- HUGGING HAROLD REYNOLDS has audio of Magic Johnson responding to Isiah Thomas (who responded to Magic Johnson’s book).

- AWFUL ANNOUNCING has video of Terry Bradshaw guaranteeing a Steeler win over the Bengals on Sunday. Oops.

- GUYISM has video of a little girl scoring a goal on her own team in a junior soccer league. It is kind of funny.

- SPORTSbyBROOKS wonders if Jerry Jones looks a little tipsy in a recent photo.

- DEADSPIN has more details about ESPN horndoggery.

On the Blazers’ acquisition of Andre Miller…

21. Andre Miller
We knew Miller was a bad fit when the Blazers signed him. It just didn’t feel right. He’s a moody loner; they had great chemistry last season. He needs the ball in his hands; so does Brandon Roy. He likes freelancing; Nate McMillan is hands on. But Portland felt obligated to spend its extra cap money, and nobody else was pursuing Miller, so what transpired was the equivalent of two single wedding guests going through the motions on the dance floor.

I could use someone, and you could use someone. Unfortunately, I hate bald guys and I have a tiny butt; you’re bald and you love bubble butts. We have no spark and are destined to fail. But crap, there’s nobody better. Screw it, would you like to come back to my room?

I get Portland’s thinking: It wanted to turn that cap space into an asset. And I get Miller’s thinking: He wanted to get paid and hoped things would work out. But now we’re here. Incredibly, Portland plans on bringing Miller off the bench. He’s already miserable. (And available, by the way. Make Kevin Pritchard an offer. Seriously, call him right now.) So what did we learn? Just because you have cap space doesn’t mean you HAVE to use it.

On Shaq joining the Cavs…

8. Shaquille O’Neal
Red flag No. 1: He’s 835 pounds. Red flag No. 2: He has never successfully pulled off the whole “sidekick” thing; even to the bitter end, he was playing the big brother/little brother routine with Dwyane Wade. Red flag No. 3: He’s splitting time with Zydrunas Ilgauskas, who might be a better fit for this particular team because of his outside shooting. Red flag No. 4: He has never, ever, ever, not in his entire life, played for a coach as offensively challenged as Mike Brown. Red flag No. 5: He doesn’t have the luxury of Phoenix’s training staff anymore. Red flag No. 6: He’s so fat that it’s like looking at one of those TVs where the HD is screwed up so it makes everyone seem wider. Red flag No. 7: The Suns traded him for two guys who they immediately bought out for a combined $14 million. Red flag No. 8: The Cavs are better off if he’s playing 15-20 minutes a game and that’s it. Red flag No. 9: He’s so fat that it’s possible Delonte West was packing three guns because he got confused and thought Shaq wanted to eat him. Red flag No. 10: He’s awfully close to some records, which will make it awkward if Cleveland tries to reduce his playing time.

That’s 10 red flags. Ten. (To be fair, Shaq doesn’t look THAT fat. He just looks a little, um, heavy. Maybe it’s the uniform that makes him look doughy for some reason. I just know that, when I saw the cover of Sports Illustrated this week, I couldn’t figure out why Aretha Franklin shaved her head. Then I realized it was Shaq.) And that’s before we get into the whole, “Shaq seems like a great guy, but if he’s a great guy, then why did he leave four teams on really bad terms” thing. Be prepared for him to do more harm than good in Cleveland. One difference: If he crosses LeBron like he crossed Nash, he’ll be getting the Braylon Edwards 48-hour ticket out of town.

Is it just me or was this a fairly useless clip? The only possible nugget of information is that the Broncos are working harder behind the scenes to move Marshall than they’ve been letting on. (But isn’t this fairly intuitive given all the trouble Marshall has caused over the last couple of weeks?) This is supposed to be the latest news on Marshall, but he only rehashes everything we already know (that the Jets are interested, that the Broncos are interested, and that the money could be a hold up).

Schefter says that if the Jets offer the Broncos a package that meets their expectations, then the Broncos will move Marshall. Isn’t this the crux of any trade in any sport? One team has a player and is given an offer that they think is worthwhile, so they pull the trigger on the trade. This isn’t very insightful.

How about discussing exactly what the Broncos are looking for? Is it still a 1st and a 4th, or have they changed their tune? What kind of contract is Marshall expecting if he’s moved? Is the money reasonable or would his asking price dissuade potential suitors?

The bottom line is that, given a camera, a backdrop and a satellite hookup, Anthony Stalter and I could have produced the exact same clip without the sources available to Schefter. It’s almost as if ESPN called up Schefter and told him he was on the air in five minutes and ignored his pleas for more time to call his sources, so he could only speak in generalities.

Interesting commentary on Deadspin today about the state of sports blogging and the mainstream (sports) media. Most often in news media, bloggers are more or less second class citizens. Respect and credibility come usually when bloggers stop blogging and begin “writing.” Anyway here’s what Barry Petchesky had to say about it:

And like any good conglomerate, the big names snapped up the best content. Abbott, Florio, Leitch and others aren’t doing anything different content-wise than they were before, but all of a sudden they’re mainstream? Blogging is just a word. It encompasses everything from reporting to humor, from analysis to aggregation, from live commentary to finding attractive female athletes. None of these are anything the establishment hasn’t done before with, like blogging, varying degrees of success.

If the line between blogs and the MSM (mainstream media) appears to be getting blurrier, it’s because there never really was a line in the first place.

I suppose my first response is to think that sure, lots of time blogging has a lot of crap going on. Bloggers have comparatively smaller budgets than places like ESPN and CNN. But where straight news reporting has had a bit of a battle with the bloggers, sports media has appropriated/assimilated them into their organizations on level terms with non-blogging staff members. Sports outlets have done a better job of incorporating the changing landscape of news media than “hard-news” sources, but I’m not altogether surprised by that. I’d rather get my news from someone who: is constantly fact-checked by his/her peers, remains accountable for his mistakes, and attempts either to be objective in their reporting, or is at least transparent in their bias. Wait a second, I forgot which area I was blogging about. And anyway, I get all my news from the BBC’s website.

For some reason, I didn’t find this one to be very funny. What did you think?