Danny Ainge Should Tell the Cavs to Piss Up a Rope if They Asked for Jaylen Brown or Jayson Tatum

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Look, I never wanted to trade Isaiah; thats my guy. But, the Celtics have burned that bridge to the ground so going back isn’t really an option now. And the Cavs know it. According to several reports yesterday, the Cavs are now looking for a pot sweetener to complete the IT deal as concerns about his hip linger.

Hell, Kyrie was already disgruntled in Cleveland and asking to be traded. So if the trade doesn’t go through it doesn’t really affect the Cavs any more than it would have two weeks ago. But the Cavs made this deal KNOWING Isaiah had a hip injury. He suffered that exact injury playing against you for christs sake. So I find it pretty hard to believe that Danny Ainge was playing the role of snake oil salesman about how much healthier IT is or is not.

Especially for such a widely publicized injury. It happened in the Eastern Conference Finals. So I think the Cavs are purely posturing and just trying to hold Danny’s nuts to the fire and squeeze out some additional assets.

Except reports came out that they were asking for Jaylen Brown or Jayson Tatum ON TOP of everything else the C’s gave them, including the Brooklyn lottery pick. There’s only one reply for such an outrageous request.

I mean you’ve got the Celtics already selling Kyrie Irving jerseys, you’ve got Jae Crowder working out in Cavs shirts, there’s no going back on this deal now.

But, to reiterate my point and to borrow a GIF from one of Big Z’s recent blog posts, this needs to be Danny on the phone with Cleveland.

However, now there are conflicting reports the Cavs never made such a request. Who the hell knows. Get in there and clean this shit up Woj. Either way, if I’m Danny I tell the Cavs you’ll get nothing and you’ll like it. That or a second round pick.

The New York Jets Have Truly Embarrassed Themselves With This New T-Shirt

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The Jets have done a lot of embarrassing things over the years, but this new t-shirt may take the cake.

No Off Days? Why..does..that..sound..so..familiar?

Oh thats right, its because Bill Belichick made it the biggest Patriots rallying cry since Do Your Job and The Patriot Way. But here come the Jets like some shitty t-shirt vendor just switching a couple words around and passing it off as their own. Embarrassing. Not even worth the ink it would cost to print the cease and desist letter.

NO. OFF. DAYS.

Edelman Out, but the Work Goes on for the Patriots

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As was suspected Friday night when Julian Edelman left the Patriots’ third preseason game with an injury, Edelman tore his ACL and will miss the entire 2017 season.

A lot of fans on social media were quick to decry the NFL preseason but the truth is that this injury could have happened at any time. Tom Brady didn’t play at all in the 2008 preseason and suffered a season-ending injury in Week 1 of the regular season. Wes Welker tore his left ACL and MCL in Week 17 in 2009. Rob Gronkowski has suffered a wide range of injuries during his seven year career, including a broken arm while playing on field goal protection (!) against the Colts in Week 11 in 2012.

Time and again, the Patriots have shown the ability to adapt and not only survive, but excel. The Patriots won the Super Bowl last season despite not having Gronkowski for the last five games of the regular season or the playoffs. They won the Super Bowl in 2003 after cutting Lawyer Milloy four days before the start of the regular season. And they won 11 games in 2008 without Brady, becoming the first 11-win team to miss the playoffs in more than two decades.

This season will be no different. It’s always disappointing to see a star player go down, but Bill Belichick never lets emotions affect his team’s play. The Patriots still have a very talented wide receiver corps that includes Brandin Cooks, Chris Hogan and Danny Amendola. Future hall of famer Rob Gronkowski is apparently healthy and ready to go, and the Patriots should still be able to cobble together a pretty good running game (to the chagrin of fantasy football players). With the AFC East still consisting of the Jets, Bills and Dolphins, it’s hard to bet against this team making it back to at least the AFC Championship game in January.

If you’re still down about Edelman, though, rest assured. He will be back, and it will be a hell of story in the updated afterword to his memoir in a few years.

Sox Take 2-of-4 in Cleveland, and I’ll Take That, Too

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It’s never a good thing when your ace gets shellacked like Chris Sale did in Cleveland last night. Sale gave up seven runs on seven hits and three walks in just three innings as the Red Sox fell to the Indians  13-6. But now is not the time to panic.

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The Red Sox still took two out of four games against the Indians in Cleveland, a team that has played them tough over the past two seasons. It could have easily been three out of four, if not for a bullpen implosion on Monday night. Those happen every once in a while, even to good teams. But Doug Fister and Drew Pomeranz both pitched very well, and Eduardo Rodriguez pitched more than respectably.

Again, it sucks to see Sale get knocked around but we know he’ll bounce back. Sale is not something the Red Sox need to concerned about going forward. David Price’s elbow and Dustin Pedroia’s knee are things they need to be concerned about.

Even though this series was just a split, the positives that come out of it – Rodriguez, Fister and Pomeranz pitching well – far outweigh the negatives – Sale’s bad night.

Baltimore comes to Fenway tonight and Rick Porcello takes the mound for the Sox. It’s been a strange season for Porcello, but he’s 4-0 with a 4.07 ERA in August. It’d be nice to seem him keep that trend going against the O’s.

I Need These Custom NBA Jam Jordans Like I Need Air

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I don’t think I’ve ever needed something as badly as I need these video game sneakers. So FreakerSneaks makes all these custom Jordans and they are so choice. They got all the classics like NBA Jam, Super Mario, Duck Hunt, and Sonic. There’s stunting on people and  then there’s stunting on people in totally custom NBA Jam Jordans. $1,200? Swipe swipe. So slap these on my Christmas list today mom and dad. Just look at the details though, they even have the championship screen shot on the tongue.

But lets not forget some of the other beauties like the Jordan Sonic: Marble Zone 1. If these kicks don’t take you right back to the glory days of playing Sega in the basement then I don’t even want to know you.

And of course you can’t forget the true classics, the godfather of modern video games, the plumber himself; Super Mario.

On to the best of the rest:

Somebody get me a goddamn sneaker deal!

PS – If I were to design my own pair of these I would 100% have to call them the Jordan Super Nintendo Chalmers 1.

…..Patent Pending.

Friday Morning Randomness

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Losing a a perfect game or a no-hitter in the 10th inning of a scoreless game has to be the most heartbreaking experience for a pitcher. I’d rather give up a walk-off grand slam in a three-run game than lose like Rich Hill did on Wednesday night. There can’t be anything worse than being almost perfect, and still losing.

Obviously, it reminded me of Pedro’s night in San Diego in 1995. Though at least Pedro got some run support in the top of the 10th inning and still got the win.

Rob Manfred Getting His Stadium Hustle on in St. Pete

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AP — Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred wants Tampa Bay to work a little quicker on getting the Rays a new ballpark.

Rays Principal Owner Stuart Sternberg has been working for nearly a decade to get a new stadium for the club…

The Rays were averaging 15,815 fans per game before Wednesday night’s contest against the Toronto Blue Jays. That is just over half the major league average of 30,470. Tropicana Field and its location have been almost universally blamed as the reason for the poor attendance. Paid attendance Wednesday was 8,264, the lowest for a Rays home game since 2006…

Manfred said Major League Baseball “doesn’t have a firm timetable” for what steps to take if the Rays fail to get an agreement to build a new stadium in the Tampa Bay area, but added that “it is a topic of discussion in the industry, the lack of progress.”

I’ll give you a firm timetable, Mr. Commissioner. 2028. That’s because the Rays’ ironclad lease agreement with Tropicana Field runs through the 2027 season, and doesn’t even allow the Rays to explore other options.

With a lease agreement like that, it’s no surprise that the St. Petersburg City Council has basically given Stuart Sternberg and the Rays the Michael Corleone treatment.

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As I said in my review of Tropicana Field earlier this month, it’s hard to believe that Major League Baseball actually agreed to put a baseball team there 20 years ago. Was Bud Selig that desperate to add a second team in Florida? Other cities vying for an MLB team in the mid-1990s included Orlando, Buffalo, Vancouver, Washington, D.C. and Nashville.

Obviously D.C. got its team a few years later when the Expos left Montreal. An expansion team in D.C. prevents the Expos from moving to D.C., but it probably doesn’t keep them in Montreal either. Wherever else the Expos could have landed couldn’t have been worse than Tropicana Field.

And the NFL, NHL and NBA have all set up shop in Tennessee since 1998. With a little foresight, Major League Baseball also could have become a part of the burgeoning sports scene in Tennessee. Alas, not much foresight went into this decision. How much foresight was needed to see that the concrete multipurpose venue was going out of vogue? Still, MLB planted the Rays in one. For 30. Effing. Years.

My advice to the Rays and MLB is to grin and bear it. You made some awful, shortsighted decisions and now have to live with the consequences. You may play in dump, but you can still try and make the best of it. Nobody likes to hear owners worth $800 million complain.

I’d have more sympathy for the Rays and MLB if not for all the other taxpayer-funded stadium boondoggles. And even if construction on a new stadium could start tomorrow, it probably wouldn’t be ready before 2020. What’s a few extra years at that point? At least by 2027 the Trop will be 37 years old, making a new venue somewhat reasonable.

And take heart, Rays fans. Not too long ago the New England Patriots were locked in an ironclad lease to a dump of a stadium. That ended up working out for everybody.

1unrgd

P.S. – Manfred chose to go on a fact-finding mission at Tropicana Field on a Wednesday night Rays/Jays game at the end of August? Bonus points for picking the best night in over a decade to complain about how awful that place is. Announced attendance 8,264.

Woof.

I Ruined Rich Hill’s No-Hitter Last Night

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So you know how whenever a pitcher has a no-hitter going and the TV cameras show him by himself on the bench? None of his teammates will talk to him because they’re afraid of jinxing the no-no. Hell they even say fans and broadcasters shouldn’t talk about it because you’ll jinx it. Welp, I fired off a tweet about his no-hitter last night and 47 seconds later Hill gave up a walk-off home run in the 10th inning. So that ones on me, sorry Rich. I’ll strive to be better next time.

Three Years Ago Today the Red Sox Signed Colossal Bust Rusney Castillo

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Man time flies. Three years since the Red Sox dumped a 7-year $72.5 million contract in Rusney Castillo’s lap on a whim. And this is why you do not get hyped about a player over a goddamn YouTube video.

Did we learn nothing from Yi Jianlian AKA “The Chairman“? Rusney Castillo looked like he was gonna be a 5-tool stud that the Sox plucked out of Cuba. We’d pair him with Yoenis Cespedes, Hanley Ramirez (and maybe even Giancarlo Stanton?) to form the Cuban Missile Crisis. Right? Well actually not a single one of those guys plays OF for the Red Sox today. Rusney turned out to be a complete bum and has taken up residence as the highest paid player in Minor League Baseball (I chose not to fact check this).

Over parts of 3 seasons in the big leagues Castillo is a career .262 hitter in 317 at bats with 7 HR, 35 RBI and 7 Stolen Bases with a .301 OBP. As a potential 5-tool player, Castillo proved to actually not have a single one of those tools.

Baseball Reference pegs his 162 game average season at .262/.301/.379 with 11 HR 57 RBI 74 Runs and 11 SB. All of that for the cool price of $72.5 Million. And he’s still got THREE YEARS left on his contract at $11M, $11M and $14M. At least Pablo Sandoval made a few DL trips as an excuse. What. A. Disaster.

PS – Rusney Castillo has a .286 career batting average in the minors over 800+ at bats. The $72 Million player can’t even hit .300 playing against kids in Rhode Island.

Why the Celtics Won the Trade of Isaiah Thomas for Kyrie Irving

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Wow. Last night the Celtics traded Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder, Ante Zizic and the 2018 Nets pick for Kyrie Irving. As I said at 7:30 last night, I go off the grid to workout for ONE hour and I come back to find Trader Danny has fundamentally changed the structure of the Celtics with another blockbuster trade. Seriously, sleep with one eye open around this guy.

First things first, it sucks to see Isaiah Thomas go as he was absolutely integral in putting the Celtics back on the map the past couple of years and vice versa. Celtics went from a middling team to the No. 1 seed in the East. Isaiah went from a third string point guard in Phoenix to Boston finishing in the Top 5 for MVP. He had 40 and 50 point games while getting his teeth knocked out and even putting on dazzling performances after suffering tragic family losses. IT seemed like a genuinely good dude with a massive chip on his shoulder who just wanted to prove the world wrong. And he’s done that. IT, the last pick in the 2011 NBA Draft just got traded for Kyrie, the first overall pick in the 2011 NBA Draft.

While IT has been hands down my favorite Celtics player since KG and it sucks to see him go, Kyrie is so, so, so good that its hard to not like this deal. The Celtics upgraded at PG getting one of the best scorers in the entire NBA. Kyrie isn’t exactly a defensive savant either but he’s 6 inches taller than IT, which alone will allow him to more effectively cover the positon defensively. Kyrie is also going to create even more space for the Celtics on offense, especially in the playoffs, as other teams won’t be able to smother and trap Kyrie as they were prone to do with IT. Teams will have to account for his one-on-on play and continuously have help defenders and double teams waiting for Kyrie, which will open up even more opportunities for guys like Al Horford and Gordon Hayward.

The Detractors:

  • “Kyrie is not that much of an upgrade over Isaiah.”
    • He’s 3 years younger, healthier, bigger and has one more year left on his contract than Isaiah. At just 25 years old Kyrie can grow with the Celtics core of Jaylen Brown and Jason Tatum and be right in his prime as the other two are coming into theirs. As much as I love Isaiah, the core probably would not have been good enough quick enough as he and Horford would be in their 30s by the time Brown and Tatum enter their prime.
  • “The Celtics have just wrecked their team chemistry.”
    • This I admit could be an issue as the Celtics now only return 4 players from the 2016 team that reached the Eastern Conference Finals and only 1 out of 5 starters. That is CRAZY. However, one of the reason’s I’m not higher on the NBA in general is because, more than any other sport, talent wins above all else. It doesn’t matter how great your chemistry is if you don’t have 2 or 3 of the best players in the league. The NBA is built around a core of hypertalented superstars and if you don’t have at least a couple of them you’re porked.
  • “I hate to trade Jae Crowder and Ante Zizic.”
    • Always loved Crowder and he was a key guy off the bench. Again this is why I’m not a GM, but if we’re going to look at this emotionlessly, thats what Crowder was; a guy off the bench. You do not turn down trades for 25-year old 4x All-Stars over bench players. And for anyone crying about trading Ante Zizic I ask you this; Have you ever even seen Zizic play? Granted I’m not a scout, but this is a guy who was so good that he couldn’t get on an NBA roster and got stashed overseas his rookie year. I’m not sweating over trading a guy with exactly 0 minutes played in the NBA. Plus, we still have the Dancing Bear.
  • “Who is going to rebound for us?”
    • WHO HAS REBOUNDED FOR US THE LAST FOUR YEARS?! The Celtics as an organization have effectively punted on rebounding. Last year the Celtics were 22nd in Offensive Rebounds per game and 22nd in Defensive Rebounds per game. Not exactly world beaters to begin with.
  • “I hate trading the 2018 Nets pick.”
    • It sucks to trade one of our treasured assets, but thats exactly why Danny got them. He’s been trying to trade these things for years, he just has never found a deal he wanted to pull the trigger on. Plus how many of these things are you going to keep? The Celtics have already drafted No. 3 overall the past 2 years and still have a potential Top 5 pick next year (more on that below.)

How about Danny Ainge though? This guy has effectively turned a 36-year old Paul Pierce and a 37-year old Kevin Garnett directly or indirectly into: Kyrie Irving, Jaylen Brown, Jason Tatum, Al Horford, Gordon Hayward and the 2018 Lakers potential No. 2-5 pick.

And if Kyrie re-signs with the Celtics then Danny looks like an even bigger genius for the Jayson Tatum move, trading down from the No. 1 overall pick to No. 3 while also scooping up the 2018 Lakers pick from Philly. This is HUGE looking back because without that Lakers pick in his back pocket I highly doubt Danny makes the Kyrie trade, having to surrender the Nets pick. He basically, as many said at the time, got the guy he wanted in Tatum while also picking up an additional draft pick. And while many people laughed at Danny for trading the No. 1 overall pick for another one of his coveted draft picks, the fact of the matter is he got a great player while also adding a back up lottery pick, which allowed him to more aggressively shop the Nets 2018 pick.

For those of you that are mourning the end of the “Pierce/KG Nets Trade” well fear not, because its not over, not really. The Celtics got that 2018 Lakers pick by trading the No. 1 overall pick, which was the Nets pick. So we still have one more year to live off of the Nets misery if we’re getting technical. One more asset/player to build off of, while the Nets continue to send Billy King hate mail.

PS – This Isaiah trade just reinforces my longstanding personal policy of never buying a player’s jersey unless they’ve recently signed a contract extension. I’ll never forget buying a Sergei Samsonov jersey in 2006, only to see the Bruins trade him A WEEK LATER. Which is why the next Bruins jersey I bought was a Patrice Bergeron jersey, fresh off his 8-year contract extension.