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8.22.2017

Welcome back to The Grip, which took a week off because all the news sucked. We would rather close up shop than report tweets, unless someone *ahem, Bleacher Report* was willing to pay us to report tweets, then we’d sell out faster than you can type G-O-O-D C-O-N-T-E-N-T.

THE STATE OF INDIANA VS. MAGIC JOHNSON

THE FILED TAMPERING CASE IS CLASSIC SMALL FISH VS. GOLIATH 

This summer has been bad for the small market teams.

Gordon Hayward left Utah virtually empty-handed after a six-year rebuild; Giannis INSERT-LAST-NAME-HERE said some ominous things about his career in Milwaukee; and, of course, Paul George told Indiana general manager Kevin Pritchard this: Trade me or I’m going to play out my miserable contract and leave for Los Angeles.

Pritchard, overseeing a roster that once upon a time took the mighty Miami Heat to a seventh game in the Eastern Conference Finals, blew up the final and most important piece, sending George to Oklahoma City for a decent player and an essential prospect.

But the bad blood from George’s way-too-early L.A. courtship apparently remains, because Indiana filed a complaint against the Lakers on Aug. 19, according to long-time NBA scribe Peter Vecsey, which alleged newly-appointed front office member Magic Johnson illegally tampered with and recruited George.

The ultimate punishment is severe and could possibly bar the Lakers from signing George; of course, that is highly, highly unlikely.

But Indiana has a case (remember this Kimmel segment?), and seems to be more-less trying to expose Magic Johnson as a non-front office type who has no freaking idea what he’s doing. Remember, Johnson used to work for the Lakers on a more vague, consultant basis, and has been accused of this before, but it’s a lot more serious now because he’s one of a handful actually calling the shots.

Again, it’s a near-given that nothing will actually come of this, but it’s fun to see Indiana flipping off showtime.

(It’s not the first time Magic crushed the hearts of Indiana basketball lovers.)

THE JUICE IS PROFUSE-LY SORRY 

The good news for O.J Mayo: He’s only the second most scrutinized athlete in modern American sports with a first name doubling as a breakfast drink.(Is O.J. predominantly a breakfast drink? Do people drink O.J. after noon?)The bad news: He’s still kind of in trouble.The embattled journeyman, a high school phenom and the third overall pick in 2008, gave his first interview since being banned for at least two seasons last summer for repeated failed drug tests.He is sorry, he is lonely, he wants his job back and he apparently has a rich family history of drug and alcohol abuse. The initial reaction may be to turn up your nose at a vastly rich person like Mayo, but to us, cases like this always end up being more sad than polarizing. Tap here for the Sports Illustrated exclusive.

QUICK HITS

• The case of New York Knicks first round draft choice Frank Ntilikina versus the neighbors with an in-ground hoop continues. We can confirm that that in-ground hoop is really nice. One of us might actually have handily beaten a member of that household in H-O-R-S-E the other weekend. It wasn’t even close, actually.

• Leandro Barbosa got some serious FOMO (see comments section) 

• LeBron James hates Donald Trump. Here’s the part where we report tweets.

• NBA Reddit went back and found this horrific clickbait from Bleacher Report in 2012, where some guy definitively tells us Kawhi Leonard IS the biggest bust of the draft.

CONCRETE READS 

• Fansided’s Ti Windisch revisits the story behind the Milwaukee Buck’s acquisition of Kareem in 1969. Back then, Kareem was just a college prodigy named Lew Alcindor, there was no NBA lottery -- thus no tanking -- and the two worst teams from each division flipped a coin for the first draft pick. Of course the Suns lost that. [Tap Here]

• Some writer for SLCDunk that goes by AllthatAmar preaches to millennials about just how good John Stockton was. If you can get past the clickbaity title, there’s some fascinating stats in there. For example: Stockton was more likely to finish a game with 16 or more assists than 5 or fewer assists. [Tap Here]

A TIMELESS WATCH

Did you know Manute Bol had range? Wanna see a 7-foot-7 flagpole nail six three-pointers? Of course you do. R.I.P. Manute. [Watch here]

#throwbackeveryday

August 22, 1951: To rival the communist youth in East Germany, the US sends The Harlem Globetrotters to Berlin's Olympic Stadium. They perform in front of 75,052 people -- their biggest crowd ever. And there was a special guest in attendance - the legendary Jesse Owens.