weekend, Houston has a bye. They get Tennessee in Week 11 when they return and then Indy again, this time at Reliant. Guess which one they'll spend more time preparing for this week? Especially if they can get over the top and beat Peyton & Co. (who will be battered from consecutive matchups with New England and Baltimore), this team has a real shot at a wild card slot. With a saliva-summoning schedule that still includes the Titans, Jaguars, Seahawks, and Rams, I'm picking this team to finally get to a winning record and the playoffs. (Hey, eighth time's the charm.)

Honorable mentions: 49ers (3-5), Dolphins (3-5).

Overrated and trending downward: Broncos (6-2). I want to give Josh McDaniels credit for beating mentor Bill Belichick, but the Broncos' Week 5 victory over the Pats is a red herring. (Imagine if life were played by the NFL's ridiculous overtime rules.) As Tampa Bay reminded us last Sunday, there are no gimmies in the NFL these days, and 6-2 is 6-2. But let's discount the two easy wins over Cleveland and Oakland and focus a bit more on the 30-7 beatdown this club recently received from the Ravens and the equally impressive 28-10 win the Steelers just escaped with -- the latter at Mile-High.

Honorable mentions: Vikings (7-1).