I explained the whole "girl from a country while explaining Copa Mondial to him some 12 years ago, back when I thought he would be something.

My girl from Gha-ha-na, she's so cool

Only works in the true literary sense, and more importantly working up to a Copa team with a true sachet for their women being recognized as being hot.

My girl from Tokyo
My gril from San Paolo
My girl from Amsterdam
My girl from .....


Besides, Ghana beats the US regularly and will again. So, no anything (except the tab, you cad) for you, Larry.


P.S. In no way meant to imply that women from Ghana cannot be hot. Far from it, but the whole I'll watch with a countrywomen thing is something I ventured long ago, and I prefer to enjoy the company of any winner rather than speculate on who is/should be in the brackets (the whole one in the bush beats all thing).

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DRINK BƎTTƎR. @theRIPH

I haven't listened this week but can someone confirm that their analysis of the Finals is really "The Spurs are unbeatable now."? How do they reconcile that with their oft-screamed philosophy that you can't win an NBA title without LeBron or Durant? Now a team is not only like to do that, but they are doing it so convincingly that Dan thinks they are literally unbeatable? Embarrassing.


I guess if the Spurs win on Sunday we can expect a "This Spurs team would have beaten those 90's Bulls teams" show on Monday.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

I doubt they'd go that far as it would call those months and months of LeBron fellating into question.

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the question is, would that be the contrary position? Then yes.

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Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

This is a horrible, pointless article with embarrassing oversimplifications.



Chicago.com Senior Columnist

(CBS) — That Miami team doesn’t look so scary anymore, certainly not the one getting embarrassed on its home court.

They turn the ball over carelessly, dribble too much, and stand around looking at each other, waiting for somebody to do something. They take contested shots with the clock in the red. They are confused on defense, chasing ghosts: every hard close to an open shooter is punished by a weak-side cut or a reversal of the ball, every trap creating an equal and opposite scoring chance, and every hesitant rotation making them more likely to foul.

The big, bad Heat are being vivisected.

On the surface it all looks good to Bulls fans, if bitterly so. The unraveling of Miami’s projected identity of inevitability may satisfy those still smarting over not only the mechanism of their construction that left Chicago holding the bag, but the cold finality of playoff losses at their hands. There is pleasure in their pain, and some may be feeling something even beyond that.

It’s something resembling hope, and with that, one must be very careful.

Time is never on the side of sustained dominance. Even in professional basketball, where the combination of talent and seven-game series overcomes randomness, it’s difficult to stay great. Effective, inexpensive supporting casts are fluid, churning around a star-laden core in an accounting dance with the salary-cap and luxury taxes. Just navigating the physical challenges of the regular season has become a modern coaching concern, and the rapid deployment of advanced analytics is allowing smart teams to be more competitive in new ways.

Dwyane Wade is an old 32. Lebron James has already logged a career total of 46,000 minutes. Ray Allen is done, and so is Shane Battier. The Heat point guards are regressing, and not one single player on their roster seems to be getting better, with the possible exception of James. Therein lies the warning.

Are there really new cracks in the glass ceiling of the Eastern Conference, or is it just tempting to want to see them?

The timing is convenient for the Bulls, amid growing dissatisfaction with the repeated pattern of regular-season overachievement followed by playoff strangulation. That’s the hamster flywheel of NBA hell, and both John Paxson and Gar Forman are smart enough to want to get off. They are increasingly impatient, and they are trying.

Carmelo Anthony is a long shot, as is KevinLove. Regardless, even the outside chance of some kind of tactical nuclear option is more compelling than anything else for a fan base getting antsy for a Derrick Rose Era to be resurrected in any meaningful form. It feels like there’s a lesson in this new evidence of Miami mortality, that it’s more worth it than ever to reboot the system with some kind of second star, assume that Rose is himself, hope Tom Thibodeau can be taught or forced to better care for his human resources, and make the grab for at least that puncher’s chance. There’s no good reason to wait.

For many of us, it’s worth doing almost just because. It can’t hurt, it could help, and it sure beats watching the same sad, predictable ending again. But it may be missing the larger point, which is how to really get by the Heat, or wherever a still-prime James may be.

Play basketball like the San Antonio Spurs. Do business like the San Antonio Spurs.

Move the ball gracefully to open shooters in uncovered areas. Space the floor with ideal geometric balance, and synchronize every action. Defend with awareness of situation and personnel. Acquire and develop intelligent, multifaceted, unselfish players who respond positively to relentless coaching and quiet veteran leadership. Put together a global machine – two Frenchmen, an Italian, an Australian, a guy from the Virgin Islands, a Brazilian/Spaniard and a few well-chosen Americans – that becomes more than the sum of its parts. It’s just that easy to make the Miami Heat look overmatched.

Everyone’s vulnerable to greatness.

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I think his thesis is that the Bulls should try to be good?

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Does he think Ginobli is Italian?

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

It's easy to be great! Just be more like the Spurs! Problem solved!

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Ethnically Italian Argentine. DAT'S EXACLY RITE!

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Did anyone project it other than bernstein?

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Boy, that's a clunker when you try to say it out loud.

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Set coordinates for KevinLove!

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The Bulls haven't done anything wrong, and they're not going to do anything wrong.

RFDC, Nas, Ivan, vegan, probably many more.

_________________
Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

Whoa, don't lump me in here with Berstein. I wouldn't have put it as clunky as he did here if I held the same position. "Projected identity of inevitability" is closer to having no meaning at all than it is to saying something meaningful. Aren't all identities projected anyway since whatever we mean by identity is not tangible? Sort of like saying imaginary dreams, or structured houses.

Anyway, the only thing that's "unraveling" here is Bernstein's entertainment value, or at least the laughing with subset of it as opposed to the laughing at.

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Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

I honestly don't know what it means. If interpreted literally, I guess I would think it meant that the Heat have portrayed an identity that is inevitable? I'm not sure how an identity can be inevitable. Maybe he meant to write "invincibility"? Also, I agree with vegan that projected identity is redundant.

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I'd guess it leads awkwardly to a rather straight forward point: the inevitability of them winning a ring, but yeah it's just bad phrasing. Not sure if the inevitability of success is an identity anyway.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

It means they couldn't lose. And they may not lose yet, but it seems that bernstein is now at least acknowledging the possibility, although they have not actually lost yet.

There's an old rodeo saying: There isn't a bronc that can't be rode and there isn't a cowboy that can't be throwed. And that's why you don't tank seasons and talk foolishly about the "inevitable".

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

If he means they couldn't lose, he should have written "...identity of Championship inevitability..."

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He just can't say players. He just loooooooves using 8 words where 3 would work.

I'd rather bash his idiotic sports thoughts than his overwrought columns.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

I used to think that until I read this article. They are now equally horrible in my eyes.

What do you think his thesis or main point is on the above column?

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I couldn't really say. He likes the way the Spurs play basketball. He thinks the Bulls have a slim opportunity to make some moves to become a real contender instead of the fake contender they were when they were winning more regular season games than everyone else and he believed the Heat couldn't lose.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Exactly. I think he just writes to write.

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He does this speaking as well. Especially so when asking an interview question. I imagine the guest saying to themselves today junior.

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Elections have consequences.

Well, bernstein's interviewing skills are great when compared to North or Mully who go around and around and actually answer the question themselves before they are finished asking it.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

You are right but it is a sports radio thing not 60 minutes or a congressional hearing.

_________________
Elections have consequences.

Yeah, I can't complain about his interviewing, especially when looking at him relative to other Score hosts.

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Personally I prefer the tough and probing questions approach on subjects that may deserve that kind of approach. In general I prefer risking burning bridges during interviews rather than soft questions designed to look tough just so access is protected and relationships aren't damaged.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

I am not being clear maybe. I like his interviewing and questions and content. I just think he goes out of his way to be overly verbose and show off his vocabulary.

_________________
Elections have consequences.

The team I've steadily proclaimed for many years to be invincible is getting beat really badly.
Really, really badly.


For some reason, maybe because I'm in Chicago, I want to invoke the Chicago Bulls name in an extremely tortured to the point of being rendered meaningless way.
No, not a really, really good reason at all.

Beyond overstating the obvious that any "dynasty" comes to an inevitable end at some point, even in basketball. Here's an opportunity invoke the term "analytics", could it be that the Heat aren't really smart or their analytics aren't as advanced as previously believed?

The supporting cast, principally Dwayne Wade, isn't holding up their end of maintaining Lebron James' greatness. There's something cautionary about this, but exactly what is unclear.

NBA hell, the people running the Bulls aren't happy with winning regular season games because that's how you get to NBA hell.
Yet really smart people, like the author, propose that if the Bulls get one more star player they will not just be in NBA hell, but have a hell of a chance better at winning it all. It is really, really that simple.


Let's step out on a limb and flirt with going towards NBA hell but with one caveat, the games greatest player ever can be beaten by playing team basketball, like the San Antonio Spurs.

Yeah, that's the ticket. Just play better team ball, and build, run, and maintain an organization with that in mind. Play better offense and better defense and the result is that the Lebron James Heat can look overmatched.

This is brilliance simplified despite the lack of any real analytics to extrapolate where a player is from to correlate to how well they will play team ball, but if you've read this far you've probably read more than needed.

This is also why having the title "Senior Columnist" means never writing literary tripe, even when trying one's best to do just that. Any and all previous criticism leveled by the "Senior Columnists" towards any local columnist is now rendered null and void. This is real genius here, special genius, and having read this column has permanently exposed the reader to this unique genius.

Genius today, bullshit yesterday and even more bullshit tomorrow.

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DRINK BƎTTƎR. @theRIPH