Michael Malone is taking the pettiest shots at Nuggets
Good morning, Winners! This is For The Win’s daily newsletter, The Morning Win. Did a friend recommend or forward this to you? If so, subscribe here. Here’s Mike Sykes.
Imagine getting fired from your job in the middle of trying to complete a big project. Yeah, I'd be pretty upset about it, too.
When you think about it like that, it's no wonder former Nuggets coach Michael Malone is being so shady toward his former team (and maybe even his best player?).
Malone joined ESPN's broadcast crew covering the NBA's conference finals action this postseason. That'd be awesome for him if he weren't hoping to be still coaching at this point. The Nuggets unceremoniously fired Malone with just three games left in the regular season before Denver headed into the playoffs.
One could argue that it worked out — the Nuggets made it to Game 7 in the second round of the playoffs before losing to the Thunder. They may have just been one player away from being able to head back to the Conference Finals. Would Denver have advanced that far under Malone? It's impossible to say.
But whatever. That's not what we're here to talk about. Nah. The topic of today is Michael Malone's pettiness, because we received it in abundance on Tuesday night.
Malone used his debut with ESPN to throw tons of shade at the Nuggets.
He called Oklahoma City's fans the "best fans in the world" when talking about the Thunder playing the Nuggets in Game 7 at home. This furrowed my brow.
What happened to Denver's fans, Michael?!? Weren't they the best? What happened?!?!?!?
He wasn't done there. Nope. Still had one more bridge to burn. After all of those years of supporting Nikola Jokic, he turned around and did this:
That's Malone explicitly calling Gilgeous-Alexander the league's MVP just a few months after saying Nikola Jokic was the MVP.
HMPH. WONDER WHAT CHANGED.
Now, there's a chance that Malone knows something about the MVP race that we don't. But, regardless, it's hard not to interpret this as a shot at Nikola Jokic, who didn't defend Malone after his unceremonious exit from Denver. We see what's happening here. This man is bringing petty back like Justin Timberlake brought sexy back in '06. I'm here for it.
Is this a bit rough to watch, considering all that Malone and the Nuggets had been through? Yes. Absolutely. But I can't blame him. I'd be doing the same thing.
Long live Petty Malone.
The Tush Push is outta here (probably)
The NFL hasn't voted on outlawing the Tush Push quite yet as of this newsletter's publishing, but all signs seem to indicate that the league will likely move forward with its ban.
The Athletic's Dianna Russini reports that the NFL's competition committee and player's health and safety committees have voted to ban the play, signaling that the owners will likely do the same.
I don't have much to say on this outside of what I said on Tuesday, which is that this is wack. Hopefully, Jason Kelce's argument is far more compelling than my own. He's arguing on behalf of the play one last time before it gets canned.
We'll see how this unfolds. I won't hold my breath.
A word on Around the Horn
Around the Horn is coming to an end this week. If you're a sports fan, you've probably loved and cherished this show for years. It took a difficult programming block right in the middle of that dead period before all the sports start for the night, and turned it into something magical for nearly two decades.
Our Charles Curtis wrote an excellent column on the show and how it's so different from the "embrace debate" culture we're used to watching on sports television these days.
This show left a legacy. It's so rare for television to do that these days.
Yes, we'll all remember the scoring that no one could figure out, watching names like Kevin Blackistone, J.A. Adande, Tim Cowlishaw, Bill Plaschke, Jackie MacMullan and Bob Ryan go toe-to-toe and Woody Paige's Hall of Fame run that included all those whimsical daily chalkboard messages.
But it's the way in which the show became thoughtful and honest -- led by Reali refusing to shy away from any of it, even from the devastating loss of one of his twin babies -- that should be what we all focus on as the curtains fall on a two-plus decades run. The panelists became a more diverse group -- Kimes, Clinton Yates, Sarah Spain, Pablo Torre and Israel Gutierrez among them -- and the topics had more inclusion.
The ways this show shaped me are immeasurable. I've never seen anything else quite like it. We'll probably never see anything like it again.
Do yourself a favor and read Charles' full column here. Maybe a few times, just to savor the moment.
Quick hits: Caitlin Clark on fearing the Fever ... Saban has an Emmy ... and more
— Meg Hall dropped her Q&A with Caitlin Clark. The Fever point guard talked about why she'd fear her team if she had to play against it.
— Nick Saban won an Emmy, guys. That's wild. Cory Woodroof has details.
— Shai Gigelous-Alexander shooting over his cousin on the NBA's biggest stage is so cool.
— Kenny Smith didn't like how Inside the NBA's contract negotiations with ESPN went. Yikes.
— Jordan Mailata had a cheeky reason for being fine with a Tush Push ban. Robert Zeglinski has more.
— Will the Bears get a Pope Leo bump? Bettors hope so. Blake Schuster has more.
That's a wrap, folks. Thanks for reading. Peace.
-Sykes ✌️