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oh, no doubt. if someone offered me 5 million dollars a year more than i was worth to play basketball (which would mean they offered me 5 million dollars) i would take it and laugh all the way to the bank as i made ryan bowen look like michael jordan. but you still gotta take the jokes that are going to come along with a huge contract if you don't live up to it. that's just part of the deal.
The one thing that's always gotten me about Simmons is that he has b****es about Houston traffic every time he goes there. This is a guy that grew up in Boston (the worst sh!thole in the country behind Syracuse, NY) and currently resides in LA. Oh, and raggin' on Yao on draft night. But, he was man enough to admit he was wrong about that one.
That's a great point that needs to be made about a ton of players. Allan Houston, Mike Finley, Brian Grant, Antonio Davis. But I don't know about Webber and Rose. Rose could have played a LOT better from 2000-on. His stats went way up during that run, but he could have done more, and relied on pure talent to get his numbers. And Webber, to me, hideously underachieved until the mid-point of his Sacramento run. I'm not angry at them for the way they're playing now, as Webber actually works his ass off (though he does need to stop himself before whining, although that was an isolated incident), but you can harp on them for taking a half-dozen years in the NBA to get their act together.
He's at it again: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/070129 MIAMI -- Greetings from Miami! After holding its last four Super Bowls in Detroit, Jacksonville, Houston and Kazakhstan, the NFL switched gears and moved the game to a marquee destination people enjoy visiting. Sure, it's a radical idea to have the world's biggest sporting event in a desirable location that features warm weather, dozens of luxury hotels, an endless array of hopping nightclubs and restaurants, a gorgeous beach scene, enough strippers and hookers to wear down Charlie Sheen, high-class shopping and a major airport that flies direct to every city, but give the NFL credit for taking such an enormous gamble. For years and years, I've been arguing for a switch to the "Big Three," where we'd hand the Super Bowl exclusively to Miami, San Diego and New Orleans (rotating every three years) and ban every other city from having it ... well, unless they build a 75,000-seat football stadium in Las Vegas, and we expand the concept to a "Big Four." Either way, the Super Bowl should be given only to cities that double as bachelor party destinations or feasible destinations for a "Real World" season. Think about it. If you were a best man throwing a bachelor party, you'd never say the words, "Hey, guys, we're going to Jacksonville!" If you were an MTV executive planning a "Real World" season, you'd never say, "Hey, what about Houston?" So why would we hold the Super Bowl in those places? Isn't Super Bowl week supposed to be fun? To my knowledge, except for the beach part, Houston fits the bill on Bill's first set of criteria (someone tell me where the beach is in N'awlins). Second, MTV did come to a Texas city for the Real World...Austin. So it's not inconceivable that if Houston was more of a college town, they'd have chosen Houston over ATX. Simmons is really annoying with his hate for all things Houston rants! Come on now, we're MUCH better than J-ville in all things (especially football!!).
Normally, I hate it when anybody bashes Houston... but I do agree that the Super Bowl should be in a marquee destination city every year. People don't take vacations to Houston... they live in Houston (and LOVE it). The Super Bowl is a vacation for essentially 95% of its participants, thus you can imagine their dissapointment when its in a place like Detroit, Minnesota, or Jacksonville. Houston would have left a better impression had it not been drearily cold/rainy that entire week (kinda like it is now). That being said, I don't mind not having the SB here on a rotational basis (just as long as the b****in doesn't stop when Simmons has to spend an entire week in ARLINGTON).
Simmons is fine, I still read him, but something happened a couple of years ago were it seemed that the writing became more of a job for him and he went from being somewhat cleverly funny to having to depend on snide for 99% of his shtick. I really mean it, read through any column he puts out these days and count the number of times were he cracks a joke that isn't a bashing. He was a decent enough guy when he was in town for his book signing (at least to me he was). Evan
....what a shock, a bunch of Miami Vice references...never would have seen that coming.... Simmons is now a pro writer who gets paid and hobnobs with other writers and jocks but still has the amateur/blogger/voice of the fan schtick going as his hook. Something about it just doesn't work anymore, particularly when he tries to actually talk sports, not to mention that most of the jokes are jso recycled by now, they're not as funny as they used to be.
You guys are so tough on Simmons. I think he's funny. Let him rag on Houston all he wants, it helps keep property values low
And just think what he would have said about Ray Jackson if he had remembered his name! I love Bill Simmons - he can do no wrong in my book.
Bill Simmons is gold. Everything he says in jest and shouldn't be taken seriously. Just read his NBA draft coverage, those things are the funniest things ever and he manages to make fun of everyone in the sphere of NBA coverage without being malicious.
