As The Big Lead noticed today, Tony Parker got engaged to Eva Longoria. Longoria, 31, has previously commented on how sexually inexperienced Parker was before they started dating, and when she rose to national fame due to Desperate Housewives' success, her interviews almost always included how vital her vibrators were to her daily masturbation.

In other words, she might just be dumb and horny enough to make this work. For as many as four years.

p.s. Way to be the hot one on Desperate Housewives, Eva. That's why I entered sports media. I look great when I stand between John Clayton and Tony Siragusa!

As we all know, the Knicks suck in epic fashion — not merely for their losing record, but for their historically poorly constructed team. That's why, even in a game they won that featured LeBron James, the best highlight is of the game is of undersized, selfish, turnover-prone point guard Nate Robinson attempting to alley-oop a dunk to himself, only to miss the dunk and get called for traveling.

Ladies and gentlemen, your 2006-07 New York Knicks.

Awesome. 

Fleshbot directs us to this SI.com gallery of NBA cheerleaders featuring several photos of Rockets dancers dunking… which, in the span of .000001 seconds, is automatically more interesting than anything that's ever happened in the 10-year history of the WNBA.

Once you get through the handful of cheerleader dunk photos, the gallery unfairly depicts professional cheerleaders wearing tight, revealing clothing and shaking their asses. It's a real chore to look at, let me tell you.

But you can't argue with the style displayed here. This gal obviously has solid ball-cupping technique. You could probably even say she works well around the rim.

This (last item) is why I created the "Unsurpirising Stories" tag:

Though the Lions poked fun at his piano-playing last week, Joey Harrington said more parents actually have told him their children play piano because of him than play quarterback because of him.

Uhhhh… ya think? How many parents have told him that? One? That's probably all it would take.

Joey Harrington, inspiring children to play quarterback. That's rich. That's like if Joey grew up idolizing Steve DeBerg. Because he was so inspiring for one season during his six-team, 16-year career.

Jon Kitna, now there's a guy who can inspire you to play quarterback. He's got a haircut you can set your watch to. 

Yeah, yeah, I heard… Mark McGwire is on the Hall of Fame ballot. I'm willfully avoiding the subject, even though if you think he should get into the Hall you clearly have no soul and belong in Hell, sodomized for eternity by a splintered 4x4s from the remains of the Polo Grounds.

Thankfully, the Dugout distracts us from that argument in today's episode, in which aggressively unfunny writers Patrick Hruby and Jim Caple of Page 2 ("ESPN.com's chunky vomit. The analogy works right down to the color scheme.") discuss Dante Bichette's Hall of Fame credentials.

I don't want to ruin the surprise for you, but if McGwire is having trouble getting votes, all he needs to do is change his t-shirt. 

(Seriously, Dante Bichette? Who else made the ballot, Pete Harnisch? Oh wait. He did.)

Update: As wet blanket commmenter Rob notes, the last link is not to the ballot itself, but to the list of players eligible for the ballot. With Leather does not regret the error.

…and I said nothing. As TrueHoop's Henry Abbott notes today, AOL is developing the NBA FanHouse as the next frontier after successful forays into the NFL and NCAA football. As with the first FanHouse installments, there's a list of blogging All-Stars that have signed on, proving that as much bloggers love doing what they do for free, they love doing it for money even more.

(Excuse me while I take off my "With Leather" hat…) 

Full disclosure: I write for the Seahawks FanHouse, and it's an enjoyable side project (even if most of the comments read like a chat room of teenagers and middle-aged housewives who couldn't grasp irony if you beat them with a tire iron). But the NBA has such a sprawling, marvelous blogosphere, with so many sites that have not just unique writing styles (I'm looking at you, Wizznutzz) but defining visual feels as well. Will Bethlehem Shoals's magic be the same when he has to abandon FreeDarko's mysterious imagery for the licensed photos at Getty? 

Well, whatever the case, if it gives splendid writers and original wits like Marcel Mutoni (who's everywhere these days) and J.E. Skeets a larger audience, I'm all for it. And I'm not just saying that because I'm contractually bound to AOL. Well, maybe I am. But this is as genuine as I get.