The VCR

It sits there on the shelf, blinking. Blinking. Blinking.

There really is no use for it. All of the tapes have either been sold at a yard sale or boxed up and put somewhere. Movies are now watched on shinier, sleeker, easier to use DVD's. If you want to record a show, the Tivo is there for you. So why won't you get rid of that blinking VCR? Because some day, it might be of use.

The Jazz have a VCR. The problem is they actually use it. Matt Harpring is The VCR.

Oh, sure, there will be times where the VCR is useful. There is the time that you use it to convert your old home movies to your computer so you can burn them onto a DVD. There is the time you "stumble" upon the old stash of Ginger Allen or Christy Canyon's best work. Yes, you will use the VCR for those few and far between times.

The Jazz feel they have to use The VCR all the time. It doesn't matter that they have shiny gadgets that have pretty much rendered The VCR obsolete. The three man rotation of Andrei Kirilenko, Ronnie Brewer, and Paul Millsap has not only made The VCR obsolete, they have rendered him useless. And yet he still gets used. I know what you are thinking: "But YB, he saved the Jazz last night with his performance in the first quarter." That was little more than burning the 1993 All Star Game to the computer. The Jazz could shelve The VCR and not miss a thing.

The Warriors were playing the second game of a back to back. Many of their players had played huge minutes the night before. They had no chance of beating the Jazz. None. Yet there was a big deal made out of The VCR's use.

When The VCR is used, time stands still. The game slows down. He moves back and forth like a TV screen playing an old movie that needs to have its tracking adjusted. I often wonder if his knee has old tangled VHS tape in it rather than scar tissue. But he is out there every night. Blinking. Blinking. Blinking. Instead of blinking "12:00", he blinks "WOOT!", "WOOT!", "WOOT!"

It is time for the Jazz to show the old man how to use his DVD player. How to use his DVR. And how to use his computer. Unplug and shelve The VCR. Donate it. Do something with it. Learn that it is no longer of use.

Capt Sig: 4th Quarter Randomness

Yes I am back. Not by choice but I can't stand Tatermoog's boobing about the conditions on the deck.


Disclaimer: I suck at intranets blogging.


The positive is the possibility unfolding that the Jazz could blow this game. That is always a good thing for Harpringsucks.com. It also appears Harpring is leading the Warriors come back.

"Chicks Dig Fur"! Good to see The BEAR give a shout out to the Wasatch Front lesbian community. There are no divisions when it comes to the Jazz. We all like fur.

Nice haircut Matt. Didn't know he flew to Paris Island to receive the 'high and tight."

I am very impressed with Boozer's off-season program. Proactive really does work.

Milsap down, Harpring winks at Secretariat in the player's "significant other" section.

Whenever I look at Baron it just seems he should be playing sax in some LA night club.

Warriors cut the lead to 9. AK gathers splinters. Plastic splinters.


Commercial break.


Little Sig had his black belt test today. Puked on lap 5 of the two mile run.

Matt is out of the game. Harpringsucks.com always feels empty when Matty heads to the bench.

Williams hits a jumper. A new twist to the Jazz offense.

Hmm, the next time you read any ESPN experts, just remember Chad Ford had Patty O'Bryant rated as the #1 pick.

Did Bolerhands just say "Mema" Okur?

The back of Joey Harrington's head looks like Plumber's Butt.

I don't see the big deal about Deron tonight. I could school Kenny G.

I love the NBA and the players it creates. Harrington is on fire, having one heck of a night. He makes a great play and celebrates. Totally oblivous that his team is down by 11. I think a great new NBA fan friendly innovation is to suddenly stop games and ask players:

1. The score
2. Their teammates currently on the floor
3. How many shots they have taken.

It has been so long between Williams's passes that it now appears he has regressed to Harpring passing capabilities.

Come on BARON. YOU CAN'T MATCH DWIL NOTE FOR NOTE!!!!

SWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN

A somewhat terrible night for harpringsucks.com. Little Harp playing time. Williams making everything, and the Jazz winning. The only thing left to look forward to is YB's ESA snatch report.

time to give AK a shot

Ak for 3

the uptimism is out of control.

That reminded of the time we let the retarded kid bat in little league.

Mansap in with 34 seconds. Time for 3 shot attempts.

Camera shot of Giricek. Subway sub of the Game. Time to reward himself with a new Prada handbag.

Jazz win. Deron with a Quad 4 and Octagonal Double 4x4. Boler will double shave his hands and splash on some lotion on after this game.

AK 3-4 from outside the paint. AK and Horny are going to celebrate by a 7 hour marathon session of Pac Man and Atari pong.

Am I done yet?

GS/UTA: Third Quarter

-Now comes the horrifying realization we've committed to liveblogging a crappy game. This is similar to my experience halfway through Transformers.

"In fifty years, don’t you want to be able to say you had the courage to get in the car?"

By the way, I don't recall anyone at my high school looking like Megan Fox.

-AGH! The Wendover Fun commercial just said the next four shows are Joan Rivers, Wayne Newton, Styx, and Carlos Mencia! It's frickin' Dante's Inferno II: The Lounge.

-Gordan Giricek with 12 points, Harpring with 8 tough points. Advantage: Harpring.

-Is there a more awkward dribbler in the league than Memo? I'm asking. Seriously.

-Jazz open up a 23-point lead. And to think, we lost Fisher's veteran leadership.

-Apparently the Jazz are using an image of AK dribbling as an advertisement for the team. I guess it constitutes more touches in some fashion.

-Jazz 8-10 from 3. That's kinda surprising.

Did you hear, Mr. Chipmunk?

-Wow, there's now a lithograph with Stockton and Malone passing the torch to Deron and Carlos. I'm sure there's an apology by LHM on the back for Deron only being half-white.

-Ronnie Brewer just hit a layup with no double-clutch. It is possible.

-Harpring in for AK. That's a tough substitution.

-Missed Inbounds Attempt for Harpring. Strange, he's usually such a fine passer.

-Warriors have cut it to 15 after the entry of Harpring. Strangely enough, Boler and Boone aren't relating the decreasing deficit to the toughness of Harpring.

-Awesome! Harpring defense! His opponent gets the ball, and Harpring CUTS TO THE BASKET. What in blazes? Needless to say, Barnes 3-pointer, Jazz now up 11.

-Someone should tell Harpring the baseline marks "out of bounds."

-*points to blog title* Fisher gave us doubts, but...thank you, Matt.

-Boler: "Monta Ellis, quick, shoot...*sound of ball clanging off rim* Airballed it."

-Matt Barnes a bit confused, tries to peg Bolerjack in the face with the basketball instead of passing the ball downcourt. An understandable mistake.

-OK, lead down to 13 in the fourth quarter. Turning this thing over to Sig/Pearl. Harp have mercy on us all.

Golden State @ Utah : Quarter 2

Oh boy. I get to cover 12 minutes of Hart, Collins, Giricek and Miles. You'll have to forgive me if you can't feel the Loudness and Proudness flowing from my keyboard. Tater got to blog AK Appears To Be Running From The KGB, Harpring's Triumphant Entry, and Brewer Hits A Three. Lucky.

And we're back. Boler continues to be impressed by how many shots Harpring can get off. Although, let's be honest. As a fan, looking at this lineup, deciding who I would want to shoot is like deciding which "pasta salad" from Chuck-a-rama I'd like to start my dinner with.

AK blocks with his elbow. Can't he do ANYTHING right?

Millsap with a triple-pump fake under the basket. Amusingly, his team kept running around as if Sap was deciding whether to shoot or to pass. Still on pace for 0 assists this season.

Harpring follow-up MLA (missed layup attempt, for the uninitiated). Booner: "He must be upset with himself." Really? Does the wind get upset with itself for blowing? Is the sun embarrassed for shining?

Boler notices that AK is displaying some "grit". Booner adds that he must have learned that from Harpring. I can't wait until AK masters the art of Stinkeye and Falling. We can only hope that the Master will stick around with the Jazz long enough to impart ALL of his wisdom to the team.

Giricek is a great shooter when he doesn't suck.

-------------------------

We re-join our blogging heroes, 15 minutes in the future. Sorry about the technical difficulties. But don't despair, I took notes that I will now transcribe:

1) Harrington's head looks like Battier's head that got left on the grill for an extra 10 minutes.

That's all I got. Back to live action.

-------------------------

I swear, FSN brought in an extra camera just to track Harpring all night. Meanwhile, Giricek is quietly having one of the best nights of his Jazz career, and not even a mention of a potential "double-double" from Boler.

I guess that quarter went better than expected. For the Jazz. And my work here is done.

*high-fives self*

Golden State at Utah: Quarter the First

-Just so you know, I'm taking a break from reading for class to liveblog this game. Here, let me give you a taste of what I'm currently reading:

If there is a bridge between life and mind abstractionists rarely cross it. They feel no need to. They are certain that what lies on the other side is only a reflection of their present position. All too often substantialists prove them right, for when they cross the bridge they generally find what they set out to find, namely, a life that reflected the mind.

/Christopher Morris, Becoming Southern

In other words, there are worse things out there than watching Jason Hart run the break.

-Good Scott, I've missed Boler, shaved hands and all. He's the pretentious uncle that talks out his ass about subjects of which he has no knowledge I never had.

-First double-double reference of the night, game hasn't even started.

-OK, in order, the Jazz game is brought to you by GMC, Toyota, Big O Tires, Geico, and the Worker's Compensation Fund. Sounds like a process.

-Ronnie Price just mentioned he "still sleeps with a basketball some times" and "his girlfriend doesn't like that." I'm more concerned for the basketball.

-Remember The Royal Tenenbaums? Remember how everyone told you that was the greatest movie ever? Remember how you said you thought it seemed well-made but didn't do anything for you? Remember how they then told you you just didn't get the movie? That's how I feel about Deron Williams.
Ha, how delightfully quirky.

-Utah loses the tip, leading 0-0.

-Boozer is trying to play defense by not shifting his feet and instead hopping bunny-like with arms outstretched. Still more effective than Harp.

-AK with a nice move, grabs the ball, pump-fakes, slips, falls into the opponent, and then throws the ball off the bottom of the backboard, and gets called for a travel. Hornacek calls his travel agent, gets tickets back to Phoenix.

-AK with his first jumper of the season. Also with his first confidence.

-AK immediately follows with a lazy TO. Confidence back down to zero. Sloan heaves a sigh of relief.

-Boler with another classic example of strange voice modulation after AK hits a jumper. "That additional work with the...[long pause]...SHOT DOCTOR paying off." I hope he doesn't think he just successfully coined another nickname. After all, it would have to be something like Money Shot Doctor.

-Jazz down 9, 6:35 to go, Timeout. In completely unrelated news, I smell smoke. Be right back.

-OK, the apartment's not on fire. MUST BE THE WARRIORS.

Hahahahaha...Wes Anderson would have thought that was funny.

-Lost my feed for a sec, Bordy's narrating.

‹bordelais8› jazz stand around, bewildered on defense as their opponent keeps launching shots that appear to not be layups

Sounds accurate enough.

-Boxscore says Hart just checked in. I think my IP was just launching a preemptive strike.

-Harpring in.

SWAN!

-DOWN GOES DAVIS.

Matt Harpring just toughed the hell out of him.

-Y'know, I can pretty much do this liveblog without a video feed. Jazz stand around on defense, Harpring's cutting around yelling "woot," baskets are exchanged. And so on and so forth.

-Feed back, first words I hear are (in an admiring tone): "Matt Harpring." Then Boler proceeds to gush man love.

-Boler: *interrupting Boone's Harp love* "And he has attitude!"
Boone: *somewhat dejectedly* "And he has attitude..."
*pause*
"A tough attitude!"

I'm sure there were nods all around.

-Harpring is doing quite well for himself. 5 shots in 3 minutes. Must still be recovering.

-Was going to add another picture making fun of Baron Davis, did a Google Image Search for "eggs in headbands." Nothing good came of it, though somebody knitted some adorable little outfits for some eggs.

-Ronnie Brewer just hit a 3. First, that was unexpected. Second, bet he gets subbed next stoppage in play.

-3 seconds left in the quarter, Harp can shoot two more times.

-29-28, Jazz, and Phase Three of Project Status Quo is initiating. Farewell, AK. Hello, Harp.

Second Verse, Same as the First: LiveBlog One, Intro and Invocation

As part of an ongoing initiative to push the picture of Kathy Bates in a hot tub off the first page, the HarpringSucks Crew has decided to post our first liveblog of the year. At least, as long as Bordy gets done with his kid's birthday party quickly enough. Let's hope he avoided the Dora Chinese Fun Time Pack.

For those of you not in the know, liveblogs provide the HS writers with an opportunity to analyze games as they happen, comment on NBA storylines, type the word "boobs," act like we have actual content on this site, and give the Pearl/Sig a chance to James Joyce his way to associations between "Shane Battier" and "hot dog juice." Keep in mind, the quality of the liveblog is always dependent upon the game (thus the reason I always take the first quarter), so if it isn't funny, the game sucks. Or SJF is the current liveblogger.

The HarpringSucks Game of the Night, of course, is between the Utah Jazz and the Golden State Warriors. The first game between the two gave the Utah Jazz fan hope, suggesting the future of the team might consist of entertaining lineups, an active AK, actual quality playing time for Ronnie Brewer, and little in the way of Matt Harpring.

Of course, then came the second game. Sloan, the passion of the game ignited deep in his withered loins, realized he would need to compete with a much better Houston team. Off the bench came Jason Hart, stalwart warrior. Paul Millsap, out of the game with 3 fouls, was replaced ably by Jarron Collins. Deron Williams and Carlos Boozer, Captain Auras glowing, shot the ball and afterwards waited for the ball to return so they could shoot it again. And Andrei Kirilenko, five shots and minimum contribution stinging, sobbed into a fold of Okur's chins as the team lost an always competitive game. If only there had been some way of stopping T-Mac from driving through an open lane. If only.

So, here we are at the third game of the season. This could be the team's opportunity to show the failure at Houston was a fluke, this is a new team and new concept, things will be different, a Pure Harping Adrenaline Rush.

My guess is probably not.

Water Moccasins.

Dear Jazzbots, are you there? It's me. Sirkickyass.

When Ralph Wiley died, ESPN.com scrambled to find a new black writer who could speak credibly about the frequent race issues facing the NBA. Unfortunately the settled upon one Scoop Jackson who was previously primarily known for his work on SLAM magazine, a publication that is one of the primary contributors to inextricably tying up professional basketball with hip-hop culture. Jackson, unfortunately, celebrates the worst aspects of hip-hop culture and makes frequent bizarre predictions and proclamations. Somehow, he still has a job despite stunningly bad errors in judgment (one popular story is that he threatened to quit his job at SLAM magazine if they didn't put Allen Iverson on the cover while he was still at Georgetown, when the magazine did so the issue bombed and became the worst selling copy in the publication's history) and awful writing.

This week, Jackson wrote an article called "NBAipedia" that constituted a number of opinions about the upcoming season. Some samples of his "gems" of insight include predicting that Kim Kardashian will be the most desired woman in the NBA this season, detailing the most fashionable watches for NBA players, bemoaning that Nike discontinued a line of commercials featuring Lebron James, talking about new clubs in Miami, and telling his readers about Tiffany jewelry. At least he balances this all out by calling Kenyon Martin the last true power forward in the league; which is a little like calling Kathy Bates the last true Hollywood beauty.

In ESPN's NBA predictions series this week Jackson also indicated that Rasheed Wallace was the most important player in the league (when asked about these statements, Jackson replied only "everyone wrote hard"), picked Steve Francis (who received a DNP-coach's decision in the season opener) for most improved player, and indicates that the only thing wrong with the Bulls last year was that the coach wouldn't let them wear headbands. In a league where it is frequently asserted that there's a fundamental disconnect between the guys who can buy tickets and the hip-hop centered players and culture, Scoop Jackson is the primary villain.

Good thing ESPN decided to feature him this week. I'm sure his focus on all the worst aspects of the league really will help ESPN's ratings this season.

Bizarre and unrelated confessions: One Mueller daughter, while writing about how much she is looking forward to the upcoming season, bizarrely confesses to the many different methods she has used to sneak peeks at upcoming Christmas presents. I'm sure her parents are so proud.

I anxiously await her confession that she also steals her siblings' teeth and puts them under her pillow in hopes of fooling the tooth fairy.

A clue you should stop posting: Keith Haney flatly admitted this week that he had nothing to write and instead talked about how great Boston is. A member of the Mueller family also acknowledged that she was straining to come up with a decent topic. That's 2 jazzbots bloggers that have admitted they have nothing to say, we only have roughly 20 more to go.

I just can't wait to see what quote Laurie Nyland would open up with when she acknowledges her own uselessness. I'm going to suggest one by the immortal Joseph Conrad: "It occurred to me that my speech or my silence, indeed any action of mine, would be a mere futility."

He's being paid $1 million this season to blog: Morris Almond was left off the opening day roster in favor of Jarron Collins. This is somewhat like being told that you can't be in the Justice League because you're not good enough to replace Aquaman. Given that Almond was the Jazz first round draft pick, they have to make him do something. Enter jazzbots.com, where Morris Almond is the newest blogger.

Couldn't he have made himself useful in some way? Do the real players' laundry or something? As of right now he's getting outwritten by Annie Whittaker who could charitably be described as the Jarron Collins of Jazzbots. How embarrassing.

Gross Omissions: Tammy Rasmussen compiles a list of her favorite sports nicknames in a jazzbots post this week. Although she included some of the great sports nicknames like "The Round Mound of Rebound" most of her inclusions are lame. Let's be honest "King James," "Babe" Ruth, "Primetime," all feel generic or generally uncreative. The following omissions from her list are completely unconscionable.

Darrell "Dr. Dunkenstein" Griffith (extra shame because he was on the Jazz, so she really should have known)

Darryl "Chocolate Thunder" Dawkins (extra points because he gave the nickname to himself)

Georges "Chicoutimi Cucumber" Vezina.

Marvin "The Human Eraser" Webster

Rod "He Hate Me" Smart (whose real name I actually had to look up because I only knew him as "He Hate Me")

Andre "Bad Moon" Rison

Chris "Pee Drinking" Paul (still a classic jazz game chant. They really need a graphic for this on the Jumbotron)

And a personal favorite that probably reveals that I was an economics major: New York Jets Mark Gastineau, Joe Klecko, and the rest of the early 1980s defensive line were collectively known as the "New York Sack Exchange."

Ron Artest sighted at Utah High School Football Game: Annie Whittaker reports that she was present for a rather large brawl in the stands at a local football playoff game. Sadly she remains unharmed enough to type.

Ticket Sales say differently: Karen Chatterton's students expressed well-wishes for the Jazz before the season began. One student writes "“It doesn’t matter if you win or lose, your fans are still rooting for you.” I'm sure that Larry Miller agrees after seeing a half-empty building frequently in the one season the Jazz went 26-56.

For absolutely no reason: The Madame's cat has a serious need to lose weight. Her belly drags on the ground when she runs, she manages to routinely take dumps that have to be hauled away by a bulldozer, and she's starting to develop a perceptible gravitational field. Alarmingly the cat is only gaining weight over time, to the extent that I'm convinced that a) the Madame is feeding her McDonald's double quarter pounders and b) if you were to shave her you could knit a XXL sweater out of the fur. The cat is about one more protein smoothie away from turning into this:

Since this is a cat that's clearly lost all self control, I have suggested that we motivate her the same way I motivate everyone: shame.

My theory is that if we tape several photographs of thins cats at her cat's eye level all around the Madame's apartment we can establish a negative body image of the "ideal" cat in this feline's brain. Additionally, I think it would be helpful to put the above picture of a morbidly obese cat right next to the cat's food bowl. Hopefully, using these methods, we can induce "catorexia."

Something has to happen soon. At this point I'm worried she could kill me just by passing wind.

Spoke too soon: Jonathan Kendrick did a feature this week on getting to know Kevin Lyde ... exactly one day before he was waived. So much for the Jazzbots having inside information as promised.

Punctuation gone crazy: The Mueller family (a favorite punching bag of Harpring Sucks) recently had a lengthy post which contained more consecutive question marks in one sentence than paragraphs in the entire article. Good thing, as she acknowledges later, she's "not one to answer any of those questions."

That was really enlightening Mueller family, thank you. Should have stuck to your previous admission that you had nothing to say rather than trying to force the issue.

Jazzbots gets professional broadcaster added to staff, stunningly become less credible: Tom Nissalke has started blogging for Jazzbots, Harpring Sucks cheers as this is sure to guarantee a wealth of new material in future posts. In this post he tells us how great a coach Jerry Sloan is. I'm thrilled we're getting coaching recommendations from a guy who was a former coach, even if his career record was 371-508.

Leerooooooooooooy Jeeeeennnnnnnnkins!: We've made a hobby out of picking on Matt Harpring, but nothing has ever reminded me of Harpring more than this youtube clip. While everyone tries to come up with a coherent plan for victory Matt "Leeroy Jenkins" Harpring just charges in looking to score. Fast forward to the 1:23 mark for one of the greatest battle cries in the history of everything.




Bad Idea: Jonathan Kendrick seems to suggest he likes Matt Harpring's chances of supplanting Ronnie Brewer in the starting lineup. Of course he also suggests that Jerry Sloan would play Gordan Giricek in the last few minutes of a game, leading me to believe that a) he hasn't actually watched a game in a few years or b) he was on mind-altering substances when blogging.

I'm going with option b, if for no other reason than this is better written than most of his posts and I feel like that's as good an explanation as any.

Early Rush to Judgment: After watching half of one game Jazzbots' Patrick Kinahan makes a spirited argument that Boozer and Deron Williams will be better than much-beloved John Stockton and Karl Malone.

In completely unrelated news, Kinahan also believed in October of 2001 that George W. Bush would be our most popular president ever, proclaimed that tech stocks couldn't lose in February of 2001, bought tons of canned goods in December of 1999, picked Howard Dean to win the Democratic nomination in September of 2003, and was convinced that invading Cuba with an undermanned force was a good idea.

Unfortunately "to write" wasn't an option: Laurie Nyland listed made a list of 10 things she learned during the Jazz first game of the season. Number 11 may well be that she has to pay David Letterman royalty checks for stealing his gimmick.

Among the things she "learned:" Officials suck, announcers are generally uninteresting, and Mehmet Okur played a bad game. I didn't even watch the game and I could have told you all of those things.

Laurie, by the way, is described as filling the position of "Jazz Wife." Why the Jazz thought we needed the perspective of someone who's a "Jazz Wife" is curious as it implies that if you're a wife you can't be a fan in your own right. It might make sense if she was married to a Jazz player, but I'm pretty sure they could all do better (although the Pillow Fort incident indicates that Brewer might settle for anyone). If I was the Madame I would demand a "Jazz Husband" position for gender equality purposes, but only the Madame is that crazy. Luckily I know she won't read this because she'll be feeding her cat twinkies.

Outright theft: Keith Haney doles out Halloween costume ideas. Good thing no one did that recently. Especially not on this site.

At least his costumes were all NBA themed, but he left some obvious NBA based costumes out. Examples: The Second-Round monkey on Tracy McGrady's back, a member of Stephen Jackson's entourage, Torrey Ellis (looks strangely like Deron Williams), and Larry Miller's elbow. Nothing's scarier than Larry Miller's elbow. Nothing.

Nothing.