Weekly Rundown: Garnett, Paulus, Madden

Weekly Rundown is a combination of links and brief comments on stories and topics that I couldn't get to during the week. If there's something important that I missed, don't hesitate to send an email or leave a comment.

• The Celtics' chances to repeat as NBA champions took a big hit with the news that Kevin Garnett could miss the entire postseason with a lingering knee injury. Bill Simmons gives his own thoughts on the KG situation, handicaps the Celtics' chances to win without Garnett, and offers an insightful discussion on the continuing demise of the newspaper industry. [ESPN]


• Greg Paulus will apparently be given a chance to compete for the starting quarterback job at Michigan. Duke coach David Cutcliffe offered Paulus a chance to try out for the team -- but at wide receiver, not quarterback. Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez must really be desperate. [ESPN]


• John Madden has decided to retire from broadcasting. Mike Florio offers some comments from Madden and toots his own horn for predicting in January that Cris Collinsworth would take over for Madden after the season. [PFT]


• Redskins fans really want Mark Sanchez. Or not. [Redskins Insider]


• Truth provides some end-of-the-season thoughts on Antawn Jamison and now former coach Ed Tapscott. [Truth About It]


• The Nationals just can't seem to get anything right. They're 1-10, they can't spell "Nationals" correctly on all of their jerseys, and they even suspended outfielder Elijah Dukes for showing up five minutes late after doing some charity work. [Big League Stew]
  
• ESPN's Rob Neyer wasn't a big fan of MLB's Jackie Robinson celebration idea, in which every player, coach, and umpire wore No. 42 in honor of Robinson on Wednesday. Neyer: "Never underestimate the ability of the commissioner to take a pretty sweet idea and just drive it into the ground until it's dead." [SweetSpot]


• ESPN actually being reasonable and willing to acknowledge criticism? This can't be right. [Awful Announcing]


• Peter Schmuck thinks umpire Doug Eddings did a horrible job behind the plate on Saturday: "Eddings needs to go back to one of the umpire academies and learn the strike zone." [The Schmuck Stops Here]

Scoop Jackson: Team USA isn't intimidating enough

In a recent column on ESPN.com, Scoop Jackson wrote the following:

But what's missing is ... Amare Stoudemire. Even though Chris Anstey of Australia believes the fear factor is still there ("I think a lot of teams get intimidated by that [U.S.] team"), the truth is, if the intimidation factor was there, none of us would have that feeling in our stomach.

Confused?

Let me first say this: I think the U.S. team will win the gold this year. Now, with that out of the way, I have no idea what Scoop Jackson is talking about. I know he mentions this in the article, but Stoudemire declined the opportunity to be on the 2008 team. So did Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett; Stoudemire isn't as good as Duncan or Garnett, and I'm sure that Stoudemire is nowhere near as mean or crazy as KG. Wouldn't the team be better off with one of them instead?

I'm fine with the reasoning that the team could use another big man, but really, the team needs Stoudemire to help intimidate other teams more? Granted, the U.S. men's basketball team has always had great athletes who can dunk over the competition. After all, who could forget this dunk? But the U.S. teams of the last few years have lost because they didn't shoot well, play well together, or play any kind of solid defense -- not because they didn't dunk or weren't mean enough.

How about this: the "Redeem Team" needs to play better pick-and-roll defense and hit open jump shots and they'll be just fine. (Just ask the Chinese team.) I'm pretty sure that they have the whole intimidation factor and dunking on opponents' heads thing down pat with Dwight Howard, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, and Carmelo Anthony on the team.

But two more dunks a game by Stoudemire would definitely bring the gold home. Right. His amazing presence really helped the team win bronze in Athens in 2004. Come on, Scoop.

Some points and thoughts from this past week

-- While watching the Orioles this week, my first thought was that they should just leave Dave Trembley as the manager. With Trembley as interim coach, the O's surprisingly took two out of three from the Padres. Then on Friday, Daniel Cabrera pitched up to his potential and the O's won again to make it three in a row. (If you're not an Orioles fan, with the current situation this team is in, winning three games in a row is almost like making the playoffs.) But the last two games against the Diamondbacks have looked like more of the same, including lack of offense, mediocre pitching, and a complete lack of urgency. If the O's want to get shutdown by Jake Peavy, then hey, that's fine. But Dave Bush? Come on, guys.

Anyway, I still believe that the O's should just let Trembley manage the team until the end of the season, then depending on what happens, such as if the team shows any positive signs or winning trends, then they could re-access the situation. There's no need to rush into hiring a manager, like Dusty Baker, who just probably would be another bad fit in a long line of bad teams and frustrated managers -- who have annoyed every O's fan in the process.

-- I stumbled upon this story about one minute ago: Apparently over the weekend, a player who you've probably never heard of before, Fred Evans of the Miami Dolphins, was "arrested early Saturday morning, and tasers were used to subdue him, after an alleged argument with a Miami Beach taxi driver." I could be wrong here, but I think the reason for his tasering may have been as follows: "According to the report, Evans bit one officer on the wrist..." It might not be such a good idea to be out so late if the possibility of biting a cop may arise in the process -- just my two cents. Even Bill Romanowski has never bitten a cop before. I think.

-- With that last note, I fell into the trap of discussing the disturbing trend of NFL players being arrested and following the disappointing behavior of guys like Pacman Jones, Chris Henry, and Tank Johnson. In better news, Jon Kitna recently predicted that the Detroit Lions will win at least 10 games next season. And I'm glad that Kitna did this; his remarks leave an important reminder that NFL players aren't all just clowns who get arrested. They also can make us fans laugh with funny and bizarre predictions that don't really make any sense. Kudos to you, Mr. Kitna.

-- I have really wanted to comment on the latest news in the Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett situations in which multiple trade scenarios have been speculated about over the last several weeks. But I really don't think either one is going to get traded right now. The Lakers would be a disaster if Kobe left, so I seriously doubt that would happen. And even though KG has remained pretty silent and hasn't gone nearly as far as Kobe has in demanding trades out of LA, I think KG needs to get traded and that McHale should seriously consider it. The T'Wolves have been pretty bad for years, and their only young player with any talent is Randy Foye. The team's nucleus includes Foye, Ricky Davis, KG, and now Juwan Howard of all people. This whole team is a mess, and it must be bad because even Troy Hudson is trying to get out of there.

KG might really be against a trade to the Celtics, and that's ok. But he should really consider leaving and playing for a winning team while he still has much of his athletic ability and talent left. Even though the Suns seem very reluctant to trade Amare Stoudamire for Garnett, that deal would be a perfect fit for both teams. Phoenix would probably win the title, and the T'Wolves would have a younger player to build around along with Foye. But since it makes too much sense, it won't happen. Go NBA!

-- On another NBA note, I also don't have a mock draft to offer in my blog. Mock drafts are interesting to look at, but they're always wrong. No one really knows what a GM or an NBA team is thinking, and at any time they could have one player higher and ruin everyone's perception of what they thought would happen. I have no idea who will get drafted where, let alone who will get drafted number one. I guess the Blazers will take Oden over Durant, which seems to be the most popular pick.

But aside from Oden and Durant, here is a list of players that I really do like, no matter where they get drafted this year: Al Horford, Mike Conley Jr., Corey Brewer, Jeff Green, Taurean Green, Jared Dudley, Carl Landry, and Acie Law, just to name a few. I don't know much about any of the foreign players, mainly because, I'VE NEVER SEEN THEM PLAY BEFORE, aside from the nifty little clips that ESPN shows during the draft. It's great to see how easily Yi Jianlian dominates in the clips they show, namely because he's two feet taller than anyone he's playing with.

That's enough for now. Just for the record, next weekend during the NBA Draft, I'll be doing a running blog to post later on that night. That should definitely be some fun, and the NBA draft is always hilarious.

Here's to the Wizards actually picking someone this year whose name I can pronounce.