Bill Simmons recaps the NBA off-season in a two-part epic on ESPN.com. Minus all the quotes from "Almost Famous," his laughable choice as the best movie of the decade (off the top of my head - I'd take "Remember the Titans"), it's a good article about the NBA.
He's not a big fan of the Rasheed Wallace signing or Marquis Daniels:
The song Stillwater sang backstage before every concert goes to new Celtic Rasheed Wallace, who's hoping for a piggyback ride to a second ring. Look, it's hard to criticize your team for spending $20 million to upgrade a position that Mikki Moore and Brian Scalabrine manned last season. But Sheed will be 35 years old and is coming off a brutal contract year. He coasted on his reputation these past two seasons and helped two coaches get fired. Last season, he looked disinterested, took bad shots at the wrong times and never posted up. (In the words of William Miller, "I was there. I WAS THERE.") Considering the Celtics had trouble with everyone who went small against them last season, weren't they better off targeting a third swing guy who could make 3s and defend hot scorers (and please don't tell me Marquis Daniels is the answer) over frontcourt insurance? Also, what makes anyone think Kendrick Perkins -- a young warrior who really came on last season, but an emotional guy for better or worse -- won't be affected with Rasheed breathing down his neck for playing time?
The most confusing part of this NBA summer: most fans and media members failing to realize Sheed and Ron Artest earned their contracts on reputation alone. Artest can only defend physical small forwards and slipped noticeably as an offensive player (among qualifiers, he ranked last in two-point shooting percentage and third-to-last in two-point jumpshots). Sheed hasn't been effective in the playoffs since 2006 and submitted an epic stinkbomb in the 2009 Cleveland sweep (6.5 PPG, 6.3 RPG and 36.7 percent FG). Aren't these facts relevant? For all we know, the Lakers and Celtics BOTH made themselves worse.
He makes the case that the Celtics could be the most hated team in the NBA:
To the Celtics, the consensus choice to represent the East in the 2010 Finals even though we don't know about KG's knees; how much Ray Allen has left; if Rasheed will be good; how they're going to defend quick perimeter guys or handle anyone who might go small; how much Paul Pierce has left as a franchise scorer; and most of all, how an enigma like Rajon Rondo will respond to Danny Ainge inexplicably shopping him around AND publicly flaming him for the second half of June. Yes, I am concerned. Another concern: Did the Celtics just assemble the most hated NBA team of this decade? Everyone outside of Boston turned on Rondo and KG last season. Throw in Wallace's antics and Perkins' physical style, as well as the natural distaste for any Boston success, and the Celtics suddenly look like the league's premier bullying/chest-bumping/ref-badgering villains. So much for the days of ubuntu. Will they embrace this new identity? How will this play out?
(Follow-up: Thankfully, it looks like Stephon Marbury won't be back after his career-ending 24/7 webcast last weekend. And by "back," I mean, "allowed back in the United States." I think we have to deport him.)
After the jump, a hilarious story about Ron Artest wearing underwear only on a team bus...
For instance, Artest routinely walked around in his underwear in public places: the Rockets' team bus, hotels, you name it. People around the team barely flinched after a while. Before Game 7 of the Lakers series -- only the biggest game of the entire season -- they finally flinched.
Here's what happened: Artest missed the first two team buses (the ones for players, coaches and team personnel) from Houston's hotel to the Staples Center and barely made the third and final bus, which was reserved for business staff, sponsors and friends of the team. These stunned people watched Artest sprint to the bus right before it left, jump on and take one of the remaining seats ... yes, wearing only his underwear. Owner Leslie Alexander happened to be sitting on the bus and witnessed the whole thing. And you wonder why the Houston Rockets didn't make any effort whatsoever to bring back Artest.
He makes a legit case for LeBron going to the Clippers:
