This Week In GIFs: Flying Slides, Face-Punches, And Kevin Garnett's Ill-Fitting Shorts

Hello and welcome to our third-ever installment of THIS WEEK IN GIFs, in which we review all the greatest animated sports GIFs from the last seven days and vote on the very greatest.

Vote on your favorite, and please feel free to argue your cause in the comments. And if you catch any outstanding GIFs in the future, you would have my gratitude if you tweeted me at @jon_bois.

AN ANIMATED GIF ABOUT HOCKEY!

(Via Travis Hughes)

It's a wonderful GIF, and the most wonderful part, as usual, is the very end. Röger Höckey knows he completely deserved that sock in the mouth, and he has "yep" written all over him.

By the way, we're in our third week of This Week In GIFs, and we hadn't used a single NHL GIF. And we still haven't, because this is a Swedish hockey game! Ha! Hahaha! Smell you later, jerks!

LAKERS GM MITCH KUPCHAK

(Via Mike Prada)

"Everyone's wearing the same shirt except for me. Am I even allowed to sit here? Am I doing something wrong? Ah, damn it. It'll look weird if I just get up and leave, and it'll look even weirder if I ask someone, because I've been here three hours already. They'll say, 'I had a shirt for you right here, why didn't you just ask me? Were you ... nervous? What's wrong with you? Are you so nervous and stupid that you're too nervous to ask a question about a shirt?' No, that's no good, no good.

"But now I just have to stand here all overdressed. If I were underdressed I could play it off like I don't even care. Being overdressed is way worse. They just threw their shirts on in two seconds, and I bet they're all looking at me and thinking, 'He spent two hours in front of the mirror deciding what to wear. He cared too much. He's insecure. What an insecure idiot!' Ahhhh God.

"At least I'm not on television. Aw shit. Well at least they won't zo-- AW SHIT. AWWWW SHIT."

BOBBY VALENTINE

(Via Jeff Sullivan)

I don't even think this GIF is all that awesome or anything. It's kind of funny, but I'm including it because y'all will be furious with me if I don't. It's probably going to win!

TONY CAMPANA SLIDES OVER TAG

(Via Baseball Nation)

This is the first example I can recall of a player sliding over a tag. I bet there are probably more, but not only does MLB Advanced Media vaporize all third-party video content on the Internet, they lack the passion and/or interest to ever upload such things themselves. As a consequence, while I may have seen something like this happen before, I cannot verify it, and I can remember like four baseball moments prior to 2008, and three of them are "Kent Mercker makes pick-off attempt." You are the worst, MLB Advanced Media, and I will wander as far into a tangent as I need to in order to say so. Anyway, this play was awesome. Good on you, Tony Campana. Take a fist-pump. You more than earned it.

CAMERAMAN REFUSES TO LEAVE KEVIN GARNETT IN PEACE

(Via Mark Sandritter)

"Hey. Hey Kevin. Hey. Kevvo. Kev-man. K-Swiss. K-19: The Dribblemaker. What's real good? What's on your plate these days? What are you up to? Tying up your shorts? Cool, cool, right on. I dig it. Shorts might could fall down and you're all like "Helllll no I'm not gonna play ball with my shorts fallin' down!" Haha! I dig it, dude! I'm pickin' up what you're puttin' down! So. What's the deal here, bro? What's your opinion on shorts? How many shorts are there? How many shorts do you think there are? What is your opinion on tying things? What is your favorite knot? ... Bro? What's your favorite knot? Mm. Guess "knot" ain't the only silent K. Ain't that right, K? C'mon bro. What do y-BLEJBJFHLHTTKLH"

DONALD DRIVER, STOPPER, DROPPER AND ROLLER

(Via @bubbaprog)

Here's Donald Driver winning some thing in Dancing In Addition To The Stars. OH GOD OH GOD I'M IN A PLACE HOTTER THAN GREEN BAY IT BURRRRRNS

LEBRON JAMES, PLEASANTLY SURPRISED TO FIND TYLER HANSBROUGH GUARDING HIM

(Via Mike Prada)

Here's LeBron acting just like I act when I'm going through security in the airport and I get waved through without stepping into the see-your-dong machine. "Oh, you don't --" I gesture with my hands. "I could -- do you want -- I mean -- OK -- OK cool!" And I bet if my shoes were as nice as LeBron's, I would never have a problem with walking 20 feet before remembering to go back and put them on.

Welp, I followed up a reality television joke with an air travel joke. Time to see about putting me in a home.

The Young Fool Carlos Ruiz Goes to ye Market: A One-Act Play

Sally forth ye to the market, young Carlos!

But I's want only to stay at the stead an' play with me tin soldiers!

We's need flour an' chickens, Carlos. How's we to make dinner, we ain't have chickens? Do as ye mother says!

Must I to go to the mar't? I's sure to get swindled again!

Argh! Take the family ball-bat an' barter it for a chick an' a sack o'grain, lest I box ye ears!

Sigh. I must to go to the mar't then.

THAT EVE:

Carlos! You's come back from the mar't and ain't ye have no grains?

No, mrs.'m. I haven't grains.

And ain't ye have no chickens?

No, mrs.'m, I ain't haven't no chickens.

And what of ye ball-bat?

I's haven't even the family ball-bat, Ma!

Well what I's to make of ye, then?

I's only as the Lord God made me, Ma. I's name is Carlos. Carlos, the Grand Fool of the Village. And we's all to go hungry to-night.

FIN

(GIF via Baseball Prospectus, nominated by @nationalsreview and @pbsenerchia)

DON'T DO THAT, JAMES JONES, THAT'S NOT WHAT YOU'RE FOR

(Via @jose3030)

James Jones can probably do all kinds of real-life things, but in the NBA he is only for one thing: three-pointers. His career shooting percentage is greater from three-point range than from anywhere in two-point range. Just the other night, my friend and I were talking about a recent game in which he fired off a shot from four feet within the arc, and how f***ing weird it was that he even did that.

It's really weird, then, that he did this. At the risk of objectifying, if NBA players are things you find in a tool shed, LeBron James is one of those Swiss Army knives that has a pen and magnifying glass and flat-head screwdriver and Philips screwdriver and basically everything else. Dwyane Wade is a nail gun. Chris Bosh is a jigsaw. And James Jones, in this analogy, is a guy who is good at shooting three-pointers. HE CANNOT DO OR BE ANYTHING ELSE EVEN IN ANALOGIES. DO NOT ATTEMPT.

VOTE!