Money Mike

What do Gatorade, Nike, and Wheaties have in common? They are three of the biggest sports-related corporations on Earth and they all got to where they are today on the back of the incomparable Michael Jordan.

And don't even get us started on Gentle Treatment hair products.

Mike was the greatest athlete of our lifetime but also the greatest pitch man in the history of the planet. So with his much-anticipated induction into the Hall of Fame just next month, we break out the Top 10 Jordan commercials of all time.

10) I always thought a better end to this would be if Bird lost the bet on the last shot and, as punishment, had to put on that outfit that Jordan is wearing...but this one is still pretty good.



9)You know how they say that Walken just never turns down a part? Well in those early days, Mike never turned down a pitch...



8) "Mike, man, that's cold..."



7)So smooth: no words needed.



6)Always loved that they brought back Mars. The folks running Nike just did it right.



5) Man, this song makes me smile. Doesn't this ad make you feel like World Peace is possible in our time? Everybody loves this ad. Even Craig Ehlo.



4)Probably the best concept of any Jordan spot. Magic and Larry had each other. Mike only had Mike.



3) Couldn't pick a better song. I wish this commercial lasted 45 minutes.



2) "Brooklyn, New York...1963..."



1)The copy in this ad is better than 99% of the writing in Sports Illustrated. I think Don Draper wrote it.

In Indecent Times

Most of us, it would seem, don't want virtue in our sports. We don't have room for it.

Maybe that's why so many Americans scoff at the Europeans and the South Americans and the Africans and the Asians and their soccer. With all it's drama of heroes and villains, of politics and morality and national tragedy, we just can't relate.

In America, who cares?

This week, the NCAA announced that it will vacate the University of Memphis's 2007-2008 Men's Basketball season. On the one hand, this story is really something, considering that (1) the decision concerns a team that made the Final Four and was generally considered the best in the land for most of the season (2) the controversy centers around the deceitfully concealed ineligibility of Derrick Rose, the college game's best player that year and a young man who may end being one of the most memorable NBA players of his generation and (3) the man captaining the ship at Memphis was none other than John Calipari, the highest paid coach in college basketball and a man who had another Final Four vacated thirteen years ago after scandal involved with cash and - oh yes - prostitution payments to players came to light.

On the other hand, once again, who cares?

Certainly not John Calipari, who'll make over thirty million dollars over the next eight years at his new gig at Kentucky. Not Derrick Rose, who's onto bigger and better things with the Chicago Bulls. Not the University of Memphis, which had been a virtual basketball unknown before the Calipari years put them on the map.

Don't look to CBS Sports: they got their money last March regardless. And don't look to ESPN and or the curmudgeonly, coffee-soused sportswriters of America's newspapers: they're free to issue a few obligatory complaints, but they've got to move on. The Dark Prince, Mike Vick, is quickly approaching.

And who can blame them, we suppose? We've gotten to a point where there is so much money and television and corrosive incentive involved, can we really be surprised when they go this way?

It's even hard to get riled up about Calipari. Sure, in less relativist times, he would be excepted to serve as a moral example, a leader who shaped young men above all else. But as Rick Pitino might say, John Wooden is not walking through that door, fans. Dean Smith is not walking through that door and John Thompson is not walking through that door.

This is the college the basketball we have. And this is the man who, in many ways, is it's new king.

If you want to blame anyone, blame the NCAA - the sniveling, fangless, effete little watchdog who lets this stuff happen time after time. By failing to deter any of the players involved, they end up encouraging rather than discouraging cheating.

And of course, like their revolving door counterparts on Wall Street and in the Steroid-soaked Major Leagues, they coincidentally get rich along the way.

How long till the World Cup starts?

Unstandable Smooth Shit That Murderers Move With

Remember way back when dudes wore teal and purple jogging suits, Arkansas and St. John's had respectable squads, and Ross Perot was gonna be the next President? In those days, my personal style exclusively involved a pair of blue Umbros and a Larry Johnson jersey, but if it hadn't...I'd like to think I'd have worn what Kevin Buckets Durant wears in this video.

Also, respect to Mo Williams for looking like a real real real soft Eazy-E. I guess.