Retirement? That and other Links

Here's some stuff to get you started this morning - Sammy Sosa says he wants to retire after the 2009 World Baseball Classic, and since Sammy isn't playing this year, it's sort of like Corey Haim "retiring" from acting. In other baseball news, the artist formerly known as Fernando Tatis returned from the dead to lead the Mets to a win, and the Yankees won - even with everyone obsessing over Joba's work load.

The Celtics took a 3-2 lead over the Pistons, due in part to the fact that Ray Allen decided to make some shots last night. When he wasn't busy making threes, Rasheed Wallace found time to pick up another technical. Arguing with the refs must take up a lot of energy, because at 7 feet tall, Sheed managed to snag a grand total of 4 rebounds last night. Tonight, the Lakers try and put the final nail in the Spurs coffin, the Lakers Blog LA Ball Talk breaks down what the Lakers have to do to win - and at this point, we hope they do whatever takes, everyone is sick of the Spurs.

Proving that it's never too early to start thinking about college basketball, the Card Chronicle does an excellent job highlighting 9 questions that will dominate the Big East off-season. They wisely point out that Syracuse could be dangerous next year. In other news, Wesley Johnson, a guy I've never heard of and am too lazy too Google, has been granted his release from the Iowa State basketball team - and Syracuse is on his list of schools. Former Orangeman Andre Hawkins' son AJ will play at Canisius next year. Hawkins was our type of guy - slightly undersized, a real hard worker, a little bit dirty and a guy you'd want on your side in a street fight.

In slightly odd news, Calvin Schmidtke - a guy with a name that makes it sound like he should be on the chess team - has been released from his commitment to play football at Washington State next year, due to 11 citiations from law enforcement in the last year and half. Way to go Calvin, Ryan Perrilloux is proud of you. And for those of you still basking in the glow of the lacrosse championship, A.EM. at the Orange Squeeze has the complete run down of the Major League Lacrosse draft here.