I’m officially losing it. Last night, I had a dream that Corey and I were hanging out with Steve Nash and Kevin Garnett. And, to make matters worse, each time I would speak, a small piece of spit would fly out of my mouth. However, Steve was nice enough to pretend not to notice.

Yes, we had a nice conversation about how tall and short people are. I think Kevin was even taller in dreamland than he is in the real world. He didn’t hang out much. Actually, he came storming through the room followed by many tiny kids chasing after the basketball he bounced between his legs and swung around his body. When he threw the ball up in the air, Corey grabbed it and to my dismay gave it to some snotty-nose kid instead of taking it home to play with in our home basketball court. Yes, I am mean in my dreams, selfish and mean.

My buddy Amy was there, too. She did admit that Steve looked much better in person than he does on the ball court with his greasy hair. (Yes, I admit having a secret crush on Steve. He did bring me back to the sport after I lost interest when the Bulls started to suck.) As you can see, Steve and I are on a first-name basis, and for those who care, things are well in Canada.

The dream ended, quite oddly, with all of us in a conversion van trying to outrun a bunch of crazy people who were crashing their vehicles into each other. (Those who know me may recall that I detest conversion vans and had a hard time having to look at one outside of my apartment in Sauk Rapids.) This was right before the basketball game was to start, fortunately we got through it all without whiplash.

All in all, I don’t think I have dream-laughed so hard in my life. I woke up with a big ‘ol “what the hell?” I just can’t figure out what this could mean! I haven’t remembered a dream in months. Could this possibly be related to the fact that I have taken up running (ahem run/walking) within the last week, or that I made beans from scratch for the first time last weekend? Are there any dream interpreters out there? Help!

Okay, Eric. You’re right.

Bill Walton sucks.

I have never heard a more one-sided commentary from a national network sports announcing personality than Bill Walton’s Spurs Love-Fest during Sunday afternoon’s Indiana-San Antonio game.

And the worst part? For a while there, I was an apologist – a person that thought Bill Walton was interesting and had funny things to say. I thought he was a valuable part of any broadcasting crew.

I used to hear from all of my Timberpup-loving friends that Walton was horrible, as if he was the scourge of televised basketball, a man that was single handedly tearing apart the league as we hopelessly watched. He would side with the Los Angeles Lakers nearly incessantly, but you know what – they were winning, and I thought it was kind of fun to watch my friends squirm. I hated the Lakers, but I didn’t listen to the announcers at that time. I didn’t get the chance to watch professional basketball and actually hear the announcing, let alone dissect Walton’s never-ending stream of words.

But Sunday, I turned to the light. I listened to Walton. And I hated every minute of it.

Ask Kerrie – there were times I was screaming at the television after Walton said yet another pro-Spurs, anti-intelligence type thing. “I thought you liked him,” she said, to which I reply, “I DID…but now I realize what Eric and Ryan used to bitch about!”

The game was close throughout, even as the Pacers took a seven-point lead with 1:30 left (a lead that they, in true Indiana fashion, pissed down their leg quicker than they could run into the stands.) Still, you’d never know by listening to Walton. Tony Parker (6-15 shooting) was being hailed as the best thing since Magic Johnson, and Tim Duncan (4-15 shooting) was “having a bad night,” with no mention of Indiana’s defense.

Even Rasho Nesterovic – a center that couldn’t even make the rotation in the Finals last year, was getting more praise than any Pacer on the court. Every time it looked like he may have blocked a shot, Walton would practically shriek with delight, regardless of the fact that he had 4 points, 2 boards and 1 block. If I had never watched a game of basketball in my entire life before this one, I’d have thought the Spurs were undefeated, the Pacers were freshly installed from the NBDL, and that Rasho was on his way to the Hall of Fame.

Sometimes, his broadcast partners would get on his case. During one wobbly Fred Jones pass, Walton exclaimed, “You should not be attempting that pass. That was a horrible pass.”

To which Steve “Snapper” Jones replied, “He still caught it, Bill!”

Later, after “Snapper” mentioned how Indiana backup center David Harrison was playing well against Tim Duncan, Walton replied with the following snide barb:

“You can never compare David Harrison and Tim Duncan. You’ll never be able to do that.”

I agree with this overall, but it wasn’t a straight comparison of Harrison to Duncan as overall players – just how the two were matching up on this specific night. What then took the cake is that Walton had the audacity to compare Rasho Nestrovic’s skyhook to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar!

Just to show how lame Bill Walton is, I’ve pulled a bunch of horrible Walton quotes from a NBA message board – you can reach it here.

Enjoy the rampant hyperbole in these quotes. And don’t be afraid to say, “I told you so.”

I already know you did.

Bill Walton Quotes:

“Manu Ginobli is one of the all time greats” (See, blatant Spurs gushing about a third-year player that’s been to ONE All-Star game.)

“Kenyon Martin is the 2nd best player in the (eastern) conference.” (he’s barely ever been the 2nd best player on his team)

“Greg Ostertag is one of the top centers on this planet”

“Steve Nash is the most unathletic player in the league” (Kerrie will LOVE that one, especially since she’s seen Big Oliver Miller, the TRUE “most unathletic player”, in person when he played for the Wolves.)

Finally, the long awaited EA Sports game is here: EA Arena Football.

Are you kidding me?

What’s next?  EA CFL ‘06: Race for the Grey Cup?  Challenge the top teams in the Canadian Football League in a grueling 23 week season.  Includes legends team featuring Warren Moon and…er…

I guess that’s all there would be.  Warren Moon playing all 11 positions, offense and defense.

How about EA CBA ‘06 — complete with all eight teams of the Continental Basketball Association, including the Rockford Lightning, Yakima Sun Kings, and CBA Champion Sioux Falls Skyforce.  Real arenas will be rendered — everything will be perfect, from watching Quick Change at halftime to seeing the stadium filled to 25% occupancy with a record 1,300 attending.

Not to be outdone, 989 could feature NBDL Basketball 2006, with cover star Will Bynum (current PPG leader and Roanoke Dazzle guard) making hundreds of appearances around the nation, mostly to stores where, unrecognized as he is, he’ll be asked numerous times for soda refills.

I think my favorite, though, would be Midway reliving thier basketball heyday with NCAA “Divizzon III Hoopz”.  What better way to spend your time than by creating hardcore, rim rattling, arcade style battles between top-25 teams like Worcester Polytech and Carnegie Mellon.

We can always dream.

That would have been the chant in Detroit Sunday if the stadium wasn’t at least 98% Steeler’s fans.

I know this is already tired and most of youhave read almost this exact same thing yesterday, but fuckin’ shit, c’mon! Luckily, for the first time in years, I did not bet any money on the Super Bowl this year. If i had put money on the Seahawks (which i may or may not have) I would be really really pissed about this instead of just really pissed about it.

For those of you that didn’t watch the game (yer all terrble Americans!) there were some pretty big calls that were bad. Ok, i’m lying, there were some REALLY HUGE calls that were AWFUL! First came the alleged push-off by Jackson in the endzone. That’s a touchdown in preseason, let alone the damn Super Bowl (where I remember a time when “that’s not gonna get called in the Super Bowl” was something you heard every year.)  Also, Big Ben’s touchdown…not a touchdown.  Nuff said.

The holding call on Hasselbeck’s 3rd down pass to the one: not holding. Hasselbeck was also called, as you may remember, for hitting below the knees, illegal if yer blocking, but legal if yer tackling.  Guess which one he was doing. RIGHT — tackling…gross.

Also there was a horse collar tackle on Shaun Alexander that wasn’t called, but could have been er..i mean should have been. Look at that list! Bullshit! Super Bowls are supposed to suck because it’s a blowout, not because the ref’s are idiots (or cheating, the ref that threw the pass interference flag on Jackson: oh yeah, he’s from Pittsburgh.  I’m just saying…it looks a little fishy. Ok, a lot fishy). This made me cry, and I couldn’t have written this until today.  Too upset.

Now, I know people are going to say that Pittsburgh probably would have won anyway and they would probably be right. BUT MAYBE NOT! And even so, wouldn’t it be great to be talking about “Randle El’s td pass to Heinz Ward” or “Bettis’s td run on 4th and inches after Ben Roethlisberger barely missed a touchdown on third and goal” (didn’t happen, but probably would have). Wouldn’t that be great? Fuck yes it would.

But no, the ref’s in the NFL as a whole are getting worse and worse. Anyone who watches a decent amount of football can feel me here. Fulltime ref’s are not the answer — it’s these dopes they’ve got doing it. How about this: let’s punish these Super Bowl refs by having them call every single Arizona football game next year (in the event that the impossible happens and the Cards start winning, send them to San Fransisco). Just make an example of them.

Either that or fire all of them and have us beer-drinking-experts take over.
Ok that was a dumb joke.  But seriously, football makes me happy, and it makes me sad when it goes away. Usually, though, I have a good Super Bowl, or a won bet, to tide me over until next season.

This year I have neither.