Manic Monday

by Lang Whitaker

I’m not sure that today could be any worse. It’s another manic Monday and I wish it was Sunday, because that’s my fun day. It’s pouring rain out, it’s cold and windy, there’s about 8 million things that have to be done in the next 24 hours.

And before we go on, I’ll speak for all Linkstigators today and say that our thoughts and prayers go out to everyone affiliated with Virginia Tech in the wake of what went on down there earlier. Just horrible stuff.

My once-trusty T-Mobile Sidekick 3 decided to stop working this morning. Actually, it hasn’t been working for a few weeks — the “n” key will periodically take off days at a time. But this morning, as I was on deadline waiting for an email from an NBA player telling me to call him, it went to sleep and froze, so I had to reset the whole thing. I still want a D-Wade Sidekick, but I think I have the Derek Bell Sidekick, because it’s fully in Operation Shutdown mode.

To make matters worse, everyone here is harried and ornery and trying to work as hard as possible. Call the SLAM Dome, for today, at least, The Grindhouse.

Watched a little basketball this weekend, but got stuck mostly doing stuff around the house. But I did see that odd Joey Crawford/Tim Duncan exchange. Have no idea what was going there. It’s weird because I’ve heard many NBA players say that they like Joey Crawford and think he’s one of the most fair refs in the game. Although from the way it looked, what happened was anything but fair. Obviously, I wasn’t there yesterday so I don’t know exactly what was said, but knowing Timmy a little bit I wouldn’t be surprised if he said something to Crawford here or there.

Is this first time two grown men called Timmy and Joey have been in such a public fight?

Also, the Slammys are coming. Just a word of warning.

Other stuff…

• My favorite things on the intenets today is Mark Cuban’s post about the Crawford/Duncan debacle. Cuban is so terse and angry that it’s funny.

• Michael Lee emailed to let me know he actually updated the blog he supposedly co-writes…and sure enough, he did. Ivan Carter should be getting double-pay.

• How bad are the Hawks trying to tank games? Mike Woodson is sitting out tonight’s game with “food poisoning.” Sure. Seiko Smith has all the time in the world for this story.

• The Celtics are sending Tom Heinsohn to be their rep at the NBA Draft Lottery, which seems like a pretty certain way to avoid getting one of the top picks. No way ABC wants to have to interview Tommy on live TV.

• Our people at DallasBasketball.com are all over this KG-to-the-Mavs deal that was apparently discussed around the trade deadline. I just can’t believe the Wolves would have taken Josh Howard and Stackhouse for KG. Actually, after looking at their record, maybe it’s not so surprising.

• Tim Thomas — Tim Thomas!!!!! — is upset that some of the Clippers players weren’t giving full effort yesterday. Karma’s a funny thing, man.

• After I mentioned the Smush Parker/Phil Collins strange stat a few weeks ago, Smush had a falling out with Phil Jackson and finally ended his streak yesterday. Upper hand: Collins.