Vacation Planning - Detroit Pistons

I always liked the Detroit Pistons. They always had a strong, definite identity: they're the Bad Boys. In the late eighties, early nineties, they were the villains to Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls with brutal players in their lineup such as Dennis Rodman, Bill Laimbeer and Rick Mahorn.  They won championships with these guys. They made it work. Same thing in 2004, except this time they were even more awesome and that Kobe Bryant will forever see this face in his nightmares.

It was a terrible season overall for the Pistons last year, but you couldn't help thinking they were a few details away from making it come alive. They had some bad luck, they took some bad management decisions, but the talent is there and the team is shaping to become interesting again after GM Joe Dumars sabotaged it with a series of bad decisions starting in 2008. So, you know, I'm a nice guy so here is what they should do to get things going in 2013 and make another championship push sooner than later.

Vacation Planning - Minniesota Timberwolves

The Minniesota Timberwolves are the epitome of a small-market business in professional sports. It's a phenomenon that characterizes itself through three things: an earnest approach, tight finances and an abusive relationship to your occasional superstar players. Right now, the T-Wolves are all that and that's why I feel an irrational sympathy for them. I want them to do good, the way the Oklahoma City Thunder are going good right now.

Their 2012-13 season was atrocious. Kevin Love played a whopping eighteen games. Ricky Rubio missed the first few months because of a knee injury and took time to find back his timing of old times (but eventually did). Nikola Pekovic wrestled with injuries too, they gave employment to J.J Barea and David Kahn still managed the team. The way they were handled, the Timberwolves don't deserve to do well, but I still wish 'em well against all odds. Partly because Kevin Love is the face of the franchise and is still my favorite active player. So here are suggestions for their off-season.

Vacation Planning - Oklahoma City Thunder

Most basketball fans I know, regardless of teams allegiances, were genuinely brokenhearted by the early elimination of the Oklahoma City Thunder at the hands of the Memphis Grizzlies in the second round of this year's playoffs. Many reasons can explain that.

1) Nobody really likes the Grizzlies. They are a blue-collar, hardworking team, sure. But they play an ugly brand of basketball. They are a defense-first team that clogs the paint and brutalizes star players. Unlike the 2004 Detroit Pistons, they don't have the following redeeming factors: a badass outside shooter, a terrifying center, a crazy person or the most maniacally competitive coach. The Grizzlies are boring in and off court.

2) They made their way to the finals last year, only to be brutally beaten by the Miami Heat. Nobody likes to see the underdog lose. Nobody likes to see a team patiently build through smart drafting lose to a team that was quickly assembled with money (I'm simplifying the Heat here, but without LeBron and Bosh it's unlikely they would be a dominant force). So everybody wished them retribution this year.

3) Russell Westbrook got injured. It's safe to say that given the number of close games the Grizzlies won against the Thunder, it's safe to say Westbrook's massive offense would have helped tip the scales in their favor. While everybody around Kevin Durant choked, I believe Westbrook would have been enough help to propel the Thunder in the NBA finals once more and get another crack at the annoyingly dominant Heat.

So back to the drawing board for General Manager Sam Presti and his troops. The 2012-13 season exposes the frailty of the Thunder's business model and the disastrous implications of trading James Harden. Long story short, the Thunder are a good, young team but they have a longer way to go than we first thought to become a reliable dominant power. Here are a few suggestions of what they should do during the off season.

Vacation Planning - New York Knicks

It's been a fun year for my Knicks.They came out of the gate firing, winning eighteen of their first twenty-three games. The comeback of point guard Raymond Felton, like the dude's rug, seemed to tie the room together. His dynamism and his ability to penetrate the perimeter stretched the floor enough, so that Carmelo Anthony, J.R Smith and role players like Steve Novak and Chris Copeland could just fire away without thinking twice. Felton himself proved to be an efficient outside shooter.

But Felton got hurt right before New Year and things started getting out of synch. The Knicks became streaky, capable of the best and the worst on court. Sometimes during the same game. General Manager Glen Grunwald's decision to hire so many players between thirty and forty years old looked absolutely brilliant at the start of the year, but it started showing its limitations after the all-star break as players started coming down with injuries and left Grunwald scrambling to patch the holes in his lineup. The Knicks lucked out when they hired Kenyon Martin after the trade deadline, but that was the last good management move of the season.

We got booted from the playoffs in round 2, by the Indiana Pacers. I'm actually happy we made it this far, which hadn't happened for a decade and a half or so. It was evident the Pacers were the bigger, younger, more cohesive team at the series went along and that Mike Woodson got painfully outcoached by Frank Vogel. Like I said, no big deal. We have something to build on. There are things that work well with the team, other that need improvement. Here are five suggestions for my dear New York Knicks' off season.