John Calipari is Smooth; Deconstructing Nike's NFL Unis
Today in sports: Kentucky's basketball coach swears he's not interested in a jump to the NBA, Sacramento's NBA future looks murky, and Jack the Georgetown bulldog gets an heir.
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Oh, gosh: the plan to keep the Sacramento Kings in Sacramento -- which looked like a done deal as of last month - is starting to look like a decidedly undone deal. The city and ownership (the Maloof family) are fighting over who is going to cut the first check for a proposed new $387 million arena. Maloofs, city of Sacramento, we have a suggestion: why don't you each write a check representing a proportional amount of your commitment to the project ($75 million for the Maloofs, $200 to $250 million for the city) at the same time. Think of of yourselves as submarine captains who must turn their keys at exactly the same moment. [Sacramento Bee]
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Good news University of Kentucky fans: it has been 48 hours since your beloved Wildcats won the NCAA title and John Calipari, your shifty-eyed vagabond coach, still swears he's not interested in coaching the New York Knicks, or any other NBA franchise that might come a-calling. Of course, Calipari waited until June before leaving UMass to take the New Jersey Nets job after the Minutemen to the Final Four in 1996, so patience, folks, patience. [ESPN]
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Ha, another terrific John Calipari story: it seems that when John Calipari -- who it bears repeating, is not interested in coaching the New York Knicks, no sir -- was head coach of the New Jersey Nets, he masterminded a PR offensive whereby a team intern -- operating under the guise of "Anthony from Hoboken" -- would call into WFAN and say things like "Come on man, Cal's doing a great job!" Shrewd, John Calipari, shrewd. (Calipari was fired 20 games into his third season with club, with a less-than-auspicious NBA record of 72-112.) Because John Calipari has no interest -- no interest! -- in that soon-to-be-vacant Knicks job, it's unlikely that Anthony from Hoboken, whoever he was, will ever be heard from again. [Yahoo Sports]
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Want to play "Paul is Dead" with those fancy, not all-that-different new NFL uniforms from Nike? The Seattle Seahawks, who allegedly received a radical haul to their atrocious, rainwater colored duds -- now have home uniforms that feature white piping (!!) adorned with twelve vaguely ethnic feathers, in honor of the "12th Man" the marketing gimmick that the team appropriated from the fine folks at Texas A&M University. The new looks from the Carolina Panthers' also includes the personal mantra of former linebackers coach/aggressively decent human being Sam "Keep Poundin'" Mills. [USA Today]
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Ho, boy this is pretty terrific: under the terms of MLB's new collective bargaining agreement, the use of tobacco products has been banned -- banned! -- in places where patrons can actually see their heroes. (Note: this is the most baseball rule ever.) To show that everyone involved is very, very serious about this provision, there's now a spot on the official MLB website where you can narc out your favorite player for using chewing tobacco and the like. The season starts tomorrow on the mainland, so everyone, get your narcking hats on. [via Hardball Talk]
Jack, the 8-year-old English bulldog with a partially torn ACL who cavorts around the court at Georgetown's home basketball games (pictured above), has an heir. Or a protegee. Whatever. The point is this: Georgetown has acquired a four-month old English bulldog puppy named "J.J. or Jack, Jr." -- per a university press release -- to learn from Jack, and someday maybe possibly replace him. It's just like Training Day, but with fuzzy dogs. [The Reliable Source]
