The Timberwolves might have lost yesterday, but they went down swinging.
Wait.
They won??
Wild.
I did not know that until I checked for the order of punches.
If you, like me, weren’t watching one of the more consequential NBA games of the season, which is to say an NBA game responsible for minor changes in who will soon eliminate whom, Jaden McDaniels punched a wall and broke his hand a few minutes after Rudy Gobert punched his teammate and didn’t break anything, because Rudy Gobert evidently has not been using boxing lessons as cross training on off-days. The reaction to this has been intense. The Timberwolves have suspended Gobert for their first Play-In Tournament game. Jaden McDaniels’ hand is refusing to show up intact for the rest of the season. It seems like overkill, to be frank. If the Timberwolves can’t punch each other and can’t punch walls, what can they punch?
This is one of many issues with the NBA. If you punch a fan, you get in trouble. If you punch a teammate, you get in trouble. If you punch a wall, your bones start getting all whiny.
The NBA has an exhilarating product. It’s basketball, after all, and much better basketball than what you see in the NCA* *********t. But it’s held back by a lot of nonsense, and the chief nonsense right now is this: Can these guys punch anything??
Joe Kelly to the IL
Joe Kelly hurt his groin, in yet another example of the human body being unable to handle Joe Kelly’s greatness. He went on the IL today. I haven’t heard anything more than “15-Day IL.” This is my first time climbing out from under the covers since the news broke. I’m going to need a long walk later.
Just Rig It, Adam
The Mavericks are in “trouble” from the NBA for making their tank too conspicuous on Friday, to which we say:
Rig the lottery, Adam Silver.
It’s really not that hard to do. All the NBA needs is one of the 11th through 14th-place teams to get a top-four pick for the Mavericks to lose that pick to the Knicks after all (it’s a top-10 protected pick, and the Mavs will be 10th if the lottery all goes chalk). The odds of that happening are, if we wink and nod and “acknowledge those odds are real,” 1-in-20. It’s not so unlikely that it can’t happen, but it’d certainly pop a little, which is perfect: The NBA can plausibly deny this underhanded approach to discipline while making teams wonder. That’s a key to discipline: Leave the consequences a little unclear, and make it seem like you’re capable of pulling strings. This is why, if I’m lucky enough to have kids, I’m going to teach them about Pearl Harbor right after they hit their sister. “If you hadn’t punched Kelly, all those young American sailors wouldn’t have died fiery deaths. Maybe think about that the next time you don’t want to share your commemorative 2032 NIT toy basketball.”
The other benefit to this approach is that the Bulls are Team 11 or Team 12, meaning they could get a top-four pick out of the deal. Win-win.
Fight, Brawl, or Incident
Benches cleared yesterday in the White Sox/Pirates game, and it wasn’t very fun. Oneil Cruz broke his ankle, and he didn’t even do it during the fight, because there wasn’t even a fight to break ankles during. Just a bunch of yelling and a little bit of pushing while one of baseball’s most exciting young talents writhed on the ground in pain.
It’s important to not call every bench-clearing incident in baseball a brawl, because not very many ever get to that level. Some are fights, but even those choice few rarely escalate into brawl territory. If we’re going to protect the integrity of grown men in coordinated pajamas wrestling each other in perfectly mown grass, we need to be smart with our language. Which is why we should use the word “scrum” more often. It’s perfect for situations like these. Broad, not requiring violence in its definition, and far more exciting than “incident.” The Pirates and White Sox had a scrum. There. See? Doesn’t that sound better?
Contingency Planning for the Pack
If the Packers lose this game of chicken with the Jets, they better lose it badly. Would a second-round pick be more valuable than a seventh-rounder? Of course. But it would be very funny to look Aaron Rodgers in the eye and say, “Sorry, man. Turns out your new team only thinks you’re worth a seventh-round guy.” Most quarterbacks could see through that, and Aaron Rodgers isn’t stupid, but Aaron Rodgers *is* extremely sensitive to perceived criticism. His shaman would be hearing about this.
Look Out, Premier League
Burnley is back.
They won’t clinch the (EFL) Championship (league title) until sometime in the next couple weeks, but the Burnleys are headed back to the Premier League, clinching promotion on Friday with a 2–1 win over Middlesbrough.
Weirdly, the emotion here is kind of neutral. It was so easy. It feels like the lads missed a lap while running the mile in P.E. class. They didn’t, though. They just dominated the second tier of English footie. It turns out that bringing in a ton of young talent and identifying/handing the reins to a good coach will do good things for you. Probably a lesson in there.
They’re playing Sheffield United right now, and they’re probably going to win, and that means there’s probably going to be a scenario in which they could clinch the league this Saturday.
Sometimes, the World Sens’s You
The Ottawa Senators have officially been eliminated from Stanley Cup Playoff contention, falling 7–2 on Thursday night for their fourth straight loss. They’ll still play a couple more times—tonight, they host the Hurricanes; Thursday, they visit the Sabres—but the season is over, and no playoffs were found.
Overall, it’s just kind of a bummer. Things never got *that* hopeful this year, at least after the early-season disasters, and the talent is still stockpiled, but there’s probably going to be a big overhaul of management by the new owners, and change is always kind of weird. On one hand, the Sens probably need it, but on the other, D.J. Smith and Pierre Dorion were both funny. Very much Gabriel Pizza guys. They really fit the Sens.
