that's kind of what i meant by scope. the NFL is exclusively an american sport, baseball realtively worldwide by comparrisson, but stern's been trying to take the NBA global, in marketing (and players) at least if not in location of teams. that makes his job infinitely harder than Tagliabue's, who i like a lot (except for the lack of guaranteed contracts, i hate the idea that you can get hurt and the management doesn't have to pay you. could any injury be more work related or deserving of some kind of workman's comp?).

my brother had lunch with Tagliabue last week. He pretty much saw him eating by himself in the NFL cafeteria and pretty much forced his way into eating lunch with him. Had nothing but nice things to say about the man. Not that I know fucko all about football or even how to spell Tagliabue without thinking really hard about it.

i will be at the bulls/wiz game tonight

If they lose it rests on your shoulders.

you should wear your new shirt and if the bulls lose you should immediately punch your father-in-law in the face.

guys they won't lose. i should've worn my new shirt but i'm going straight from work. it's an early start

if you're afraid of having your father-in-law whup your ass in public just say so. it's gonna happen sooner or later.

he's not going. it's me, the future bro-in-law and 2 other mystery people.

interesting. well i'm hoping for the worst.

you jerk

if you could beat the wiz by less than 5 then that would be just as good, i guess.

hopefully gordon gets his together for this game.

yeah, hopefully. where's he been? i fear for your sake that the jettisoning of Kwame Brown is really going to help the Bullets a lot.

throwing up a phat 1 of 13 last game. hopefully the home town crowd will get his wits about him

man, what a bitch. that comeback was incredible though.

We're bad luck. I've been to the 2nd and 3rd most painful games of the year(Rockets and Pistons) and you've been to the first.

you're starting to sound like a cub fan

and yeah that was the most incredible and terrible basketball game i've ever seen.

Seattle over San Antonio in six

Well, blame the union s well, they accept these terms. Ever notice that the NFL is in far better shape financially? that they sell more merch? that they have a better TV contract? That they have stricter rules governing their players' appearances?

I will give you the global scope of the nBA, but with a few marketable stars, that still doesn't seem too hard.

the only numbers that i've seen indicate that the NBA passed the NFL in merchandise sales for the first time in 2004, mostly due to the advent of Lebron James; if you've got something else then please point me to it. The TV contract thing in innarguable. i'm not sure what you're basing "better shape financially" on (not that i necessarially disagree but i'd like to see the numbers) or what "stricter rules governing appearance" means or it's importance. Attempts to expand the appeal of the NFL have more or less been a failure as i remember, for however you want to slight the moves that the NBA has made in that arena.

in the end i don't think that either of us are capable of being objective on this matter, so this is probably a fools errand.

edit- i think that the crux is that these commish are playing vastly different games because they're defining growth differently. i think that tagliabue is on top competing with baseball and nascar whereas basketball is targeting soccer, maybe.

Why does Pargo have to get his double-digits in the last 3 minutes of every game? I really don't understand Skiles' sub petterns...

It had more to do with the fact that the team has no urgency until there are 3 minutes left than Pargo not being in the game until there were 3 minutes left.

I won't comment on that, but will make my own predictions:

# of times Ray Allen whines to the media and refs about Bowen's defense during the series: 261.

Something that can maybe get Duncan to stop making the 'game face': Radmanovic's hair.

Forthcoming Robert Horry in 2004-esque meltdown against former team: Antonio Daniels.

# of times Glenn Robinson accidentally mows down He Got Game: 14.