NBA: There Are No Lakes In LA, Just Cocaine. The Houston Rockets–without Yao Ming–ran the Lakers up and down the floor in their Game 4 yesterday, trouncing the Western Conference favorites, 99-87. It was Houston’s Aaron Brooks (pictured) who led all scorers with 34 points. Kobe was held to 15 points on 7-of-17 shooting. That series is tied, 2-2.

Also, the Celtics tied their series with Orlando after Glen Davis hit a game-winning deuce with time running out [video after the jump]. They go back to Boston for Game 5 tomorrow…Denver and Cleveland can advance to their respective conference finals with wins tonight.

NHL: Unoriginal. The Red Wings, Blackhawks, Hurricanes, and Penguins each hold a 3-2 advantage in their series. Chicago and Pittsburgh could wrap up their series with wins tonight. Why Chicago is in the Western Conference, I’ll never understand.

Golf. Tiger didn’t win.

Baseball. Nationals third baseman Ryan Zimmerman has now hit safely in 28 consecutive games. And Reds pitcher Micah Owings hit a home run. I would say that he helped his own cause, but that’s gayer than those pink bats they used yesterday.

This Week In Cocaine. French tennis player Richard Gasquet failed two tests for cocaine and will be suspended. Even worse, Gasquet is French. Read the rest of this entry »

There were plenty of poor performances to choose from this week, but we’ve narrowed it down to three.

Team USA was finally eliminated from the World Basebalzzzzzzzzz after losing to Japan last night, 9-4. The loss marks the end of a wayward odyssey for an American team plagued by injuries and conflicting interests between the national team, the players, and the players’ teams. Notably terrible last night was Adam Dunn, who followed up his wild throw from first base on Wednesday with an 0-for-4 night at the plate, and even quit on fielding a line drive for good measure. He’s like the white Manny Ramirez! Except not as marketable! He’s like John Goodman, but without the nuance. Enjoy him, Washington.

In Illinois high school hoops, Coach Thorpe’s North Lawndale College Prep boys’ squad were assessed a technical foul for wearing uniforms that were deemed illegal by officials; they lost the game by one point. While everyone wants to cry about the fact that no other opponent cited the fact that the stripes on the jerseys exceeded the four-inch limit, no one seems to be too worked up about the fact that a school (and probably the coach himself) ordered uniforms that were unfit for play. And frankly, pretty damn ugly.

But Marquette’s Lazar Hayward probably had the biggest suck of all, if only because it happened on the grand stage of the NCAA tournament. With his team down by two with the ball and time running out, Hayward went under the hoop to inbound, but stepped on the baseline, turning the ball over and taking his team’s chance to win right out of their hands. And that was the unkindest suck of all.

Wild Card weekend shot its wad on Saturday, leaving us a pair of miserable Sunday games.  Quick caps:

• Cardinals 30, Falcons 24:  Caw, caw!  Skreeeee! Bird noises!  Compared to Sunday’s losers, the Falcons played admirably, but the Arizona D bottled up Atlanta’s vaunted running game and forced some key turnovers, paving the way for a loss next week in Carolina.
• Chargers 23, Colts 17 (OT): That’s three straight playoff victories for the Bolts against Indy.  Credit for this one goes to Darren Sproles and… Mike Scifres?  Sproles filled in for an injured (surprise) LaDainian Tomlinson, amassing 328 total yards and the game-winning TD that made up for a costly red zone fumble.  Scifres dropped six punts inside the Colts’ 20.
• Ravens 27, Dolphins 9:  Ugh.  You know that scene in Leaving Las Vegas where Elisabeth Shue just sits in the shower and cries after getting anally raped?  That was Chad Pennington after the game yesterday.
• Eagles 26, Vikings 14:  Donovan McNabb in early playoff round + Brian Westbrook + Philly’s blitzing D > Adrian Peterson + (-Tarvaris Jackson).  T-Jack was 15 of 35 for 164 yards and an INT.  He would have thrown more interceptions, but he’s too inaccurate.

Suck-Off winner is a tie between Pennington and T-Jack.  Pennington’s numbers were worse (4 INTs), but man oh man, it blows my mind that Tarvaris Jackson in an NFL quarterback.  He is horrible.

Jevon Kearse and the Titans celebrate a 9-0 record with a little wit

By my count, there were five games yesterday in which the team that had been outplayed most of the game had a chance to win or tie in the final two minutes — and all five lost.

• The Eagles got run over by Brandon Jacobs & Co. (Philly had the ball for only 20 minutes the whole game), but still had a chance to win late.  Then Andy Reid called for a pair of unimaginative runs up the middle on third- and fourth-and-short, and that was that.  36-31, Giants.
• You play to win the game: a flubbed PAT earlier in the game meant the Chiefs could only tie after scoring a late TD (thanks to a BS pass interference penalty) that put them within a point of the Chargers, so the Chiefs went for two and a win in San Diego.  No dice.  20-19, Chargers.
• The Steelers played tough, but Ben Roethlisberger was sloppy, mismanaging the final drive and throwing critical interceptions late in the game, including the Hail Mary that nearly won the game.  24-20, Colts.

Read the rest of this entry »

Watch out! Grossman’s back! And he’s got a neckbeard!

The NFL script was flipped this week, as several sucky teams decided not to suck.  So does that make this Opposite Week?  Is this the Monday Blow-Off instead?

First, a hearty congratulations to the Bengals, who won their first game of the season behind the competent play of Harvard man Ryan Fitzpatrick and a resurgent Chad Johnson-Cinco, who caught two touchdowns in a departure from his season-long suck.  All it took, apparently, was the threat of T.J. Houshmandzadeh walking 25 miles to the NFL Network studios.  Elsewhere, the Chiefs, Lions, and Browns all flirted with upsets before succumbing to their inherent crappiness, as all coughed up 4th quarter leads.

At least those teams flirted with winning; several crappy teams mailed in predictably crappy games.  I’m looking at you, Seahawks (26-7 loss to the Eagles) and Rams (34-13 to the Cardinals).  And the Raiders… ouch.  A 24-0 blanking at home against the Falcons that was sealed by halftime.  (Thanks for those 2 fantasy points, Justin Asshole Fargas.)

And yet, none of these teams earned the Suck-Off title this week.

Read the rest of this entry »

Three teams lost at the feet of kickers and their last second field goals yesterday, but if you’re a fan of the Lions, Redskins, or Bears (oh my!), you might already know that. And if so, congratulations on not committing suicide last night! We all know you had the perfect opportunity after watching New England get destroyed last night. Man, that game would have been so satisfying, had it happened in Week One, but with Matt Cassel dragging that team down to Special Olympian status, even the confused face of Bill Belichick couldn’t bring me the joy that flipping to another game would have.

You know who else sucked yesterday? The AFC North. Baltimore got whipped by an Indy team that’s been struggling all year, while Favre’s two picks and one fumble weren’t generous enough to get a Carson Palmer-less Cincinnati team past the Jets. As for Pittsburgh and Cleveland? Those turds didn’t even play.

The Tom Cable Era got off the only way it possibly could have, with the Raiders losing in a blowout to the Saints. San Francisco’s not quite ready for prime time, as the Niners let the Westbrook-less Eagles hang 23 points on them in the fourth quarter in a come-from-ahead loss. And Carolina lost a big division game against Jeff Garcia, who may have played well enough to usurp Brian Griese as the Bucs’ starting quarterback next week against Seattle.

If we were going to hand out some suck-off medals, the bronze would go to clockblocker Ken Whisenhunt, whose last-second timeout in regulation damn near cost his team a win. Any silver would be set aside for the officials of the Packers-Seahawks game, who seem hellbent on screwing Mike Holmgren on every conceivable gray-area call that arises. I suppose Dan Orlovsky could have made it here, too, but there was just so much novelty in unintentionally wandering out of the end zone…that’s more like “trailblazing” than “sucking” to me.

But the gold would have to go to the Miami Dolphins defense, who let Matt Schaub and his three picks drive down the field on them for the game-winning touchdown in the last minute.

Congrats to everyone that sucked this week. You are what makes watching the NFL so awesome.

This will be an abbreviated posting day because of the holiday. Seriously. WL will return in full force on Tuesday.