Jon Marthaler bakes up a batch of delicious links just for you. Other times, you can find him here and here. Jon?

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Happy weekend! Here's my story for this week: at the RandBall Timberwolves Ticket Spectacular on Wednesday, I was roundly (and rightly) mocked for my selection of a game against Indiana. I didn't detail my reasoning at the time, in order to avoid further teasing, but here it is: I picked a Pacers game because I owned a Reggie Miller jersey in the sixth grade. I was caught up at the time in the fad of NBA jerseys from non-Minnesota teams; I remember my friend Andy having a Harold Miner jersey, possibly the only one that was sold outside Miami and not to a member of Miner's immediate family. I loved Miller because I was in love with the three-pointer, which seemed like absolute magic to me, like Bert Blyleven's curve ball or Keith Millard's tolerance. I desperately wanted to fire away from downtown like he did, a task that was made harder by my status being a backup power forward on a sixth-grade team in western Minnesota.

Nowadays, Reggie Miller is a terrible television analyst, hipster idiots have ruined the wearing of classic NBA jerseys, and the Pacers are four kinds of awful. But I still like to imagine myself raining threes from way, way beyond the arc. (Unfortunately, I'm guessing that watching Mike Dunleavy won't exactly provoke the same reverie.)

On with the links:

*Since we're talking NBA - how about Canis Hoopus's season preview? Or if you prefer your preview in audio form, there's Brandon's "The Riff" podcast, the latest episode of which is devoted entirely to Wolves hoops.

*Steve Rushin is right: this is the true golden age of sports. (Trust me, this is doubly true if you're a minor-sports junkie idiot, like me.)

*In a similar vein, Chris at Smart Football makes a few points about the current state of sportswriting, as related to a couple of recent stories that you (cough) may have heard of. It's a good read.

*And finally: Mr. Rand wrote the other day about how badly he wants an ace for the Twins pitching staff. Well, I hope he's got a spare $20 million laying around - because as John "Twins Geek" Bonnes lays out, the money just isn't going to be there in 2011 for the Twins.

And that's that; here's hoping you enjoy your weekend. (Usual talk about the weather deleted, for fear of jinxing everything.)