Round 1 of the TWB NBA Draft Lottery Mascot Challenge was a rousing success! We now up the stakes as last week's winners face off against each other for a shot at the Sweet 16. There will be humor, surprises, and fights to the death! What are you waiting for? Let's vote!

Athlete Region

Joe Mauer vs. Adrian Peterson

vs.

After knocking out their first round opponents, the two biggest stars on the Minnesota sports scene will face off in a battle for a spot in the Sweet 16.  I'm sure that this one will come down to whether we have more Twins or Vikings fans on the site, however, as an outside observer, I pose this question:  If Adrian were charging down the 3rd base line towards Mauer at home plate, does Adrian kill him, or does Mauer hold onto the ball and save the run?

Click "Read More" below to view the rest of our match-ups!

After pouring through close to 100 nominees in our NBA Draft Lottery Mascot Challenge, the TWB staff has narrowed the field to 64 contenders!  The bracket is divided into four regions: one for athletes, one for celebrities, one for TV/Movie Characters, and one for complete and utter randomness.  You can click the image below to view a full-sized image of the complete bracket.

We'll be kicking off the first-round voting tomorrow, starting with the Celebrity Region.  Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday we'll have daily voting for each of the three remaining regions, and on Friday we'll announce the first-round winners.  Next week, we'll narrow things down to the Elite Eight, and then the following week, we'll crown our mascot, just in time for the Lottery!

Be sure to check in each day and vote!  When John Wall or Evan Turner is wearing a Wolves jersey, you'll be glad you did!

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Picture life on some idle Tuesday, mid-Fall in the year 201x. Whatever age you happen to be, picture you live a ho-hum routine, living in a podunk town. You don't live a very exciting life, but your job happens to be kind of entertaining and interesting. You aren't particularly good at your job, but pretend that it involves presenting to a small audience on a daily basis. While you have an interesting job, you aren't the best speaker in the world. You stutter at times, are not persuasive, and tell bad jokes. However, the catch is you are extremely good looking. For the most part. You have a large mole on your face, but it is only visible from a certain angle. Similar in concept to Barbara Streisand's Toyota Camry-sized nose. However, due to your looks, audiences remain more engaged with your dry material despite the minor abnormality.

Now let's take this a step further. It's Tuesday and you have no presentations that day. You stumble into work late, rather unmotivated, as you have certainly been lately. You fill up your coffee from the office  coffee machine and prepare your agenda for the remainder of the week. Suddenly your phone rings and your boss wants to talk. Terrified, you stumble down to your boss' office, and slowly open the door.

"Sit down," your boss says. You take a seat on the black leather chair and struggle adjusting the arm rests. Your boss chomps on a frosted, rainbow sprinkle covered donut before presenting you with a 10- page document you barely understand.

"So, I want to talk to you about your performance. Basically we understand you aren't great at your job, however you have a component that is rare. You, son, are damn sexy. With that said, I am here to present you with a 400% increase in your salary."

Where am I going with this? Click "Read More" to continue

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(I hail from Donetsk.  It's in the USSR.)

My buddy Don over at With Malice... started the NBA "Unsung Player Day" April 5th two years ago, and it has been an ongoing celebration of the NBA's most unhearalded players.  In case you are not familiar, here are the parameters in which Don has outlined for potential candidates:

"Yup, I'm declaring April 5th ‘Unsung Player Day'... we should recognize the guys who toil and work hard every day, for no recognition. Well, today's your day. In reality, these guys are just as responsible for making the NBA what it is today - every team needs role-players, guys to come on and give that valuable 2-5 minutes. Without them, there is no NBA. I would encourage NBA bloggers to put up an ‘unsung player' on their blog on April 5th. (Original linking piece)"

Last year TWB nominated Sheldon Williams, because he is clearly amazing. Amazing in the way that his wife is a better basketball player than he is.  And probably his small baby girl too. Let's just move on.

So this year we are nominating the immortal Oleksiy Pecherov. Also known as "O-Pech", "Big Oily", "I Get Buckets, Son", "Stewie", and "The White Hole".  I don't know about you guys, but I don't think his passing abilities are very appreciated by anyone outside the state of Minnesota.  For example, his career rate is 1 assist per every 52 minutes and 12 seconds of game action.  However, this year he's averaging 1 assist per every 40 minutes or so of game action! Whoa Nelly!  That shows me he's really putting in the effort to be a team player, and stepping up his game exponentially.  By the year 2023, he could very well be averaging 5 or 6 assists PER GAME.

(Trust us, his skills are improving)

I mean, look at it this way.  Big Oily was a throw in for the amazing "Mike Miller + Randy Foye for the Wizards 5th overall pick" trade (HAHAHAAHA BWAHAHAHAHAHA pause... breathe... HAHAHAHA LOLOLOLOL OH MY GOD AHAHAHAHAH!!!!) This past off-season, the Wolves signed Ryan Hollins (ummm yeah, pause)  for something like $7 million over three years.  I can't be bothered to look up the specifics of his contract right now, because he's worthless.  Seriously, he's like not-having-opposable-thumbs worthless.  This year Ryan Hollins has snagged a mind-blowing 206 rebounds in 1,221 minutes played.  He also has 199 personal fouls over those same amount of minutes.  If you didn't know, he's also 7 feet tall.  What I just told you must set some sort of record.  Ryan Hollins couldn't grab 8 boards in a lumberyard.  I mean, seriously.  He is 7 feet tall and he's averaging 1 rebound per every 6 minutes played.  And on top of that, this season he almost has MORE FOULS THAN REBOUNDS!

Back to my man Oleksiy Pecherov.  Like Ryan Hollins, he is also 7 feet tall, but he rips down a rebound once every 3.6 minutes.  And we got him FOR FREE!  He's only played 447 minutes this year, which is 8 billion minutes less than he should have played compared to Ryan Hollins. Please note that he has only committed 55 personal fouls this year, which is less than half the number of rebounds he has.

Let's see... what else.  Oleksiy can also shoot three pointers, if pressed, as he's a 29% 3-PT shooter for his career.  Not great, but it's not like he's the absolutely worst of all time.  He's close to the all-time worst, but close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.  (For everyone at home, Ryan Hollins has never made a three point shot in his NBA career.)

Oleksiy is a career 79% free throw shooter, but this year he's shooting a blistering 90.6%.  Don't mind the sample size, and for what its worth, I say we resign him PRONTO.

He has one third the amount of turnovers compared to Hollins this season (32 vs 95), and in about 40% the amount of minutes played (447 vs 1221.)  Wait, we signed Ryan Hollins by choice?

Ok, this is getting depressing.  I didn't make this post to rip Ryan Hollins, but good god he sucks balls.  Just go look at all these awesome pictures of The White Hole:

(Oleksiy need more lift weights)




(Oleksiy happy face)




(Oleksiy sad face)




(Oleksiy towers over opposition)




(Oleksiy constipated face)




(Oleksiy drafted face.)

All of the above just goes to show that Oleksiy Pecherov is clearly underrated, and the 2009-10 Minnesota Timberwolves most viable candidate for this year's "Unsung Player" Award.

So, the Wolves play the Lakers tonight. Unless you have NBA League Pass or are attending, you unfortunately will not be able to watch. Seriously.  Is this the only Laker's game that is untelevised nationally all year, and the Wolves aren't even carrying it on Fox Sports? Seems a little off to me.

Anyhow, Don from With Malice and I exhanged some questions late last night. Check out his fellow Bloguin blog where he will likely have a Q&A with tours truly posted later today. Here goes:

MR: I'll let you defend yourself: why do you think so many NBA fans hate the Lakers and Kobe?

D: I'd put it down to jealousy.  Success breeds it, and there's no denying the success of the franchise.  That they'll at the very least compete at the upper levels is almost a given season-to-season... and Kobe?  Well, there's no denying that in the past he's appeared pretty smug.  That's gone now, but he still is - largely - paying the price.

MR: Why is Adam Morrison still on your roster?

D: Simple.  A little bit of monetary relief.

MR: Why do you think the Wolves had such a terrible 2nd half of the season? Aren't young teams supposed to grow over the course of a season?

D: One would hope... but I think it's more that young teams "grow".  Sometimes that growth is to experience a godawful season - such as Minnesota have this season.

MR: You are the new GM of the Wolves. You have our roster, Rubio, Pekovic's rights, the 3rd, 16 and 24 pick in the draft. Let's see what you'd do this summer.

D: Ok... the caveat in this is I'm operating with no real knowledge of the T-Wolves.  I think I've watched 2 games this season, and this is on about 20 minutes research...

The reality is that regardless of space, you're not attracting a top-notch free agent.  I doubt even David Lee (you don't need Lee anyway).  Accept that, move on.

Let go of one of your two decent bigs (no, not Nathan Jawai)... if I were GM, I basically let go the one who would garner me the most value - I think that would be Jefferson, and I'd be happy with that.  I think Love has greater long-term value.  The only hiccup might be Jefferson's contract - but I think he's still pretty good value at 12 mil per (tho' who knows with the looming CBA!).

The only problem would be what do you get in return?  I think that Minnesota need a quality swingman, and Andre Iguodala would be a perfect fit.  Would Philadelphia be interested?  Maybe not, but there should be enough interest in Jefferson that a third team mightn't be too hard to find.  Anyway... something along the lines of Iggy (you might be able to send him BACK to Boston in a sign-and-trade for Ray Allen plus something...) would work well.

Fight like blazes to get Darko to stay - I think he still has value at the 5.  Between he and Hollins you might be able to get most of a game done.  Perhaps give Love some time there and go small.

Make up your mind who is going to be the PG of this team and run with that.  Hold onto Rubio's rights if you've got to, but cut one of Sessions or Flynn.  Either would give a bit of value in return, but let one go.  At the moment you're just stifling both of them.

The caveat here is if Turner falls to you.  He'd be a PERFECT fit, and if that happens, then I use Jefferson plus whatever PG interests whoever to get a good center.  

2nd pick - take a punt on a guy - someone who's a risk with high upside... or get a spot up sharp-shooter.

MR: Give us your two cents on the NBA playoffs, matchups and who you've got this year.

D: Briefly: I think LA'll be fine.  I actually think that Cleveland (from Rd 2 on) will have more difficulty up to the ECF than LA will.  LA will get to the WCF, and match up against either Denver or Dallas.  And it will go 7... but I think the homecourt will be telling.  Despite the recent play (which hasn't bothered me overly), LA will get to the Finals.  And most likely meet either Cleveland or Orlando.  What happens from that point on is anyone's guess... but I still like LA to win the ring.

Cheers!