The Sports Guy had a few random thoughts this week. Here are some highlights:

When ABC launches a game-show pilot called “Country Singer, Famous Assassin or Kick Returner?” the final question will definitely be, “Who is Johnnie Lee Higgins?”

What would have happened at a 2007 Arkansas tailgate if a blitzed Razorbacks fan offered everyone $100 at 50-to-1 odds that Peyton Hillis would finish with more 2008 fantasy points than both Darren McFadden and Felix Jones? And why do I have a feeling Jerry Jones made his billions in a similar way?

Has there ever been a football player listed as “questionable” more often than Brian Westbrook? Does this extend to other parts of his life? Can anyone rely on him? Do his buddies make plans to see a movie with him knowing that he’s questionable to show up? Does he send back wedding invitations checking both the “Yes, I Will Attend” and “No, I Will Not Attend?” boxes? What would it be like if he hosted a radio show? All right, that’s it for today’s show, I’ll see you tomorrow, or I might not. Why aren’t we calling him Brian “Mr. Questionable” Westbrook?

Not to be a party pooper, but with “The Ageless” Fred Taylor’s career winding down, somebody needs to assume “ageless” status in 2009. I vote for Warrick Dunn because his spin move is like Seth Rogen’s dice-roll dance move in “Knocked Up” — it’s effective the first few times until you realize it’s all he has — only Rogen landed Katherine Heigl’s character and Dunn keeps getting first downs. So there you go.

Hey, is there any way for the Chiefs to hypnotize Larry Johnson into thinking every short-yardage situation is really a crowded bar filled with the boyfriends of women who just resisted his advances?

Note to every lousy cornerback: If your guy has four steps on you for a sure TD, only the QB underthrows him to the degree that the guy has to put on the brakes, stop and jump for the ball, giving you time to reach him and deflect the pass … this doesn’t mean you’re allowed to dance around afterward while waving the “incomplete” signal with your arms, or as I like to call it, “The Deltha O’Neal Shuffle.” Just put your head down and run back to the huddle in shame. OK? OK.

Funny stuff.

In the Sports Guy’s latest column, he talks about all sorts of NBA storylines, but finishes with this gem about Clipper coach and GM, Mike Dunleavy.

10. In the post-Isiah era, is Mike Dunleavy the single most destructive coach/executive in the NBA right now?

Forget that he’s a mediocre coach and an even worse GM, that Clippers fans openly grumble about him during games, that he dresses like a movie usher, that he forced out Elgin Baylor (only an NBA icon and the most beloved employee in the organization), that he clearly has nude photos of somebody important and that can be the only explanation for all of this.

Forget that he only succeeded for one season with the Clippers — when Sam Cassell was basically running the team — and screwed up the 2006 playoffs with the forever-indefensible substitution of an ice-cold rookie named Daniel Ewing during the biggest moment of the Phoenix series (when Raja Bell hit the game-tying 3-pointer in Game 5 over, you guessed it, Daniel Ewing).

Forget that he spent $65 million on Baron Davis this summer — a player who only thrives in a specific type of freewheeling system — then saddled him in a half-court offense with two centers and about 500 plays. Well done. Way to know your personnel, Mike. Maybe that’s why, within five games, poor Baron was regarding you with the same contempt that somebody’s wife would have if their husband showed up at 7 in the morning reeking of booze and cigarettes and wearing the previous day’s clothes. He couldn’t be more bummed out. It’s not possible. You did this to him.

As I was perusing the second part of the Sports Guy’s mailbag column, a few interesting tidbits popped up.

First, there was this commentary on Anquan Boldin’s toughness:

Q: For years, you’ve been asking for certain athletes to be wheeled out on the court or field in a Hannibal Lecter Mask. Well, isn’t Anquan Boldin perfect for that? For all the talk of T.O. and Brandon Marshall, Boldin has to be the strongest receiver in the game. You’ve got a better chance of your defensive coordinator stopping him with an elephant gun than relying on a 185-pound defensive back. Plus, the man BROKE HIS FACE. After hearing Eric Allen describe how they had to lift the skin on his face to insert the plates and he’s playing at such a high level three weeks later, is there any question that he could be one of the toughest men in the NFL?
– William Evans, Columbus, Ohio

SG: I would say he’s No. 1 on the list. The broken face story absolutely amazed me; I never fully realized how bad it was until the Monday night guys discussed it, and I ended up spending an hour Googling stories about it. First, can you imagine if that happened to Vince Carter? He would never be seen again. He would just sit in a dark room with a towel over his head moaning until 2057. Second, isn’t it weird that Boldin’s new face makes him look like a cross between Shannon Sharpe and Ervin Johnson? Do you think he’s angry at the doctor? Third, how does Boldin continue to run fearlessly over the middle after what happened to him? It’s like he took amnesia pills to forget the whole thing ever happened.

Then there’s this bit about LeBron’s possible 2010 landing spot…

Last time I checked, free agents were fleeing Detroit (Allan Houston, Grant Hill, Ben Wallace) and not signing there. And if you really think Detroit is landing a marquee guy in 2010 when big markets such as New York and L.A. and warm-weather cities such as Miami, Phoenix and Orlando will all be throwing money around — not to mention deep-pocketed Portland, which will have assembled a contender at that point and remains the most logical destination for LeBron if he only cares about winning titles and nothing else (and also, Nike is right there) — then you’re obviously in denial. Chris Bosh loves Toronto. He’s not leaving. Dwyane Wade isn’t leaving South Beach so he can wear a parka and live in Michigan. And LeBron wants to be the next Jordan and/or the most famous athlete on the planet; these things aren’t happening in Detroit just because Worldwide Wes likes the Pistons. Come on.

Wait a second, I started that LeBron to Portland talk! Here’s an excerpt from my 2008 preview for the Blazers.

The Blazers project to have a ton of cap space in the summer of 2010, when a number of stars will hit the free agent market. In fact, aside from the fact that Portland is not Brooklyn, the Blazers might represent LeBron James’ best shot at a championship. (Don’t worry, Nets fans, I don’t think that Portland is a big enough of a market for King James.)

Okay, maybe I’m not the first one to write about it, but as I was typing up that preview and got to the part about LeBron, I was thinking to myself “I have to be the only person in the country talking about LeBron James landing in Portland.”

Then Bill discusses how his picture ended up on the “experts” page of a website for an aviation company.

Q: I work for a help desk and our e-mail box gets a ton of random e-mails. One e-mail we regularly get is from Western Aviation, which sells and buys planes and helicopters. I happen to click the link which brought me to their home page, and was like wait a minute, THAT IS BILL SIMMONS!! Click on their link and check out the photo used for “Experts,” the photo is definitely you, right? I figured, as a fan, it was my duty to let you know about this atrocity.
– Mike G, Franklin Square

SG: I can’t fathom how this happened. Was it an homage? Did they just like the picture and think that I look like someone who should be selling aviation? Were they hoping I would link to them in a mailbag? Do they have an expert who looks exactly like me and imitated my photo? Were they trying to coerce clients into thinking I worked for them or endorsed them? Are laws being broken here? Should I be flattered? It’s completely inexplicable. I don’t know whether I want to sue them or embrace them. Western Aviation, why don’t you donate $10,000 to the Jimmy Fund and we’ll call it even?

The Sports Guy’s favorite YouTube video is a nine-minute clip from an episode of “Battle of the Network Stars” from the ’70s.

I’m not even going to post the video here, because watching it without Simmons’ commentary just doesn’t do it justice.

As I was reading one of Bill Simmons’ recent columns, I was struck by something he said about last Monday’s Cowboys/Eagles game:

Only later did I realize I had spent infinite more time biting my nails, e-mailing friends, throwing my remote, refreshing my league’s “Live Scoring” browser, piecing together different miracle comeback scenarios and basically fretting about the Eagles-Cowboys game than I had enjoying the game itself.

I remember those days. I used to be in two or three fantasy football leagues and I always found myself obsessing over my players, refreshing the live scoring box score repeatedly, and panicking when one of my guys was underperforming or – gasp! – if he went down with an injury. Since one or two of my games would inevitably depend on the Sunday and/or Monday night games, they turned into a gut-wrenching roller coaster of emotions.

Those days are over.

You might be thinking that I reduced my number of teams to one or zero, but I went the other direction. I joined 10 leagues last season and 11 this year. And I haven’t enjoyed watching the games this much since my first few years of playing fantasy football.

When I tell people how many leagues I’m in, I usually get one of three reactions: (1) their eyes get big and they start to stare off in the middle distance, pondering about how much time it would take to manage that many teams, (2) they cackle, thinking that I’m joking but when I fail to join them in laughter they ratchet it down to a chuckle and probably start thinking that I’m a total sports nerd, or (3) they gaze in wonder, jealous that I have so many fantasy football teams and wishing they did too.

When you have multiple teams, there’s a point when it becomes basically useless to root against anyone. You have so many players in your starting lineup and are going against so many other players that you’d probably be rooting for and against the same guys. Those situations cancel each other out and you’re left with a surprisingly serene Sunday. It’s sort of like watching the games in the eye of the hurricane. Things are rather pleasant where you are, but a few miles away, all hell is breaking loose.

Sure there are a few guys that I have on several teams: Roddy White (5), Jason Witten (4), Ben Roethlisberger (4), Jerricho Cotchery (4), Reggie Bush (3), Marion Barber (3), Larry Fitzgerald (3) and Jamal Lewis (3). But for the most part, my fantasy risk is spread around, and no single injury or bad season can ruin my year. My draft positions were all over the place (and I even got into an auction league), so when it was my time to pick, I just grabbed the guy I thought was the best fit for my team at that particular time.

It also allowed me to pretty much draft every guy I liked heading into the season. You know how you go into a draft with a few players that you’d like to draft late but inevitably miss out on most of them? For me, that list included surprises like DeSean Jackson and Eddie Royal (as well as disappointments like Ronald Curry and Ted Ginn). Save for a couple of exceptions - Steve Slaton, I’m looking at you – I managed to get every player I liked on at least one team.

When it comes to the Sunday or Monday night games, I’m pretty relaxed. Sure, I often find myself with four or five games tipping in the balance, but if I lose one, all is not lost. I basically just sit back and watch the week’s action and then pick up the pieces on Tuesday. The first week of waivers is kind of a bitch, but after that it’s not too much work to manage my teams.

So if you find yourself stressing out about your fantasy team, consider joining a few more leagues. You might find that’s just what the doctor ordered.

In his latest column, The Sports Guy goes over some New Rules for Sports (a la Bill Maher).

New Rule: Playground rules for the NBA All-Star Game. Ever since the idea of having captains pick sides started to circulate, in February, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. Let’s say Stern names Kobe and LeBron as captains. Right before the game we have a coin flip, and the winner gets first pick. The All-Stars line up, and Kobe and LeBron pick their teams playground-style. Imagine the drama. Who’d get picked first? Would a snubbed player end up wreaking havoc in the game? Would bad blood carry over to the rest of the season? God forbid something fun happened on All-Star Weekend.

He also discusses Ryder Cup high fives, baseball managers in uniform, Scott Boras’ evil ways, the NHL in warm weather cities and Tony Kornheiser’s curious MNF apology.

Bill Simmons, also known as “The Sports Guy,� writes a column for ESPN. He regularly blends his wide interest in sports with pop-culture references, and on the whole, I enjoy reading his stuff.

But every once in a while, he goes off the reservation and says something absurd - like his whole campaign to become the Milwaukee Bucks’ new GM. It might have started out as a joke, but as he was reading that fifth or sixth email from a Bucks fan that supported his campaign, I think he actually started to think that he was qualified for the job.

It was at that point that reality stood in the way of his fantasy world. A world where you could get a job running a NBA franchise just by writing a NBA column and owning Clippers season tickets. Simmons seems to know a lot about basketball, but every once in a while he’ll say something that tells me that he’s never played the game at a competitive level.

For example, in the second part of his recent MVP column, he talks about T-Mac:

Speaking of T-Mac, here’s my No. 1 NBA pet peeve this season: When a lousy long-range shooter has no qualms about jacking up 3-pointers every game. For instance, T-Mac shot 34, 33, 31, 33 and 30 percent on 3s the past five seasons, but that didn’t stop him from jacking up 4.5 per game this season. Really, T-Mac? If you can’t shoot 3s, why shoot them?

Granted, McGrady had his worst season shooting the ball from long range since the 1999-2000 season when he made just 28% of his threes. But that doesn’t make it a good idea to stop shooting them completely. First, there’s the extra point to consider. Shooting 28% from three-point land is the same as shooting 42% from inside the arc. McGrady shot just 46% from two-point range this season, so it’s not like the discrepancy is so big that it’s a no-brainer for him to completely shelve the long ball.

Besides, McGrady is a career 34% three-point shooter. Not great, but that translates to 51% from two-point range. I doubt T-Mac headed into the season knowing that his accuracy was going to take a dive and consciously decided to keep jacking threes. In fact, his 4.5 three-point attempts were his fewest since the ’01-02 season when he shot 3.7. Throw in the fact that McGrady took 0.3 fewer threes a game after the All-Star break and I’d say that he managed his shots pretty well.

Lastly – and this is the thing that really bugs me about Simmons’ comments – the three-point shot is so important to an offensive player with T-Mac’s physical ability. McGrady is quick, but not super-quick, so he needs the threat of the long ball to force his defender to close out aggressively, or else there won’t be any room to drive. If he reduces his three-point attempts even further, his defender will know that he can close on him with caution, looking for the drive. This will make McGrady’s penetration less effective.

This isn’t to say that every player who is chucking up threes is doing the right thing. Taking the ball inside is generally the better idea, because the shots are easier to make and there’s a much better chance of getting to the line. But for a guy like McGrady, who relies on deception and position more than quickness to get to the hole, the threat of the long ball is crucial.