Things are looking up in South Beach

I was sweating bullets at 7:35 last night. After listening to how trades were falling through, I had this terrible feeling that the Miami Heat were indeed going to pick O.J. Mayo second overall. Looks like I was duped by my old friend Pat Riley. B-Easy is going to rock the red and black alongside two former Jayhawks, Mario Chalmers(!) and Darnell Jackson. Here's what espn.com's Chad Ford had to say about Miami's draft:

"I hate to break it to what looked like a very sober, perhaps disappointed Pat Riley, but the Heat won this draft. They walked away with arguably the best player in the draft and then got a second-round steal at point guard, a position at which Miami really needed help.
Beasley has a chance to be a superstar. With him and Dwyane Wade, the Heat have a terrific future. On top of that, Miami got a player at No. 34 who I had ranked as a potential mid-first-round pick. Chalmers is perfect for Riley: He is tough, plays defense, can shoot the lights out and is a winner. Once the Heat find a way to trade Shawn Marion, they'll be in great shape to make a big run at a young free agent next summer.
And according to John Hollinger's statistical formula, Jackson is one the biggest sleepers in the draft."

He gave them an A+. Needless to say, I am stoked. Hopefully they will find a taker for Marion before the trade deadline. It would be pretty interesting to see Chalmers, Wade, Haslem, Beasley and Marion on the floor at the same time. They could definitely pull it off against a lot of the teams in the league right now.

The Boston Celtics had a chance to STEAL Chris Douglas-Roberts at 30. They instead chose to go with J.R. Giddens. Not a bad pick, but I thought CDR would have been a perfect fit for the C's. He strikes me as a James Posey-type player. We all saw how well that worked out. Guess they're planning on resigning him and his man-hugs. Late in the draft, they traded for Bill Walker who was drafted by the Wizards. He has been described as, "Vince Carter before the ACL injury." Dang. And with the last pick, they took a seven foot dude from Turkey who they'll stash away in Europe. Solid picks but again, I'm really surprised they didn't take Douglas-Roberts. How did he fall all the way to 40?

The whole Memphis-Minnesota trade is weird to me. How did McHale and Wallace even talk to one another? That's quite the meeting of the minds. Don't really see how Love will help out Big Al...

What can be said about ESPN's coverage that hasn't already been said about Afghanistan? I knew it would be horrible, but that was an absolute trainwreck of an embarrassment. AwfulAnnouncing did a great job of pointing out just how bad it was in their live blog coverage. I would start to get into here, but I would just get too worked up knowing that those jokers can be downright unwatchable and my journalism degree is collecting dust. (Thanks BU!)

Of course the Knick fans would boo Gallinari. I think he'll actually do pretty well there with D'Antoni running the show. Anyone but Rose wouldn't drastically benefit the team anyway. They are still a couple of years away from erasing the mistakes of Isiah. Nice Jeff Van Gundy chant though...

The only real shocker was Jason Thompson going to Sacramento at number 12. It looked like they had a chance to get either Bayless or Augustin, but they were both snagged right before the Kings were on the clock. Looks like they didn't have much of a backup plan. Oh and can the Maloof brothers just move this team to Vegas already? After what David Stern is doing to the Sonics franchise, he should give the Kings the go ahead just to balance things out.

So there you have it. There's plenty I missed I'm sure, but the forties of a certain champagne of beers didn't exactly help keep my head clear. And seeing as how I am an unreliable (at best) poster, there are talks of bringing in a few other writers to expand the site. I'll keep you posted.



P.S. Okay, just one thing about Stuart Scott. He badmouthed the person who bought Doc River's "Gatorade" shirt for $50,000. The money went to charity you buffoon! He was atrocious the whole night but that was the icing on the cake. I cannot stand this man. The amount of enmity that flows through my body is getting to dangerous levels. He had no business being anywhere near Madison Square Garden last night. None.

P.P.S. "So Brandon Rush, are you excited to be playing alongside Brandon Rush?" Good one Stephen A.

DRIZAFT!

While our man Leon gets to chill out in Oakland and soak in the fact that he's a World Champion, focus now shifts to Madison Square Garden. That's right, the 2008 NBA Draft is tonight! And since the Celtics have picks 30 and 60, I don't see them drafting anyone that will have any kind of immediate impact on the team, thus taking away any more potential playing time from The Show. I could honestly see Boston keeping almost the exact same roster as this past year with the much needed subtraction of Brian Scalabrine and Sam Cassell. This is assuming of course that Posey, House and Tony Allen all resign with the team. Give Gabe Pruitt a few minutes here and there but it's essentially the same team that just won the Championship! Granted, the vets will be a year older, but I'm pretty sure this Powe guy could play a little more...

So Boston won't be making much of a splash tonight (barring some odd trade that I'm not seeing). The Miami Heat however, are the focal point of the entire draft. Whatever decision they make tonight will impact the next 10-12 teams that are behind them. With each passing day, hour and minute, it looks as if the Chicago Bulls will take PG Derrick Rose with the first pick. A pick they have no business owning by the way. And the general consensus is that Rose and PF Michael Beasley are hands down the two best players available tonight. Here's the thing.

The Heat want nothing to do with Beasley.

With Shawn Marion deciding this week to not opt out of the final year of his contract and stay in Miami, the Heat have the 2 (Wade), the 3(Marion) and the 4(Haslem) set. Combine that with the numerous reports of Beasley's character issues. And since I don't see any kind of depth at the center position available to draft, it would only seem logical that they should draft a point guard. But with Rose off the board who is left? Well, a few guys actually, but no one worth taking straight up with the number 2 pick. From everything I've read, it seems like Riley wants to go with O.J. Mayo. I really don't see him as a point guard at all and think his style would actually clash with D-Wade's. Russell Westbrook, Jerryd Bayless and D.J. Augustin are other options depending of what team Miami pulls the trigger with. Minnesota, Seattle(OKC?), the Clippers and Memphis have all been in talks with the Heat about a possible trade. Things are more wide open than the sores on Amy Winehouse's face. (You thought I was gonna go with Lindsay Lohan's legs, didn't you.)

One trade that already did go down was between the Pacers and the Raptors. Indiana finally unloaded Jermaine O'Neal. Personally, it doesn't look like this guy has anything left in the tank. Maybe he will prove me wrong playing along side Chris Bosh but he just hasn't been able to stay on the court over the past few years. In return, Toronto sent TJ Ford, Nesterovic and their pick tonight (17th). This leaves Jamal Tinsley high and dry so maybe Larry Bird isn't done dealing. Last year's draft was out of control with all of the trades. The guys covering it really had trouble keeping up.

Speaking of which, I'm soooo psyched to listen to Stuart Scott, Stephen A. Smith and Dick Vitale all damn night. If I wasn't already going to be drinking furiously because of the Miami situation, I'm definitely going to be slurring my speech by 8:30 listening to those fools. I know they have the ticker at the bottom and all the nice graphics and stuff, but a draft just isn't something you can listen to on mute while blasting T-Pain videos on the Wii all night. (Or is it?) I wonder if any of these dopes will top Berman's "hold the Mayo" gem from the NFL draft a couple months back. Wow, and there's a chance to do that too. How did two guys with the last name of Mayo get into two drafts in the same year? If there someone out there to coin an atrocious new line, it's the King of Booyeah.

Soooo, I'll be back tomorrow with reactions. I said last night that if Miami just drafts Mayo with the second pick and not execute any kind of trade, I will stop being a Heat fan. I'm not sure if I'd take it that far because I still got love for Wade and Haslem but with so many other teams below them coveting Beasley, it really doesn't make any sense to not make a deal. (Said deal should obviously somehow include Mark Blount. I mean, have you seen that guy's contract? Who would give him all that money...)

But Leon can just hang back and watch like the rest of us tonight. It's good to be the champ...

UPDATE: Just saw that the Nets and Bucks have agreed to a trade. It doesn't involve any draft picks but Richard Jefferson will head to Bret Favre country while Yi Jianlian and Bobby Simmons will now play in the dirty Jerz. In case you didn't get the memo, LeBron James is going to play for the Nets when they move to Brooklyn. This just adds to the buttload of cap space already created by the Jason Kidd deal. It's the R.O.C. Holla.