Sporting News recently named Vince Young the 2009 NFL Comeback Player of the Year. He took over an 0-6 Tennessee Titans team and led them to an 8-8 record while rebuilding his image on and off the field.

I’m sure he’s doing some partying in the offseason because he’s 26 years old and rich, but Young is also trying to help others. He donated 10 grand at the Houston for Haiti concert and he made the video below for the kids. Like ODB, VY is for the children. You will appreciate his honesty.

The person I want to see this video is JaMarcus Russell. Not because he needs to learn better study habits (even though he does) but because he needs to learn how to wear his jewelry. See how VY’s rockin’ one chain JaMarcus? That’s cool, it’s not overdone. Walking around looking like the Iceman is stupid.

Welcome back to the 20th edition of Diary of a Clippers fan, where the biggest news is the selection of Los Angeles Clippers center Chris Kaman as an All-Star replacement for injured Portland Trail Blazer Brandon Roy. Kaman’s inclusion as a reserve for the February 14th game makes him the first Clipper all star since Elton Brand in 2006 and will definitely make a lot of Clipper fans (who felt he was initially snubbed) happy.

Kaman will join teammate Eric Gordon in representing the Clippers as a participant in All-Star weekend, with Gordon set to play in the Rookie/Sophomore game and possibly in the Slam Dunk competition. While the Kaman news was a nice surprise, it comes after the Clips lost their first game of the post-Mike Dunleavy coaching era, 98-81 against the San Antonio Spurs.

NBA All-Star – So easy a Kaman can do it.

Everyone had been anxiously awaiting the chance to break free from Dunleavy’s rigorous half-court sets, including new coach Kim Hughes and point guard Baron Davis, but boy were the results ugly. As Kevin Arnovitz (ClipperBlog/ESPNLosangeles.com) pointed out in a column after the game, the transition between coaches and playing styles is rarely an easy one in the NBA. An excerpt is below:

“I hope we run like crazy,” Hughes said. “More transition, early offense attack. More of a free-flowing offense.”

In that spirit, Hughes turned the play calling over to point guard Baron Davis, who has been eager to orchestrate a more improvisational offense for the Clippers. The results of the experiment were ugly. After scoring the game’s first four points, the Clippers surrendered an 18-0 run to the Spurs and never recovered. They were unable to get good looks at the basket, when they got looks at all. The Clippers converted only eight field goals in the first half but accumulated 15 turnovers.

The team cut down on the turnovers in the second half, finishing with 21, but the damage had been done. While Davis is sure to find a rhythm without Dunleavy soon, his first game gave a glimpse of how difficult the change can be, as he finished with a game high eight turnovers in only 28 minutes of playing time.

The decision to drop Dunleavy was one that made headlines across the NBA and was the topic of plenty of conversations, including one caught caught on camera between Pardon The Interruption’s (PTI) Michael Wilbon and ESPN NBA analyst/former player Jon Barry, in which Wilbon suggests eliminating the Clippers altogether may be the best solution. While it was a low blow, it’s probably an accurate gauge of how those outside Clipper Nation feel, which makes the Kaman news a even more satisfying given the tendency to make us the butt of all jokes.

Now we just have to cross our fingers that the Kaman who shows up is the one who can lead the break and finish with a behind the back assist to his teammate and not the one that airballs layups.

Kaman is averaging 20 points and nine rebounds a game and is of course on of the most unique (see: possibly crazy) Clippers in the last decade, so it will be interesting – to say the least – to see how All-Star weekend will turn out with all those cameras in his face. One thing is certain though, since his free time will be taken up playing basketball and not back having fun with guns in Michigan, Ford Tauruses across the country are breathing a sigh of relief.

PS, it probably wouldn’t be a smart idea to let David Stern, who chose Kaman for the game, see that video until after next Sunday, so shhhh.

-Will.

“Diary of a Clippers Fan” will be published Mondays and Thursdays during the regular season.

Drew Brees won the Super Bowl MVP with his incredible 32-39, 288 yards, two TD performance. After falling behind 10-0 and going three and out on their first two series, Brees and the Saints took control of the game. Brees went 3-7 in the first quarter and 29-32 the rest of the way and one of those incompletions was when he spiked the ball to stop the clock. As the star of the night and hero of the Gulf Coast region Brees gave the traditional “I’m Going to Disney World” announcement which was quickly flipped into a commercial. This is the first in what will likely be a long line of endorsement deals for Brees.

Congrats to Brees and the New Orleans Saints.

Here’s Drew Brees at Disney World for the parade:

Former NBA player and coach Avery Johnson was born and raised in New Orleans and is a life-long Saints fan. Being who he is gave him access to the tunnel after the game where he congratulated the players and posed with the Lombardi Trophy with head coach Sean Payton. I’m guessing Johnson, like the city of New Orleans, is still up celebrating the Saints Super Bowl win.

Trailing 24-17 with 3:24 remaining in the Super Bowl it was reasonable to assume that Peyton Manning would lead his team down the field for the game tying touchdown. He and the Colts had the ball at the Saints’ 31 and were facing a third and five when Tracy Porter stepped in front of a pass intended for Reggie Wayne and returned it 74 yards for the game clinching touchdown. Let the Peyton Manning is a choker talk begin.

Not that any member of this team will ever have to pay for a meal again in New Orleans, but Sean Payton, Drew Brees, and Tracy Porter can run for office.

The New Orleans Saints continued the healing of their city and region with a tough, 31-17 come from behind win over the Indianapolis Colrts in Super Bowl XLIV. Peyton Manning and the Colts jumped out to a 10-0 lead, but by the end of the game Drew Brees and the New Orleans defense were in control.

It’s been four and a half years since Hurricane Katrina pounded the Gulf Coast, and the area, including the city of New Orleans, hasn’t finished the rebuilding process. After watching what the Saints accomplished tonight there’s no doubt that New Orleans will be back and better than ever. The team represented more than 53 men working together to possibly win a championship. They carried the hopes and dreams of their community onto the field and they didn’t let them down. Congratulations to the Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints and to all the people that tied their personal comeback to the football team.

Mark it down on your calendars Clipper fans, because Thursday February 4th is now a glorious day in Clips history.

In case you haven’t heard, the Los Angeles Clippers announced today that Mike Dunleavy has been fired relieved of head coaching duties – effective immediately – and the move has been overwhelmingly greeted with joy by citizens of the Clipper Nation.

Halle-muthaflippin-lujah.

I know it may sound harsh, but screw that, I’m a Clipper fan and that alone gives me the right to thoroughly enjoy this moment. By the way, he’s remaining with the team as general manager and assistant coach Kim Hughes will serve as interim coach for the rest of the season.

However promising the Dunleavy hiring may have seemed back in 2003, years of under-achieving, bad rotations/substitutions, awful draft picks and so many other miserable choices completely alienated him from not only the fan base, but seemingly his own players as well.

This guy was a pariah in Clippers circles, a figure loathed by fans (see video below) who stacked up losses and yet never seemed in any danger of losing his job (thanks Mr.Sterling!), so the move comes as a huge surprise. There had been rumors of his possible removal earlier in the year, but something (unexpected quality wins against the Boston Celtics, LA Lakers and Denver Nuggets) always seemed to save his job.

His job security even appeared to be at an all-time high after he wasn’t fired following back to back losses to the New Jersey Nets and Minnesota Timberwolves (they’re a combined 15-82 and literally the two worst teams in the NBA) which essentially dropped the Clippers out of the Western Conference playoff race.

Personally, I figured it was just a part of our team’s sad destiny to be forever linked to Dunleavy, so when I got a text earlier from a fellow Clipper fan with the news, I hesitantly replied with “if this is true, that’s great,” even though I saw that the text was prefaced with a “MYLAC: Breaking News” stamp on it, signifying it was an official Clippers press release.

I’ve learned to proceed with caution and disbelief at any good Clipper news, so I had to grab my laptop and check ESPN and Yahoo’s NBA websites. Once there, I realized I wasn’t dreaming and I’ve been in a great mood ever since. That blown fourth quarter lead and loss against Atlanta last night? Nothing but a distant memory.

However happy we are at the move though, the news still comes with the unfortunate reality that it happened at least 10 games too late. As J.A. Adande says in his reaction to the news “If they were going to try to make a run at the playoffs they needed a jumpstart, not the setback that was this final trip under Dunleavy’s watch. Dunleavy hasn’t been the answer for a long time. The Clippers seemed to be the last to realize that.”

Adande is dead on with his commentary, since Dunleavy’s last stand during the 2-6 road trip put a big hamper on the other LA team’s playoff hopes. All in all, Dunleavy’s record was far from impressive and I doubt his resume will be wowing any other teams anytime soon. Via the Associated Press, his record is less than stellar, as seen in the following info.

“Dunleavy was 215-325 in 6 1/2 seasons on the bench, and Los Angeles made the playoffs just once in his first six seasons, getting within one game of the Western Conference finals in 2006. The Clippers haven’t been back to the playoffs since, winning just 42 games in the past two seasons.”

The news has been met with elation and classic comments from Clipper fans on websites like ClipperBlog.com and ClipsNation.com, who have compared it to “losing their virginity all over again” or this fitting tweet from Dunleavy critic Bill Simmons:

“According to Steiny Mo: Mike Dunleavy out as Clipper coach (staying on as GM). I just wish they had given him more time.”

The craziest part of this all is the fact that even though he’s not the coach anymore, he’s still being given a chance to run the team as GM.

Only with the Clippers.

-Will.

“Diary of a Clippers Fan” will be published Mondays and Thursdays during the regular season.

Earlier today Sports by Brooks brought us the news of Dwight Howard’s baby mama Royce Reed partying it up in Miami for the Super Bowl. He has pictures and a Twitter confirmation. The party was thrown at Fontainebleau and hosted by Ludacris and Terrell Owens. From the looks of this video is was a great time for all.

Royce Reed is the woman in the black outfit:

They were dacning for tickets? Seems like Royce could get them a lot easier if she wasn’t involved in lawsuits with Superman 2.0.

UPDATE: If you have any doubt that the woman in the video is Dwight Howard’s BM Royce Reed this tweet from her will remove it for you:

Chad Ochocinco tweeted last June that he was dropping a line of condoms. He hasn’t given up on the idea and says he wants to sign Tiger Woods to pitch his catchers.

If the Ochocinco condoms ever see the light of day there’s no chance in hell Tiger Woods will endorse them. From everything I’ve read about the T-Dub scandal he doesn’t use condoms.

Earlier this week I did a post about a diaper brand imitating the David Beckham Armani underwear ad where he’s holding a rope. The ad was put together by Creative Diamond Olgivy which as far as I can tell is the Korean branch of Olgivy. Apparently they’ve received some heat from children’s groups for the ad.

They sent me the following email with “kindly request to take down the “rope”" as the subject. I have to admit.. When I read that I thought David Carradine had reached out to me from the grave.

Dear Mr./Ms.

The main reason is we did not expect people to feel this negatively about this ad.
If you can pull “rope” ad we would really appreciated it. If not we understand.
Truly, our intention was a parody to a designer underwear ads.
We would never want to exploit children in any way what so ever.

We are very sorry for all this inconvenience
Best Regards,

Sylvie Park
E.A. to V.P. & Chief Creative Officer (Wain Choi)
Creative
Diamond Ogilvy (Advertising), Seoul

I’m not taking the pic down. I’m glad they’ll understand. I posted it because I thought it was funny and it never entered my mind that some people would have a problem with the picture. I should’ve known though because everybody has a problem with everything nowadays.