In case you’re the type who needs a screenprinted message on an oversized foam finger to be convinced of anything and believes the NBA Lockout is ending soon, here’s your finger: pending the ability of the team owner to actually get the money to make it happen, Kobe Bryant has agreed to play basketball in Italy.

From The Associated Press:

Italian club Virtus Bologna has reached a verbal agreement with Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant to play in Italy during the NBA lockout. The sides have settled on a $3 million contract for the opening 40 days of the Italian league season, a person with knowledge of the negotiations told The Associated Press on Friday.

Bryant, who spent much of his childhood in Italy, was in the country for sponsor appearances over the past two days but was flying back to the U.S. for labor talks with the NBA on Friday.

Bryant will get a work visa and return to Italy next week, said the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the deal has still not been signed. Virtus had been due to open the season Oct. 9 against Roma, but schedules now need to be reworked after Venezia was added to the league as a 17th team.

I’m guessing “Virtus Bologna” makes the most righteous sandwiches ever.

Three million dollars for 40 days of work comes out to roughly $75,000 a day for basketball. However, Bryant was set to make $25.244 million for the 2011-12 NBA season, so the deal in Italy gives him about a $233,000 a game pay-cut. With the lockout still on with no end in sight, it beats getting a real job, or going on Twitter and joking about having to get a real job, or whatever it is players are doing now. Not sure whether or not it beats what Roy Hibbert had going at Entertainment 7wenty, but Kobe knows what he’s doing, and “actually getting paid to play basketball somewhere” is absolutely what he should be doing.

Sports

Gina Carano’s Haywire Has New Photos - I wish I’d been around a couple of years ago to try and convince you “American Gladiators” was a sports thing. I can’t wait to see Gina Carano in movies, where there is a 100% better chance of me seeing her naked. Also, I think the best way to shoot an uzi flamethrower is to hold it as close to your face as possible. [Film Drunk]

Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, and Larry Bird Cover NBA 2K12 - I approve of this marketing, and think we should erase the last 15 years of NBA history and have continuity pick back up sometime around when Chris Webber showed up. [Smoking Section]

CM Punk Crashes Comic-Con - There are a lot of Comic-Con-related links in today’s Morning, but none as wonderful to me as the WWE Champion showing up and making Bill Simmons feel like he’s got to explain ‘worked shoots’ to us again. Here’s a footnote: you don’t know anything about wrestling. [The Wrestling Blog]

Disgusting Video of the Day: Pat Barry Loses a Wisdom Tooth - He needs a pair of jam shorts that say ‘WARRIOR’ down the side so you know how tough he is for doing this. Also, he should compare himself to a warrior or some sort of Spartan every time he opens his mouth. [Cage Potato]

With Leather

Lockout This: 10 Awesome Sports That Could Replace the NBA - Assuming we don’t move forward with my Zero Hour plan for the NBA, these will be suitable replacements, especially “Octopush”, which is about as close to Blitzball as we’re going to get. Luca Goers for life. [With Leather]

The Dugout: How to Pick Up Soccer Girls on the Internet - I think my professional dream at this point is to have one f**king baseball player say “oh hey, I know about that comic you’ve been making for the last seven years”. I still think Farnsworth turned down an interview with us because we’re the only thing that shows up when you google Kyle Farnsworth. [With Leather]

Tennessee Cops Can’t Find Murder Suspect Because They’re Looking at Porn - Lorenzen Wright’s family might be making it up, but it’s hilarious/depressing to think cops have to let dead people rot because they spent too much time browsing for casual encounters on Craigslist. [With Leather]

Taiwanese Animation Covers Yao Ming - Worth it just to hear an Asian lady say “Charles Barkley”. [With Leather]

Not Sports

A Golden Treasury of Photos from the First Day of Comic-Con 2011 - I want to make it to one of these things one day. I’ve been to a Wizard World and a Motor City Con, but never the big real one. I want to camp out for two weeks and be briefly glared at by Kristen Stewart. :( [UPROXX]

The Best of #Justin Bieber Lulz - In case we aren’t all tired of making fun of this kid by now, here’s a ton of stuff making fun of him. I never hear him on the radio and only see him on TV when people are interviewing him about how popular he is, so I don’t know, I think he’s a figment of our imagination. Let’s direct some of this hatred toward somebody who deserves it, like will.i.am. [UPROXX]

Comic-Con: Beavis and Butthead - I’m so happy about this, and the only news that would’ve been better is ten more seasons of “King of the Hill”. [Collider]

Did you expect Zach Galifianakis to ride something other than a Vespa? - No. [FARK]

A few things, because this worked well on the wrestling post.

1. Don’t be afraid to leave us a comment. I don’t troll the commenters, I actually want to hear what you have to say and interact with you. Creating a community of sports fans at With Leather is one of the best ways to differentiate us from the +1 Dens and gargling bitchfests of other sports blogs.

2. Follow us on Twitter @WithLeather and like us on Facebook so you don’t miss anything, or follow ME on Twitter @MrBrandonStroud for Nickelodeon jokes and sh*t you don’t care about.

3. Click these links, because hey, they’re here.

Sports

Just in Case: The 2011-2012 NBA Schedule Released - Highlights include the Miami Heat being awarded the NBA Championship at the BEGINNING of the season, just to make sure, and “Cleveland Cavaliers” with quotes around it playing a Cub Scout rec-team in January. The Cub Scouts are going to kill them. [Smoking Section]

When Neck Still Mattered - Green Bay Packer Sam Shields decided to get a gigantic tattoo of his own Super Bowl ring on his neck. I think it’s a great idea. I won 2nd place in my 5th grade science fair and have had the ribbon tattooed on my neck since I was 11. [Kissing Suzy Kolber]

Duke Roufus Talks About Pat Barry and the Future of His Gym - Including this for three reasons: 1) we need more MMA coverage on this pro wrestling and Kate Upton website, 2) Maggie Hendricks is great, and 3) whenever somebody talks about the future of their gym I imagine them as Cutty Wise, standing in their doorway making bug-eyes at some petulant 14-year old who would rather shoot Snoop than box. [Cagewriter]

Why Can’t NBA Players Be Aerophobic? - An opinion piece about why NBA players playing overseas would be a bad thing. If I was an NBA player, my response to this would be “lol I’m rich, gonna go get a million dollars to play pick-up basketball for two months in Prague, smell ya later”. I wish I was an NBA player :( [Pineriders]

With Leather

The Best and Worst of Raw 7/18 - With over 100 comments and counting, I’m doing my very best to create and nurture a community of sane, level-headed wrestling fans who just want to enjoy their dumb show and not have to explain to to everyone, much less the other people who watch it. If you don’t like wrestling, click through and look at hot muscular girls in their underpants. [With Leather]

This is the Greatest Collection of Kate Upton Pictures You’ll Ever See - If you still haven’t clicked this, do it just to read the comments section, where a guy is convinced that Kate Upton, super hot magical woman Kate Upton, is a “chubber”. Hilarious. [With Leather]

In Case You’re Wondering, Michael Jordan Is Still Michael Jordan - One of the best comments we got for this story was a retweet that added “if you didn’t think 48-year old Michael Jordan couldn’t dunk, kill yourself”. Man, if I killed myself for every misconception I’ve felt I would’ve perished in the womb. [With Leather]

Chris Kluwe Is The Voice of Reason - The most controversial thing ever said by a punter (outside of With Leather) is now an online phenomenon, and Lockout or no we should spend the next five months watching NFL players compare dicks and lengths of piss on the Internet. [With Leather]

Not Sports

Amazing Spider-Man Trailer Leaks, Goes First Person POV - You know what would make Spider-Man better? Making it be exactly like Twilight. You know what would make the Twilight Spider-Man movie better? Making me play Mirror’s Edge for 20 minutes while it’s on. [Gamma Squad]

Call James Cameron, They’re Planning a Captain Planet Movie - Hopefully they’ll get the guy from Sugar Ray to play Captain Planet like I’ve been joking about since I found out what “Sugar Ray” was. Donald Glover with a flat-top as Kwame NEEDS TO HAPPEN. [Film Drunk]

Fun with the New Two and a Half Men Ads - To date, the only thing remotely resembling fun I’ve ever had with “Two and a Half Men”. [Warming Glow]

The 10 Most Bangable Celebrities on the Planet - I really hate the word “bangable”, but Alison Brie made the list so I’m sharing it. People who did not place, but should’ve: the girl from Paramore, the Chickbusters, the drugged-out 30-year old Taylor Momsen is pretending to be, Mia Tyler (no, seriously), Julie from “Growing Pains” (still), Aubrey Plaza (specifically in Funny People), Scarlett Johansson (all versions). [Pajiba]

[header photo credit to Cody Duty]

NBA Players Union Executive Director Billy Hunter walked away from the latest collective bargaining agreement negotiations and told reporters that he felt good about where the conversation is heading. That’s a bit surprising considering the owners’ latest proposal. While teams currently enjoy a soft, flexible salary cap of $58 million that allows for excessive spending by teams like the Los Angeles Lakers, Orlando Magic, San Antonio Spurs, Boston Celtics and the Miami Heat, the new $45 million hard salary cap would put an end to overspending by making teams actually… *GASP* spend wisely.

Some team owners and presidents have always pushed for this hard cap inclusion, but they’ve always bitched out at the last second and continued giving guys like Jermaine O’Neal and Shawn Marion huge contracts, but now they seem intent on putting their collective foot down. What’s that? My arm? Oh, it naturally wanks in a dismissive motion.

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As bored as most people are with the NBA Playoffs by now, what with Oprah Winfrey dictating when games can be played, we should embrace as much NBA action as we possibly can in the remaining months of these playoffs, because the future of the 2011-12 season isn’t looking very bright.

The NBA Players’ Association is hoping to block a looming lockout by filing unfair labor charges against the league with the National Labor Relations Board last night. The players believe that the owners are making unfair demands regarding money and revenue while not offering anything back to the players in return. Basically, the owners won’t admit that they flooded the league with terrible mid-level and horrible max contracts over the past 5 years and now they would just like to call a do-over, what with that whole half-the-league’s-teams-are-hemorrhaging-money thing. You can guess the response of the guys who are on the other end of those terrible contracts. Here comes the Gilbert Arenas Amnesty Clause!

Also, the Los Angeles Lakers have hired Mike Brown as their new head coach in case the league ever has another season.

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