More photos » Steve C Wilson - AP

Marcus Camby is heading to Portland. (AP Photo/Steve C. Wilson)

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As NBA trade rumors continue to swirl we saw the second deadline deal agreed too today.  Sources are reporting that Marcus Camby will be leaving the Los Angeles Clippers and be heading to the Blazers in exchange for Travis Outlaw and Steve Blake.  

For the Blazers this deal helps them fill the center position for the remainder of the season where they have been devastated with season-ending injuries to Greg Oden and Joel Pryzbilla.  Camby will provide them with an athletic big that has a knack for blocking shots.  He is also an excellent rebounder and will not require touches on the offensive end.  The Blazers gave up Steve Blake and Travis Outlaw, but with the emergence of Jerryd Bayless and the return of Nicolas Batum from injury, both players became expendable.  

For GM Kevin Pritchard and the Blazers this deal will help them address their lack of size in the frontcourt and adds no payroll to the salary cap after this year with Camby's contract expiring this summer.  Another excellent move by a franchise that has made many over the past few years.  

The Clippers on the other hand make another trade that should leave their fans dumbfounded by the stupidity of GM Mike Dunleavy.  The issue here isn't trading Camby.  In fact, that was the prudent move to make after they dropped to 10 games under .500 heading into the All-Star break.  Camby is a quality big man and with teams looking to solidify their rosters heading into the last third of the season into the playoffs this was a good time to sell high on him. While the Clippers certainly did sell, they failed to get any real value in return.  

They added a point guard in Steve Blake and a small forward in Travis Outlaw, both positions where the Clippers have depth at.  Additionally neither of these players is much better, if at all than the options the Clippers currently have at those positions in Sebastian Telfair and Al Thornton.  The worst part of this deal is that there is no indication that the Clippers received any draft picks from it.  The only positive aspect of this trade for the Clippers is that they did not take on any additional salary after this season with both contracts expiring then.

Essentially the Clippers traded a center to a team desperate for one and in return received nothing of benefit to themselves. There is no greater indictment on a GM's abilities then when dealing from a position of strength he fails to gain any valuable assets in return.

A savvy move made by the Blazers addressing an area of great need and for the Clippers another curious move in a history filled with such events.  I know I definitely don't want Mike Dunleavy managing Project Franchise's team.  

With 2:37 left on the clock in the fourth quarter of the NFC Championship game, the Minnesota Vikings got the ball back with all three of their timeouts in hand and had a chance to punch their ticket to the Super Bowl.  We all know by now that they came up short and that Brett Favre's interception was the nail in the coffin, but let's not forget the culpability of the man on sidelines calling the shots.

On the first play, with the ball on their own 21 yard line, Minnesota head coach Brad Childress called a run play for Adrian Peterson for no gain. Rather than showing any urgency trying to run another play, Childress was content to allow the clock to run down until the two minute warning. 

What the hell is the purpose of that?  Remember the situation here is 2nd and 10 on a potential game-winning drive and you're back at your 21.  Why do you not run another play there?  

Let's move on.  

After the Vikings came out of the two minute warning, Childress called another run play this time gaining two yards. Finally after this, Childress must have realized that he had a Hall of Fame quarterback running his team and decided to let him try his luck.  

Favre responded by hitting Bernard Berrian on a 3rd and 8 to move the chains and on the next play nailed Sidney Rice on a beautiful throw down the right seam for 20 yards, down to the New Orleans 47-yard line.  

On the very next play after this Childress called one more run play a good idea in a situation where the defense is struggling to organize themselves, this time a 14 yard gain by Chester Taylor down to the Saints' 33.  At this point New Orleans called a timeout.  

Let's think about this.  You have the ball on your opponents' 33-yard line with 1:06 left on the clock, a Hall of Fame quarterback who's been making big throws all game and all three of your timeouts. From here a field goal would be about 50 yards, a distance where kickers miss more than they make.  What would you do?

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The San Diego Chargers and the Dallas Cowboys both had their seasons come to disappointing ends this past Sunday.  San Diego lost their divisional playoff match-up 17-14 against the wild card New York Jets at home in Qualcomm Stadium.  The Cowboys got spanked back to Texas by the Vikings 34-3 in Minneapolis.  

Both teams overcame adversity during the season with the Chargers left for dead when they started 2-3 following a loss to the Denver Broncos.  Dallas recovered from a Week 14 loss to the Chargers in Dallas that dropped them to 8-5 and creating the thought among most that the Cowboys habit of late season swoons would continue.  

In the process both teams saved their head coaches their jobs.  The question fans of both teams have been asking themselves is if this necessarily a good thing.

Do Norv Turner and Wade Phillips have the ability to do more than just develop good game plans?  Can they instill the confidence in their teams necessary to win a Super Bowl?  So far the answer in their careers has been no, though I would give Turner more credit than Phillips.  

Turner has led San Diego to three consecutive AFC West titles and playoff appearances.  This is the first time that under Turner that the Chargers have failed to win advance at least one round in the playoffs.  Don't forget that last year the Chargers upset a red hot Colts team before losing to the eventual Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers in the divisonal round.  The year before that San Diego defeated the Titans in the wild card round and the Indianapolis on the road in the divisional round before losing to the eventual Super Bowl champion 18-1 Patriots in the AFC Championship game. 

Yesterday, San Diego presented Turner with a 3-year contract extension that would run through 2013.  I understand why Chargers fans would be so frustrated after failing to get to a Super Bowl throughout the second half of this decade even with the excess of talent up and down their roster.  However, Turner has won 3 playoff games in 3 years, obviously not a ringing endorsement, but still something to hang your hat on.  

I see this as more of a 1-year deal that has the potential to go two more if Turner can get this team over the hump next year.  If not I think Turner will be packing his bags.

Wade Phillips is another case altogether.  He's been to the playoffs four times now in his coaching career.  Twice with the Bills and twice with the Cowboys.  This year is the first time in his career he has registered a playoff win, which only served as a platform to a Viking ass whooping this past weekend.  

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Last night we posted this poll, probing fans thoughts on the timing of Pete Carroll's departure of USC for the great wet northwest.  The vast majority of FOF readers (83% of you) felt that the Pistol Pete was looking to get away from USC before the sh*% hit the fan.(scandal, recruiting violations, NCAA Sanctions, etc...)  Admittedly, this isn't rocket science...and a lot of people saw this coming.  If Carroll gets away from USC before these issues surface, he comes away smelling like roses, much like Calipari did at Memphis.  But if he waits until any of these negative stories break, he either resigns in disgrace or he is forced to stay to avoid the appearance of abandoning ship.  Well, Pete's timing was impeccable, because just hours ago, sh*% and the fan were cordially introduced as it was reported that USC assistant coach Dave Watson was addicted to painkillers...and Carroll allegedly knew all about it.  

Something tells me that this is just the tip of the iceberg...now that the likeable Carroll  is leaving Los Angeles, I think the media may start reporting on a lot of things that they swept under the rug in order to stay in the program's good graces.  I think we should get ready for a salacious few weeks.  FOF will continue to report the news as we read it, hours after it's been reported by major and legitimate news organizations.

More photos » David Zalubowski - AP

3 months ago: New Jersey Nets guard Chris Douglas-Roberts reacts as the Nets fall behind in the third quarter of the Denver Nuggets' 101-87 victory over the Nets in an NBA basketball game in Denver on Tuesday, Nov. 24, 2009. The Nets have lost the opening 14 games of the season. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

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We are starting to see the ripple effects from the Agent Zero/Javaris Crittendon scandal...and apparently it is starting from the bottom up, literally, with the New Jersey Nets.  Fanhouse is reporting that Nets management has taken the bold step to ban gambling amongst teammates on team flights.  This makes perfect sense, because everyone knows that the most effective way to eliminate gun related violence is by preventing Devin Harris and Trenton Hassel from playing high stakes Uno on a flight from Newark to Minneapolis.  This is like trying to stop drunk driving by making it illegal for wives to nag their husbands about folding their clothes (which should be illegal on independent grounds).  Yes, there is a causal relationship in some cases...but it's not the root of the problem.  In this case, two grown (very rich) men got into a tiff over a gambling debt, and the martian we know as Gil Arenas took his "joke" a little over the line.  The real problem is you have a guy who operates on a completely different wavelength than the rest of the human population.  Now, because Arenas has the same sense of humor as the bad guy from Inspector Gadget, poor Brook Lopez can't spend his time by winning money from the teammates that are wasting his rare young skill set. 

No wonder the Nets brass can't fix this team, if this is how they fix problems, they probably tried to stop the losing by banning birthday cake.  Seriously, can the Nets spirits get any lower?  Their "home games" are as well attended as an indie movie starring Jessica Simpson and Bronson Pinchot.  When they are on the road, they lose at every stop along the way.  Now, during their miserable road trips they are forced to entertain themselves with in-flight movies like Paul Blart: Mall Cop and 27 Dresses.  If anything, this is going to result in more player on player violence...you don't have to be betting on it, for an old fashioned fist fight to get the adrenaline pumping.  Right now the prospect of being a NJ Net for the rest of this season looks very bleak. 

You may have tried to forget that Mark McGwire will be returning to Major League Baseball as a hitting coach for the St. Louis Cardinals. He's been recruited by Cardinals' manager Tony La Russa, who coached McGuire on both the Cardinals and the Oakland Athletics, to try to help teach the team the best practices of hitting where the ideal location to stick needles is. 

McGwire, you may recall, broke Roger Maris' single-season home run record in a memorable 1998 battle with Sammy Sosa. When Barry Bonds broke that record just a few years later, alarm bells started ringing in rational heads that maybe something wasn't quite legitimate here. A congressional hearing was held on the subject, and McGwire, among others, pretty much unanimously gave embarrassing testimonies that shamed themselves and the sport.

We haven't heard or seen much from McGwire since 2001. We really haven't even gotten many comments from him about his new hitting coach gig. But something just rubs me the wrong way about the poster boy for performance enhancing drugs getting a job to rub elbows with baseball's greatest hitter - the one pretty much everyone is counting on to break all the records he can, do so cleanly, and restore some credibility to the game.

On top of this, Tony La Russa had another great idea, which was reported on after this interview with Contra Costa Times: http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=4804082.

The highlight, of course, is this gem of a plan:

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Disclaimer: This is my first crack at writing something like this.  I have a lot of angst built up over the last seven years of losing, so if you are easily offended, please skip this one.  I'll try to tone it down the next time around. 

In honor of the recently released 10^th anniversary edition of the epic "10 things I Hate About You" (Complete with a Heath Ledger Commemorative Chemistry Set), I decided I would try and whittle down my list of 1,278 things that suck about being a Raider fan into 10 concise details of despair.  This was extremely hard to do (our horrible home stadium didn’t even make the cut), but here goes. 

 1.       The Slogans:  Listen I love the clip of Al after the super bowl uttering "Just Win Baby" as much as the next guy but I’ve had about enough.  If "Just Winning Baby" was all that was important why are we constantly in pissing matches with coaches, players, executives and lunch ladies?  Why did we keep Kiffin around when we knew he was sabotaging us (attempting a 76 yard field goal? Come on!), just to fire him for "cause" and save some cheese.  "Pride and Poise"? Seriously f*#k the heck? The next time a Raider player shows "Poise" will be the first time since…well it might be the first time.  Did anyone see the 874 penalty yards we gave up to the Cleveland Browns? Seriously "Poise"?  I could go on for hours about "Team of the Decades" (which decade exactly?), etc. but you get the point.

2.       The Coaching Carousel:   This one never gets old.  Team loses (shocking), Al hates losing, Al Fires Coach, Al Calls 248 unemployed coaches, 247 of which let it go to voicemail or pretend to be housekeeping when they realize it’s Mr. Burns errrr Al Davis on the line.  The one who accepts the call puts down the fry basket and says "Sure Al, I’ll take a pay cut to get run over by you and your hand picked group of talentless athletic specimens.  You already have my assistants picked out?  Great I didn’t want input on that anyway."  Rinse and Repeat every 8-12 months. 

 3.       The Draft:  I consider myself somewhat of a draftnik.  Every year I follow prospects like I’m watching bare titties.  I watch hours of college games, senior bowl practices, combine footage and read more mock drafts than Tebow reads Bible passages.  I’m obsessed, I’ll admit it.  When your team is as horrible as mine is, the draft is your only hope.  Unfortunately almost every year the Raiders treat those hopes like Nancy Kerrigan’s knees.  The penultimate was this year.  I knew in my heart of hearts that they would blow it and take DHB.  This is a classic Al pick.  Blazing speed, all kinds of athletic ability, couldn’t catch AIDS in a mid 80’s Frisco bath house.  Forget that his actual job on the football team was to catch the ball. Who gives a $h*t, because the only thing that makes Al’s shriveled dick twitch nowadays is sub 4.4 forty times, and we all know Al’s dick twitches win football games.  I actually punched myself in the balls when they made the pick.  Of course since I knew it was coming my asshole (Niner fan) friend was ready with a video phone. Which brings me to my next topic…

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Darron Cummings - AP

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Just caught this "Outside the Lines" segment about the recent roster turnover caused by John Calipari's arrival at the University of Kentucky.  Basically, six Wildcat players were "encouraged" to leave the program so that Calipari could make room to bring in his own players.  While the focus of this segment is mostly on UK, it's clear that this type of treatment of student athletes occurs nationwide, and the real villain here is the NCAA, an organization whose actual purpose is utterly baffling.  Nothing that Calipari has done at UK is against the rules, nor is it uncommon.  With his big salary and expectations that come along with it, I can't really blame the guy for wanting to put "his" guys on the floor.  The point is, he shouldn't be allowed to and the organization charged with protecting student athletes, does anything but.

The gist of the OTL story is that when a new head coach takes over a program, it's customary for student athletes to be shown the door, for no other reason than to make room for some of the new coaches favorites.  I would have less of a problem with this if NCAA rules afforded student athletes similar flexibility.  For example, if the coach that recruited a student-athlete was fired during that player's freshman year...that player does not have the option to easily transfer to another school.  If that player wants to play for another D-1A program he/she needs to sit out a year...and the school he's leaving can place all sorts of restrictions on where the student can transfer to in exchange for a release from the scholarship.  Texas Tech football will be an interesting situation to monitor, because apparently under the rules, whoever takes over there can "encourage" players not to return by making it clear that they will be buried on the sidelines and their scholarships will not be renewed.  On the other hand, the current freshman who expected to play four years under Mike Leach is left uncertain what his future holds.  The new coach is free to implement a new system that makes his skill set obsolete, the new coach may be a total a-hole, or the new coach may send him packing....but the student athlete has no real recourse other than to ride the situation out or transfer and put up with the NCAA's litany of rules.

I don't have an answer, nor do I know how to fix the problem...but this is just another example of Division 1 college athletes being treated like comodities, while everyone else makes $$$ off their hard work and talent.