This is it. They’re never going to top this one. Taiwan Animation covered Dennis Rodman’s trip to the Vatican with a game of NBA Jam, pitting Rodman and the Pope against evil lawyers, dunking altar boys and RICHARD SIMMONS (to represent gay people). At one point, Simmons gets “on fire” and Rodman puts him out with a hose.

Dude. Dude. This is it. God (and The Pope) bless you, Next Media Animation.

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Links

Even The Westboro Baptist Church Loves Jennifer Lawrence |UPROXX|

Here’s Every Pam Poovey Food Prop From ‘Archer’ |Warming Glow|

‘Action Stars Shooting At Dogs’ Debuts With Mel Gibson |Film Drunk|

My New Favorite Thing: TRON Hockey |With Leather|

UPROXX Video: Meet Real Life Superhero ‘The Chum’ In ‘TV For Real’ |Gamma Squad|

10 Redman Songs Everyone Should Know |Smoking Section|

How to Properly React to Free Agency |Kissing Suzy Kolber|

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I haven’t settled on whether or not I like Felicia Day. I was disappointed by season 7 of ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer’ (more on that in tomorrow’s Sports On TV column), but I loved Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog and she was cute in that one episode of ‘Undeclared.’ ‘The Guild’ seems like a pretty good show, if you laugh at the word aggro and want to watch a woman who is always on the verge of being sexually assaulted by people who laugh at the word aggro.

That said, the fastest way to earn a spot in my heart is to talk about NBA Jam. So far at With Leather we’ve written about the game’s T2: Judgment Day origins, its Wii remake and the video some guy made of the announcer cursing. Now I get to write about Felicia Day playing NBA Jam. Internet worlds are colliding! This is making me totally aggro*!

So yeah, the latest update from The Flog features Willow When Willow Stopped Being Willow playing the best-ever Sega Genesis basketball game. Okay, second best. She isn’t playing Bulls Vs. Blazers. Highlights include Felicia marking out for 1990s Hilary Clinton, thinking Eric Montross’ last name is “Mattress” and discovering how awesome Anthony Peeler was. Lowlights include a guy named “Ryon” throwing shade at DJ Jazzy Jeff, and the show’s dog host spelling out some stuff in poop. Viewer discretion, I guess?

Video is below.

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To be fair, it’s more NBA Jam R than NBA Jam XXX, but this unearthed clip of the original NBA Jam with a ton of cursing in it (sample dialogue: “HE’S ON F**KING FIRE!”) is my new favorite thing. It’s the manifestation of every joke I made playing NBA Jam with my 13-year old friends, and yes, when you’re 13 there is nothing funnier than putting ‘f**k’ where it doesn’t belong. See also, The Dan Band.

The clip made the rounds in video game circles back in August, but I have Jason at Sportress Of Blogitude to thank for the share. Former Midway creative director Mark Turmell talked about the video with GameTrailers.com and gave us just enough to believe Tim Kitzrow saying ‘boomshaka-f**kin-laka’ really happened:

He said through a conversation with Side Mission on Facebook that he saw the video the other day and recalled doing some similar audio recordings with voice actor Tim Kitzrow during the development of the arcade game.

“I can confirm that in the early days we did record tons of off-color stuff,” Turmell said.

Lines like “Get that **** out of here” and “He’s on ******* fire” were recorded when they worked on the arcade version of the game for Midway. Turmell said they actually tried to put the “Get that **** out of here” line into the final version with a “bleep” sound over the offending word, but the NBA objected and it was removed.

Kitzrow wrote to them shortly thereafter with an e-mail that read, “uhhhh, I don’t remember saying ‘shit’ so much” and Turmell turned around and denied the cursing to Kotaku, so the clip isn’t real. But ultimately, who cares? It’s hilarious, and you should show it to everyone you know.

Video is after the cut.

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Jest.com is always on point when they cover sports, but this clip of LeBron James developing his talents (and bad habits) at an early age might be the funniest thing they’ve ever done.

1994 LeBron taking his talents to Peter’s team and dribbling forever only to pass at the buzzer are funny enough, but the joke about not being able to be Michael Jordan in NBA Jam is so good it makes me jealous and angry. That’s the sign of a really great joke — it makes you mad you didn’t write it first. Give the kid who plays LeBron a sitcom, somebody.

[h/t That NBA Lottery Pick]

Welp, that’s a headline I never thought I’d write.

But here we are, traveling back to 1992 to watch Williams Entertainment pitching the original “NBA Jam”, trying to win the lucrative NBA sponsorship necessary to license professional basketball players by basically listing off every scene in the movie Terminator 2: Judgment Day. You see, Williams Entertainment are the guys who made that Terminator 2 arcade game you still find tucked into the corners of yet-to-be-updated bowling alleys next to Demolition Man pinball machines, and if it hadn’t been for the This Ain’t Nintendo blast processing rah rah of that game, Williams wouldn’t have had the tech necessary to put that two second clip of Horance Grant dunking in the halftime report.

You can watch the pitch below. At no point do the programmers catch fire.

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The Big 3 celebrates Christmas in June

In case you weren’t aware, the Boston Celtics went into Staples Center and defeated the Lakers 103-94 last night. Ray Allen, who had to sit much of Game 1 because of foul trouble, was better in Game 2. I’ll let Larry David tell you how he played:

Pretty good indeed, Larry. Warming up for 3 hours before game paid off, as Allen channeled his inner NBA Jam to the tune of 32 points. He was on fire in the first half hitting 7 threes in a row, a Finals record. But he wasn’t done there, Allen hit another three in the second half (finishing 8-11 from downtown) to set the record for three pointers made in a Finals game. He eclipsed his own performance in the 2008 Finals, Scottie Pippen, and Kenny Smith to make the record his own. Ray talked about how he was able to get open at the post game press conference.

“I didn’t think it was easy, getting the 3′s up in the air,” Allen said. “You look up and everybody is probably thinking, ‘How did this guy get open?’ But there’s so much going on there — big screens, misdirection plays. I thought they did everything they could to keep me from shooting 3′s, [but we] worked tirelessly.” –ESPN.com

Rajon Rondo finished with a “quiet” triple double, if such a thing exists. He was a stat sheet stuffer, leading the Celtics in rebounds, assists, steals, and blocks. The Lakers got 20 point performances out of Pau Gasol, Kobe Bryant, and Andrew Bynum. Highlights after the jump: Read the rest of this entry »