I tried to take it all in. Each story and remembrance of Seau and his acts of charity and friendship left me pondering the larger issues of depression and suicide. It’s too early to make the leap that football and injuries sustained during his lengthy NFL career are the root cause. Analysis will be done on his brain and will help to fill in some of the answer.

But, the answer will never be complete.

Of all the interviews I’ve heard/seen or transcripts read on the issue, Marcellus Wiley’s appearance on ESPN and the following piece from USA Today with Basketball Hall of Famer Bill Walton resonated with me. Walton had spoken openly in the past about his own thoughts of suicide when a back injury left him bed-ridden for a long period.

Bill Walton talks about Junior Seau’s death .

From the article — “surveyed over 1,000 adults as to the athletes they considered influential, while also assessing their likeability and awareness levels. Only those known to at least 20 percent of the respondents were considered.”

Tom Van Riper, who wrote the piece noted that boxing champ Manny Pacquiao was familiar to only 12% of those polled and was therefore left off of the list.

I suspect that the same poll taken today might shift those result. Who didn’t hear sportswriters and talking heads (self included) yelling about the miserable spectacle put on by Pacquiao and “Sugar” Shane Mosley on Saturday night? Seriously, it ranked among the more miserable sporting experiences I’ve witnessed in some time. Dance … dance … hug … tap gloves … dance … dance …

I digress. Let’s count down the top 5 from the article, starting with Olympic hero Michael Phelps.

5. Michael Phelps, USA Swimming — Forget that the stage disappears for long stretches. Dominance is dominance.
4. Shaquille O’Neal, NBA — “Blue Chips” actor & rapper extraordinaire. “The Diesel” doesn’t dominate as he used to, but the pitchman remains one of the biggest names in the game & best soundbyte artists
3. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. — Hendrick Motorsports — Doesn’t matter that he can’t win a race (now over 100 straight races without a trip to Victory Lane), the brand is huge
2. Tom Brady – New England Patriots — Take the shots at his hair, dancing, the team’s recent playoff failures or his tears when recounting that draft day in 2000. Anything the guy does attracts attention. The fact that Gisele is usually on his arm doesn’t hurt.
1. Jimmie Johnson — Hendrick Motorsports — Winning. He’s not flashy, but he’s always atop the heap in the end. What else needs to be said?

Check out the entire article here .

I joked that I wasn’t going to sit and watch Game 7 after investing a ridiculous number of hours watching the three-month marathon that is the NBA Playoffs. Rip Van Winkle awoke to see that nothing had changed. The never-ending investigation of USC athletics … ended. Ubaldo won 13 games … almost as many as the Orioles.

In the end, I invested another three hours and was misera …. umm, entertained, by the final game of the season. I nearly fell asleep in the free-throw shooting festival of whistles that was the fourth quarter. Seriously, that was just painful to watch, particularly as the Lakers clanked free throw after free throw (they would convert two-thirds of their free throws for the game).

It came down to loose balls and rebounds. Period. True to form, the victor in Game 7 was the team that won the rebounding war. The Lakers out-rebounded the Kendrick Perkins-less Celtics by a margin of 13 overall (15 more offensive rebounds to offset the pathetic shooting display). At the center of the action was the dynamic duo, MVP Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol. They combined to shoot a miserable 12-for-40, but lived at the free throw line and scored 42 points to go along with the astounding total of 33 rebounds.

The fact that Ray Allen couldn’t buy a bucket, Rondo has yet to develop an outside shot (his late three-pointer, notwithstanding) and there was little movement and ability to get to the bucket in the fourth quarter when the worm turned. Again, I saw the shots of Kendrick Perkins all suited up on the sidelines and wondered how this final game would have changed had he been able to participate in this one. If nothing else, there would have been five (or six) more hard fouls to give and Rasheed Wallace’s minutes could have been metered out a little bit more. I have to say that Glen “Big Baby” Davis was tremendous in this one, providing quality minutes and, well, a big body down low to at least give the Celtics a rebounding option (nine in his 20 minutes and change).

In a contest replete with as many missed shots as celebrity sightings, we did at least get the appearance of Brian Scalabrine for 51 seconds. More than a few Michael Rapaport references were made in sports bars and homes across America, and I just started yelling about “beautiful girls making you dizzy … like you’ve been drinking Jack and Coke all morning.” Seriously, I’m a fan – go rent “Big Fan” with Patton Oswalt and Rapaport (gets you jonesing for football after this rough-and-tumble Game 7).

Bryant won the Bill Russell MVP Award, although I still think they should take it to a metal shop and give Gasol half.

I mentioned Bryant’s rebounding before. There was where he shone on Thursday. His outside shot was terrible, and we can credit some good perimeter defense from Ray Allen. Bryant missed a number of free throws as well, but got to work on the glass.

And, his supporting cast picked him up. Derek Fisher knocked down a big three-pointer. Ron Artest (wearing No. 37 in the reverse of Dennis Rodman’s No. 73 during his Lakers tenure) knocked down a huge three-point shot off of a Bryant pass and did his best Rodman “thank you very much” acknowledgment to the crowd. He also caught a pass while cutting across the lane and tossed up a shot, hitting the ensuing free throw, to aid that fourth-quarter barrage.

Artest had been invisible for much of this series, leading many to start bringing up the name of former Lakers stopper, Trevor Ariza, who was swapped out for Artest this offseason. His 20 points, 5 rebounds and 5 steals helped carry the Lakers this evening and silenced the critics.

Some fans will start looking ahead to next week’s draft and the all-important July 1 beginning of free agency. I’m frankly shocked that I wasn’t offered a live look-in on LeBron James’ facial expressions while watching this Game 7. That might have been as entertaining as this slugfest. I’m counting down the six weeks until the start of NFL training camps.

Raise a glass to Kobe Bryant on winning his fifth title and to Phil Jackson on his 11th. The Artest experiment worked.

Now, how much does Phil want No. 12? Kobe was already talking up another run for a title.

Let’s put it on the shelf for awhile and enjoy the boys of summer.

PS – Can someone write the NBA equivalent of “One Shining Moment?”

“You can see the frustration on Phil Jackson’s face because he knows what’s happening.”

When asked point blank if Phoenix would win Game 4, Donaghy responded with this: “I’m not saying it’s a definite thing, but they’ll get the benefit of the calls.”

“It’s obvious how the referees are trained and programmed to put the teams that are down in the series at an advantage.”

Sigh. The home team got aggressive and drove the ball to the hoop. They didn’t settle for jumpshots and tried to force the action against the wounded Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol. They did the same thing on Tuesday night. Bynum scored 12 points with eight rebounds, while Gasol added 15 points and five boards.

Look at the difference in the Los Angeles offense. They shot 33 three-point shots combined in games 1 and 2. In the past two games in Phoenix, the Lakers chucked up 60 three-point shots (connecting on 30%). They out-shot the Suns marginally on Tuesday overall, but Phoenix amassed 19 more all-important foul shots (15 more makes).

You go into the box score and you also see another couple troubling notes for the Lakers. The Lakers were -16 with Bynum on the court and -21 in Shannon Brown’s 13:38 of action. Brutal.

Donaghy claims that he was told to manipulate games and in pre-game meetings, told what to call and what to look for in games. He did clarify those statements to explain that he was never explicitly ordered to produce a specific outcome, although it had been implied.

He’s basically equating the NBA to soap operas and the WWE. You know it’s scripted. You get sucked into the drama, anyway. I guess Donaghy’s next book will have a chapter or two about the league’s partnership with TNT. “We know drama.” I want an investigation about the hours of “Law & Order” re-runs that I’m losing to NBA coverage, too.

Seriously, the whispers have always been there. The frozen envelope for the Knicks. The 2008 NBA Draft Lottery win by the Bulls … and countless other examples are cited. Fire up the telestrators and game film and we can find 1,000,000 uncalled traveling violations, big men camping in the lane for a week, palming, push-offs, “dirty” screens and touch fouls that altered substitution rotations and game flow.

I do appreciate that everyone remembers the lesson out of Woodward & Bernstein: “Follow the money.” I do.

Do I believe that the league would like to see Los Angeles and Boston battle again? There’s no question about it. With most of the stars still around from that historic rivalry (just find an online feed for an LA or Boston radio station), you’re likely to run into one of them.

I get the basic economic principles at play. More games equals more butts in seats, ad sales, marketing opportunities and so on …

Do I believe that David Stern is working an invisible hand to manipulate the outcomes of games? No chance. There’s enough human error in trying to keep up and call 48 minutes of activity with some of the greatest athletes in sports. There are enough bang-bang plays to force quick decisions. Superstars get calls. That’s the nature of sport.

- In baseball, hitters or pitchers get the call on the edges based on their histories. Just ask Boggs or Maddux.
- In football, established linemen rarely get called for a hold, even if they’re mauling the charging defender. Established receivers get to put to push-off a bit and rarely get an offensive PI call.
- I need only one word here. QUARTERBACKS
- The referee looks the other way when the manager throws a foreign object into the ring.

Wait. That last one isn’t helping my point.

“Follow the money.” A direct link back to Commissioner Stern sees that money walking over to another sport and his work toward global domination swirling down the drain.

Might Donaghy eventually be tagged as basketball’s Jose Canseco? You know what I mean. He’s a man with questionable motives looking to sell a tell-all book and generating controversy. Canseco’s allegations have proven true time and again. Will Donaghy’s? He predicted a Suns win in Game 4 and got his W. Predicting games on a national radio/tv show, as Mr. Patrick pointed out, seemed to be a dubious move, but Donaghy did it nonetheless. In this case, he’ll need more corroboration from other officials and executives or a paper trail or positive drug tests as were obtained in the Major League Baseball inquiries.

I have to ask this … if David Stern was operating things in the matter Donaghy suggested, why wouldn’t the calls have shifted in the Lakers’ direction in light of his radio appearance? Wouldn’t the Commissioner flip a double-bird in the air to Donaghy and call off the Code Red? Don’t tell me that the hotline didn’t ring in the Commissioner’s office once Donaghy’s segment began to air. He’s ever-vigilant about his brand.

Now, push that aside for a minute. I do have a bone to pick with the Commissioner’s office about collecting checks from owners and front office folks (Mark Cuban and Steve Kerr) while chiming in about his desired destination for King James. I’ll save that rant for tomorrow.