Mitch Cumsteen

It's exciting that this is what we get to bitch about -- some sloppy defensive play out of a vanilla gameplan in an otherwise dominating win against a team that they clearly weren't amped up to play. I'm not overly concerned about the rushing defense. They held up fine against Michigan. If Blue doesn't fumble and the team goes on to score there, MSU has to throw that gameplan out the window and pass the ball. Instead, they got to play keep away and milk the clock for a bit. Complementary football, as it were.

Oh, I like Divincenzo quite a bit. He's a really good rotational piece. He can obviously shoot the shit out of the ball, can run some point, has championship experience, and is on a bargain deal for the next three years. Any team in the league would love to have him on their roster. But you essentially traded KAT for him plus Randle, who is one of the more overrated guys in the league IMO. He wasn't in the Knicks plans going forward. I also didn't realize that he had a $31 million option for another year, that he will almost certainly pick up. It should be interesting to see how the pieces fit. I wonder how many non-shooters you can put on the floor around Edwards and still give him room to operate. There will be some offense/defense trade-offs I imagine. I also love me some Naz Reid. I want to see what he looks like playing starter minutes in a contract year.

LOL at the end of this thing... Wemby looks like he's already had enough of this old fucker carping away at him.

I must have seen Beast Master 1000 times. It was in heavy, heavy cable rotation in the mid 1980s. It had a little bit of everything -- weird cult pagan shit, excessive violence, the whole mind meld with the animal bit, gratuitous nudity, etc. They don't make 'em like that any more. RIP John Amos... from Kunta Kinte to James Evans Sr. to Cleo McDowell to whoever the fuck he was in Beastmaster. This week has been the absolute pits of the world for celebrity deaths.

Records in the east are going to be inflated at the top and in the middle of the conference because there are going to be so many tankers - Charlotte, Detroit, Washington, Brooklyn are going to be shamelessly racking up Ls. I'm keeping an eye on Chicago - word is that Lonzo Ball is going to be ready to go opening night. It would be the most Bulls thing ever to finally embrace the tank, then get a healthy Lavine and Ball for once and end up playing their way out of the lottery. I'm still processing the KAT trade and what it means for both teams. While I always thought he was braindead, I think the Knicks won the trade - you don't often get a 4 time, 28 year old all star for a one year rental on an injury prone black hole, a heavily protected 1st, and a solid but not spectacular perimeter role player. They essentially gave up nothing but cap flexibility for him. The Wolves had to do something because of their own cap problems, but that's not much of a return considering what they gave up for Gobert. I wonder how their offensive spacing works without Towns, especially when you don't have to guard Gobert outside of 4 feet. The west is going to be a slog. Nobody is outright tanking except for Portland. And maybe Utah. That will change with injuries, but most of the teams look to be going for it. It's bad enough that OKC is completely loaded, but those assholes are a Kawhi injury away from buying another lottery ticket in a loaded draft. I still don't like their ISO heavy offense, but they are going to be an absolute motherfucker on defense. They were soft in the middle last year and Giddey got played off the floor in the playoffs, but they fixed all of that this offseason. I like Memphis to be in the top tier of the west. I think people are sleeping on how good they were before Morant spun out. I also like New Orleans, but I like them every year. They had a great off season but as always are Zion health dependent. Denver has got to take a step back, right? Jokic needs more help. The Mavs will go as Kyrie goes. I don't trust his injury history or him in general but so far so good in Dallas with him.

Agreed. Whoever they trot out at WR and RB isn't going to matter if they can't keep the QB clean or get movement in the run game. I didn't watch them very closely against Auburn, but it seemed like the OL was better than they were against Tennessee. I don't know how much of that had to do with the Tenn DL being one of the best in the country compared to what Auburn is trotting out there, but improvement is improvement. OU still has one of the better OL coaches in the country. If they can get anything close to competent line play, they might be able to hit some things here and there with a running QB. But otherwise? I think they're fucked going into Dallas. It's going to take multiple Texas turnovers and/or special teams gaffes for them to win.

I'll just re-post it, then. Here's a couple I found on my computer. I have no idea why I put my "name" on the first one. And the Charlie Strong one is kinda hilarious in hindsight.

Line starts behind me, Pop.

This is going to take some getting used to. He looks like he's on the Giannis body trajectory. He's going to be terrifying.

That's terrible. RIP. He was an amazing humanitarian and apparently a great dude... but I'm a little embarrassed to say that the first thing that popped into my mind was the "Who wants to sex Mutumbo?" story.

Media Day is here! There is going to be a lot to unpack and I have lots of deep thoughts for later.... but holy shit Wemby is up to 235 lbs. He played at 210 last year. Go Spurs Go.

And oral hygiene.

RIP to a legend.

Probably all of them. It don’t make a shit.

Is being without your top 5 receivers bad? That seems bad to me.

And Jeremiah Smith at Ohio State.

It looks like the transfer from Utah will be the guy. He started 8 games for Utah last year. I'm not sure why he wasn't playing already. While there is certainly a reason he's running 3rd string, I can't imagine the difference between him and Shanahan is all that great. He's at least an upperclassman and has some experience. The A&M/Arkansas game is always such a weird shitshow. Both teams do multiple stupid things for three quarters, and then Arkansas always seems to find a way to shoot themselves in the dick at the end to lose. If there were ever a year for the Hogs to get over on A&M, you would think this is it. Arkansas can move the ball. They have the best offense that A&M has seen so far (low bar) and Bobby Petrino running a wide open system going up and down the field on them would be serious comedy. But who knows which Arkansas team is going to show up week to week? They didn't play well against Auburn, but got 5 turnovers and pulled out the win. They dominated the stats against Oklahoma State and somehow found a way to lose.

Four days later, still have Put the Blame on Mame stuck in my head.

I still haven’t given up on Rudy Gobert.

He’s got a 44% completion rate and had less than 90 yards passing in the two games they played against teams with a pulse (Kansas and Houston). Brent Venables, please pick up the white courtesy phone.

See... this is where you're wrong. No coach is better after an inexplicable loss as a big favorite with an overwhelming talent advantage than Mack Brown. Then again, nobody has had as much experience at it.

There is lots of naked Demi Moore and naked Margaret Qualley, although I don't know how much of each is real and how much is prosthetics/CGI. You could always bail after the first half of the flick. I wish I had.