In the past few weeks, various websites and blogs have been reporting on Blake Griffin’s new girlfriend, a student at USC named Jasmine Shein.
(wrongwrongwrongwrong)
Griffin and Jasmine Shein were first linked by a sports blog called playerseason.com on Dec. 22 of last year with this post:
This is Blake Griffin’s new girlfriend Jasmine Shein. The two met each other in LA, where Jasmine is a student at USC.
All reports tell us that these two actually met on facebook and have been seeing each other in LA for a few months.
The post by the obscure site elicited no reaction across the web. That changed though thanks to a subsequent entry on a notorious sports gossip website. Read more…
Despite unprecedented room under the salary cap, the Clippers have so far elected to completely ignore the greatest NBA free agent class in history.
(MEDIA: MUST CREDIT CLIPPER DARRELL)
Ah, but don’t be fooled by wily Donald Sterling & Co. He didn’t come to be L.A.’s most notorious slumlord by not showing up for meetings with prospective, elite employees who could help take his business operation to the next level.
Okay … let’s go straight to the source when it comes to credible Clippers news: The undisputed mascot leader of Clipper Nation, Clipper Darrell (Darrell Bailey).
This Clipper Darrell Tweet today sent shockwaves through sports media all the way from Pacoima to Huntington Park: Read more…
After reading today’s Peter Vecsey NEW YORK POST claim that Donald Sterling is considering handing control of the Clippers ship to David Geffen, I made some calls to some well-connected friends in Hollywood.
(Geffen’s boyfriend Lingvall behind mogul’s interest in Clips)
From what I’ve since been told, it turns out that Vecsey is at least in the ballpark. The 66-year-old Geffen does have a passing interest in the Clips. But his own personal interest isn’t what’s motivating a potential investment in the NBA franchise.
Reporting from Atlanta - Baron Davis called it heartbreaking. Eric Gordon said it was not up to par.
Al Thornton?
“It was a decent trip,” the Clippers forward said Wednesday night at Philips Arena after his team concluded a two-week journey with a 103-97 loss to the Atlanta Hawks. “We could have done a lot better, but it was a decent trip.”
Asked what he meant by “decent,” Thornton fell silent for several seconds.
“What was our record on this trip, anyway?” he inquired.
Informed it was 2-6, Thornton chuckled and said, “I guess not so decent, then. My bad.”
Not mentioned: two of six losses were to the 4-44 Nets and 11-38 Minnesota with the 14-day excursion ultimately resulting in head coach Mike Dunleavy’s ouster.
UPDATE (5:15p ET): Ramona Shelburne of ESPNLosAngeles.com reports that the Clippers are denying they are considering Isiah Thomas for a position with the club.
Shelburne adds: “This feels like story came from Isiah… Can’t see why the Clippers would want to pay $10 mill worth of coach next year.”
NBA Hall of Famer and current men’s basketball coach at Florida International University Isiah Thomas has emerged as one of the candidates to run the Los Angeles Clippers.
According to a source close to the situation, the Clippers have reached out to Thomas — who coached the Indiana Pacers and also the New York Knicks — to take over coaching, general manager and president duties.
He would replace Mike Dunleavy, who was relieved of his coaching duties earlier this week but remains the general manager.
Goodman’s report is all the more delightful when you consider that 11 months ago, Dunleavy said on the record that he turned down Thomas’ offer to work for the Clippers for free - in any capacity!
Thomas is doing what he can to try to get back into the game, and with his daughter set to attend Loyola Marymount, he offered to work for the Clippers without getting paid because he is still receiving money from the Knicks, Dunleavy said.
“Isiah came to us,” Dunleavy said in a telephone interview Thursday morning. “I wasn’t going to be a jerk and say, ‘I can’t talk to you.’ But there’s no position in the organization for him.”
While Dunleavy may sound like he’s somewhat sympathetic to Thomas, to reveal that Thomas was willing to work for free was clearly a low blow.
Then there’s January, 2008, when Dunleavy slammed Thomas for running the Knicks into the ground.
The LOS ANGELES TIMES has video of righteous observations from an appropriately smug Phil Jax on the delightful plight of Donald Sterling. (And Clips.)
“I’m of that generation that believed in karma. If you do a good mitzvah, maybe you can eliminate some of those things. Do you think that Sterling’s done enough mitzvahs to eliminate some of those? How about all those other incidents that we have on file?”
Switching gears from the normal “holy cow check out the details on this sports news story hey!” formula. It’s a Friday and we’ve got something different and interesting. None of the details have changed since 1991 - and even then, not materially since 1982. You call it “old news,” we call it “evergreen.” Semantics: good for business, good for you.
(Not seeing it yet? Just wait.)
The guys over at BOTH TEAMS PLAYED HARD recently started a study on ranking the NBA logos from worst to first (hey, it’s the offseason), and we expected to see the Clippers near the bottom. Sure enough, they’re at #26 - but is it warranted?
A fellow ShareBro over at SLC DUNK pointed out to us earlier today (and as BTPH also dutifully noticed) that the Clippers and Lakers had surprisingly similar logos. We looked at them next to each other - as shown above - then shrugged our shoulders and said “eh.” But there’s something to it, as a simple but elegant adjustment will show below the break.
Just when you thought things couldn’t get any weirder in sports crime - O.J. Simpson still hasn’t found his wife’s killer but we can’t be assured that Dirk Nowitzki’s baby momma didn’t have something to do with it - former NFL linebacker Eric Naposki is arrested for being the gunman who killed Newport Beach (Calif.) millionaire William McLaughlin. If you’re looking for more information on him, don’t check his former teams. The Patriots have already spiked his former alumni player page.
According to the ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER, Naposki — who was the paramour of McLaughlin’s girlfriend, Nanette Johnston — shot McLaughlin six times in an infamous 1994 slaying that sent shockwaves through the Southern California socialite circles and the medical aristocracy, since McLaughlin was the man who invented the process to separate plasma from blood.
Naturally, the case is being buried underneath all the Vick attention, but it’s a truly stunning turn of events. This is a cold case 15 years old, and suddenly dual arrests, one of which goes to a guy who played for both the Patriots and Colts in the late 1980s? Didn’t see that coming.
Then again, who saw the Magic win coming, either? After watching Cleveland breeze through its first two playoff series, sitting at home while waiting for the Celtics and Magic to finish beating each other up. When they finally returned to action on Wednesday, they jumped out to a lead, though that didn’t do anything to give them a win. No, instead, the Cavs dropped their first game of the playoffs, raising serious questions over whether the cast around LeBron James can keep up with Dwight Howard and a Magic team that looks more and more playoff tested.
Speaking of basketball, the Lakers are still in the playoffs, but they’re hardly the biggest basketball story going on in their own city. Ok, maybe they are the biggest story in L.A., but the Clippers are stealing some of their thunder, for good and bad reasons. First, they win the NBA Draft Lottery for the right to pick Blake Griffin. Then, less excitingly for fans of the red and blue (are any left?), is this incredibly damning portrait of owner Donald Sterling, who looks like a bigger and bigger racist with each article that gets published.
The most recent accusations were lobbed by ESPN The Magazine, which we tripped across via DEADSPIN, and they go into scary detail about his slumlording and overt racism in granting the right to live in his shantytowns. Here’s your gratuitous over-the-top pullquote, courtesy Mr. Sterling’s written records themselves (no one told him about this new invention called a “shredder”?)
When Sterling first bought the Ardmore, he remarked on its odor to Davenport. “That’s because of all the blacks in the building, they smell, they’r enot clean,” he said, accoding to Davenport’s testimony. “And it’s because of all the Mexicans taht just sit around and smoke and drink all day. He added: “So we have to get them out of here.” Shortly after, construction work caused a serious leak at the complex. When Davenport surveyed the damage, she found an elderly woman, Kandynce Jones, wading through several inches of water in Apartment 121. Jones was paralyzed on the right side and legally blind. She took medication for high blood pressure and to thin a clot in her leg. Still, she was remarkably cheerful, showing Davenport pictures of her children, even as some of her belongings floated around her.
Can’t David Stern steal back the top pick? I mean, top media market aside, is it really worth putting a talent like Blake Griffin in L.A. if it means helping Sterling make money? We’re certainly not sure it is.
Meanwhile, it was only a matter of time until the floodgates about Milton Bradley conspiracy theorists came out of the woodwork. Well, consider them here to stay, after two radio hosts on Chicago station THE SCORE debated whether Bradley was a good contributor for the Cubs. Not surprisingly, the takes of the two hosts were vastly different, though the boiled down to once major concern: Is Bradley a clubhouse cancer? Or is he just infairly maligned by the media?
The issue at heart is a legitimate one, since the media continues to trot out a ditribe about how Bradley brings only negatives to a team. According to analysis from MOUTHPIECE SPORTS, which we’ve always heard and read as well, Bradley is actually known as a terrific teammate, by Jake Peavy, Carlos Zambrano, Ryan Theriot and, most recently, Bobby Scales.
That sure makes it seem like Bradley is the victim of unfair media criticism, though who really knows with a guy so volatile he rips an ACL while arguing a call at first base. Not third or home, first. Yet that in itself seems to prove that he’s got a lot more passion that he’s getting credit for, so we’re not sure what Matt Abbacatola was talking about. Do you?
Evidently Larry King’s “Shattered Glass”-esque story about horse racing was only the latest episode in his career of lying about famous sporting events and moments. Paging you, Mr. Sandy Koufax.
Is it possible that Tony Kornheiser is just a jerk? We all know that Joe Theismann hated him. Did Mike Tirico burn out on him, too?
Speaking of Theismann, we’re sorry, but we can’t get enough of this whole Keyboard Cat fad, and if we don’t use this now, we’ll never get a chance to. Sure it’s macabre, but then there’s a cat! Playing a keyboard!
SI decides hockey is just relevant enough to compile a list of the sports most rugged players. Thanks SI. Of course, it is a pretty solid list, considering the fact that Owen Nolan is near the top. That’s all we needed to know.
And, just for good measure, the first triple play of the MLB season. If you had the Texas Rangers in your pool, congratulations. You probably got good money on them, too.
