Let's get this thing over with

Dear Bron, D Dub, Bosh,
    PICK A FRIGGIN TEAM. JUST PICK ONE. ENOUGH WITH THE ASSKISSING MEETINGS, AND PICK ONE.
    Ahem. OK.
    But oh my God. What more do they need to feed the ego?
    A) You're rich, and going to get richer;
    B) Grown men are lying about the plans that'll be in effect for their team as soon as you sign.
    C) You're rich, and going to get richer.
    D) There will be women available wherever, as they are now.
    E) There will be plenty of groupies, male and female, coddling you and loving you.
    F) You're wanted, OK, really wanted. You want a hug.
    And now LeBron has an hour-long special on ESPN to make his announcement? An hour?
    Holy crap, Batman.
    The nice thing is that LBJ wants to sell sponsorships with proceeds going to the Boys and Girls Clubs of America. But still, an hour? To name a team and why he picked it?
    Interesting arrogance (and I kinda like LJB).

    I'm pretty much ready to dislike wherever Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh end up, and ditto for ABC for LeBron: Anywhere But Cleveland.
    But if they all end up together as the Collusion Triplets, let's agree to strongly dislike that team and hope - nothing personal against their teammates, coaches or the city - that they fail miserably.
    Frankly, it'd make me want to see Boston and the trifecta of Pierce, Allen and Garnett take the Triplets down in the playoffs on a regular basis.
    Yes, sports business is different than regular business, and yes, players still are employees. Holding cities and organizations hostage and toying with fans' hearts - and wallets - is annoying.

LOUGHDMOUTHINGS

    Condolences to Atlanta Hawks fans. You get Joe Johnson for a long time and at too much money.
    What the market dictates doesn't mean the market is right. That phrase in itself means "a sucker is born every minute and is charge of something."
    As per a fairly silly column on realgm.com – read almost like a release from JJ’s agent - that made this wretched deal seem like a bargain. A royally absurd statement: "If he had left, Atlanta would have become the Clippers East again."
    Not hardly.
    You just don't pay A-list money to a B-list player, and Johnson isn't an elite player, and it's very debatable if he's a winner or makes his teammates better.
    Naturally, he may prove us all wrong, but this one feels like a very safet bet, unless he has some sort of offseason intervention. ...
    I grew up 50 miles from Baltimore. We played whiffle ball, and two of us were Os fans, so sometimes we had to come up with somebody else's lineup.
    But even decades later, I can just about remember the lineup: Bumbry, Blair, Singleton, May, Robinson, Grich, Hendricks or Dempsey, Belanger and the pitcher.
    We also had Rich Coggins and Rich Dauer and others at different times.
    Now, the Orioles are in their second decade as one of baseball's absolutely worst franchises.
    Baltimore is 26-1/2 games out of first in the AL East. Good grief, the Orioles are 9-1/2 games farther out than any other last-place team in the bigs.
    The thieving fraud named Peter Angelos has misowned the team since 1993. What was once a model of a pro sports franchise has surpassed the Clippers on the way down.
    The Orioles haven't been to the playoffs since 1997. The last century.
    In 2009, Sports Illustrated called Angelos one of the worst owners in pro sports and the worst in baseball. The Orioles haven't had a winning season since 1997 and really, at this rate and with so little progress, could go 20 years without cracking .500.
    I really believe that somehow, someway, he's related to Robert Irsay. ...
    Mercer's baseball team finished 124th in the NCAA's RPI. The Bears were 125 in Warren Nolan and 125th in Boyd's World.
    The Bears are probably better than that, but were hurt by playing 21 games against 200 or better and going 6-10 against top-100 teams.
    Those numbers will be better in 2011. ...
    I'm surprised more fans haven't fallen from an upper deck, as per the man at the Texas-Cleveland game Tuesday night.
    People get loopy, and then ridiculously excited about T-shirts. Folks, do some damn laundry. It's  3-buck shirt. To be jostling and elbowing and running through stands for a shirt is idiotic.
    A baseball is a little different, but still. When you're in the upper deck, take it easy.
    It's sad, and thankfully, more rare than not. ...
    Yes, Michael Vick is smarter and more mature and interested in rehabilitating his reputation and engaging in a long NFL career. ...
    Jerry Crowe of the L.A. Times, like normal people, wonders about that Hall of Fame night in Lexington.
    "John Calipari called Kentucky's having five players taken in the first round of the NBA draft 'the greatest night' in the program's history, conveniently forgetting the seven nights before his 2009 arrival in Lexington when the Wildcats actually won NCAA championships with lesser talent."