TZ's World: Let's Face It: Marty Mac is an Asshat

(As I said in a comment to the Hart news, I spent a good portion of Thursday composing a response to Marty McNeal's unfortunate column calling for the head of Eric Musselman. My creative juices had been expended, apparently, because I kept wadding up the paper and tossing it at the waste basket. Consider this a last-ditch effort.)

Just heard Thursday morning that Martin McNeal, who gained local notoriety as the go-to columnist for players who need a yankpiece in The Bee, wrote a column.

McNeal oftens talks about people being 'fake.' For all you who don't know, make sure you go out of your way to make a good impression on the local columnist and suck up to him and your players and don't be a punk.

Speaking of punks, McNeal said he thinks Kings head coach Eric Musselman should be fired at the end of the season. Nevermind that Musselman has coached only 57 games for the Kings, and has a three-year deal with the team. Nevermind that Musselman hasn't been playing with a full deck all season, with two cancerous stars, no size in the frontcourt, and a very young bench.

Why does McNeal have beef with Musselman? Since Marty refuses to lay it out plainly in his column, allow me:

1. In January, Jason Hart and his agent Bill Neff came to McNeal to complain about Musselman's "treatment" of Hart. The bad treatment? No playing time. The Kings told Hart in training camp he wasn't really in their plans, yet it still came as a shock to Hart and Neff that Hart wasn't getting any burn. Musselman reportedly told Neff that the call to play Quincy Douby and John Salmons came for higher up. Geoff Petrie and the Maloofs denied this. McNeal wrote a big column focused on this and everyone got all huffy.
2. A few days after the Hart/Neff saga, McNeal spent a column relaying another perceived Musselman slight. Apparently, months prior at some function or another, McNeal asked Musselman for his cell phone number. Musselman said he didn't know it. From this, McNeal extrapolated that Musselman is 'fake,' a 'liar,' and a smarmy jerk who doesn't realize how he comes off. It is later discovered that portions of McNeal's column - basic information, in fact - are incorrect.

Sorry if I'm not surprised McNeal of all people would call for the coach's head because of some minor perceived slights.

Now, because of Musselman's clearly sarcastic comments following the Philadelphia game - and honestly, you'd have to be autistic not to realize the sarcasm in Musselman's comments - McNeal is pushing the 'dude is fake' meme as hard as he can. He's adding a couple, too:

This is buffoonery, complete asshattery. You have beef with dude, whatever. Think what you will. But you're the NBA columnist for this paper, so instead of ever f*cking actually analyzing the NBA, you use your personal beef to fuel a call for someone's head? You use your position and experience not to educate the reader about what exactly this coach is doing wrong, but just to insult him for 500 words? Seriously, the next time McNeal coherently spells out some Xs and Os in his column, it'll be the first time.

McNeal's sole role in the Sacramento media landscape is to slurp players publicly, to give them some good PR when things are rough. He's adding to those vast responsibilities playing out personal vendettas for the world to see. Kudos, Marty.

There are problems with Musselman. His offensive system should be in much better shape than it is, and his rotation is a complete clusterf*ck most nights. Analyze that stuff, please! Why don't you tell us what's going wrong? Why don't you tell us where the Kings should be better, Marty?

Maybe like the team he "covers," he just doesn't have the talent to get it done.