Last night, as I watched the Celtics go scoreless for the first four minutes in game five against the Pistons, I found myself thinking “This stuff is unwatchable. It’s bad enough to make Teddy switch over to American Idol again.”  And it didn’t end any prettier than it began – with more than five minutes left to play in the game Boston had 71 points. They finished with 75. In game four, of the CONFERENCE FINALS, the Celtics scored just four points in the final five minutes and zero points in the final two-and-a-half minutes. They shot a worse-than-miserable 31%, and if you’re thinking this was just an off game, think again. The conference championships have seen such beauties as a 15 point Q3 by the Lakers in game three, a 15 point Q2 by Detroit in game three, a 14 point Q4 by the Spurs in game 2, and a 13 point Q4 by SA in game 1. And if you think any of this is the result of stifling defense, as opposed to putrid offense, you haven’t been watching (and lucky you.)

I keep thinking that one of these days we're going to get a pro-athlete type of effort from TWO teams, in a supposed "best of the best" confrontation. But . . .

That even one person still tunes into watch this crap is testament to the solid job done by the NBA marketing machine. And sports betting.

And Tim Donaghy was probably just tossing sour grapes when he said that point spread abuse is much wider than any of us could imagine. Yeah, right . . .

I had a Ted-like moment myself, in the same game, LA vs. SA game 3. The action on my screen was so riveting I caught myself channel-flipping, and landed what might be the worst bit of programming on the tube, except of course for ‘Kardashian’ and that despicable excuse for a human being Nancy Grace. I was going to blog on it, because it was sports related, sort of; Super Bowl related, sort of. But it wasn’t on ESPN. It was on Animal Planet. Anyone catch “The Puppy Bowl?” They take a couple of puppies, drop them into a miniature football field/stadium, and watch them play with each other to the tune of what sounds like a cheap porno sound track. That’s it, that’s all there is – one half hour of puppies playing on a tiny football field. So many channels, so little to watch . . .

Ya gotta feel for anyone who bet the Cubbies on Sunday – 2 outs, bottom 9, a 5-4 win in hand when McLouth pops one up to left field for what will be the third out. But wait – that’s Soriano territory because Lou (“My name’s Forrest. People call me Forrest”) Pinella doesn’t make the necessary 9th inning defensive change. Score tied when Soriano drops it, and Pitt wins in the 11th, the second day in a row that the Cubs blow a ninth inning lead and go on to lose.

Cub fans are like Charlie Brown, every year they think that Lucy is not going to pull that football away at the last minute.

What do female bears on birth control and the World Series have in common? No Cubs. (Thanks to my pal the Dago for that one.)

At the beginning of the year Big Poppy was Big Pop-out, and I thought that the Red Sox might have to stick Ted in the microwave on high for three minutes (not our Ted, I mean the Splendid Splinter, AKA the Patient Popsicle.) But he’s got his average up to .247 now, with 12 HR’s, and the Sox lead the AL in batting average and runs scored. But the O’s are hanging in there (yeah, right.)

I didn’t get a chance to pop in a free MLB play using the Ov/Un profile last week, as it only was active in one game (5/22, Milw/Pit Ov; Winner) and I needed it to close the week strong after a slow start with my daily package (6-1 Fri/Sat/Sun.) It’s charted at 6-3 and we should start getting more than one play per week now; I’ll get the next one in as a free play, regardless of where my week is. Watch for it. And as long as ‘The Willie Watch” is on, don’t bet the Metz . . .