Is "Baller" Trademarked Yet?

On Friday, the WNBA will hold an expansion draft for the Golden State Valkyries.  While there almost certainly won’t be any stars that would be selected in this draft, there are several interesting role players or young players with upside.  As such, I would like to discuss who I would select.  While I would normally make predictions, there is one snag that makes this difficult. The general rules are that Golden State can select up to 1 player per team, and up to 12 players total.   Each team can protect 6 players, and these players can be either under contract or are free agents (in which case the team will protect their rights).   Any player who have already been signed with a core designation are ineligible to be selected in this draft, so teams don’t have to protect them.   If Golden State selects a free agent or unsigned drafted player, they are selecting the rights to this player.   Teams have the ability to make a trade with Golden State to ha...

Now that the WNBA season has been over for a few weeks, it is impossible to deny the on-court success that the league had this year.  This season consisted of historic performances, record viewers, several players who appear to be future stars in the league, current stars putting up insane performances, and a 5-game Finals between the two best teams in the league.  That said, there are two things that the league (especially from the commissioner’s side) majorly failed at and likely aren’t going to make any adjustments regarding going forward since nobody is discussing it anymore, which are racial issues involving players and player safety.  I initially was not going to write about either of these since there was a lot of discussion about both, especially from people who were not the most well-versed in either matter, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to contribute to this, but after much consideration, I believe I have input regarding these topics that are valuable and are not b...

Game 5 of the WNBA Finals is in the books, and New York won 67-62.  It was a terrible game that I’d prefer not to revisit…so let’s revisit it with my observations.   That game was horrible This was a bad game both offensively and defensively, yet people praised it as a thriller since it went into overtime.   New York shot 30.6% from the floor and 8.7% from 3 (while also taking 25 free throws) and Minnesota shot 37.1% from the field and 15.8% from 3.   On top of that, neither team played good defense, as there were several instances where I noted players had wide open looks that missed or where teams missed blatant assignments.   Overall, the part of this game that was a thriller was when it ended since I was thrilled this atrocity was done; it was cruel after an amazing series.   The refereeing was…a bit one-sided, to be generous This has been a talking point since the game and has been a bit controversial with pretty serious accusations being m...

The NBA season is here!  After an exciting and interesting offseason, the season is set to start!  In my predictions, I am discussing my standings predictions, playoff predictions, award predictions, and my analysis of each team (I put that last since I know most of you care about that a lot less than I do); in the analysis, I discussed each team and several key players, an x-factor role player from each team, and the best and worst case scenario for each team.  Enjoy! Standings East Boston Celtics New York Knicks Philadelphia 76ers Milwaukee Bucks Cleveland Cavaliers Indiana Pacers Orlando Magic Miami Heat Atlanta Hawks Toronto Raptors Detroit Pistons Chicago Bulls Charlotte Hornets Brooklyn Nets Washington Wizards   West Oklahoma City Thunder Minnesota Timberwolves Denver Nuggets Dallas Mavericks Phoenix Suns New Orleans Pelicans Sacramento Kings Houston Rockets Memphis Grizzlies Golden State Warriors Los Angeles Lakers Los...