Congratulations, Philadelphia, your “camera phone” pictures (and this site?) have caught the attention of the Los Angeles Times. 

Kings GM Dean Lombardi thinks Mike Richards' and Jeff Carter's partying is much ado about nothing: [LA Times]

It only seemed as though everyone in Philadelphia owned a camera phone and managed to snap a picture of Jeff Carter and Mike Richards out on the town.

The pictures were all over the place when the two were running mates in their Flyers days and later when Richards headed to Los Angeles and Carter to Columbus in June. They resurfaced again when the duo was reunited by Thursday’s trade with the Kings sending defenseman Jack Johnson and a conditional first-round pick to Columbus in exchange for Carter.

“I think a lot of this stuff really got blown out of proportion,” Lombardi said. “As I told one guy, if somebody had taken pictures of me in college … I’d like to know if they had cameras around when you guys went out on Friday and Saturday night? How many of those pictures would have shown some things that probably were… this is something you do as a 21-year-old.”

“How many of us are in position to throw stones?” Lombardi said. “We were just never were celebrity enough where people wanted to take pictures of us. I do think that given our culture with TMZ and things, this stuff can get a little exaggerated.”

It sure can, Dean.

Photo courtesy St. Pete Beach Photo

Big news in Clearwater today-- Cliff Lee has an ab strain. He’s fine, it seems, but spoke with reporters and was completely indifferent to your injury concerns:

"Decided to skip my bullpen, which is a minor deal, and basically just play it safe at this point. I felt a lot better yesterday and today, and heading in the right direction.

Different than [the thing last year]. Similar to ab strains that I’ve had in the past, basically the early stages of that, and in the past I’ve tried to just power through it and I’m trying to be smarter with it now. Small issue now, so decided to skip the bullpen."

Whatever. 

Video of his comments, via Ryan Lawrence and the Delco Times, after the jump.

Photo: Mike Preston

Well... this is exciting. We think...?

According to Sixers PR man Mike Preston, Evan Turner just set a Guinness World Record for most shots made in a minute from behind the backboard, 14, at NBA All-Star Weekend festivities in Orlando.

Congrats, ET.

Thus fulfills your daily quotiant for random things. Video of Turner setting the record, via the NBA, is after the jump.

UPDATE: What a waste of energy this post was. Not an hour later, Ricky Rubio broke the record, with 18 shots in less than a minute. You'd think that they'd hold off on awarding winners until all contestants are done shooting, no? This whole thing is dumb.

Mike! I brought the jet ski! I brought the jet ski! Let's ride!!

I like to fancy this site a bit of a democracy (also, it’s day 3 of dog-sitting temperamental dog and I haven’t slept and don’t feel like writing anything myself). So, last night, when news broke that Jeff Carter would be heading west to join his Oh Captain My Captain, the former One Eight, Mike Richards, many of you sent Tweets, texts and emails expressing your joy, fear, LOLs and excitement over what promises to be a sexcapade for the ages-- two millionaire friends, torn apart then reunited on the opposite coast where the hunnies are beautiful and the legs are wide.

Some of you even requested that we form a CB West unit to cover all the goings on. I’ll think about it. Because this isn't going to end well:

Anyway, what you are about to read is an aggregation of your responses to the trade. I’m not sure if I should be proud or frightened that many of you reflexively thought of CB when the news broke. Disclaimer: The thoughts and accusations shared in these Tweets, texts and emails are not presented as fact. Rather, the reactions of Flyers fans who have some familiarity with the duo...

As always, Jeff Carter and Mike Richards reaction aggregation posts are best viewed while listening to Dave Matthews' You and Me. [click play]

Some Tweets are in response to me asking who the underrated winner in all this is: I say Justin Williams, because he'll benefit from the leftovers. Others, a reaction to news of the trade.

Reader Adam: 

I texted my buddy last night "How long before Carts catches the HIV in LA?"

His response was "However long it takes him to penetrate Richie...."

They have to be quasi gay together.  Not full blown gay, but frequently sword fighting gay, or checking each other out while they are tag teaming some Sea Isle Co-ed gay.

Reader J.T.: 

Scott Burnside article. And if you're still reading, I commend you. Because fuck Scott Burnside. But, I'll take whatever I can for hockey stories, especially involving Richards and Carter. By getting all the way through it, I found this gem: 

"Maybe Richards and Carter can find some sort of mojo and those stories of sowing their wild oats will become a footnote to something greater both personally and for the Los Angeles Kings. "

You know these guys get it in when a national (respected? No. God no.) hockey writer uses the term "sowing their wild oats" in a story, and uses it seriously. Are you fucking kidding me?

I miss having these two around. The stories are so much more fun when it's local, not on the left coast. 

J.T.

http://espn.go.com/blog/nhl/post/_/id/14950/kings-bet-on-carter-to-fulfill-teams-promise 

Reader Dave:

Sorry... I don't do the twitter or facebook thing.  Jeff Carter traded to LA for Jack Johnson and a 1st round pick.

Now Carter and Richards can go back to sucking each others birds.  If they win a Cup before we do I will kill them both.

Dave Q

(OneManWolfpack)

And they say it's always sunny here...

We were going to have some sort of a Flyers recap for those of you who didn’t stay up, but, you know, they didn’t score. We’ll just let Peter Laviolette sum up the game:

"At the end of the night, there was probably 15 quality chances, and the guy made the saves on them. Could we have gotten traffic on some other shots? I  don’t know. Maybe. The assessment of the second period is accurate, it was disgraceful. You’d like to think it serves as a wakeup call, because we’re in a playoff race and tonight is unacceptable. We eased our way into the first period, the second period was horseshit. Wake up and try to win a game in the third period."

No jam. Very little jam.

Video after the jump.

Courtesy CSN

Oooooohmaaaahgawd. Wet Island goes to the left coast. Look out, vaginas.

Jeff Carter is the gayest straight man in the world right now. He has been traded to Los Angeles, where he will join former teammate and best friend Mike Richards, who lives about 30 feet from a gorgeous beach. All west coast ladies are advised to paint a really pretty picture on their ceilings.

An email from reader Dave:

Yeah, it's weird. Carts missed Richie. So much so, in fact, that he took a private jet to see him in Canada this summer. CSN's John Boruk explains the relationship: 

Now, a pictorial retrospective, assembled from across the interwebtuals and previous Morning Carts posts:

Warning: Jeff Carter and Mike Richards pictorial retrospectives are best viewed while listening to Katy Perry's California Gurls. [click play]

CB Radio was live at 8:00 p.m.

We discussed whether we thought the Flyers were serious contenders. We mixed in some Sixers talk, and even had a bit of breaking news to report live on the air.

You can listen after the jump.

Eating cheesesteaks with little kids as part of a BlackBerry promotion!

A few weeks ago we told you about Scott Hartnell and the NHLPA partnering up with BlackBerry for the NHLPA Players' Playbook, a web series trying to be NHL 36 which is trying to be 24/7.

Anyway, the first video is posted and it features Hartnell eating cheesesteaks with his family. So very original it is.

Bonus video of ah Claude Giroux stammering through an ah interview ah. Both after the ah jump.