Today's Best - 02.27.08

5. mike bibby - in his first game in front of the new home crowd of atlanta, bibby faced off against his former teammates from sacramento. while his new team has a worse record than his old team, his new team is in the east, which makes their playoff hopes far more reasonable. bibby had 24 points and 12 dimes to lead the hawks to victory, bringing them one game within the playoffs. my early season prediction was that atlanta was a playoff team, and the arrival of bibby makes that one step closer to reality. but with joe johnson ignoring the other team manhandling his point guard, it's possible that chemistry issues could derail them.

4. the seven implausible assertions - they’re not deadly sins but roger clemens still could burn in hell. as a result of his hearing before congress, the justice department will open an investigation into whether or not roger dodger committed perjury. the issues on which they feel he lied include steroid use (duh), injections by brian mcnamee (double duh), his presence at jose canseco's party (mountain duh) and his knowledge of the mitchell report prior to its release (duh-blemint gum). i'm not sure what good all this investigation will do, but maybe we'll determine whether clemens' career was downright incredible, or simply uncredible.

3. chris paul - coming off three losses in four days, it seemed like new orleans was hitting a rough patch. their hot start to the season came as a big surprise, so most people assumed they were coming back to earth a bit. in an effort to prove they are still out of this universe, they knocked off the celestial body that is the phoenix suns, 120-103. cp3's 25 points and 15 assists led the way for nawlens, and with a head-to-head with deron williams and the release of his signature show line on tap, it's a good time to be chris paul. as opposed to all those other times when it sucks to be a 22-year-old superstar in the nba.

2. cj wilson - the rangers closer is an alumnus of santa ana junior college and coming from such an academic utopia, it's no surprise he considers himself smarter than his peers. while he has a contract with the club that allows him to engage fans online, he crossed an unspoken line recently when his posts criticized his teammates. "the average guy in a baseball clubhouse does drive an SUV, drinks beer, chews or dips tobacco and is relatively a [expletive]." the site on which wilson's words appeared has since deleted them, so we're left to wonder what the expletive was. my guess: cootie-head. instead of chiding him, i'm inviting cj to stop by garbage points and voice his displeasure with our site. i'm sure someone of his stature would be appalled by improper capitalization.

1. robert mckiver - all year, memphis has dominated headlines and pundits talked about how they were the only noteworthy team in conference-usa. the houston cougars, and robert mckiver in particular, are going to great lengths to prove that they belong in the conversation. with a 10-3 record in conference (two losses to memphis), the cougars still have some work to do, but they are surely on the prowl. the team's leading scorer went into hyper drive last night, racking up 52 points in a 95-67 shellacking. his night included 7 threes and 11 of 12 free throws. what do you expect from a guy whose name sounds so much like 'macgyver'? he probably scored all those points with nothing but a leaf blower and some paper clips.