NBA Essentials provides the must-see links, quotes and videos of the day.
-- "I'll make a deal with you MsClarkJones... COME TO THE NEXT HOME GAME, IF WE DON'T DELIVER A WIN, I'LL GIVE YOU YOUR MONEY BACK" -- Charlie Villanueva on his official Twitter feed
-- "The NBA will establish an office in India and establish grassroots programs to showcase the sport. This investment is also a boon to the NBA partners such as adidas, Electronic Arts and Spalding, all of whom will be getting involved with products on the ground customized for the unique Indian audience. " -- Biz of Basketball
Yes, this was the first time that I got to meet Kevin Love. The man who used to terrorize my Stanford Cardinal basketball team in his one year at UCLA. Well, on the last play of the day, Kevin Love went up for a dunk. I tried to block it and the next thing I knew I was making two unexpected trips after practice.
1) To team physician Sheldon Burns (he is also the USA Basketball head physician) to get 12 stitches in my chin,
2) To visit Matthew Alm of Brookside Dental (Minneapolis), to get my front tooth popped back into place.
Mad Dog just can't catch a break. Last summer, a vicious (I guess) jet ski accident left Madsen for dead (in Randy Wittman's eyes). This year, he gets his chops literally busted by a fricking rookie. No respect! And really, why wouldn't someone respect Mad Dog Madsen? I can't think of any reason at all.
NBA Frankenstein pays a special visit to the NBA Finals. Introducing: the most lovable most-hated team in America, the Los Angeles Lakers.
Liner notes: Mad Dog's 90 seconds of fame; The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (in large print); Mark Heisler's forthcoming The Kobe Rules (scheduled for 2017 publication); a desk calendar with daily lessons from the Dalai Lama; Jeannie Buss' Facebook wall.
When I read Shoals' piece the other day about players as mascots, the first name that came to mind was Mark Madsen. He seems like a nice enough guy, but he's a fan favorite for no reason that relates at all to his contributions on the basketball court. After all, he's best known in L.A. for a goofy speech and even goofier dancing at the Lakers' championship parade back in 2001. Please click that "goofy speech" link, I promise you won't be disappointed.
Something you may not have known about Mad Dog -- besides his fluency in Spanish -- is the fact that he's a full blown technology geek. So much so, that he was among the masses in Minnesota who waited in long lines to buy the latest and greatest gadget: the iPhone.
Look, when I heard the iPhone was coming out, I was ready to hire someone off of Craigslist to wait in line for me. I asked the AT&T people if this was OK, and initially they told me no. So I waited in line for the iPhone myself in Eden Prairie, Minn., where I think I was about number 21 in line. Luckily, I got one!
I don't know what's funnier, the sight of Madsen sitting in a lawn chair outside an AT&T store in Minnesota for hours and hours to buy a cell phone, or the prospect of him calling up people from Craigslist and trying to hire them to do it.
Either way, if the guy was really into his technology, he'd have known that waiting in line was completely unnecessary. Apple never releases new products in short supply, and I got my iPhone the day after it was released, no line at all, just walked into a mall in L.A. and picked one up. I guess in that respect, I'm actually geekier than Mark Madsen ... which, after seeing him at that parade, is something that I would have thought to be completely impossible.
When you have a limited basketball skill-set, you can still carve a niche for yourself by playing with unbridled enthusiasm and energy. Mark Madsen is a poster boy for this method, but apparently it's not something he can just turn on and off like a switch. No, he attacks everything with surprising vigor, even his sightseeing trips in Turkey. From his blog:
The coolest [trip] to me was the Hagia Sophia Mosque. For one thousand years, it was actually the largest Christian Cathedral in the World. Then, it was taken over by the Ottoman Empire (I learned all of this from our guide today!) and converted into a Mosque. Today it is a museum! So it's been a Christian church three times (Replaced once then burned down a second time, finally rebuilt a third time), a mosque, and now it's museum! How cool is that! ... All of the Islamic and Christian influence can be seen in the building! Then we ventured down to a giant underground water tank (Cistern) that was like a mini reservoir to hold water for those many times when Istanbul was attacked and seiged over the centuries. It was awesome!!
I counted: that's seven exclamation points in the span of one paragraph (not to mention the title of his post is "Hello Again!!!!") -- I'm surprised not to see a random :) interjected here and there. (Realize, though, that I poke fun because I care. If I didn't find Madsen interesting enough to subscribe to his blog's RSS feed, I never would have noticed.)
In other news (and I fully admit this is more "newsworthy" and probably should have been the leading point of the post), Madsen describes how Juwan Howard has started to warm up to his younger teammates. Whereas one reporter noted that Howard seemed reluctant to interact with the young cubs at media day, Madsen says Howard is now one of the leaders on the team who talks with everyone "1 through 15" about how they can help the team. Three cheers for team unity!
Everyone's favorite bilingual spaz (Minnesota reserve Mark Madsen) had a date with jet ski last week. It didn't go so well. But Mad Dog did score an evening with surgeons, and now he's looking forward to nice 3-month rehab session. Good times.
"This was an unfortunate accident that I have put behind me," Madsen said in a statement issued by the team. "My focus now is to concentrate on my rehabilitation with the goal of returning to the basketball court as quickly as possible."
If the Wolves planned on giving Madsen more than a pittance of minutes as the Youth and Beauty Brigade takes the reins, it'd be more than an unfortunate accident. It'd be like when Half Pipe Radmanovic busted his shoulder in Park City last year and the Lakers whispered about 'contract nullification.'
No matter: Everyone loves Mad Dog, and no one drawing a Timberwolves paycheck really cares Mad Dog won't suit up opening night against the Nuggets. (Unfortunately for Mad Dog, though: He'll miss Minny's tour of Europe, including games in Istanbul and London. Too bad; I hear the Sea of Marmara is killer.) Still, he'll have more time to chat up the FanHousers who improbably made it into his Facebook network. That's a win for us all.
FanHouse's Top Five scans the sports blogosphere for the best posts of the last 24 hours so you don't have to. Got something for this feature? Hit us up at fanhouse@googlegroups.com.
4)Ballhype conducted a study about sports bloggers. Turns out they're not all unemployed basement-dwellers. Well, except for me of course.
5)Our Book of Scrap shares the newest sensation -- kicking field goals at oncoming cars. Just make sure you have a good excuse in mind when they hit reverse.
As we fans watch the Tim Donaghy scandal unfold mostly dumbfounded, the other estates of professional basketball have begun to speak.
David Aldridge, yeoman reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, talked to an anonymous veteran referee to get at the predictable morosity gripping the zebra corps.
"It's beyond devastating. [...] Every guy is sick to their stomach. We know it's going to come back on us."
David Stern also made a statement, which you can read in full on the league's website. In paraphrased terms: 'The league's very upset and we'll get to the bottom of this and we'll talk more next week.'
"The minute they name the referee, every player is going to try to remember their games that he worked," said Madsen. "If there were any close games or late calls, players are definitely going to think about that. This is bad."
Burns quotes an NBA coach who says the league "could be facing a PR hit that will make the infamous Pacers-Pistons brawl seem trivial." Odd note, given ESPN's Chris Sheridan's timely notation that several veteran refs partially blame Donaghy for letting the brawl get so out of hand.
NBA Essentials provides the must-see links, quotes and videos of the day.
When I read 
When you have a limited basketball skill-set, you can still carve a niche for yourself by playing with unbridled enthusiasm and energy. 
Everyone's favorite 
FanHouse's Top Five
As we fans watch the 
