Some of my personal favorite bits... In reverse order ... <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>450. Stephon Marbury Even before the season, Marbury looked like the favorite for my annual LVP ("Least Valuable Player") Award thanks to some peculiar TV interviews, a prominent role in the sexual harrassment suit against the Knicks and the inspiration for at least 50,000 fantasy team names that somehow involved the words "Truck" and "Party." Then the season started and he splintered the Knicks during a vicious argument with Isiah Thomas that included the reported threat, "He thinks he can (bleep) me, but I'll (bleep) him first." He was immortalized on YouTube with the superb "Night At The Starbury" parody. He played 24 games and participated in a whopping six victories (considering he makes $20 million, that's $3.3 million per victory), then took an extended leave of absence after his father's death and nobody cared if he came back. And finally, he opted for season-ending ankle surgery when he easily could have waited until the summer. We've had nuclear leaks that were remembered more positively than Marbury's 2007-08 season. (You know it has been memorable when you're asking with a straight face, "Do you think he'll even be alive in two years?" Did I mention that he's on the books for $21 million next season and might be the single most untradeable professional athlete since Rae Carruth's final days on the Panthers roster? Now that, my friends, is an LVP)</div> <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>423. James Augustine Our 2008 winner of the "Wait, Instead of Paying That Guy For the Season, Why Not Sign Rod Benson And Boost The Traffic To Your Team's Web Site?" Award, narrowly edging Casey Jacobsen, Louis Amundson and Maceo Baston.</div> <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>414. Jamaal Tinsley Gave us an embarrassing off-court incident, a tantalizing fantasy stretch in November/December that was ultimately derailed by an injury, a February filled with "Indiana is actively trying to shop Tinsley but nobody wants to take his contract" stories, and then, a season-ending injury resulting in another year in which he missed more games than he played. In other words, it was just like every other Jamaal Tinsley season! We're one year away from the Pacers slipping an opiate into his Gatorade, waiting an hour, then forcing him to pee into a cup at gunpoint to get him off their cap.</div> <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>145. Tyree Ricardo Davis After playing such a pivotal role for the Tankapalooza All-Stars in Miami, Ricky has a rare chance to become one of the biggest losers in the history of sports. Some relevant stats for you: He has played in 661 career regular-season games but only 10 career playoff games; he has been traded five times; his teams from 2001-2008 finished a combined 175 games under .500; he has played for a 17-win team and a 14-win team; and he has had 224 different teammates told by a coach or front office official, "Look, you're not allowed to hang out with Ricky after 10 p.m. under any circumstances, are we clear?" The best part? He's only 29! He still has four or five more teams and the inevitable Clippers stint in him! Has anyone ever lost 1,000 career games before?</div> <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>105. Shawn Marion Game Show Host: "Welcome back to 'Control Your NBA Destiny,' I'm Peter Tomarkin Jr. We're here with Shawn Marion of the Phoenix Suns. Shawn, before we went to commercial, we gave you the choice of two doors. Behind Door No. 1, you have the chance to keep playing with the great Steve Nash and potentially win an NBA title in Arizona. Behind Door No. 2, you can change your destiny, move to Miami, play with Ricky Davis and half the D-League on a terrible team, go for your own stats for a few weeks, then get sidelined with a made-up injury and get all of March, April, May and June off. Shawn, it's up to you ... it's time to control your NBA destiny." Marion: "In Miami, even if we missed the playoffs and I got all that time off, I'd get paid the same amount, right?" Game Show Host: "That's correct. $16 million this year, $17 million next year." Shawn: "I'll take Door No. 2!"</div> <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>85. Vince Carter I mailed in this paragraph in his honor.</div>' Link Part II coming tomorrow.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>449. Zach Randolph Any time the same player is widely credited for one team's resurgence (simply because he left), another team's ongoing demise (simply because he showed up), and the firing of a third team's GM (Milwaukee's Larry Harris, who made the fatal mistake of trying to convince his owner the Bucks should trade for him), that should have been enough for him to cruise to the LVP Award. Zach, I'm sorry. I don't know what else you could have done short of stabbing Nate Robinson during a timeout.</div> Haha, that's awesome. I'm lovin this. <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>314. Tim Thomas I guess the question is this: Is there an NBA forward alive who couldn't play 31 minutes a game, score 12 points, notch five rebounds and three assists, miss 70 percent of his 3-pointers and allow his guy to score at will? If baseball has VORP (value over replacement player), then basketball should have VOTT (value over Tim Thomas). And that's not even half the story. During a Lakers-Clips game last week, the Postmaster General (that's my nickname for him) spent a large chunk of the third quarter jogging between the two 3-point lines without ever crossing either line, almost like he wagered a teammate that he could play an entire quarter without going within 24 feet of either basket. It might have been the most riveting moment of the Clippers season. He's such a dog that PETA might protest this paragraph.</div> hahahah that had me DYIN <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>99. Andrew Bogut Cracks the top 100 for the clip of when he [video=youtube;Zc11PUnFgkQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc11PUnFgkQ[/video] because his teammates ignored him. I continue to maintain you can't go wrong with Australians or Canadians under any circumstances.</div> hahaha, sweet!
Yao Ming definitely doesn't deserve to be 112. The Rockets may be playing well, but they are definitely a better playoff team with a healthy Yao Ming. Ghoti, Bill Simmons agrees that Rashard Lewis' contract sucks. <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>90. Rashard Lewis Look, any time you can tie up your cap space by giving a free agent $118 million over six years to be your third-best guy and average 18 points and five rebounds a game, you have to do it. OK? Let's stop arguing about this.</div> The D-Wade comparison was funny. <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>156. Dwyane Wade Games played by Penny Hardaway, first five seasons: 82, 77, 82, 59, 19. Games played by Dwyane Wade, first five seasons: 61, 77, 75, 51, 51. Playoff games played by Penny Hardaway, first five seasons: 3, 21, 12, 5, 0. Playoff games played by Dwyane Wade, first five seasons: 13, 14, 23, 4, 0. (In other words ... uh-oh.)</div>
