The Tom Brady press conference about Ballghazi came and went, and you can all decide on your own whether he met the truth, skirted it or puked all over it.
Me, I have a sudden hankering for an insulin-and-soda.
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The NFL has leaped into action to make sure no ball-based skullduggery happens next Sunday, giving Chicago Bears’ equipment manager Tony Medlin custody of the balls for the game.
How they chose Medlin to sit on the trunk the balls are stashed in rather than, say, Bob Romanski in Oakland, Jimmy Luck of Jacksonville, or the gloriously named Red Batty of Green Bay is a mystery, unless they actually rate equipment managers in addition to everything else. But for the sake of the game’s integrity, let’s hope Medlin does his job more convincingly than Robert Mueller did his.
But if Brady or Russell Wilson can hide the ball in his helmet at any point during the game, we’ll know that someone got to Medlin too.
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Ryan Vogelsong, we hardly knew ye. And yet, here ye are again, a Giant. Given the way San Francisco always seems to re-up its own, it makes Pablo Sandoval’s decision to not even let the Giants have the last bid before he left for Boston seem like an act of extraordinary mind control.
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Stephen Curry wanted a piece of Trevor Ariza Wednesday night after a bit of a dead-ball bump during Golden State’s 126-113 win over Houston, and we have a guess how that would have wound up.
With Steve Kerr’s life flashing before his eyes.
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Kobe Bryant’s rotator cuff is just part of his body saying, “Uhh, I don’t want you to expend any more of my precious life force playing for this team. I mean, look, I’ve watched this team, and I hate it. Hell, even when you’re playing, I hate it, and I’m you. So since you won’t take the other subtle hints, let me try this. I’m looking after your well-being here, and besides, when people laugh at you about this team, they’re laughing at me too.”
In a sidebar, the rotator cuff just put Klay Thompson in the All-Star Game. If this news cheers you more than Bryant’s injury disappoints you, you are on the first step to being the Twitter guy in the next item.
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And yes, every once in a while Twitter should die, and the latest one happened to New Mexico basketball player Hugh Greenwood, who was reminded during the day by a UNLV fan that his mother was battling secondary breast cancer in that Twittery-hateful kind of way (“Greenwood’s gonna be driving his mom to the game in a hearse”). Greenwood responded the two best ways he could, one by being instrumental in the Lobos’ win (22 points, eight rebounds), and by calling the idiot out on television after the game.
Results: Said idiot killed his account, doubtless to start another with someone else’s brain, and UNLV apologized. Here’s hoping it wasn’t enough to satisfy Greenwood, a guy who deserves far better.
And you know else deserves far better? His mom.
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Rich people should never have families, and here’s another reason why: Tom Benson, who owns the New Orleans Saints and Pelicans and a bunch of other stuff in town, has cut his daughter Rita and her two children out of the succession plan for the two teams in favor of his third wife, Gayle.
The New Orleans Advocate reported the story, and the additional fact that the three are now suing Benson, claiming he has been manipulated by his wife and lacks the mental capacity to make such a decision. The suit claims he shows brief periods of lucidity “that quickly turns into confusion,” like thinking the President is Ronald Reagan and then Harry Truman.
He in turn wrote them a letter banning them from any Saints or Pelicans games or their facilities, his television stations, Benson Towers, and cannot hire or fire any employees, and signed it, “Sincerely, your father and grandfather, Tom Benson.”
Lessons: Don’t get old, rich, married or parental. Live a life of quiet desperation, and when you’re ready to join the feathered choir, gather all your stuff in a pile in the middle of the street and set fire to it. Everyone but the fire department will thank you for it.
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And finally, Robert Allenby is the latest person to learn (A) that strip clubs really aren’t that much fun, (B) that people who go to strip clubs often aren’t that fun, and (C) if you can’t lie seamlessly, don’t lie at all.
And I’m Robert Kraft and Bill Belichick, and I endorse this message –- especially that last part.
Nominate your favorite All-Star Teacher today!
