I love when people say things that just catch me a touch off guard.

The Raptors’ three-point specialist and defending champion of the NBA’s three-point contest was interviewed about his quest to repeat this weekend. From Sportsnet.ca…

“Kapono, meanwhile, will attempt to become the first back-to-back winner of the three-point shootout.

The Raptors’ sharp-shooter, who won last year in Las Vegas when he was with the Miami Heat, takes a certain amount of pride in his three-point prowess.

‘It’s my only chance to show my kids and say, I’m the best at something so when I’m 35, 40, 45, and my kids tell me that I’m a scrub, I can at least say I was the best for one year, 2007,’ Kapono said, laughing. ‘That’s about all I can say I’m the best at, because I’m not very good.'”

I know a few friends big Phoenix Suns fans.

I also know that their heads are shaking right now, unless they know something that I don’t.

In case you didn’t hear, Phoenix just traded Shawn Marion and Marcus Banks for Shaq. I won’t bother trying to analyze this deal. If you want some of that, here’s two good articles for you…

All I can say is a couple things…

1) Marion must have been viewed as troublesome in some way to the Suns, and I mean troublesome to an extent that it made his freakish athleticism “just not enough” reason to keep him anymore.

2) Suns’ GM Steve Kerr must have a lot more confidence in Shaq these days than everyone out there besides Shaq’s mom. At the very least, it’s been confirmd that Mr. Kerr’s still got ice in his veins when pulling the trigger on big shots… or long shots.

A few reasons why today’s Super Bowl match-up really intrigues me…

1) If the Patriots go 19-0, this game will be forever remembered by football fans.

2) If the Giants drop the Patriots to 18-1, this game will be forever remembered by football fans.

3) That final game of the regular season (New England won 38-35) showed that the Giants can play with anyone. Most would argue that the Giants had much less to play for on that day than the Patriots did, and yet there they were… on the verge of winning. If this were any other team against New England, I’d see the Patriots winning cleanly. But nothing is clean with the Giants–they fight tooth and nail for every inch.

Enough analysis. Two weeks of coverage on ANY game is overkill.

Kick the ball already!