Looking Back On All-Star Saturday Night

******UPDATE: TYSON CHANDLER TO OKC, SAM CASSELL TO SACTOWN (FOR 2ND ROUND PICK).*******

A Moose Track

Hello, basketball blogger world. Coming off of all-star weekend, color me . . . unimpressed. But, before I give my thoughts on it, I'll give you all-star weekend bit by bit.

I'm going to start with Saturday night, because I didn't watch all of the Rookie-Sophomore game. So Durant just dominated, as I saw in the box score. Anyways, they said that all of it started at 8:30 . . . and it didn't. So me and my 5 friends were sitting in front of the TV, talking about how funky D-Wade was dressing. And why the hell does he have a band-aid with his name on it? Hmmmm.

Shooting Stars contest. Derek Fisher gets booed thoroughly, and laughs, winking at one of his teammates. Gotta love Fish for stuff like that. I'm rooting for the San Antonio team, because David Robinson, Tim Duncan and Becky Hammon are all awesome. I'm rooting against the Detroit team especially, because of Laimbeer. And they totally could've done better than Afflalo. I love him as a player, but why not Sheed/Tay/Rip/Iverson/Stuckey? Or even Kwame (haha)? Anyways, Detroit pulls it out. Barbosa wasn't going to hit any half-court shots flat footed anyways.

Anyways, the skills competition starts, and we make our picks. Everyone in the room is rooting for Devin Harris, except for me, who chooses Rose. Rose runs roughshod over the competition, but he couldn't have done it in a more boring fashion. He wasn't hustling, he was just going through it smoothly--until the end. That man threw down the 180 pump, and we were stunned. We were all like, "Did he just do that?!" Because, you know, it's the skills competition.

Harris did well, Rose did well, Williams did all right . . . but Tony Parker was disappointing. He was my pick to win it. That man is, arguably, of course, the most skilled man in that group with a ball in-game, but then he gets to the stage in all-star weekend and couldn't make the cut. So, at the end of the skills contest, I'm already slightly bored because the commercial to material ratio is at about 6:1.

Three point contest. We hear all of the judges talking about how Kapono is in a whole different league than all of the rest of them, blah, blah, blah. We all pick Kapono to win, except for my one friend, who really likes Daequan Cook for some reason. None of us were rooting for Kapono, but we all thought he'd win. I was going for Roger Mason, but I don't remember who everyone else was going for.

The three point contest was . . . well . . . where the hell was Ray Allen and Eddie House?! As in, nobody did very well at all. The highest score was, what, 18? And that was because Cook was on fire. None of the sharpshooters lived up to standards, especially Kapono, who was the hands-down favorite to win it. We were just waiting for the dunk contest.

Commercial. They come back, and who do we see? We see Kevin Rudolf singing "Let It Rock", even though he can barely do it. I leave the room out of embarrassment for the league, and then I come back when it's over. Not really. But it was embarrassing. OK, the dudes are introduced. Cheryl Miller goes to midcourt and takes out Howard, asking, "So, what are you going to do tonight?" Howard replies, calmly, "I don't know." I laugh, and she says, "Well, you should probably come up with something." He says, "Yeah, maybe." Dwight is one of the should-be-most-liked dudes in the L.

The room picks Robinson, although we all think that Dwight is going to win it. JR with the first dunk. Nasty. Nothing special, just he threw down hard. Enough for us all to go "Oooooh." Rudy takes off his jersey to reveal this dude Martin, the first Spanish player in the NBA. Nobody knew who he was, but it was good. Behind the back, off the glass, throws down. Very, very nice. I was surprised at how good it was. But, I did vote for Fernandez daily for over a month, so I got what I wanted, I guess.

Time for Nate. Robinson comes out with a nice dunk, with me still laughing at how short he is. Just a question here, but is Nate really 5-9? If he's listed that low, he's probably shorter than that. Kind of like Dustin Pedroia (who's actually 5-6, MVP!). It was very good. Dwight Howard comes out. We lean closer, waiting to see what Dwight comes out with. Ehhhh. It was OK. Nice dunk, but 50 points? Nahhh.

Next round. JR Smith put us all to sleep after he tried the dunk about a million times, changing it a bunch. It was annoying, and not all that great of a dunk. It was OK. Then comes Rudy, bringing out Pau Gasol. He really stressed the Spanish thing. On the first attempt, he missed, of course, but that just built the adrenaline. I thought, That dunk, if landed, would be just sick. Of course, it took them 11 tries (Pau's fault) but at the end, when he did land it, it was nasty. It was truly a great dunk, the air he got was great, all of it was nice. Of course, because the judges don't want to vote him higher than Nate or Dwight because they want to see what they can do, they don't give him as much points. Rudy got shafted. Sorry, Mr. Fernandez.

Nate's next dunk, jumping off of Wilson Chandler. Pretty good, but it kinda defeats the purpose. I mean, if a five year old gets the cereal from the top drawer with a step-stool, did he really get it? Exactly. Something to think about. A good dunk nonetheless. Howard comes out. Goes into the phone booth. I get excited. Comes out with the cape, but was the skin-tight jersey really necessary? Methinks not. Clever stuff, though. Jameer comes out to help. Jameer! To hell with the surgery, I wanna help Howard. Anyways, they get a hoop to 12 feet. He takes it off the backboard and dunks easily. 12 feet! That was crazy stuff, if not flashy.

Nate and Howard are left. Robinson comes out wearing all green. I am confused. But then I'm not. Kryptonite. KryptoNATE! He pulls off one of the greatest dunks that I've seen outta that lil' man, great stuff. Howard followed it up with an almost free throw dunk, like Dr. J. But, it wasn't original. Good, but, ehhhh. Nate brings out a green ball. Howard stands in the paint . . . I say, "No, he won't do that."

He did.

It was impressive when he jumped over Spud Webb. But Spud was 5'7". Howard is 6'11". Nate jumped 14 inches over his own height. I know, technically he didn't because he did a mid-air split, but he barely touched Howard. That was just nasty. Props to Howard for letting him be a prop in his own defeat. He caps it off with a slightly in-your-face Crank That dance. We rush to the computer to get Nate the votes, because that was too good to be true.

Howard breaks off his dunk, which was good, but it couldn't live up to Robinson's stuff. Howard lost by 2%, and you can tell that he isn't happy about it. Great effort, Dwight. Sick dunks, from all of them. In the end, All-Star Saturday was all right. Worth those last couple of dunks, all right. Best commercial? The Barkley-Wade-Howard one. Great sense of humor from all of them. And, of course, "EAT THE HEAD!"

As for HORSE, ahem, GEICO, I didn't watch. I couldn't find it. It wasn't part of all-star weekend, so I couldn't find it online. I saw the highlights though, and it didn't look as good as it could've been. Durant can snipe, though. Anyways, there were my thoughts. Overall: Meh. By the way, these were done in a liveblog type of sense, and it wasn't: I wrote this up just now.

--Moose

Its Settled: The Verdict

So, a 'week' ago I said that I would come up with a slamonline all-star/dream team. That week has turned almost into a month. Apologies for the lateness.

From the comments I recieved this was (imo) the strongest line-up we could assemble for both teams. I took into account: experience, height, ability and geographical location in making these decisions (not really). for me, this was done in an exremely professional manner, taking almost 1 hour to look at all the comments and decided rostering.

1st Team:

PG- Money Bill Williams- Cos we aint got no point guard except him. Oh, and DP likes to come off the bench to kill second units. I do worry about having a 6'2 PG though. Especially from what I saw when we played.

SG-Izzo. For various reasons. 1)- He almost played for Ireland- in the alchohol Olympics- word! 2) Every team has a Allen Iverson try-hard. 3. Every team has a European in it nowadays- except Boston.

SF-Me! Cos I'm the author! And 3 is my natural position right now.

PF-Eboyyyy- because every roster always has an old person that looks funny. See, Celtics- Cassell, Rockets, Mutumbo. And because he almost played college ball.

C- Cub. Do we really have to discuss this?

6th Man: Justin Walsh. Walshy seems like a dude who can play 2 or 3 positions so versatility is important, especially coming off the bench.

2nd Team:

PG-RV - perimeter stopper. Solid with the ball. Enough said. And it takes 5 to win a ball game.

SG- DP- he loves to kill the 2nd unit. This team needed scoring and assists. Badly.

SF-B.Long- I don't think I could handle him gloating over being the shooting guard. Sheesh.

PF-BET- No-one else plays the 4, and besides, every team needs an Artest or Bowen on it. Even if it is just for kicks.

C-Tariq- Izzo says he's tall. And he adds International Flavour.

6th Man: Moose. Apart from his age, height and position, he's just so frickin' awesome that I couldn't resist giving him the insanely large responsibility as 12th man. In two years he'll be better than everyone, so you guys should watch out for lil' Moosie!

Utility: The Baconator. Why? Because he's a utility duh.

Head Coach:
Mr. Eboy. Sir!

Why? Because he was dumb enough to volunteer for the job of coaching a bunch of smart-ass pr*cks like us.

Assistant Coach:
Me. Because I coach a girls rep team that has won 64 straight games against girls who are all 2-3 years older than them. Oh, and I get to talk to coache's all the time working for the Spirit and at the Youth Olympics. And nothing could give me greater pleasure than to turture Eboy on the sidelines.

Statistician: Roy. If it weren't for injuries, he'd be starting for the 2nd team, with RV or DP coming off the bench as the 6th man for the 1st team.

Of course, I'm expecting some heated responses and even a death threat or 2. But I got this for you all 'And you know what they say- When you great, it's not murder- its assassinate'. Truth.

PS- It'd be great if you could read the game notes I wrote below. I get that because it's not about the USA, the majority of you immediately loose interest. I did put a lot of effort in though and just a 'thanks' would be awesome. Thanks guys. Besides, you might be 'witnessing' the birth of a future college or WNBA/NBA star.

Peace, Hursty.

MORE Random Musings! (Hurrah!)

Moose is back with some more non-serious writing. I've been messing around with Hibachi posts for my last couple, and sorry if you're a bit sick of them by now, I just thought I'd drop another one before going to snow-delayed school.

Aight, first thing's first, my Celtics. We are in a slump. Yes, it's true a loss to the Knicks and an overtime loss to the Bobcats (sit down BET, we know what you wanna say) really say that. But, I'm not worried. As I damn shouldn't be. If they have to slump, now would be the time. No doubt we'll be there in the end.

Anyways, their schedule. Tonight Boston takes on Houston at home, so RV and Hursty, it's on. Perk's gonna shut Yao down like Artest will shut down Pierce. Not quite sure if that'll happen, though . . . let's just say Perk's gonna do what he did to Ming last time he saw him. If Artest plays, that is. He didn't last night. Anyways . . .

Rondo, Rondo Rondo . . . slumping. Last night he had a career high in turnovers last night with NINE. Ouch. He did score 16, grab 4 and dish out 6, which is nice, but we can't have these TOs. These last four or five games has convinced me that Rondo isn't quite at an all-star level. In future years, believe me, he'll be there, but for the moment, not quite. I won't complain if he doesn't make it.

Which brings me to my next point, all-stars. Of course I've been voting every single day, for the guys who I believe should be in. Here's my ballot:

East:
G: Dwyane Wade
G: Joe Johnson
F: Danny Granger
F: LeBron James
C: Dwight Howard

West:
G: Chauncey Billups
G: Chris Paul
F: Amar'e Stoudemire
F: Tim Duncan
C: Al Jefferson

Some of it is personal preference, some of it isn't. Kobe didn't get my vote, Dirk truly deserves it but he didn't get my vote. Yes, Big Al's team sucks, but he is putting up gaudy numbers, and the centers in the West aren't on par with the rest of the league (barring Yao and Shaq) and he's one of my favorites.

CAN WE PLEASE VOTE CHAUNCEY BILLUPS!!!????!!!!???? This guy really needs to get voted. Look what happened! Denver is 24-12, Billups is doing great, and he deserves the spot. Any other questioning of my votes need to be brought to me personally, I will defend them. Wow, isn't the dunk contest awesome? What a great bridge to my next point!

Everybody vote Rudy Fernandez into the dunk contest. Every day, pass up Westbrook and Alexander, and vote Fernandez. We will truly get our money's worth if we vote Rudy. Sorry if that was a bit forceful, I just think that Fernandez will bring us the best show and competition to Nate Rob/Howard/Gay.

Another point of frustration. "Notorious", the new movie coming out about Biggie is rated R. That sucks. I am not 17. I can't go to that movie. Meh. And, to pile on, the Patriots didn't even make the playoffs. Fly Eagles, fly! I'm going for Philly there. Anyways . . . I forgot to mention, Celtics-Cavs on Friday, mark your calendars. In Cleveland. We better wake up for that one.

Eric Gordon dropped 32 last night. The Year of the Rookie. This class is looking legit. Pick it up, B-Easy! He's the only one slackin'. Rose, Mayo, Westbrook, Augustin, Gordon, even LOPEZ . . . and Beasley's got 13 and 5. Not turrible. But not living up to the hype. Not good enough for ROY. Pick it up, Mike. Anyways . . . (I've been saying that too much, huh?)

Marbury in Boston? Meh. Feels like a cancer to me. I don't really want Steph over here, it'd just be too nerve wracking. We have guys off the bench who can play, and Starbury needs the ball for a while to be successful. One of the last thing's we need is a shoot-first point guard off the bench we can spread the ball around because our bench can score. Marbury might rip us apart. But I have faith that Ainge will do what's best for the team, so it shouldn't be a problem (no matter what happens).

I'm out, everyone, sorry if this post was somewhat nagging and annoying . . . but I said what I wanted to say.

--Moose