Now, believe it or not, back before you kids had the ANBCBSPNNFOX sports network that you have today, there was this amazing network called TNT — where they had crappy original shows but for unexplained reasons, their NBA coverage surpasses every single sports show about any sports.

Let’s bring you up to speed: May 2nd, 2008. The Washington Wizards’ legion of fans versus Cleveland’s royalty. Of course LeBron was the easy choice to plow through a measly opponent like the Wizards… as their key stars are just trying to recover while a great role player is invoking a rap war over the hardwood floor.

But you obviously have not been reading up on their mystique (not the WNBA team). This is a team that will do magnificiant damage in the realms of the unseen. This is a team that shall unequivocally push their limits as a collective onto an undeserving royal. They will rise up and make it game seven…because I’m really needing the points in my playoff point.

Undeniably, I’ve been a T-Mac fan 4 lifez. Part of the enduring love and frustration for rooting a marvel such as he is not seeing his failure in the first round exits. Nay. It is our own unfulfilled expectations of superiority for a beast that cannot be defined—Darwin couldn’t draw shit like this.

If it were up to the 12 Gods of Kobol, T-Mac would’ve been ostracized long ago into Cylon kingdom. He’s not one of the pure NBA great. His storyline never changes. Worst of all, he keeps an arsenal of power that will only come out to attack when you least, and inconsequentially, expected. He is a frakking toaster.

But I still root for the guy. Because through his sideway eyes I see myself. One that was destined for greatness but for some reason our GPS gadget broke. We’re in perpetual lost-hood. Until we crawl ourselves out of the cave, there is but one option: faith in the unknown. That is the legend of the right shoulder vein.

As for the old soul Hawks versus the old old Celtics. It will make my heart warm up like the south if Atlanta maintains their idealism by flipping the script. No one gave them a single game. Yet Joe Johnson came to cross up that delusion (what up Leon Powe) by reminding the world he was once untouchable as an original mover of the ‘05 Phoenix Suns team. Let them pass and the world will be in total order. Chaos will be Boston’s street name.

Slama-jama-Obama! Illustration: TheHype

When you see the reigning lion running full steam into your defense, do the sensible thing any driver in the mist of the NBA would do: Pull the hand break and jump the fuck out of the car—Jason Statham style.

You do not want to get punked on national tee-vee. In fact, that’s 5 demerit points right there.

Things to look out for in avoiding this:

It’s probably when your team is up or very close in points against this type of road subject that your internal hazard light should flicker. Once you’ve acknowledged that this is the case, hold on tight because the thunder will come down any moment. Be sure to report it to the insurance that it was their fault.

LeBron on Deng [YouTube]

Morning Drive: Where student basketball drivers get to learn their basic theory before approaching daddy’s BMW Z4, because you’ll fuck it up bad, real bad.

ANYHOW: all that to say, since it’s October, and nearing our dream league’s return, it’s in my blood to return to good form—barring porn, obviously. So first, a return to the snark:

The definitive review of LeBron James’ SNL hosting duties:

Let me first say that I’m still a fan of the show. For the past couple of years I think SNL really tried to make a change (Tina Fey no longer the head writer–Seth Myers took over) so that the sketches don’t drag as much. The Digital Shorts are that new thing, but that’s not all, the sketches seem tighter and crisper.

So what of last Saturday’s show? Basically, it was a bad combo of bad creativity in terms of what to do with Bron and when he’s not there, they totally lost track of what’s funny. I mean, seriously, did the cold open even have a joke? There were fun times though, specifically Andy Samberg’s “I Ran” love song to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Kanye’s faux rants. Speaking of Ye, I’m totally calling fake-stutter on his 2nd performance leading to that freestyle (a little too obvious…)

Frankly, it was just a bad overall ep, with or without LeBron.

A two hit combo for this slowth day going…

– Blog Show keeps on truckin’

– Team USA scrimmagin where Kobe gets NASTILY blocked by LeBron and wins the game…

– annnnd… everything in the blog world about that Donaghy fellow

Actually, before we go, said fellow had to get help from cops because of calls threatening him. Unconfirmed sources say that one of the calls asked for an I. P. Freeley.

Oh and shit, check out the house of the motherfucker

That’s the O.C. house right there! Take a closer look at the sign:

Shocking!

Okay, where the hell did we go… oh yes, style and taste and all that. Sooo, we now want you to be familiar with NBAOU’s official Snobbery Watch Measuring-Thing™ (*cough* it’s a scale *double-cough*) for the NBA!

Snob Watch? Why…?
It’s basically a contrived device we thought up 5mins ago that lets us hate on someone or something about the NBA without any real justifiable reason. Thus, being a snobby bastard

So… it’s just like… a mini-rant…? You realize you’re blogging already, isn’t that the same thing?
Hey smartass, STFU! Who the hell are you?? We don’t need to answer— um.. okay, we’ll it’s a bit more nuanced than that. You see, Snob-Watching is when there is something perceived as “cool” or “in” at the moment and we’ll tell you why that is so “uncool” and how your sister is ugly

Hey, that’s not nice
Sorry, just projecting low self-esteem *group hug*

How does it work? Something more than “they all suck” please
It’s like this:
– Fergie: millions of little girls worship her for some insane reason (probably something to do with the water) and she’s g’damn everywhere. Her songs are being played ad nauseum on the radio and far as we can tell, apparently there’s something “sexy” about her. A Snob Watch of “Fergie” means that the person is: too overexposed; bad talent (*that’s* singing?); and a sense that they are a unique trendsetter when in fact their style is annoying painful

– Zach Braff: has a knack for being the leading man in movies where it’s all very emo-land. Pretty much the same character, same range in most of them. Somehow is making us believe he’s a star. A Snob Watch of “Zach Braff” means that: they are overachieving; fan base size does not match quality size; and not as charming off-screen (NOTE: we actually love his character of JD on Scrubs, well, seasons 1-3 JD, just to put this in context… because Scrubs is frikkin awesome. Annnnd another thing, we don’t really mind him, but since there’re plenty of snobbing on him around other pretentious elitist snobs, hell, why not)

– Sophia Coppola: this is a harder one to explain (that’s what she said!) but it basically boils down to — making films that we’re supposed to learn something deep and insightful, but in the end it all becomes very ambiguous (the annoying kind of ambiguous) where the films end up looking aesthetically very nice, but that’s about it. A Snob Watch of “Sophia Coppola” means: they are all about the sizzle and not about the steak; and a small group of devoted followers (apologists) will defend them til death

– Dane Cook: a very popular comedian rising in the mainstream consciousness and whose MySpace page is probably more famous than MySpace itself. However, this is interesting, because the Snob factor is at question here: critics freakin’ hate him, and it is even worse The Internet (as in, with the general pop, tons of folks love him, but pretty much everywhere we looked online, Cook has been thrashed) so is it still snobby to use Mr. Cook as someone that’s “in” even though tons of other folks knock him? Hmm… We gotta admit, we liked him and his bits, before the recent “blow up” of success—but, you know, being part of the Internet means we have to Snob away… and so we must. A Snob Watch of “Dane Cook” means: they are on the up of being insanely successful but it just feels (in the gut) that the successfulness shouldn’t be *that* insane; and that their level of popularity is as high as their unpopularity

Good LORD that was wordy, hows about an example of this in use for your beloved NBA?
Here goes: Snobbery Watch Measuring-Thing Victim #1 is— LeBron James.

Right, sure sure, we know, it’s easy to knock down the king (especially when you build him up a month ago) since he got his ass handed to him by the Spurs last month in the Finals. But realistically speaking, dude is as popular as ever. That’s perfect for Snob Watch. He has been coasting on his super skills that we can’t see the correlation of his true deserved fame. Yeah, he’s a freak of nature, one of kind player every 1o years, but as last season has shown, he was just so very “meh” up until the Detroit Pistons playoffs series.

So with the first edition of Snob Watch, we crown LeBron James Snob Status of Sophia Coppola where obviously his kickass on-court powers are very pleasing to the eye whenever he explodes, but besides the one blow up every so often, we are left feeling a huge void of his true essence, waiting to burst out. Take pride James, in being the first victim of this stupid silly and daft little exercise in bitchery, so that perhaps somehow, somewhere, a friend of a friend of a mom’s sister will read this and tell you that you got Sophia Coppola-ed, and hopefully you’ll work to change that, ASAP.

“Microsoft Balla”
..uh, uh, call me the Ballin’ Mista,
y’all don’t want me messing wit cha
unless you wanna be upgraded like Windows Vista..

“My World, And My Nikes At My Side ft. Chris Brown”
..yo, I’m a foot soldier
y’all hear me? Check it—
I need my polyurethane bitches!

or the unforgettable

“$100 Million Hustler”
..What you know about that? No seriously, I bet you have no idea what it is to be rich. Suckers!

Now, word up the NBAOU streetz (btw thx Scrap, hadn’t thought of using that!) is that BronBron will be looking to splash the waters on Broadway! YES trust me, I make this up to be true!

It’s going to be a play called “How My Team Aren’t Going to Win Me A Championship Anytime Soon” with showstopping numbers such as “Donyell Marshall Should Be Thrown Down a Well” or “Everyone should kiss Boobies!” and how can you not cheer for the tearjerker “My wifey is preggers but eh, I make more money playing on national tv so that’s that”

And of course, Nathan Lane plays LeBron’s long lost half-brother for waaaacky hijinks!

Tinseltown’s triumphs are reflected in this year’s Celebrity 100, Forbes’ annual list of the world’s most powerful–and best-paid–celebrities. To generate the list, Forbes analyzes celebrity earnings, plus media metrics like Google hits, press mentions as compiled by Lexis/Nexis, TV/radio mentions from Factiva and the number of times an A-lister appears on the cover of 32 major consumer magazines.

Earnings estimates are for June 2006 to June 2007 and consist of dollars earned solely from entertainment-related income. Management, agent and attorney fees have not been deducted.

Okay, so to bring it back to the NBA relatedness, the notable players we already know about are in there: Kobe Bryant (ranked #23), Shaq (#25), Michael Jordan (#35–who is he?!), and LeBron (#48). SHOCKER! You can see all the other sports’ male athletes here and female athletes here, try to contain the excitement.

Let’s just take a looksee at who else is on the list… I’ve make a nice screengrab here so you don’t have to go to their site because everytime their ads reloads a puppy gets shot

Disregarding the fact that Grey’s Anatomy fell off big time this year, what gives Forbes? Grouping the entire cast as one? Favoratism yo!

Again with this “entire cast” thing. Heh, gotta sting for Bron to see he can’t beat the Parker/Longoria machine anywhere.

Random Linkage for the Weekend:
Blog Show No. 13 [Mr. Irrelevant]
BestSportsStuff
Son of Sam Malone

#5: LeBron Dropping 40+ pts

Surely, I believe the correlation so far has been thus: LeBron can’t score in the field to get into a rhythm. So X plus 0.3 grams of suck = the Cavs lose. If we see a barrage of LePoints, we need to smile just a bit and think the game might be won for the City of Cleveland… only to lose yet again in Cleveland for Game 5

#4: Tim Duncan Turns Into A Werewolf And Runs Away

Timmy D has been everything he’s always been: A freakin’ Hall of Famer every minute he’s played in his life and we can’t do anything about it. What we can hope to happen is that he just leaves Game 4 out of nowhere. I don’t even care if tonight isn’t a full moon, someone do some mad science shit: turn him into a werewolf damnit—now, if someone WolfDuncan can still ball, well, we’re fucked.

#3: Drew Gooden’s Hair Patch Emerges As The Cavs Much Needed Next Go-To Man (Thing)

Obviously what’s hurting more than the Spurs choking defense is the fact that the Cavaliers are scared to make a basket. No joke, everytime they think they should score, they have instant night tremors, and they’re not even sleeping! So expect DrewPatch to step up and dunk on Fabricio tonight.

#2: Someone in the crowd takes out Eva Longoria

I’m not a violent person, per se. I’m not sexist… but sorry, having Eva/ABC infiltrate my living room everytime the Spurs are up, I turn into Jack Bauer and John McClane’s lovechild—somebody gonna get a hurt. I propose someone from the UFC, I dunno, I hear that’s thing’s the cocaine of 2007, everyone’s into it. People will be shocked that a guy knocked out Eva Longoria, but if it’s Chuck Liddell, awwww

and the #1 sign there will be a Game 5: Cavs to Win Game 4

Yeah, call me crazy, but I think if they win Game 4, they just might be able to go to Game 5. I’m crazy like that, calling out wild theories and such, people should lock me up for this type of heresy. But mark my words, if they don’t win tonight, I’ll kick every lil’ puppy I see!

…again… I dunno why I’m so violent today, I think it’s the ‘roids I had for breakfast.

Of all the series, why did this one have to be so predicable? Give us some hope, give us more than four games, c’mon, pretty please? Well, guess begging probably won’t work a darn for this Finals. It’s gonna be over on Thursday, LeSigh.

While last night’s Game 3 was much closer and saw the Cavs in an easier state of mind, defensively, with the help of the crowd, their offense just couldn’t handle the Spurs. Nothing easy… nor should it be really. That’s just the reality and level that is the Finals, this isn’t child’s play, you gotta be one hundred percent 100% of the time. Lebron and Co’ never had a real chance in this one—only imagined ones.

So perhaps, in lieu of Game 4, they should just all go out and chill somewhere… relaxing…