Jordan's hire promises heartache for Sixers

Don't look now, but he's back. Former Sacramento Kings and Washington Wizards head coach Eddie Jordan is back in the NBA.

Jordan has been hired as the new head coach of the Philadelphia 76ers, a team which made the playoffs this year in the Eastern Conference as a No. 6 seed.

The Sixers were eliminated in the first round, however, by the Orlando Magic, who played the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 6 of their best-of-7 series of the Eastern Conference Finals late Saturday night.

With a win by the Magic, Orlando would advance to the NBA Finals to face the Los Angeles Lakers, who eliminated Denver on Friday night.

However, if Cleveland were to win Game 6, Monday night's Game 7 would be aired by ABC at 8 p.m.

Jordan replaces Tony DiLeo, who replaced Maurice Cheeks, who was fired by the Sixers in December of 2008.

Under DiLeo, the Sixers went 32-27. After their elimination from the playoffs, Philadelphia owners announced DiLeo would not be kept as its head coach.

So in comes Jordan, who has a career mark of 230-288 as a head coach and a playoff mark of 8-18.

Jordan was fired as the Wizards' head coach in November after they limped out to a dismal 1-10 start to the 2008-09 season.

Yes, Jordan was faced with injuries to some key players. However, it wouldn't have made that much difference. The Wizards are a bad basketball team and Jordan is not much better as a head coach.

His Sixers will draft 17th in the upcoming NBA Draft in June. His former teams, Sacramento and Washington, will draft fourth and fifth, respectively.

Jordan, along with his draft choices, will come into Philly with the likes of Elton Brand, Andre Iguodala, Kareem Rush, Donyell Marshall and Theo Ratliff, along with youngsters Jason Smith and Thaddeus Young on his roster.

Not your daily names of conversation when the NBA is talked about.

The Sixers were a playoff team and they fired their head coach. Jordan was fired from a team that had high hopes and he, nor his team could attain them.

Philly fans will get much of the same.

Want to buy a home?

With today's economy, everyone has almost $5 million laying around the house, right?

Well, Orlando Magic forward Rashard Lewis has put his Washington state home on the market for a cheap price of $4,994,876.

Yahoo Sports! reports the house is 8,000 square feet, with five bedrooms, five-and-a-half bathrooms, a swimming pool, an open gourmet kitchen/family room, a lake level game room, a wetbar, a movie theater, a sun room and two skids on the lake for boats.

With the money Lewis makes, he probably would take a cool $4 million in cash for the house. What do you think?

To play or not to play?

Entering Saturday night's schedule of games, Los Angeles Dodgers' outfielder Manny Ramirez was fourth in voting for the upcoming MLB All-Star Game, slated to be played July 14 in St. Louis.

Ramirez, who is in the midst of a 50-game suspension from baseball due to his taking performance enhancing drugs, is eligible to return to action in early July.

So, if the fans vote him into the 80th All-Star Game, should he play?

His manager Joe Torre has said he should not play. In the past, Ramirez has come up with several reasons as to why he couldn't play in the mid-season classic. This year, he has his reason and should stick to it.

He should not, nor does he deserve to play in this year's game. Take the time off and come back ready to help the Dodgers fight for the National League title.

Jeff Christian is a freelance columnist and appears each Sunday in The News & Messenger. He can be reached at christianjeff @rocketmail.com.