08/11 (Dwight) Quickie

St. Augustine, Fla. -- On the annual pilgrimage to Tim Tebow's hometown. (Ha: Or maybe just where my wife enjoys spending our summer vacation.)

I made my points about Dwight Howard on the Lakers yesterday (scroll down to the post immediately below). I will say that I reject the moralistic stuff that "petulant" Dwight was "rewarded" for his "infant-like behavior" by "getting" a trade to a championship team. Meh, is that really worth worrying about? Howard is the edge case of edge cases, not a litmus test for How All Athletes Should Act To Win Approval From Pundits (Who All Basically Acted The Same Way Earlier In Their Careers).

I say all that and can still say that if you're a Magic fan, I feel tough for you -- I don't think the deal you got now was as good as the one you'd get from Houston, although I really like Arron Afflalo and there is potential in Moe Harkless. Orlando wasn't getting out of this as an NBA title contender (they weren't an NBA title contender with Howard anyway); their goal should be the Treadmill of Mediocrity. I have come around to the idea that there is nothing wrong with the Treadmill of Mediocrity if winning a championship is entirely unavailable to you, which covers roughly all but 3-4 franchises in the NBA at any given moment.

More:

*LSU boots Tyronn Mathieu: Damn right it hurts their chances of winning the SEC (and, thus, qualifying for the SEC's automatic entry into the national-title game), and damn right it deprives fans of watching the single-most electrifying player in the country. It might nick Mathieu's draft stock (see Jenkins, Janoris) but it won't hurt his NFL future (see Jenkins, Janoris)

*Tim Tebow's Jets debut: Are people really going to put stock in his completions total or the one pick or the score of the game? It's the first step in an inevitable progression to Tebow starting at QB for the Jets, nothing more or less than that.

*Olympics (which aren't over yet but between Howard and Mathieu and Tebow, drifting dangerously close to seeing its quadrennial window of public attention slam shut): The women's 4x100 relay team was absolutely brilliant. What a wonderful group.

*Tiger leading PGA: For now. That's basically all analysis of Tiger early at a major -- "leading for now."

*Lane Kiffin vs. USA Today: I love that my colleagues at USAT couldn't stand Kiffin's double-talk about not voting his own team No. 1 and checked to see that, in fact, he did vote them No. 1, a legit story. The stupid part is that all Kiffin had to do was say: "Damn right I'm voting my team No. 1." It's not like there isn't a legitimate argument to be made that they are No. 1 in preseason.

*Strasburg Watch: I wouldn't shut him down as long as the team was in the playoff hunt. If he blows out his arm and has to sit out all of next season rehabbing, staring at that World Series Championship flag will be the ultimate curative.

More later this weekend.

-- D.S.