KG In Green. What Does It Mean?
That's it. The deal is official. Kevin Garnett is no longer a Minnesota Timberwolf. After 12 seasons in the Twin Cities, he will leave not to be Phoenix Sun, or a Chicago Bull, or a Los Angeles Laker, but rather a Boston Celtic. Here's how the trade went down:

Boston gets:
Kevin Garnett

Minnesota gets:
Al Jefferson, Ryan Gomes, Gerald Green, Sebastian Telfair, Theo Ratliff, and two picks

This means that Boston now not only has three legit All-Stars, but perhaps the best "Big-Three" in the league. Think about it. Is there any other team whose top three players achieve the level of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen? The only other threesome that comes to mind is Phoenix's Steve Nash, Amare Stoudemire and Shawn Marion, but I think Boston's guys might be even better in terms of skill.

The problem is getting them to play together. And play together with a bad coach (Doc Rivers), a bad bench, and a young raw point guard (Rajon Rondo). As of right now, the C's look like they'll have Rondo, Allen, Pierce, KG, and Kendrick Perkins as their starting five, with the likes of Brian Scalabrine, Tony Allen and rookies like Glen Big Baby Davis and Gabe Pruitt coming off the bench. Granted, they'll probably pick up a couple veteran role-players between now and the start of the season.

Can the big three overcome all these obsticals? Absolutely. The top of the East is a cluttered mess, with no clear cut beast team. Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, and Miami can all be had if this Boston team can come together. Rondo is talented and will improve, and even Doc Rivers couldn't screw these guys up. Props be to Danny Ainge for finally putting together a contender. Now if only the Lakers could do the same...

Bonds On the Verge of Record
It seems like it was preordained. Barry Bonds comes to Dodger Stadium one home run away from tying the record. The baseball gods seem bent on torturing the Dodgers for the rest of my lifetime.

I can see it now. Wednesday night ... 6th inning ... I'm about to finish my second watered-down $10 beer in order to sufficiently inebriate myself ... A necessary evil to prepare myself for what is about to happen ... Barry Bonds steps to the plate against Rudy Seanez ... He launches a shot into the All-You-Can-Eat Pavillion ... Boos and debris are hurled upon him from the stands ... Dodger fans all heave one collective vomit.

I'm getting sick just thinking about it. I am officially pleading with Bruce Bochy to not play Bonds in this series. At least wait til Friday when you visit your old team, the Padres. Have him break the record in Petco to bring shame upon the franchise that failed to appreciate you as a manager.

Please, sir. Do not play the man here. It won't be pretty. I'm sure Dodger fans (the classy bunch that they be) are already getting their bottles, batteries, cups, syringes, and anything else they can find ready as projectile weapons.

It will rain objects and hatred. The umps will have to call the game and the Dodgers will have to forfeit. It will be a disaster. Just, please. Don't play the man.

Barry Bonds vs. Iraq War
Who will win?

War - George W. Bush makes decision to go into Iraq. War drags on for years. What was supposed to be a search for WMD's and liberation of the Iraqi people turns into an all out hate fest. Bush later maintains that it was the right decision to make at the time.
Bonds - Bruce Bochy makes decision to play Bonds on the road to try to win games. Bonds breaks record on the road and is deluged by boos. What should have been a historic moment turns into an all out hate fest. Bochy later maintains that it was the right decision to make at the time.
Edge - Bonds.

War - All evidence pointed toward Iraq having WMD's. Upon further investigation, no definitive proof of WMD's are found. But we're all still suspicious.
Bonds - All evidence pointed toward Bonds having juiced. Upon further investigation, no definitive proof of Bonds' juicing is found. But we're all still suspicious.
Edge - War.

War - Pretty much no one supports it, except for a few remaining die-hard Republicans.
Bonds - Pretty much no one supports him, except for San Francisco residents.
Edge - Bonds.

War - Costing the government a lot of money. Decision must be made whether or not to continue our presence or create an exit strategy.
Bonds - Costing the Giants a lot of money. Decision must be made whether or not to resign Bonds next year or force him to retire.
Edge - War.

War - Main enemy: suicide bombing, RPG wielding, America hating, radical Jihad-ing terrorists
Bonds - Main enemy: Bud Selig
Edge - Bonds

Winner - Bonds. The war on terror ain't got nothin' on Barry.

Bills Thrills
Chad Billingsley pitched the first complete game of his career last night, as the Dodgers beat the Astros. This gave the bullpen some much needed rest. The pen had thrown about 99999.2 innings the past week, so Bills' game was a godsend.

Next week, the Giants come to town. If Bonds breaks the record at Dodger Stadium .... well ... let's just say it won't be pretty.

Control Your Peeps, Yi
Word on the street was that Yi Jianlian's Chinese team, the Guangdong Tigers, will block his move to the NBA unless the Milwaukee Bucks trade him to another team. Now, the new word on the street is that the Bejing newspaper reporter used incorrect "second-hand information" in his report. Yi and his associates now say they "are waiting for any chance to cooperate with the Bucks" and that the Bucks are "not a suitable team for Yi, but this is not the same thing as saying he will not play with Milwaukee."

Forgive me for being a little confused here, but which is it? His agent wants him traded. The people of China want him to sign. The Guangdong Tigers wanted him traded, now they want to sign. The situation has now become worse than any other past draft holdout. Steve Francis, Eli Manning, and John Elway ain't got nothin' on Yi.

What's puzzling about this is that the only person who hasn't offered his opinion is ... Yi himself. We the public have no idea as to what Yi wants to do. He needs to stop letting other people tell him what to do and issue a statement about his intent from this point forward. If he doesn't mind playing in Milwaukee, then sign. If he wants to go to a larger market or some place with a Chinese population, then push for a trade.

I don't blame the guy for wanting out of Wisconsin (the dozens of Chinese that live there probably wouldn't have been enough to make him feel comfortable). But if you want out, just give us the real reason. It's because of the city's market and population and not this "not enough playing time, bad for my his development" bullshit. If Yi is really worried about getting playing time among the likes of Andrew Bogut, Charlie Villanueva, and the UCLA legend Dan Gadzuric, then maybe he didn't deserve such a high draft pick to begin with.

Life Found in Dodger Bats
It's common knowledge around baseball that since Bill Mueller took over as the Dodgers hitting coach, the team has shown remarkable improvement offensively. They even scored enough to net Brett Tomko a win (no easy feat). After taking two of three from the Phillies, they now start a four game set with the Mets.

Now that we're past the All-Star break, I feel like making some playoff predictions. So here they are:

AL Divison Winners
West - Angels
Central - Tigers
East - Red Sox
Wild Card - Indians

ALDS
Red Sox over Indians (3-1)
Tigers over Angels (3-2)

ALCS
Red Sox over Tigers (4-2)

NL Division Winners
West - Dodgers
Central - Brewers
East - Mets
Wild Card - Padres

NLDS
Mets over Brewers (3-1)
Dodgers over Padres (3-2)

NLCS
Dodgers over Mets (4-3)

World Series
Red Sox over Dodgers (4-0)
J.D. Drew wins World Series MVP by hitting .650 with 7 home runs in the series. Which is what I predicted before the season (See April archives).

Vlad Beats Street Sense, Wins Derby
Vladimir Guerrero won the Home Run Derby yesterday, but none of us were really that stoked about it. Why? Two words: Alex Rios. It also didn't help that the event went over schedule by an hour and delayed the broadcast of the hotly anticipated TV movie The Bronx is Burning. As if anyone watched that thing either. Like they did with the Slam Dunk contest, ESPN has taken an event that was once exciting and dragged it out to the point of being unwatchably long. By the time Vlad hit his last homer I was ready to cut my ears off to avoid hearing Chris Berman say "Back, back, back, back, ... GONE!" one more time.

There is absolutely no reason the derby should last more than an hour and a half. The event needs to be shortened by lowering the number of outs per round. For the first round, 9 outs. Last time I checked, outs in baseball were taken in bundles of 3, so how does 10 outs make any sense? 9 is plenty to weed out losers in the initial round. From then on, they should lower the number of outs by 3 per round. So in the 2nd round, 6 outs, and in the final, 3 outs each. The lower number would make things more exciting by heightening the pressure and would drastically shorten the event. Also, tie breakers should be switched to a "Top-em" sudden death format, where the players would alternate swings until one hit a HR and the other didn't. Wouldn't this be infinitely more exciting than the currently used system?

They could also take a page from the NBA and add a second event like the Skills competition. The NBA now has 800 different events for All-Star Saturday night. Would it kill the MLB to have two? I like the idea of a skills-type obstical course. Imagine having players run to first, throw a ball through a target in the outfield, run to second, hit a soft-toss ball over the fence, run to third, make a defensive stop & throw, then run home, or something of that nature. I'd love to see something new like that for baseball.

What will likely happen? Next year's Home Run Derby lasts 7 hours and delays ESPN's broadcast of their latest TV movie: The Bronx is Burning 2: Clemens and Pettite's Slumber Party.

24 Raises Terror Level
After a sub-par 6th season, the writers of 24 were ready to overhaul the series and reinvent the format. This, however, might be taking it a little far. Just a couple weeks before shooting on season 7 was scheduled to begin, the script for the entire season was scrapped. Shooting will now have to be delayed by three weeks so the writers can pen an entirely new storyline.

Supposedly they canned the script for budgetary reasons (They didn't want to spend the money to film in Africa, as the script would have required). Whatever the reason, it had better be worth it. The way season 6 started, it looked to be the best season yet. But after the initial 4 episodes, it boringly dragged itself to the end. Even a career-best 49 kills by Jack Bauer couldn't save the season. Hopefully season 7 will bring the excitement back.

All-Star Game Prediction
American League - 17
National League - 2