Thanksgiving! For those of you not in the USA, this is the time of year when we Americans celebrate our incredible imperialism and our ability to drive out indigenous peoples through sheer power, audacity and strength. I am out of the office this week, celebrating Thanksgiving by not being in the SLAM Dome. Because that’s what the Pilgrims would have done, if they’d had offices and the internets and stuff. I’m also wearing a tricorn hat right now. Here’s a picture of me wearing one. What!
I haven’t been writing about it, but I’ve been watching the NBA. A lot. And I’ll get into all that soon enough, once we get into December and the Hawks start winning games. Because you know that’s gonna happen. I’ll have some game notes on Wednesday, either way.
In the meantime, a few things…
• One reason I haven’t been posting a lot lately is because I’m doing more stuff behind the internets here at SLAMonline. Which is why I’m happy to announce that we’re about to launch the SLAM Rookie Blogs. We’ve partnered with our friends at adidas and are going to bring you five NBA rookies, who will be checking in exclusively with SLAMonline.com multiple times each month to let you know what it’s like as a rook in the L.
Our five will be Rodney Stuckey (Pistons), Daequan Cook (Heat), Javaris Crittenton (Lakers), Corey Brewer (T-Wolves) and Spencer Hawes (Kings). We’ll drop the initial installment tomorrow. This should be fun.
• Alicia Keys is one heckuva walking advertisement for ProActive, isn’t she? From this to this is remarkable. And isn’t that “No One” song a total rip-off of the Black-Eyed Peas’ “Where Is The Love”?
• At some point on Wednesday, check this site out. Can’t wait to see the SLAM shoe commercial. Gilbert better ask me to wear a lobster costume for that ad. I’ll do it, too.
(Oh, and the maniacs at Wizznutz sent along a link to their new version of the Gil II Zero that doesn’t actually exist. Not bad though.)
• Is it just me, or does Delonte West look like he just broke out of prison?
• Technically, my job description doesn’t include anything about defending Stephon Marbury, but I just end up doing it from time to time for fun. I could go there right now, because it seems like piling on Steph is the easy NBA column to write this week. Hey, Steph ruined the Knicks! Everyone hates Steph! Steph’s a terrible player! And it would be easy for me to point out that the Knicks started with a tough Western Conference swing and still aren’t used to playing with Zach Randolph, who missed a few games. But I’m not going to do that. I still think they’ll make the Playoffs.
• This is a pretty good story, though.
• Also, bloggers are making a big deal about the All-Star ballots being announced with either a bunch of players out of position of not listed at all. Why does anyone care? This happens every year, and I’ve asked the NBA for years to allow me or someone at SLAM to be on the committee that compiles these things, but it ain’t happening. Heck, they won’t even let me have a vote in the postseason awards. One of these days, McIntyre, one of these days!
• What happened to all the Luis Scola hype? Two months ago, people were making him out to be the next Kevin McHale. I, however, compared him to Shareef Abdur-Rahim and Juwan Howard. I think perhaps tempering expectations is the way to go.
• Just because it’s Thanksgiving, SLAMonline isn’t taking any time off. We’ve already fed our servers massive amounts of turkey and dressing to energize them for the surge of traffic that’s going to hit late Wednesday night, when I post the newest SLAM cover. Stay tuned, peoples…
