NBA buffet, sexploits, recruiting

If a proposed three-team trade goes down, as Yahoo Sports is reporting, with Kevin Garnett heading to Phoenix and Amare Stoudemire to Atlanta, then how much did those team do themselves right? Garnett is a better rebounder and passer, even if seven years older than Stoudemire, but does this move make the Suns better than the Spurs, and what about that megaton contract of KG's? Stoudemire in Atlanta sounds like a no-brainer but giving up two top-11 draft picks and a serviceable center in Zaza Pachulia leaves me rubbing my shaved dome. Stoudemire will sell tickets and help the Hawks get to the playoffs but this might not have been the best move for a franchise in need of a point guard. Maybe if it has the money to steal Chauncey Billups, Atlanta will have a team again.

Shedding Garnett's salary is the wise thing to do for Minnesota. That project just wasn't working and wasn't going to anytime soon. If the Timberwolves score, as reported, those two coveted draft picks, and if it can be astute in using them, they can remake the mix of the franchise quickly. The question that remains and looms large is will that be adequate compensation for KG? No, not really, but stopping the financial bleeding of that contract as well as separating from an unhappy partner is a very good thing for future flexibility and chemistry.

The WSN is all for Kevin Durant as the top pick in the NBA draft but Jim Armstrong of the Denver Post makes a powerful opening statement for Greg Oden. The biggest concerns regarding Oden, at least in this space, are his injury history and apparent lack of passion on the court, not his talent level.

And congratulations to Jason Smith of CSU, who is about to get rewarded for his college basketball education. No more scrapping for pizza money. It's time to get paid. Check out a fantastic article by Kelly Lyell of the Coloradoan detailing former pro coaches and players opinions of the Rams big man.

Here it comes, just as predicted, and it was only predicted because it's an annual event -- the Rockies summer nose dive. The pitching is awful, the hitting average and all those feel-good moments from a hot streak are being stained by a six-game (and counting) losing streak. So is management trying to find answers or is it going to allow the team to again sink out of the divisional race, holding on to, as most loser organizations do, the motto "wait 'til next year."

Poor Barry Bonds. Seriously. For once, you have to feel for the creep. It appears his ex mistress (dummy!) is about to spill all about their sex life. Now how unbelievably wrong is that! Not even a schmuck like Bonds deserves such a knife, does he? Of course, if he's the Superman sexually that he is on the baseball field, then this might be very good PR, and something to talk about other than steroids. But if he really took dope and his mistress noticed, this could, um, be, you know, embarrassing.

Feeling lonely? Try catching a Tampa Bay Buccaneers home football game. The courts have said the team can continue pat-down searches for security purposes. Honestly, I've been patted down before, had my pants pulled away from my waist (that wasn't a gun) and while it is mildly irritating, considering it is in the name of safety for all of us, I think I can handle the fondling or having someone run a device over my body so I don't up as Middle East mincemeat one day.

Look at the number -- 340. How does a pitcher win that many games? Greg Maddux just did. Color me a big fan, and I hate that word, of the old goats still laying brick -- Maddux, Roger Clemens, Tom Glavine, and Randy Johnson. To be as good as they have all been for so long is really a sight. The very big truth is this -- the game needs them, especially with all the cheating amongst hitters in years past coming to light in recent seasons.

Did you see former stud quarterback recruit Zach Frazer, who packed up and left Notre Dame, is now looking at Cincinnati and Connecticut? Cincinnnnnnati and UConn. Think those two schools would have gotten a look when Frazer was in high school? Not knocking going for the glitz and the dream as an 18-year old but if some preps would actually take a moment and look at the variables that could affect that dream, such as all the other highly-regarded players at their position at the school that excites them and think with their big head instead of their little one, they wouldn't be bottomed out on the depth chart and looking for new digs often.

Huh? Don't think this guy has been introduced to CU linebackers' coach Brian Cabral. Penn State has produced some boys who can get to the ball but who was the last great Nittany Lion at that position? Ted Johnson was a rock until injuries tore his body up. Chad Brown was a playmaker, Greg Biekert was underrated. Even Hannibal Navies has earned some dough in the League. Maybe the prep should have said, if you want to be the best in Pennsylvania, you go to Penn State.

Let's see if I have this right -- apologists are swirling around for pro wrestler Chris Benoit, who, fresh off strangling his wife to death and suffocating his child, hung himself. It seems, we hear, that steroids might be to blame. Sort of reminds me of mothers who get a pass for killing their children from feminists on the basis of post-partum depression. Not saying steroids don't have a negative effect or that post-partum depression doesn't exist but sometimes you just have to admit people are bad, as in KILLERS. Sorry, but in this court of opinion there are no passes for killing unless you're a soldier, where the job sometimes require something unseemly.