Today is Elgin Baylor Day in Washington!

But not this Washington. Greg Nickels, the mayor of Seattle, Wash., has officially dedicated today to Baylor.

Baylor was in Seattle for a couple years of college ball. So if he gets a day named after him there, Baylor should have a day named after him in D.C., too. And a street named after him. And a building. Maybe even a neighborhood. Why not the whole town! (Instead, all he's got is Ginuwine -- a D.C. native whose real name is Elgin Baylor Lumpkin.)

Butt seriously: Baylor's the best basketball player this city ever produced -- and that's saying something -- and he remains a legendary figure to an elderly generation of black folks. His lack of any real presence in his hometown is a crime. He's 75 years old now. Because the white media ignored his side of town, Baylor never got his due when he was a schoolboy god at Spingarn and local playgrounds in the early 1950s, though he was literally changing the way the game of basketball was played.

Give Elgin Baylor his due now, D.C.!

Who do I call?

***

More evidence that the Redskins don't have god on their side.

(AFTER THE JUMP: Christians don't turn the other cheek on "redskins"? Dan Steinberg calls off the Kornheiser/Wise war? Without telling me? FIOS is great, unless you're a Caps fan? Chris Webber, down and out, still gets razzed for that timeout?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Elgin Baylor Gets His Day, But Not Here?" »

Tony Kornheiser's acting like a bad guy with a dark heart again. Earlier this week, he went after Mike Wise on Dan Snyder's sportstalker, WTEM, spending much of his show ranting about a week-old column from Wise for no obvious reason. Kornheiser mocked Wise for wondering if the Redskins would win another game this season before the Denver game. Kornheiser behaved as if Wise had called Dewey over Truman. There was nothing funny about Kornheiser's rants. (The Great Dan Steinberg Steinographs the unfunny hate here.)

Kornheiser, of course, really didn't give a rip about Wise's column. He just wanted to rip Wise.

Full disclosure: I think Kornheiser's a bad guy with a dark heart.

'Course, I only met him once, for about 10 minutes about 10 years ago at a Washington Post holiday party. It's one of my favorite party stories, right up there with having Alan Greenspan wonder if he'd shown up at the wrong event after encountering me and my thrift-store wardrobe at a book party, and getting attacked by Buddy Holly's shop teacher during a night out in Lubbock.

Tell the Kornheiser-and-me one again? Sure!

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Tony Kornheiser, Mike Wise, and Me?" »

Every day I think, I can no longer bear to read another story eviscerating Redskins ownership. Then something as marvelous as Mike Wise's profile of John Kent Cooke arises, and I think, I will happily read about this team for the rest of my life!

Ladies and gentlemen, the Kent Cookes! The landed gentry of Middleburg, Va., by way of a Canadian encyclopedia salesman made a United States citizen by an act of congress! They had a town named after them, and then they didn't! Late-night rides through Georgetown with a boy-toy clinging to the hood of a Jaguar! Throwing shoes at cops! Angry wills! John Kent Cooke was supposed to run the Redskins, and then he wasn't!

You can blame Dan Snyder for a lot of things. But foremost has to be depriving us of this family through his "appalling" use of the same free market system that brought them to us.

Read More "Morning Roundup: Le Roi Manqué Edition" »

I'm hearing that yesterday ESPN jumped on the BeerInTheBathroomsGate™ bandwagon with a story of its own. I knew this was viral...

***

You don't need to read the Washington Post;s redesigned weather page to forecast the perfect shitstorm that is heading for Raljon on Monday evening.

The rest of the paper has all the evidence. There's no section of the Post that doesn't hold horrible news for Dan Snyder.

Mike Wise fills up the front page of Style with a profile of The Man Who Would Be Snyder, John Kent Cooke.

Some of the bitterness from Cooke, whose birthright to become owner of the Redskins was never exercised:

"Dan Snyder destroyed the reputation of this franchise," Cooke said. "I sure as hell don't like the way he gutted the organization after we left. And he commercialized the Redskins like my father would have never commercialized the Redskins. People brought cushions and pennants to the games. You know how they got those? My father gave them out at fan appreciation days."

Cooke also took issue with recent controversy over tickets. "Suing season ticket holders?" he said, incredulously. "My God, it's embarrassing. We would have never done such a thing."

(AFTER THE JUMP: Mike Wise dusts off Bobby Beathard to throw some jabs at Snyder? The Post's Business section tells readers that Snyder's a lousy businessman, just for the hell of it? The bingo caller line, again? The bingo caller last called plays for the Detroit Lions? How much would you have to get paid to go to a Redskins game? Eastern gets its first and last win? )

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Even Bobby Beathard Goes After Dan Snyder?" »

Another day, another update on Dan Snyder's Cheerleader Car Wash Sweepstakes. Another chance to run that fab/yucky photo from Snyder's WTEM promotion, the one that's sucked in some of the most brilliant minds in new media to our humble comments section.

Seems Snyder doesn't really care who he jumps in bed with these days. His partner in the contest, which forces Redskins cheerleaders to put down their pom poms and pick up sponges and go service his radio station's 25-54 year old male demo, was a sponge company called SpongeTech Delivery Systems, Inc.

Well, just as the cheerleader pride giveaway was heating up, Snyder's ally gets nailed for all sorts of alleged shadiness by federal regulators: The Securities and Exchange Commission suspended trading on SpongeTech stock this week because of sketchy reports and non-filings of required documents.

(AFTER THE JUMP: SpongeTech's the Six Flags of the sudsy set? SpongeTech's so messed up it makes Snyder look like a fab businessman? Are Redskins cheerleaders being punished? Is WJFK punishing WTEM in the ratings? Can Mike Wise punish Tony Kornheiser? Is Anacostia/Eastern the Good Counsel/DeMatha of crumminess?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Could Car Wash Contest Be Snyder Punishing Redskins Cheerleaders for Promoting Rival WJFK?" »

There's trouble in maroon-and-black-and-yellow land. The mood is so toxic that even a nice plea to help out Chief Zee, the headdress-wearing longtime unofficial mascot of the Redskins and among the nicest, naivest, old-school mega-racists you'd ever meet, turned real ugly real fast.

Somebody posted a notice on Dan Snyder's message board, Extremeskins, alerting fans that a fundraiser will be thrown in Arlington next week to help pay medical bills for Chief Zee (real name Zema Williams).

Time was, such a post in these friendly confines would elicit nothing more controversial than "How much does he need?" But these days, even wins are booed. So the thread immediately disintegrated into an interrogation of the original poster, with some folks wondering why Williams needs another fundraiser---"He can afford season tickets, but not medical bills?" huffed the poster brianm23---and others asking why give money to a guy Chief Zee's age, since he should have all his health care covered by those socialist programs, Medicare and Medicaid.

(AFTER THE JUMP: That blogger called Chief Zee WHAT? Would Justice Scalia cringe at Chief Zee's costume? WJFK's crushing WTEM? It's a good time to unaffiliated with Dan Snyder? The last Guaranteed Win Night of 2009?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Could Chief Zee Sway Supreme Court Case?" »

Get ready to hang another banner, Washington Mystics fans!

Sports Business Daily says the Mystics, who in their early years regularly hung banners declaring themselves "Attendance Champions" in the MCI Center rafters even as they fielded one of the worst performing teams in the WNBA, now lead the league in home attendance.

While the rest of the league is slumping badly at the gate, the Mystics' 2009 crowds are nearly 30 percent larger than they were a year ago.

And they did it all without putting lesbians on the Kiss Cam!

Redskins training camp opened yesterday without Stephen Strasburg Brian Orakpo or Michael Vick. There was, however, a group of fans calling for the team to bring Vick in. Spurned ex-Redskin LaVar Arrington wondered on his WJFK radio show whether the Vick clique was hired by Dan Snyder as a "guerilla marketing campaign" to prepare the rest of the fan base for actually signing history's most athletic dog killer.

I like his thinking. Arrington's, that is.

Orakpo signed last night and will be dressed out today. The Sporting News ranked the Redskins as the best fit for Vick.

***

The Vick influence, meanwhile, remains profound. Ultimate fighting opponents for years have tried to keep states from sanctioning MMA by calling it "human cockfighting," a term made famous by Sen. John McCain. But McCain's tag did nothing to stop the spread of the cage matches. So, New York legislators opposed to seeing the sport, or whatever you want to call it, sanctioned in their state have adopted "human dogfighting" as their catch phrase.

***

Speaking of guerilla marketing: Larry Weisman looks more like a brilliant hire for Dan Snyder every day.

(AFTER THE JUMP:New Skins PR official calls team "mediocre"?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Snyder’s PR Hire Calls Redskins ‘a Mediocre Team’?" »

Brett Favre's gone, so Michael Vick talk dominates.

Vinny Cerrato yesterday told the Washington Post that the Redskins will not pursue Vick, doggedly or otherwise. But Cerrato has fibbed so many times about personnel matters, most blatantly while acquiring Jason Taylor from Miami last summer, that his credibility in these situations is less than zero. So over at Dan Snyder's message board, extremeskins.com, the should-we-or-shouldn't-we talk raged on. Vick has a surprising amount of support among the Skins fan base, probably from a combination of loyalty from Virginia Tech alums and Jason Campbell's lack of a strong following.

But the anti-Vick crowd around here is much more passionate. The poster Bostic Hog spoke for a bunch of folks when he wrote: "Do you think Danny will offer us a refund on our season tickets if he signs Vick? Kind of like a breach of contract thing, or maybe a morals clause, like the players have."

I'm guessing the chances of Vick signing with the Redskins are better than the chances that Snyder will offer refunds to fans if he does. And no matter who Vick plays for, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell should make him wear jersey #K9.

(AFTER THE JUMP: Vick programs cable TV? Nats feel more thunder? Weequahic High School was a bunch of losers?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Michael Vick Inspired ‘Whale Wars’?" »

In the end, our DC Divas were only bridesmaids.

In Saturday's IWFL Sup-Her Bowl in Austin, Texas, the Kansas City Tribe beat DC, 21-18, to win the women's tackle football national title, 21-18.

The Divas end the season at 10-1.

The sunset of Rachelle Pecovsky-Bentley's career wasn't as rapturous as it could have been. Pecovsky-Bentley, a 10th-year running back, only played after sundown this season due to her observation of the Sabbath for Seventh Day Adventists. She's set to retire now, and in her last game was available in the second half. She rushed for a touchdown with less than three minutes left in the game to bring the Divas within three points. But, the Tribe held from there.

I'm no William Morris, but I gotta say, from a public relations standpoint, the IWFL just blows. As of this morning, nobody from the league had even updated the website to say anything about the game, other than one sentence congratulating the winner. Not even a box score? I tried since pretty late Saturday to get ANY news or numbers about the championship, but there wasn't anything out there. If I owned an IWFL team and was paying one dime to be in this league, I'd be steamed about the lack of outreach. If the main office ain't publicizing the championship, odds are it ain' t doing anything.

***

The Nats have won two series in a week.

Back to me: Don't Mock the R²D²!

(AFTER THE JUMP: Is R²D² is the new Total Average? Is Mike Wise the new Sally Jenkins? Can lacrosse solve our homeless problem?)

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Divas Fall in the Forest…" »

Awesome profile of Washington Caps enforcer Donald Brashear by Washington Post columnist Mike Wise over the weekend.

Brashear's childhood wasn't happy.

I'll leave it at that. Read the story.

My only problem with the piece, really, was the part where Wise quotes Brashear saying the sort of goon hockey that he's mastered---when he drops the gloves, he's as much an artist as Baryshnikov in tights---is against his nature.

Despite all the success it has brought him, though, Brashear still finds it ironic that his hockey career is built around his ability to punch another man.

"To tell you the truth, I never liked fighting," he said in a soft voice that still bears a French-Canadian accent. "I always wanted to be the type of player that plays hard, hits, body checks and scores some goals. But that's not what they wanted me to be."

I interviewed Brashear in 2006, shortly after he signed with the Caps, and he told me the exact opposite.

He told me he always wanted to brawl.

“When I was a kid, I thought about boxing because it was, like, you could fight, and you were allowed,” Brashear said then. “That was everything I wanted to do.”

Somebody really needs to confront Brashear and ask him about this discrepancy!

I nominate Mike Wise to be that somebody.