Well, it’s for reals. The NBA is going with an all-new ball next year, and that picture up there is a picture of it.
Made by Spalding, it’s supposed to resist moisture or something, and also looks like it’s from the future, which is really all we needed for approval.
The new ball features Spalding’s Cross Traxxionâ„¢ technology, a union of revolutionary design and breakthrough material. The design is comprised of two interlocking, cross-shaped panels rather than the eight oblong panels found on traditional basketballs. As a result, there is more material coverage. The material is a microfiber composite with moisture management that provides superior grip and feel throughout the course of a game. Additionally, the new composite material eliminates the need for a break-in period, which is necessary for the current leather ball, and achieves consistency from ball to ball.
“The advancements that Spalding has made to the new game ball ensure that the best basketball players in the world will be playing with the best basketball in the world,” said Stern.
The wonderball is available for preorder now, and if you’re thinking we already paid for two, you’re so, so very right.
As we alluded to yesterday, this thing opens the door for lots of shitty play in the early months of the 2006-2007 season, even though everyone could realistically be out practicing with the thing now. Also, it’s still a freaking basketball – it’s not like they’re switching in a metal cube or something.
Regardless, here are the five players/coaches that’ll complain about this the most, in chronological order.
Tracy McGrady, Stephon Marbury, George Karl, Vince Carter, & Steve Francis. Of course, Franchise will only be upset because he’s not getting a chance to touch it, being that he’s on the bench and all and also (insert your own “balls” joke here!).
We don’t know quite what we’re gonna do for the draft – liveblogging it is BIll Simmons’s trademarked thing, mock drafts aren’t fun, and Photoshopping dudes we don’t know anything about is kinda empty.
The best thing we can do is sit back and hope for trades. Trades, trades, trades. We’ll be back later for the action, with the sincere hope that some trades have taken place, so we can do something.
BTW good luck to JE Skeets, who was invited to cover the Draft by AOL, but couldn’t figure out how to make it out of Toronto. He’s giving it another go tonight.
(btw Jamie, considering we live literally two blocks away, if we’re not credentialed for the ESPYs, we’re not gonna be your friend anymore. We’ll bring our own equipment and everything – just get us in the door, buddeeee.)
The funniest thing is how the Draft is tonight, but we’re going to refuse to talk about it for as long as possible.
Chad Ford has done 18 mock drafts in the past day and a half, and we haven’t read one. We’re not sure why we hold this up as some sort of point of pride, but we’re doing it.
Maybe we’ve read too many message board trade scenarios, who knows? Seriously, does any one know? We’re awful at self-analysis, so we’re totally in the dark.
Anyway, Peja Stojakovic took the out clause in his contract, and is now a full-fledged free agent.
He’s ready to hit the market Saturday when said market opens. (This is also known as the Day of the Blessed Extension of the Lad From Akron for Cleveland fans.)
“It was nothing unexpected,” agent David Bauman said. “We just had to go through the formal process of canceling the last year of the deal. Larry and Donnie understood when they traded for him that he was going to exercise his early termination option.”
“We’re going to listen to other teams and what they have to offer (monetarily), as well as playing time and chances at a championship,” Bauman said.
We can’t help but wonder what the ratio of money to playing time to championship chances they’re looking for are. For example, Atlanta can offer the following:
100% Money
100% Playing time
.002% Championship
Chicago can offer:
100% Money
89% Playing time
54% Championship
The Knicks:
20% Money
Erratic% Playing Time
LOL% Championship
And what of the Pacers, the team he released himself from? They can offer the awesome guarantee that they have no idea what their team will look like next year. That includes everything from players to coaches to locker room happiness.
So the big mystery the day of the draft isn’t “what happened on your vacation”, but rather “what’s in David Stern’s black box“?
We assure you this is real, despite the appearance that this is something we made up. Eerie though, isn’t it?
On June 28, NBA Commissioner David Stern will introduce the NBA’s newest employees, as he announces the Class of 2006. Before that, however, he will unveil the contents of the black box below — sure to change the way you see the game. Check back Wednesday at 11:30 a.m. ET to see what’s in the black box.
Surely the box is filled with 26 million pairs of 3-D glasses, yes? See, that’s what’s got everyone thrown – this box is HUGE.
Notice how on the site it’s set against a simple black background – that’s to fool you into thinking this is a regular box, and not a gigantic, 40-story tall box filled with 26 million pairs of 3-D glasses, which will allow you to see the game differently, ie in 3-D.
TrueHoop thinks it’s a new ball, but that makes too much sense. If that’s the case, however, it gives every team/player that starts slow next year a sweet excuse.
As for that vacation, we actually wrote this last night, so we really didn’t take a day away at all, unless you count Sunday. Although we wrote on of Monday’s posts Sunday night, so the fact remains we’re always here, and we continue to do everything wrong.
We’ll be back Wednesday night for the draft.
We haven’t taken a day away from the blog for like four months, and if we have to write about draft projections, we’ll likely get suicidal anyway. For some reason the entire draft is annoying this year.
We do still love butter, so fret not a bit.
YouTube Saturday – this one is bound to live on for a long time. It’s not Mark Madsen or anything, but Pat Riley revvin’ it up is worth 56 seconds of your day.
This is from Thursday night – we’re surprised the Finals MVP trophy isn’t there, seeing as it was glued to his hand everywhere he’s gone the last couple days.
Sorry about the downtime – our server company went on a 12 hour vacation or something. Yes, for those asking, we’ll have a premiere date for Episode 1 of Who Shot Mamba? announced soon.
Before it goes lounging around the world on Carnival Cruise Lines, the Larry O’Brien Trophy needed to take part in the Heat’s victory parade in Miami today.
Shaq, and Wade, and Pat Riley, and Udonis Haslem, and everyone else showed up.
It was great fun for everyone, what with Riles doing the Vince Carter motorcycle dance and the waterguns, and the 65 cases of sunstroke. When it was all over, Shaq guaranteed a back-to-back, and Pat Riley shuffled around the question of his return.
“Don’t ask me that,” Riley said. “Next. Please. I love you — but I can’t answer that right now.”
Our money is on “he actually really doesn’t know yet but will ultimately decide to stay”.
Also contemplating his future is Alonzo Mourning. We can’t find the quote at the moment, but he said something about it “being time to think about him self and maybe make a selfish decision”. This would be in sharp contrast to what happened in Jersey, or with Toronto the following week.
Or that time he was at the hospital and forcibly took that guy’s liver or whatever the hell was wrong with him. In any case, congrats to the Heat – with this post, we officially close the door on the 2005-2006 NBA season, which shall be forever known as “the one before LeBron won his first MVP and title.”
Dirk Nowitzki got a haircut.
Not much else to add, especially when Becky said it best in the comments section already.
why do I picture Dirk spending the off-season the way Christian Bale spent the beginning of Batman Begins and coming back more bad ass than ever?
Well, if you mean travelling the Earth learning about the dark arts and such, we agree.
Of course, recent evidence suggests he may go Christian Bale in American Psycho, ie get wasted and hang out with whores.
We agree wtih Mamba – that Dirk-size t-shirt is awful big to make any sort of judgement on the attractivity of this girl.
Yes, any girl throwing “west side” isn’t someone we’d necessarily go for, but at the same time, there’s something about a girl who throws “west side” that’s attractive in a “that’s kinda wrong” way. Now that we’ve used the requisite number of quotation marks, we’ll add that her face looks a little on the “hard and angular” side, but like the t-shirt, the hair is screwing up full judgement.
MJ is fully vested (to the tune of $10-20M) in his new role with the Bobcats, and he and new underling Bernie Bickerstaff were hard at work yesterday, working out draft people, ie those who may get drafted. Potential draftees.
Anyway, MJ gave his most full interview to the assembled media, and the details of what he wants to do and how he hopes to accomplish it are coming out.
“Mistakes have been made and some decisions should have been second-guessed,” Jordan said. “What’s been asked of me is my opinion about how we should attack this scenario, and I feel it has to be done on the basketball court.
He said he won’t move his family here from the Chicago area and isn’t sure yet whether he’ll buy a residence in Charlotte: “I’d like to be here for every game, but I’m not saying I’ll be here for every game. But believe me, I’m going to be in tune and going to pay attention.”
We love MJ, but it’s kinda funny how he has to reassure everyone he’ll actually be paying attention to what’s going on with the team.
His strategy sound good – get good players and have a good basketball team. Those are certainly, at least from our studies, the types of things that makes for winning basketball. No word if they’re sticking to the youth movement, or if it’s veteran free agent time, which would be a massive mistake, if you ask us.
(And what of Larry Brown in Charlotte, anyway? Probably wouldn’t be a bad move if he’ll come for something reasonable, like fourteen dollars.)
As for Michael’s decision to buy or not buy a home in Charlotte, why the hell wouldn’t he? Jesus, won’t a half mil get you a whole plantation in North Carolina? Do they still have plantations, or did those go out with slavery?
We always wanted to live at a plantation, so we could always be like, “Hey baby, you want to come back to my plantation? I got fields, and those fields got crops and a tractor. Aw, yeah.” That’s how you get chicks, people.
