Hooligans, Kirk Hinrich and George Romney at The Gun

LONDON – Much like the Jazz’s Andrei Kirilenko, Mehmet Okur, Deron Williams and Kyle Korver, several Chicago Bulls – in town to play a preseason game against Utah on Tuesday – attended Premier League football matches Sunday.
For Chicago’s Kirk Hinrich, it was a trip with teammate Luol Deng and others to watch Arsenal beat Blackburn 6-2 in front of a crowd of 59,431 at Emirates Stadium.
“I kind of see all the reality TV shows with the riots and stuff, so it wasn’t … as crazy as I imagined it,” Hinrich said. “But it definitely was cool to see all those people in there. … I’m going to follow Arsenal now.”

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Hinrich was one of many who got drawn into Carlos Boozer trade talk last offseason, including much-publicized discussion of a possible deal that would have sent Boozer to Chicago, Hinrich to Portland and Tyrus Thomas of the Bulls to Utah.
Asked earlier about having his name thrown into the summer rumor mill, Hinrich didn’t blink today.
“I knew it was a possibility,” he said. “It’s tough to control as a player, so you just realize whatever happens you make the best of the situation and then move on.”

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And finally …
Had lunch today at The Gun, a pub and dining room in the Docklands that dates to the 18th century.
As Gun lore has it, Lord Horatio Nelson – a British flag officer acclaimed for his service in the Royal Navy, especially during the Napoleonic Wars – used to frequent the pub and rendezvous there with mistress Lady Emma Hamilton, the muse of British portrait painter and ex-Massachusetts governor/Salt Lake City Olympics boss Mitt Romney’s way-back-on-the-family-tree kinsman George Romney.
Thanks to the stepmother of an unnamed sportswriter who recommended the place; any pub she suggests in the future will be deemed a must-visit destination.
And no, for the record, the barkeep there did not ask if Boozer had been traded.

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