My state of mind: I read the New Yorker profile of Jules Kroll yesterday, which talks about the security company he started. It's not an armored-cars-and-security-guards company (although it does have bodyguarding services) so much as a corporate intelligence service, doing due diligence and legal and financial analyses of companies and people for a variety of clients for a variety of reasons. I thought this sounded fantastic and immediately went to the website to see if they had any openings in Los Angeles. (Outcome: nope. Memphis, Tennessee seems to be expanding, though, so if you're in Memphis and want to do some interesting intelligence analysis work, check them out.)

With that in mind, yesterday's box scores, which all involve games that I think are intentionall terrible so as not to interfere with Monday Night Football. Collusion!

Kings 105, Grizzlies 116: So much for the resurgent Kings. Granted that this was a road game to a fairly talented Memphis squad, it's still a loss to the Grizzlies. Don't blame the loss on Tyreke Evans, though, who had 28 points on 18 shots to go with four boards and four assists. He did turn the ball over five times, though. Sergio Rodriguez (remember him?) had 16 points and seven dimes off the bench for the Kings, and Donte Greene managed to foul himself out in just 19 minutes. Rudy Gay went off again for Memphis with 24/8/3/3/1, and OJ Mayo managed 20 points on eight field goal attempts. For the Kings to send a jump-shooter to the line ten times doesn't speak well of Sacramento's defense. Marc Gasol, by the way, shot 8-10. In other words, ho hum.

Bucks 98, Spurs 112: Ersan Ilyasova was the highlight of the night for the Bucks with 20 points and four steals, but they lost by 14 and Matt Bonner scored 23 off the bench for the Spurs (6-8 from three will do that), so there wasn't much to cheer about. Brandon Jennings had the kind of a game that a player like him is going to have every so often, shooting 6-21 and turning the ball over five times (albeit with seven assists). Tim Duncan: 24/12. What'd I say about ho hum?

Bulls 98, Blazers 122: It's just like the Bucks-Spurs score, except with ten more points for the home team. Luol Deng had another nice scoring game with 25 points, and the Bulls did rack up 23 assists on 37 makes (Kirk Hinrich, of all people, had none in 22 minutes, but pretty much everyone else contributed a couple), but Greg Oden had a monster night, 24/12 (six offensive) on 7-8 shooting, sinking 10 of his 12 free throws. LaMarcus Aldridge, who disappears for games at a time for this team, didn't disappear here with a 24/13 of his own.

Wolves 87, Clippers 91: Nobody's talking about how terrible Minnesota is, while everyone is talking about the Nets, but how much better than 0-13 is 1-13? (One win better, I know, I know, but you take my point.) Ryan Hollins is now a starter for this team, which tells you a lot of what you need to know. Al Jefferson's scoring has disappeared (he's apparently playing hobbled by some kind of leg injury or other), although he did have 13/13 in this game (but eight turnovers, which is a huge number for a big man). Al Thornton dropped 31/10 for the Clippers, though, and Marcus Camby contributed eighteen rebounds, which I think is a season high.

And it turns out my memory is really quite short. There were already ten games this year where players had 18 or more rebounds. Dwight Howard's 22 on 10/30 against the Nets is the high, and four other players have had at least 20. Camby does get high marks for grabbing 18 boards in just 31 minutes, which is the lowest number of minutes for an 18+-rebounder this year, although Erick Dampier had 20 in 32 minutes two weaks ago against Houston. (Joakim Noah had 21 that same night.)