Tag Archive: boston celtics

Random Thoughts

May 13, 2011 Adam Thomas

1.) Thor is awesome.  I saw Thor on Tuesday with Stefanie and Noah, and let me tell you what, that movie is really good. It’s the perfect three star movie.  Keeps you entertained, keeps things rolling, has good characters and a good story, has Stringer Bell as a big ass gate keeper cloaked in gold with yellow eyes.

And let me tell you something else.  Thor is the first movie that I’ve ever seen in a theater where when the main guy character came into a scene shirtless, the ENTIRE theater gasped.  The girls gasped and were like: DAMN!  The guys gasped and were like: DAMN!  Dude is just that jacked.  I’m not sure if his arms were CGI’d or HGHed or what, but if that crap is for real, hats off to you Chris Hemsworth.  Go see the movie if you get a chance, it’s the perfect way to kick off the summer movie season.By the way, they are re-making Red Dawn and you know who plays the Swayze role?  Hemsworth.  Awesome.

2.) Can we talk about these prom proposals for just one second?  What in the world has gotten into high school kids these days.  We had dinner with my aunt, uncle and cousin the other week, and my cousin, who is a senior in high school, was telling us these RIDICULOUS ways that guys were asking girls to prom. I’m talking about computer programs spouting off poems, I’m talking about roses in the bedroom, I’m talking about post-it notes on walls.  What the hell?  Then yesterday I see some kid put poster boards on his school’s outside wall spelling out “will you go to prom with me?”  To be dicks, the administration suspended the kid from prom (what a swift kick in the nuts, eh?), but the real story is…calm down guys.  Prom is kinda lame.  You eat shitty food and then you dance.  Whoopti-doo.

3.) The other night my dad and brother and me were watching the Heat play the Celtics when Big Neil uttered a phrase I never thought I’d hear.  We were watching the Philly Union game (more on that later), but switching back and forth between that and the Heat/Celtics game, and at one point I said, “We need to get Lebron to play soccer.”  To which Big Neil said, “Lebron’s not that athletic.”  (Insert record screeching noise).

Now, Lebron would suck at soccer, that much is given.  But to go as far as to say that he’s not that athletic?  Look, hate the guy all you want, but he is incredibly athletic. He may suck at life, but he doesn’t suck at athleticism.

Big Neil also said something about how he could beat Lebron James in a foot race, claiming that he is faster than Lebron James, and you know what?  I don’t totally (emphasis on “totally”) doubt him.  The reason?  If (when) Lebron did get ahead of my dad, you know that Big Neil would take out his knees or something.  Beat Lebron in a race and end his career in one fell swoop?  Just another day at the office.

4.) Speaking of the Union game, it was pretty fun to watch, as they scored late to tie the Galaxy.  But man oh man are MLS players bad.  The play is just so painfully bad to watch at times, but overall, they are trying their best and I guess that’s all you can ask for.  It is kinda bogus that the Galaxy and Red Bulls have 12 million dollar salaries and everyone else has like 2-3 million salary caps.  It’s especially bad when you consider that MLS sets the salary caps for each team.  It’s not like the Red Bulls and Galaxy owners just WANT to spend more, it’s that MLS lets them and then denies everyone else that opportunity.  Great business model.

5.) Just watched episode one of Twin Peaks yesterday and I think Stefanie summed it up best when she turned to me about 3/4ths of the way through and said, “I feel like I’m in another world.”  Exactly.

That show is unlike anything I’ve ever seen on TV before. I would say that it was ahead of its time, since it came out in 1990, but I’m not really sure if it even has a time to be ahead of. And if it debuted today, critics would still say, “It’s ahead of it’s time.”

It is just incredibly entertaining, making you feel all sorts of emotions (humor, sadness, scared, icky, odd), when most shows only go for one.  If you haven’t seen it, check it out.  We watched for two hours and it felt like 20 minutes.  The time just flew by and that is definitely a world that you want to get lost in…maybe not to visit, but definitely to observe as an outsider through a TV set.

Until next time…

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The Defense Is Killing Me Inside

May 11, 2011 Randy Neil

So the huge pitchers duel from Josh Johnson and Roy Halladay lived up the hype last night (sarcasm.) Yeah, they pitched great, but the Phillies lost, so it’s still a let-down in my eyes. Having Josh Johnson in a fantasy league didn’t help either. You want him to do great, but so great that he still loses. I’m like Tupac with all my inner conflict.

How many innings does Roy Halladay plan on pitching this year?? Seriously. I get that he is a work-horse, the man wants to pitch all the time, but he’s pitched for 61.1 innings so far this year, which leads the league. The next highest is Jered Weaver at 57.7, who is about 5 years younger. It’s awesome that Halladay has the stuff to go 9 innings every start, but it doesn’t mean he should. Not in mid-May.

Charlie needs to start digging into the bullpen and take the reigns a little. Halladay’s emotions were clearly running a little wild when Polanco was too slow throwing out Ramirez in the 8th. Roy looked like he wanted to smash his face in. Just pitch 7-8 innings and save that arm for the fall.

I watched the Grizzlies/OKC game from about 5 minutes of the 4th quarter to the end of the 2nd OT. Yes. That’s right. I stopped watching. Overtime after overtime, it was just getting a little out of control. The identity crisis that Oklahoma City is having right now makes me wonder if they are going to make it past the Mavs IF they make it past the Grizzlies.

Westbrook is taking a lot of heat for not dishing the ball to Durant in this series. They have a lot of weird defensive match-ups with the Grizzlies and it’s hurting the OKC’s offensive scheme, and even causing some drama in the locker room. Westbrook can basically drive at any point he chooses, so I don’t mind that he’s being a little more aggressive. He just needs to understand that the last shot of every quarter shouldn’t be him, and that it shouldn’t be Durant with 2 seconds left with a defender all over him because Westbrook gave a poor pass. It’s a learning experience.

It’s funny how relaxed a lot of these veterans are in the NBA playoffs… as they are losing. Kobe Bryant was ‘convinced’ he could still win the series after being down 3-0 to the Mavericks. And then he lost. The big 3 from Boston are trying to keep the same casual, care-free confidence as they travel to Miami to play the Heat tonight. I wonder what’s going to happen to them…

Once the Conference Finals are set up, I’m sure that we’ll probably have a revamp of our play-off picks. I know I need to. I still think the OKC have a pretty good chance of winning the whole she-bang, but with Miami playing at the level they are, I don’t know who’s gonna stop them. The Bulls and Hawks are taxing themselves in their series, so I pretty much have the Heat winning the East. This sucks of course, because the Miami Heat are everything wrong with the NBA, and they have (in my eyes) the easiest schedule and best chance to win the NBA Finals now.

Step 1 : Abandon teams, assemble new team of stars .
Step 2 : Play entire season casually, as to not strain yourself, draw media attention.
Step 3 : Win NBA Championship.

Perhaps I’m only bringing this up to double-jinx myself on my OKC pick. I mean, to be fair, I haven’t definitively changed my pick yet. There has been no official announcement of my new selection. So… in efforts to be respectable… my pick for the NBA Champion this year is…

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The NBA Playoffs are Nuts

May 9, 2011 Adam Thomas

The Atlanta Hawks could play the Memphis Grizzlies for the NBA Championship.  Wow.

So what happened?  Why did everyone seem to age 40 years in 20 days?  Kobe looked terrible and his team is now gone but they’ll be back next year when they get Dwight Howard so never fear Lakers fans!  Up until Game 3, the Celtics looked old until Wade tackled Rondo and it seemed to wake them all up at least momentarily.

Lebron is sporting the hairline of a 50 year old man.  But that isn’t even the scariest thing about these playoffs.

You know who looks really scary right now?  The Memphis Grizzlies.  They just look better than the Thunder.  I know that’s gonna upset some Headrush writers who saw the Thunder in person and were smitten by Durant and fell in love with Westbrook, but those two and their teammates are being worked over right now by the likes of Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol, Tony Allen, O.J. Mayo and Shane Battier.

As for the perennial villains of the east, the Heat, they did nothing to quell their dastardly ways during Game 3, with Wade throwing Rondo to the floor and Lebron using liberal use of the word “retarded” in the post game press conference.  James is such an arrogant POS, only he would use a word like that in that context and think there is nothing wrong with it.  He is a six year old in a grown man’s body and is just such a joke on so many levels.  Expect a half-hearted apology and a photo op soon.  F that guy.

How the Bulls are tied with the Hawks is beyond me.  But hey, that’s how these playoffs are going.  Expect the unexpected.

 

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Random Thoughts: Pre-Draft Edition

April 28, 2011 Adam Thomas

1.) The Sixers put up a good fight, but the Heat just had too much talent. You know, for a team that shot 57 more free throws in the series, the Heat sure do whine and complain a lot.  Also, I meant to comment on this last week but forgot.  I watched an interview with Wade where he talked about his mother being a drug dealer and at one point he said something like, “When I was three, cops burst into my house and one put his gun to the back of my head and said, ‘Where’s your mother?'”

I’m calling bullshit on that one.  Cops have been known to do some shady stuff, but putting a gun to a 3 year old’s head?  I don’t think so.

Boston seems like they should be able to beat them.  The Heat won’t be able to get rebounds like they did against the Sixers and the foul calls should even out (since the Celtics have stars that the Refs care about protecting as well).

In the end, the Heat were better than the Sixers.  But using the breakfast analogy and tacking on a dunk at the end of the game, that’s why everyone hates these guys.  Not because they are envious of their talent, but because they needlessly act like assholes.

2.) The NFL owners need to stop crying and get back to football.  Look, at the beginning of this whole thing, I was with the owners if only because the players union rep seemed completely inept.  But now, it’s over.  Just move on, we got a draft to focus on!

3.) Speaking of, I think that Von Miller guy is going to be the biggest bust in the draft.  He looks tiny as hell and he just seems like the kind of guy who gets all sorts of buzz and then never does anything.  Tyson Jackson anyone?

4.) Did you know that the most successful pirate of all time was a…wait for it…WOMAN!  Oh.  My.  Gaw.  It’s true!  She was called the Dragon Lady and would do all sorts of nutty stuff like have her crew drink wine laced with gun powder and pay her pirates for each head they brought her, so guys would fight with decapitated heads tied together by their hair and draped over their shoulders.  Also, she married her adopted son (ick) and eventually gained amnesty from the Chinese government, who gave her a crap ton of land and money to stop being a pirate.  At her most powerful, she commanded something like 70,000 pirates spread out across 9 different fleets.  Do work, Dragon Lady!

5.) I’m getting back into all the music I loved in high school: Phish, Grateful Dead, Mothers Magillicutty and it has made me wonder, why in the heck did I ever stop listening to this stuff in the first place?

I’ll be back with post-draft thoughts tomorrow.

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NBA Playoff Predictions Baby!!

April 16, 2011 Randy Neil

Got some predictions for the NBA playoff series coming up. Like to see em? Here it go:

Adam’s Picks

East:

Bulls over Indiana (4-1)

Orlando over Atlanta (4-1)

Boston over New York (4-3)

Miami over Philly (4-1)

West:

San Antonio over Memphis (4-2)

OKC over Denver (4-3)

Portland Over Dallas (4-2)

LA Lakers over New Orleans (4-1)

Round Two:

East:

Bulls over Orlando (4-2)

Miami over Boston (4-3)

West:

OKC over San Antonio (4-3)

Lakers over Portland (4-3)

Conference Finals :

Bulls over Miami (4-3)

Lakers Over OKC (4-3)

Finals:

Bulls over Lakers (4-3)

Randy’s Picks

East:

Bulls over Indiana (4-0)

Orlando over Atlanta (4-2)

New York over Boston (4-2)

Miami over Philly (4-0)

West:

San Antonio over Memphis (4-3)

OKC over Denver (4-1)

Portland Over Dallas (4-3)

LA Lakers over New Orleans (4-0)

Round Two:

East:

Bulls over Orlando (4-1)

Miami over New York (4-2)

West:

OKC over San Antonio (4-2)

Lakers over Portland (4-1)

Conference Finals:

OKC Over Lakers (4-2)

Bulls over Miami (4-3)

Finals:

OKC over Bulls (4-2)

Brendan’s Picks

East:

Bulls 4-0 over indy;

Mia 4-1 over SIXERS;

Orl 4-2 over atl;

Bos 4-2 over nyk.

West:

SA 4-1 over mem;

Lal 4-0 over NO;

OKC 4-0 over Den;

Dal 4-3 over por

Round Two:

East:

Bulls 4-0 over Orl;

Bos 4-3 over Mia;

West:

Okc over LAL 4-3;

SA 4-1 over Dal.

Conference Finals :

Okc over SA 4-2.

Bulls 4-2 over Bos.

Finals:

Okc over Bulls 4-3.

Brendan couldn’t be bothered with full names or capital letters.

GO SIXERS!

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The Saddest Sixers Post of the Year

April 13, 2011 Randy Neil

Man, things are looking ugly. Lou Williams is still uncertain about his playoff chances. The Sixers clinched the 7th seed spot. The Heat clinched the 2nd seed. We are doomed.

If the Celtics ended up holding the 2nd seed, or New York didn’t climb back into the 6th seed, I would have said we had a chance at a playoff series victory, but now, we don’t have a chance in hell.

Let’s take a look at the regular season games between the Sixers/Heat shall we?

October 27th, 2010 – The Heat visit Philadelphia for the 2nd game of the year, and end up cruising over the Sixers, 97-87. Wade grabs 30 pts, and the top scorer on our team for that game… Evan Turner. That’s right. He went 7-10 in that game, grabbing 16 points.

November 16th, 2010 – The Sixers now visit Miami for the first time, and meet almost the exact same fate. Miami takes the game 99-90. Wade, Bosh, and James combine for 61 points.

March 25th, 2011 – This was the most recent loss, and probably the most heartbreaking. The Sixers led this game with about 8 minutes to go by 10 points, and they gave that all away, eventually losing 99-111. Certainly, many could speculate that this was the game that started the Sixers slump.

The Sixers have their last game of the season tonight, facing the Detroit Pistons. Andre Iguodala will be sitting out to rest his tendinitis and Andres Nocioni will be starting in his place to help Evan Turner ‘adjust to coming off the bench for the playoffs.’ No matter what, the 76ers will end the season with a .500 record or better.

Looking back on last year, I’ll take it.

I still see this year as a huge improvement, and listening to Doug Collins always seems to help comfort my soul a little bit in dire times.

Mmmm… I’m still frightened. Thanks anyway coach.

Most are predicting this series to be an easy sweep for the Heat. I’m hoping otherwise.

The games begin on Saturday at 3:30 ET on ABC. At least our boys will have huge national coverage! So with one last battle cry, I will exclaim (in a very cowardly voice) :

BRING THE KING.

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