Markelle Fultz

Markelle Fultz to host basketball camp that will disappoint everyone and not live up to lofty expectations

Markelle Fultz, embattled former #1 NBA pick and scourge of 76ers fans everywhere took to his instagram two days ago and announced he will be hosting a basketball camp at his alma mater Dematha Catholic High School in Maryland from Aug. 5 to 9.

Now, I’m no big city lawyer, and correct me if I’m wrong here, but for one to successfully host a basketball camp one of the most important aspects is that you can successfully PLAY basketball yourself, right?

Maybe hosting a basketball camp when you can’t lift your arm over your shoulder without passing out from the pain may not be the best idea, ehh Markelle?

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It’s time for the 76ers to be transparent and say what’s going on with Markelle Fultz

Ho hum. Another week, another scathing controversy/conspiracy brewing about the Philadelphia 76ers.

What’s next? Are we a day away from 76ers CEO Scott O’Neil being found complicit in the JFK assassination? Is Brett Brown really DB Cooper? Is Joel Embiid’s success all a “Jacob’s Ladder” scenario that we’re experiencing during our last moments on our death bed?

For a yet unknown reason (be it the way the planets are aligned, the wind is blowing, or if a full moon is on the horizon) at the direction of his attorney Markelle Fultz is being pulled  from all 76ers activity until he sees a shoulder specialist next week.

The strange, sad saga of Fultz has taken yet another strange, sad turn.

No practices. No games. Nothing until Fultz is seen by whatever hack specialist he’s being shoveled off to now.

Oddly enough, Fultz has said nothing about his health this season. He’s said on multiple occasions that he feels “good” and publicly bristled when ex-shooting coach Drew Hanlen said he wasn’t healthy.

Here he is on Nov. 6th saying how good his shot feels.

 

 

 

He had opportunity last night to say he was injured. He did not.

So what changed from then to now? How have we gone from a happy-go-lucky, yet struggling, Markelle Fultz to this:

 

 

Is he hurt? Is his shoulder still bothering him? Is he and his team peeved that Brett Brown gave his minutes to TJ McConnell last night?

Now is the time, 76ers, to finally come clean and tell us what you know about Fultz.

Is he hurt?

Was he injured in a BMX accident after he was drafted?

Why is he being sent to a shoulder specialist after assuring everyone he was healthy?

Why did he so publicly split with Drew Hanlen?

Is he upset with being benched for TJ McConnell?

How much of a say do the people around Markelle have on this decision?

All of these questions have been asked by the 76ers beat reporters. None of them have been answered.

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The strange, sad saga of Markelle Fultz

Watching Markelle Fultz double-clutch his way through a free throw attempt and having it spread through social media like a plague hurt my soul. It’s painful to watch, and even more painful when you realize everyone is already laughing at it seconds after it hits Twitter.

He put in so much work, so much effort into retooling his shot, and for a while it seemed to be working. Sure, it wasn’t the nicest shot anyone has ever seen, but it was a hell of a lot better than the janky nonsense he put up last season.

Then, well, this hit Twitter minutes after his double-clutch du jour:

Oof. Just another strange nail in the strange coffin of Fultz’s young career. I know Fultz will get a lot of shit for tossing Hanlen to the curb, but Hanlen always struck me as an odd guy himself.

And to top it all off, he’s a bit of a Chatty Cathy. I’m all for sending passive aggressive tweets about someone, but give me a break. Do shot trainers need to send out “mysterious” tweets about their clients health, and then fire off this nonsense last night?

Who would have thought a weirdo shooting coach wouldn’t work well with a weirdo shooting guard who is suddenly so far inside of his own head that he’s scared to attempt a jump shot farther than 15-feet?

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Down with the boo in Philadelphia

Last night, Markelle Fultz bricked his first shot…and his second…and had his third shot blocked….and absolutely bricked his fourth shot in front of 20,000 rabid fans hoping to see some glimpse of promise from the touted prospect during the 76ers home opener.

I watched from my couch, cringing, waiting for the fickle fans to cascade the struggling shooting guard with boos, to let their frustrations out on the 20-year-old.

It never happened.

Instead, 20,000 fans cheered heartily when he made his fifth shot of the night, upping the volume with every point he scored, and going absolutely BALLISTIC when he finally made a three-point shot deep into the fourth.

Listen to the house come down when he drains this shot.

Awesome. It’s almost like cheers for a 20-year-old struggling with both his confidence and his shot are better than drunken morons booing him during the second game of the season. Who knew?!

They’re doing for Fultz what they did for the terribly slumping Pat Burrell in 2003. They recognize that the effort is there, and they’re pulling for their guy. Burrell came out of it and is BELOVED in this city, there’s no reason Fultz can’t as well.

But but but but Coggin, I hear the five of my dedicated readers saying, it’s our right to boo as fans! How will we let our teams know when they’re under performing, when they’re playing poorly, or when we’re displeased with the effort?

Now now, I’m not saying the boo should be abolished. But maybe, just maybe, it’s time for Philadelphia to finally *GASP* not be brain-dead idiots when we decide to boo.

It’s a tall order for a lot of you, but I know we can do it. Booing is a mental crutch for this city. Lets start walking again. We don’t need it.

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Good news everyone! Mike Lombardi has blessed Markelle Fultz!

What a morning! The sun is shining (it isn’t), the birds are chirping (they’re not, they’re all frozen) and Mike Lombardi, the purveyor of the least correct comment/take about Philadelphia sports in the history of sports talk, is oiling up his disgusting old-man foot in preparation to firmly lodge it in his mouth yet again.

We have truly been blessed, Philadelphia.

Last night, while likely taking a moment out of his nightly routine of applying generous dollops of lanolin oil over every inch of his wrinkled, musty body, Lombardi must have tuned into the 76ers victory over the Charlotte Hornets and run afoul of a sight he just couldn’t abide.

Why……there was Markelle Fultz, the still “injured” 76ers point guard, DARING to show his face on the television broadcast, wasting valuable moments he could have been in the trainers room balancing his scapular muscle or studying film! He needed to share his displeasure, to alert the masses of god fearing sports fans of this GHASTLY affront to everything good and pure about basketball.

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Friday the 13th part 3, THE NEW BLOOD!

We did it earlier this year. We did it two years ago. And god damnit, since this is SUCH a successful franchise and we’re really only in it for the money, we’re going to do it again this year.

Today, of course, is Friday the 13th. Jason Voorhees is still out there, tightening his hockey mask, watching camp counselors skinny dip in the inviting waters of Camp Crystal Lake, and planning a long awaited visit to Philadelphia to hack and slash his way through the city of Brotherly Love.

For the third time, we ask the age old question: “Which Philadelphia sports figure would survive if he or she found themselves in the Friday the 13th horror series?”

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Is the Philadelphia media failing Markelle Fultz?

If you watched the Blue/White 76ers scrimmage yesterday from the Palestra than you’re likely trying to come to terms with some unpleasant facts. The highly coveted #1 overall pick was anything but Sunday afternoon. Where were the head turning highlights we expect from a franchise changing prospect that Bryan Colangelo had to give up a boatload to draft? All we saw yesterday was a few mid-range jumpers, some technically sound passes, and an affable attitude from one of the supposed “top talents” on the roster.

Where were the rim rattling dunks? The no-look passes? The triple doubles? The buzzer beaters and the killer attitude? Is this what the 76ers gave up a boatload of picks for? Those picks could have possibly been used to draft the NEXT Markelle Fultz. They’re valuable assets.

Instead we saw someone who wasn’t giving 100% out there. I didn’t see him set any jaw-rattling screens or take any violent charges to give his squad a leg up. We didn’t see any of those.

Instead we saw Fultz help Ben Simmons up from the floor after the two collided at mid court halfway through the scrimmage. Are you going to do that in a game that counts, Markelle? Help up an opponent in the heat of battle?

My JV basketball coach always told us that “You play like your practice.” He was a wise man and I’m sure he was shaking his head in disgust at what he saw yesterday.

Fultz evidently does not yet have what it takes to succeed in this city, so why isn’t the media letting him know it?

Instead of hearing it from the front page of the Inquirer sports section, this young man is being trumped up as a franchise savior by the Philadelphia media.  In years past they’d be nitpicking this young man to death for “not showing enough” in his first appearance in front of the hometown heavies.

It’s called tough love and it helped shape so many of this city’s past greats into the legends they became.

Donovan McNabb. Charles Barkley. Eric Lindros. Mike Schmidt. Ask them and they’ll tell you that the reporters, journalists, and sports talk hosts in this city are 100% what made them into the hall of fame players they became, not their natural talent. They had to learn how to play in this city, and it made them better athletes, and more importantly, better men.

But not Fultz. Suddenly this town has kid gloves when it comes to handling the #1 overall pick.

Take this, for instance. Last week during media day Fultz spent an inordinate amount of time neglecting his media duties, choosing to eat Chick-Fil-A instead. Last I heard, Chick-Fil-A isn’t exactly part of a balanced diet for a highly-tuned athlete. Do you think Chip Kelly would have stood for this if he were still around? Say what you will about his tenure, but those Eagles were in tip-top condition.

But what does the media do? Does the hard-nailed Philadelphia sports media take the young Fultz to task and teach him a valuable lesson? Nope. It enables the youngsters obsession with fast food and makes a joke of it.

Where is the Philadelphia sports media I used to know that would nitpick every decision he makes and attribute it to his play on the court? Where are the sports talk hosts that would criticize everything a player did 24 hours a day, and then claim the athlete “doesn’t know what Philadelphia is about” when he dared to question the media’s negative portrayal of him?

It’s gone, and it’s instead replaced with this:

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Bryan Colangelo has an obvious tell. Does it spell doom for the 76ers?

Bryan Colangelo has an obvious tell, and it spells doom for the 76ers. Can you spot it? What’s the key difference between these two pictures?

At first glance, they look similar. Hell, he’s even wearing the same blue blazer and white button-down combination…but look at the collars. The picture on the left is Colangelo from this morning’s media day session where he stammered his way through an “update” on Joel Embiid’s health. Sure, he’s not ready for 5-on-5 yet, but is on track for their “intended goal” to participate in the regular season.

The picture on the right is when he was able to introduce the Sixers #1 overall pick Markelle Fultz to the media.

Now, notice the collars in both pictures….the collar on the right is tickling his jawbone, it’s exuberant, full of life, peacocking its way into the hearts and minds of the fans everywhere.

Look at the collar on the left. Definitely doesn’t come close to his jawbone. It’s wilted, limp, almost sallow. It’s sickly, unconfident, decidedly un-starched.

The conclusion? Colangelo’s collar height and collar vivacity, its “joie de vivre,” if you will, is his tell.

The collar on the right is his good news collar. Coincidence that he wore it while showcasing his greatest triumph as yet with the 76ers by procuring Markelle Fultz? I think not.

The collar on the left is his bad news collar. A vague timetable for Embiid’s return, denial of showcasing Jah for a trade, making excuses for why they’re signing front court has beens….he’s lying and he shows it through his collar height.

He knows something else, he just isn’t saying it verbally. Come clean with us, Bryan, we deserve it. You’re not fooling anyone.

LOOK TO THE COLLAR FOR YOUR ANSWERS.

Do you know what’s not fake? Awesome 76ers merchandise. Buy it all from the banners below (but maybe don’t invest in that Bryan Colangelo jersey you had your eye on).

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Philadelphia 76ers 2017-2018 Nike Jerseys

Philadelphia 76ers 2017-2018 Nike Jerseys

Twitter recap: Markelle Fultz is the best….and the worst

DEBVBk2XgAEgwraTwo games in, just two games in to Markelle Fultz’s professional basketball career (if you can call the NBA Summer League a “Professional League.” Anyone who isn’t a rookie playing in these games will be exiled back to their home countries in shipping containers and never heard from again…or Dante Exum, for some reason) and Twitter already has some STRONG opinions on his play.

Nevermind that he’s played less than a games worth of minutes so far in his career. We’re coming off the Fourth of July, so it’s our AMERICAN RIGHT to declare Fultz a savior of Philadelphia or a complete bust already. I wouldn’t have it any other way. You think they’re doing this up in Canada? I don’t think so….USA USA USA USA USA ::Hacksaw Jim Duggan thumbs up::

But, for fun, let’s analyze some tweets from fans and “professional analysts” who already have some STRONG opinions on Fultz’s game.

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Breaking down a minute of the most EXTREME, flop-sweatiest take on The Process ever recorded
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EXTREME HAT TILT from Gabe Morency.

Sometimes the Gods smile upon you, my friends. This gem was went to us on Twitter via @rfmchenry1371, a segment from “SPORTS RAGE” starring Gabe Morency. The show, as far as I can tell, stars a stammering bald man, well into an eight-ball of coke (allegedly), YELLING his opinions into a camera in front of an empty faux sportscenter set.

It’s EXTREME. It’s YELLY. It’s SWEATY. Oh my goodness, there is so much sweat. But I guess you do sweat an awful lot when you have such EXTREME, MUSKY takes.

The entire segment is nearly 4-minutes long. Four long, agonizing minutes of a man drowning to death during a taped segment. Rumor has it the CIA originally planned to use this as a tool to extract information from terrorists, but too many of them chewed through their wrist veins and bled out before giving anything up.

I don’t have the strength to break down the entire four-minutes, but it’s well worth it to watch until its conclusion.

Let’s all enjoy this train wreck after the jump:

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