Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame

So, I'm not blogging about the Cardinals because they are frustrating and if you want to hear opinions on the Cardinals 20-16 loss to the 49ers, just listen to any Valley sports talk through Wednesday.

No, this post is about the ceremony that was held Friday night in Massachusetts. Vivian Stringer, David Robinson, John Stockton, Jerry Sloan, and Michael Jordan are the Class of 2009. I don't like Vivian Stringer. And I don't think Michael Jordan is the greatest of all time.

All the video that I see of him only makes me think of Kobe Bryant. I don't see any difference in the way that they play or their hunger to win. Kobe is easily the hardest working athlete in the NBA right now. He has an absolutely insane training regime.

But, yeah, I don't see any difference. You can throw the whole number of titles thing at me, but Michael said why he has six in his speech. It was one of the first things that he said and deservedly so. The first person that he thanked was Scottie Pippen. I was surprised that he didn't mention Phil Jackson, who has been there for all six of Jordan's championships as well as all four of Kobe's.

As for Michael's speech being proud and bullysome. No. It was fine. The only reason that he said those things is because of the fans and media. If all of you stupid fans and media wouldn't go around saying "I wanna be like Mike" and "Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player ever" then he wouldn't have sounded so pompous in his speech.

The fans have all the power in sports. It's the fans who make or break everything about sports. If the fans would possess the least bit of intellect, there wouldn't be all these divas (i.e. Michael Jordan, Terrell Owens, Brett Favre, Alex Rodriguez.)

J-Up

A.J. Hinch just told Justin Upton to grab some bench. I couldn't be happier. Upton was being his usual idiot self and finally got some discipline for it. I'd make him sit the rest of the series.

Here is the play.

Justin has done this all season long. For some reason it seems like I've been the only one that didn't like him for it. So, finally, in a 100% meaningless game for the Diamondbacks, A.J. Hinch shows that he has stronger huevos than I've given him credit for.

Shaquille O' Krimnal?

A television show aired it's third episode last night. It's called "Shaq Vs." and it features perennial great Shaquille O' Neal against stars of other sports. I find it highly entertaining. Others, not so much.

Shaq has been accused of stealing the idea from former teammate Steve Nash. Nash tried to brush over it, but it's hard to hide when you hire a patent lawyer. So, to quiet it all down, Shaq put Nash in the credits as a producer.

Dan Bickley dropped this bomb on his blog last week.

I like this show. Shaq has always been about himself. He wants his name to be synonymous with the word "basketball". He wants to have plenty of jewelery when he retires.

I didn't like when Shaq came to the Suns on February 6, 2008. 'Twas a day of infamy. But, I'll admit, he grew on me. He entertained me until I liked him.

With Shaq, you just need to not take anything that he says seriously. He's a comedian. He'll joke his way out of any situation. He thinks Shaq first 100% of the time. Shaq is Shaq. Shaq does as Shaq does. You can laugh or criticize, but Shaq isn't going to change for anybody.