Randomizer: Bing Crosby tap dances with Danny ****ing Kaye!

Just some random comments while I sit here waiting to get a call from Bill Bellichick to play cornerback this Sunday.

-If you remember back to October, I was beyond frustrated with the tenor of the columns coming from our local sports media about how the Red Sox were going to be eating Tampa Bay's dust for the next decade - it not millennium. Well, that was merely a sideshow for all the "Patriots are finished!!!1!!11!" drivel we've been subjected to the past week. The focus on the Patriots should be on the shoddy secondary, the dropped passes and the special teams choking at inopportune times. Or, you could be completely lazy, say that the Pats are "over" as a relevant team in the NFL and commence the teeth gnashing and garment rending (as you secretly rejoice that you can now focus on Red Sox 24/7 and pray that a bus runs into KG and Tim Thomas so you can go back to exclusively covering the Red Sox again).

The sky is falling! The sky is falling!

-The NHL really has some explaining to do: schedule wise, the Bruins are in the midst of a five game "vacation". While I'm sure the B's are happy for the impromptu holiday, it would have been nice to see them sooner after the win over the Red Wings on Saturday. Then we have Sean Avery suspended for referring to his ex-girlfriend as "sloppy seconds". Really. The NHL has long had this issue in dealing with goonery and cheap shots (why else wasn't Ulf Sammuelson not given a lifetime ban?) and now you're penalizing the most hated player in hockey for making a goofy and mildly inappropriate comment? Does that make an ounce of sense?

-The NBA also needs to figure something out: the Celtics have somehow committed an incredible 39 technical fouls in 19 games. That's 14 as many as the next team in the list. I've watched the C's play frequently this year and they don't strike me as a chippy team. In fact a recent article went into the nature of the technicals, and most of them are because the Celtics are (I can not believe this) overly exuberant. Isn't one of the positive attributes in sports displays of emotion? The NBA needs to stop following the lead of the No Fun League and back off on displaying emotion.

-Sadly, nothing has changed with the Skating Friars. Nothing. Meanwhile, PC basketball is disappointing everyone except those of us too jaded by the end of the Welsh era to muster any surprise at anything. The black cloud above the PC athletic department hasn't moved since Corey Wright missed a chance to send the 97' Friars to the Final Four.

-Hi Mark!

David Stern Can Not Be Harmed By Conventional Weapons!

So, after the entire nation spends the better part of 48 hours ruminating that the Lakers will get every call imaginable for Game Three after the ridiculous free throw disparity in Game Two, David Stern trots out Bennett Salvatore. Did anyone not see this coming? And more to the point, did anyone NOT think David Stern would do this?

Give David Stern some credit: he knew he was going to get criticized for the pro-Boston slant of the officiating in Game Two and he further knew that the criticism was going to get worse if he sent scrubs to Game Three to give the Lakers the advantage. If you want to argue that the NBA is fixed, what would be more obvious than an entire game of make up calls? But David Stern doesn't care. He is apparently above criticism. The man just does what he wants.

Could you imagine if Roger Gooddell, Bud Selig, or Gary Bettman pulled this crap? League ratings would never be the same. But Stern gets away with it, much as he did with Tim Donaghy (which was far worse than the MLB steroid scandal and Spygate in my opinion because it's one thing for players and coaches to break the rules, it's another for the league officials to affect the games like they were Vince McMahon).
It's basically like David Stern is singlehandedly attempting to prove every cockamamie conspiracy theory Bill Simmons has come up with over the past eight years is absolutely true.

The fact that he would court almost certain condemnation leads me to the one unarguable conclusion:

David Stern can not be harmed. He might be invincible. He might even be the Highlander (in which case the Lakers/Celtics match up would be the Quickening). Now I want to buy "the Best of Queen" and crank the volume up to 11.