Summer is the cruelest season. If you’re like me, you spend the rest of the year looking forward to the hot-weather months, purely based on the fantasy that this year — THIS year –will surely bring the margarita-fueled windsurfing excursion you’ve always envisioned. Nope. Turns out I still have to go to work. Oh, right, I forgot. All the summer does is make things sweatier. Surf’s up.

The glaring lack of sports on TV doesn’t help things, either. But one thing I’ve discovered in recent years is the NBA summer league. It’s not exactly the Western Conference finals, but it is pro basketball, and does contain the extra drama that can only come when guys are playing for careers in the field of playing sports.

This summer, Greivis Vasquez, Eric Hayes, and Landon Milbourne all made summer league rosters. Vasquez, of course, is on solid ground after being drafted 28th to the Memphis Grizzlies. Hayes and Milbourne, meanwhile, are going to sing for their supper in Washington and Atlanta, respectively, according to a report from Ridiculous Upside. Given Washington’s guard surplus, Hayes may be playing for game tape footage, although given Washington’s penchant for signing ex-Terps, and GM Ernie Grunfeld’s penchant for white-guy guards, I’m not gonna say die just yet. As for Milbourne catching on, that’s a total crapshoot as far as I can tell.

Here are the schedules for each team’s summer league games. Select games will air on NBA TV (noted by asterisk below, or check full schedule here). All games are available through NBA Broadband, although it costs $14.95, so F that. I’ve already circled July 12 on my calendar, when Vasquez’s Grizz collide with Milbourne’s Hawks. The paparazzi are gonna be swarming for that one.

Memphis Grizzlies/Vasquez: 7/12 vs Atlanta, 7/13 vs Milwaukee*, 7/15 vs D-League, 7/16 vs Minnesota*, 7/18 vs San Antonio

Atlanta Hawks/Milbourne: 7/12 vs Memphis, 7/14 vs San Antonio, 7/15 vs Milwaukee, 7/17 vs D-League, 7/18 vs Minnesota

Washington Wizards/Eric Hayes: 7/11 vs Golden State*, 7/12 vs Clippers*, 7/15 vs Dallas*, 7/16 vs New Orleans*, 7/17 vs New York*

I said it all, baby. I called it. Vasquez to Memphis at 28, Hayes and Milbourne go undrafted.

I’ll take my payments in cash and my verbal bouquets funky and sloppy.

Seriously, it was a great night for Greivis. He got a great ovation from the notoriously irascible MSG crowd, and capped it all off in classic Vasquez fashion with a big bear hug for David Stern. Congratulations, sir.

Unfortunately Hayes and Milbourne didn’t get picked, but if it’s any consolation it can’t have come as a surprise. Now they have to hope for a training camp invite, and if that doesn’t pan out they’ll just have to be content to travel the world playing for a salary merely in the high five figures.

More coverage and the camera-shaking announcement, reaction, and triumphant stroll to the podium here.

As you know, it is very likely that Greivis Vasquez will hear his name called tonight in Madison Square Garden.  My money is still on Memphis at 28, but plenty of other options are in play. Just yesterday, for example, rumors emerged that the Knicks are trying to move up with the explicit goal of drafting either Vasquez or Iowa forward Craig Brackins. We shall see.

In the meantime, however, fellow Terp standouts and grads Eric Hayes and Landon Milbourne are also (at least technically) on the board tonight. What are their chances?

Well, in a nutshell, they’re not good. But there have been a few nibbles.

Along with the Vaz, both Hayes and Milbourne worked out with the Wizards, although that’s a classic public relations move straight out of the Susan O’Malley playbook. I wouldn’t bank on the Wiz taking them, especially since their last pick is 35 and both would be a reach at that position, plus the fact that the Wiz are looking to move up in the draft, plus the fact that the team is understandably looking at bigs with their later selections. So that’s out.

Thanks to this wonderful, incredible document from NBAdraft.net, we can see that Milbourne has drawn a lot more interest.

Along with the Bullets, Landon has worked out for the Warriors, Clippers, Hawks, Pacers, Pistons, and Timberwolves.

Hayes has been more under the radar than Milbourne, but that doesn’t mean The Steady One isn’t chasing the dream as well. His D.C. workout apparently went pretty swimmingly. He also racked up some extra footage and face time in a workout with the Raptors. Rumored sessions for the Bulls and Pistons don’t seem to have materialized.

Based on this, a draft selection doesn’t seem imminent for either. As we wrote in this space a couple months ago, Milbourne’s pedestrian showing at the Portsmouth Invitational probably sealed his fate. Hayes did not even garner an invitation to that event, which is college basketball’s equivalent of the Senior Bowl.

My prediction is that Milbourne gets a shot to make the Wizards as an undrafted free agent. They can use all the tall guys they can get, and just the fact that they invited Landon and Hayes for workouts means they still see the (financial) value in having a hometown favorite on the roster, just as they did in the O’Malley days when they kick-started the pro careers of other ex-Terps on the draft bubble (Steve Blake, Lonny Baxter and LaRon Profit come to mind).

Hayes will probably not be so lucky. But maybe the D-league is in his future. I would speculate that the NBA will not completely turn its back on someone with the calm demeanor of an Eric Hayes; that’s an increasingly rare commodity in the league and can be important to team chemistry, especially when it comes from the crucial point guard position. His NBA range doesn’t hurt either.

Of course, almost every country in the world has a pro basketball league, so these guys will almost assuredly get paid to play somewhere for some period of time. It’s anyone’s guess what happens tonight — hey, maybe I’ll be wrong. I know I’ll be pulling for all three.