I've noticed that several of you have reached this site by Googling things such as "basketball practice for first graders," so I figured I'd share the wisdom of what I've learned and tell you about the one-hour practices that we run.
1. Team Meeting. We talk about what we need to do, what we've accomplished, protecting the basketball and going after rebounds (some of the kids stand flat-footed after a shot). This takes all of a minute.
2. Defensive Slides. We used to do some jumping drills to warm up, but we go straight into about 3 minutes of defensive slides. I take the kids sideways, back and forth, stopping and starting. It's a good way to get their footwork going and to get them warmed up. Our league requires man-to-man defense, so this is a good way to remind them not to cross their feet.
3. Dribbling Drills. Only half the kids can dribble the ball well repetitively. The rest lose the ball pretty quickly, and some double dribble, either by stopping and then starting again or by using two hands. They just don't get the playground experience kids did 30 years ago, and they're so scheduled they don't play much pickup. As a result, we try three drills:
a. The "Fingers" Drill. I have them stand in place, look at me and shout out the number of fingers that I put up. The goal here is to get them to dribble the ball and not look at it. That's important, of course, because if they can dribble without looking at the ball they'll find the open man quickly and make a good pass, and, also, of course, because they can see where the defenders are and better protect the basketball. We ask them to switch hands, too.
b. The "Dribble to Half Court and Back" Drill. We have them stand at the baseline and dribble the ball to half court and then back. Remember, we're playing on "sideways" courts that are typically found in elementary school gyms in our parts, and not the "full length" court (there are two "sideways" courts for every full length court). The goal here is to get them to dribble quickly but under control, and every now and then my assistant and I pop into the lines to make the kids shift hands or protect the ball better.
c. The "Protect the Basketball" Drill. This is a great drill. We have two kids dribbling the ball while, at the same time, trying to take the ball away from one another. This drill compels the kids to angle in toward the defender and dribble the ball slightly behind them, near their hips. The kids love this drill, have fun "going at it," and some have become better dribblers because of it.
We do these drills for a total of 10-15 minutes, depending on how they are going. So right now we've used up about 15 minutes total.
3. Passing Drills. Put simply, we have kids work on their chest passes, bounce passes and overhead passes. My assistant and I jump in and out of the passing lanes, compelling the kids to make decisions, such as throwing an overhead pass or a bounce pass (yes, given that the kids are considerably shorter than we are, we duck down to make the situation look more real). We stress to them the importance of throwing a crisp pass, one that hits the teammate at the letters so that they can make a strong move or take a shot without diving for the ball, without the ball hitting their feet, etc. Most kids aren't crisp enough passers yet. We usually take 5-10 minutes with these drills.
4. Situational Drills. We do the following drills:
a. Layup Lines. To make things more interesting, we have the player in the rebounding lane throw a bounce pass to the player in the shooting line.
b. Follow Your Shot Drill. A coach throws a pass to a kid a few feet inside the foul line, and the kids are to catch the ball and shoot it without putting it on the floor. The reason for this is that if the kids are in this close and open, there is no need to put the ball on the floor (most kids will lose possession, and it's a good habit to teach at this age -- avoid wasted energy). The kids then are encouraged to follow their shots twice, so that they learn the importance of staying at it and fighting for a rebound (you'd be surprised how many kids forget that they can pursue the ball after they've shot it). This drill proved very productive, as the kids showed a lot of energy following their shots in our last game.
c. The "Dribble Hand-off" Drill. We didn't necessarily want to teach this drill, but the requirement of man-to-man defense compelled us to do so. Why? Because the kids cover each other like gloves, and there really isn't a lot of room for good chest or bounce passes. These kids are too young (read: too inexperienced) to learn a high-post offense or a 1-4 stack, so what we do is have one kid dribble and then stop, and have a teammate trail him, take a handoff and then either shoot the ball or dribble toward the hoop (all the while, we ask the player doing the handoff to slide toward the basket, a poor person's version of a pick and roll, as the handoff can serve as a pick). The handoff ends up freeing up someone for a drive or a shot. Our kids play tough defense in practice, but, again, this drill paid dividends in our last game, as we were able to get the ball inside pretty effectively.
Now we've been at it for about 35 minutes or so, and we take a water break for a minute.
5. Scrimmaging. The kids love this, of course, and I bought some mail-order pinnies so that we can distinguish the "teams" from one another. We have an odd number of kids, so we shuffle them in and out, and I keep the game to 3-on-3. The reason: first, we avoid clutter in the half court (we don't scrimmage full court at this age) and can teach better and, two, we let the odd kid take a breather. I try to create evenly matched teams, make sure every kid gets to handle the ball, switch the defensive matchups and stop play to teach. For example, if a kid double dribbles, I try to correct the mistake. If a kid loses the ball because she dribbles in front of her instead of protecting it, I'll stop play and teach. I try to be encouraging and not single anyone out. The scrimmages prove to be great exercise and get the kids in better shape for the games. On my particular team, the defense is better than the offense, but I assure the kids that no one will defend them as tough as they defend themselves (this has proven true so far -- they really go after the ball). Where we have trouble is on offense -- we really don't have a super-talented kid who can score at will (but few teams do).
6. Wrap-up. I call the kids together, take 30 seconds to review things to work on, congratulate them on improvements, have everyone put their hands in and say "Team" and then say goodnight.
As I blogged before, I wished we had a zone defense requirement so we could emphasize ball movement through passing more, but we don't. As a result, we've improvised on offense and make the best of it. Kids today don't necessarily have the hoops savvy we did way back when. The game isn't instinctive to them, so only a few know about setting screens, going for rebounds, etc. We're working on their games, and it's been fun.
A great book to get is Dave Faucher's book "Coaching Youth Basketball." Faucher once coached at Dartmouth, and his book is excellent. Some of my practice plans derive from his book, and I confess that I would have been somewhat lost at the season's outset without it.
By no means am I an expert, and I welcome your suggestions too. That's the great thing about coaching. Coaches are willing to share, and coaches learn from one another. I picked up a few things at my daughter's practice, one at the water cooler, and a few by watching TV.
Please take a moment to provide comments as to your suggestions. I look forward to seeing what you do in practice or what you've seen.
Friday, January 04, 2008
Quick, Name the 10 Mostly Highly Paid Players in the NBA
If you said that the following are among them, you'd be wrong: Dirk Nowitzki, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Yao Ming, Dwight Howard, LeBron James, Amare Stoudamire and Chris Paul. Here's the list, and, while you're at it, take at look at the neighboring list of NBA team payrolls. If you run the Orlando Magic, you should get some sort of prize.
And if you run the Knicks, well. . . I'll leave it to the rest of the blogosphere to comment on the situation at Madison Square Garden.
And if you run the Knicks, well. . . I'll leave it to the rest of the blogosphere to comment on the situation at Madison Square Garden.
Old-Time Basketball
Arizona's women lost in double overtime to Oregon State and finished the game with -- get this -- only two players on the floor.
Only six Wildcat women dressed for the game. Two players were out because of injuries, one because of academics, and one for personal reasons.
Give credit to the Iron 6. It's hard to win in a major conference when you suit up only six players, and the two who were left standing should be given a round of applause.
I hope they got some ibuprofen and ice packs after the game.
Only six Wildcat women dressed for the game. Two players were out because of injuries, one because of academics, and one for personal reasons.
Give credit to the Iron 6. It's hard to win in a major conference when you suit up only six players, and the two who were left standing should be given a round of applause.
I hope they got some ibuprofen and ice packs after the game.
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Tales from the Land of the Nintendo Wii
The last time I blogged about this, I expressed my frustration about finding a Nintendo Wii. I didn't know how hard it would be, say, in early November, to locate one of these game units. I figured I'd walk into my local Best Buy, ask some high school kid who worked there to get one from the back, and I'd pay for it and put it away for the holidays. Sounds simple, right?
Silly me.
One sales associate simply told me that they were out of them and that she didn't know when they'd get any more. When I asked if she could check with store management, she told me that they didn't know, either.
Another sales associate, even younger than the first one, looked at me as if I had small pox.
"Hey, Dad, get a clue, would you? As if we have them in this store? Where have you been, with your head in the Delaware River? They're only, like, the most popular thing on the planet right now."
She didn't actually say that, but as they say, pictures paint a thousand words. Economizing, I translated her glare of incredulity into several dozen demeaning ones. I suppose when you're selling a very hot commodity whose demand is, at the moment, inelastic, well, you can offend whom you choose. Besides, in all likelihood she won't be working there in a year, and, well, it's not as though Best Buy has superlative competition. When you read the "hot" management books, you realize that Best Buy is a model for getting customers what they want, depending on the communities in which they live.
Okay, so they whiffed on the Wii a bit, but the list of those who fanned mightily in meeting demand is endless, while the list of those who connected doesn't exist.
At any rate, my wife and I tried to figure out the best way to get a Wii for the kids. We heard that if you waited in line at Toys 'R Us, you had a good shot. Apparently, there was a story circulating that on a few different days they actually had 70 units at a time, which probably had to be a Guinness World Record for the number of units received at one time. Okay, at least in Southeastern Pennsylvania, or my corner of it. The lines outside the local Best Buys and Circuit City were absurd, especially on Black Friday. I had thought about getting up at 4 a.m. to hit the local Best Buy at its 5 a.m. opening.
As the high-school kid who worked there would have said with a daggers-like look, "As if." As it turned out, people had begun to camp outside the store for Wiis and other products starting at about 10 p.m. Thanksgiving night. Had I gotten up at 4 a.m., well, I would have been say a quarter mile down the road, about 400th in line and way out of contention for a Wii. That meant that I would have ventured down to the local Wal-Mart to buy a much-needed pair of Wrangler jeans for $14.54 (the Dale Earnhart memorial model fetches an additional $5 bucks, and I'm just not a NASCAR kind of guy).
And they don't give rain checks, either.
Try ordering on-line, and, well, fuggedaboutit! (Unless you wanted to pay a premium on Amazon or eBay, but what's the challenge in that? And, besides, I was fundamentally opposed paying above retail for this game unit. Call me crazy, perhaps, but that's the beauty of the marketplace -- the unit only has a certain value for us).
A family friend's high-school aged son works at Circuit City, so why tried to glean some intelligence from him. But he didn't know much, either, and it seemed as though store management either kept the kids who work there intentionally in the dark so that the public actually had a puncher's chance of buying a Wii (translated: even in the world of Big Box retail, passing along insider information is a no-no) or they themselves didn't know when the UPS man would arrive with the blessed units.
So, we decided for the time being to write off the "Big Box" stores, for the simple reason that the days were getting shorter and the temperatures colder, we have lives, and, well, who knows on a daily basis when the lines started outside these stores and whether they'd have units in there to sell to begin with. We just weren't going to stand outside at some crazy hour for at least a quarter of a day to have a chance to buy a Wii.
And, remember, they don't give rain checks.
We weren't despairing, however, because we made full disclosure to the kids, who are pretty patient, that we'd get the unit when we'd get it and not sooner. They were cool to it, and after checking up once or twice on my wife and her quest, only to hear that she struck out looking, they decided to give her some space and not ask.
Kind of like adhering to the adage that a watched pot never boils.
Smart kids.
I then got into a conversation with a gamer who sits near me at work, a twenty-something who seemed well-versed in all things electronic and video. I told him of our dilemma and asked him what he thought would be the best place to find a Wii.
That was an easy question: GameStop. (I trust fully that had I asked him about the fundamental interworkings of his job description, he'd be able to answer that in a heartbeat too).
That was a good answer, for while there are GameStops at strip shopping centers, they also exist in enclosed malls that have many entrances and where you really can't line up say at 10 p.m. for a 10 a.m. open. There's really no point to it. And, thankfully, there's one such enclosed mall with a GameStop in it near us.
Fortified with that information, my wife ventured to this mall before the 10 a.m. open. Once the mall opened, and fullycognizant of the precise location of the GameStop and the best entrance to the mall to get to the store as it opened, she went there on a Monday and stood in line. She was number 8, bonded with her fellow line people, and actually struck up a productive conversation about elementary education. The clock slowly ticked, and when the GameStop team was ready for the open, they announced that they had six units.
Six units.
No consolation prize for being eighth in line.
Rats!
Double rats!
Did I say they don't give rain checks?
Now, the protocol for those who are first, second, third and fourth runners up is that you wait in line until the transactions inside the store are concluded. Why? Because on occasion, those with the golden tickets, so to speak, went up to pay, only to learn that they were maxed out on their credit cards. Meaning, of course, that a runner up took his/her place and bought the precious Wii.
No such luck, for us, this time, although, quite frankly, we really didn't want to benefit from someone else's misery.
Not to let herself get defeated easily, my wife ventured to the mall the very next day. Deploying starting-block speed worthy of a participant at the NFL's annual scouting combine in Indianapolis, she improved her position to fifth in line at the GameStop. Perhaps it was a little bold showing up the very next day, as our intelligence had told us that daily deliveries had been the exception. At any rate, she struck up conversations with alumni of the line from the day before, and then the moment of truth arrived. That morning, GameStop had 24 units to sell.
Needless to say, I could tell from my wife's tone of voice when she rang me at the office that she had been successful before she even could tell me. She did add that she felt a tad envious towards those who were numbers say 15-24, because she was eighth the day before and struck out while those virtual stragglers had come up with the prize, perhaps even on the first try.
Perhaps they should have gone out and bought Powerball tickets too.
So give the Wii to the kids we did, and they proceeded to play all sorts of games. The kids beat the living daylights out of us in bowling, box each other (using the Wii, of course, in virtual fashion) on occasion, get hustled by me in golf and have some fun on the tennis court. I blast everybody to smithereens on the shooting drill, but somehow manage to steer the cow into the fence more often than not in the cow races. I have tried to teach the kids the angles of a good game of eight-ball (and failed), and the hockey game draws some of the most vicious competition among all family members, otherwise serene Mom included. As a famous coach used to say, we play to win.
I also have discovered that amidst my daily workouts, I've developed some soreness in my right shoulder from swinging the Wii "stick" (or whatever they call it) to simulate a golf swing or bowling a bowling ball. Yes, Wii is lawyered up and has all the appropriate warnings about overuse on its packaging, and it's probably a good idea to deploy ice or at least ibuprophen if you get hooked initially and play too many games in too short a period of time, especially if you sit at a desk for a living.
Overall, though, the effort was worth it and the fun is there.
New Age gurus stress the importance of the journey over the destination, and, while we take some satisfaction from the journey, it really proved to be a pain in the butt.
The destination, though, is terrific.
What will they think of next?
Silly me.
One sales associate simply told me that they were out of them and that she didn't know when they'd get any more. When I asked if she could check with store management, she told me that they didn't know, either.
Another sales associate, even younger than the first one, looked at me as if I had small pox.
"Hey, Dad, get a clue, would you? As if we have them in this store? Where have you been, with your head in the Delaware River? They're only, like, the most popular thing on the planet right now."
She didn't actually say that, but as they say, pictures paint a thousand words. Economizing, I translated her glare of incredulity into several dozen demeaning ones. I suppose when you're selling a very hot commodity whose demand is, at the moment, inelastic, well, you can offend whom you choose. Besides, in all likelihood she won't be working there in a year, and, well, it's not as though Best Buy has superlative competition. When you read the "hot" management books, you realize that Best Buy is a model for getting customers what they want, depending on the communities in which they live.
Okay, so they whiffed on the Wii a bit, but the list of those who fanned mightily in meeting demand is endless, while the list of those who connected doesn't exist.
At any rate, my wife and I tried to figure out the best way to get a Wii for the kids. We heard that if you waited in line at Toys 'R Us, you had a good shot. Apparently, there was a story circulating that on a few different days they actually had 70 units at a time, which probably had to be a Guinness World Record for the number of units received at one time. Okay, at least in Southeastern Pennsylvania, or my corner of it. The lines outside the local Best Buys and Circuit City were absurd, especially on Black Friday. I had thought about getting up at 4 a.m. to hit the local Best Buy at its 5 a.m. opening.
As the high-school kid who worked there would have said with a daggers-like look, "As if." As it turned out, people had begun to camp outside the store for Wiis and other products starting at about 10 p.m. Thanksgiving night. Had I gotten up at 4 a.m., well, I would have been say a quarter mile down the road, about 400th in line and way out of contention for a Wii. That meant that I would have ventured down to the local Wal-Mart to buy a much-needed pair of Wrangler jeans for $14.54 (the Dale Earnhart memorial model fetches an additional $5 bucks, and I'm just not a NASCAR kind of guy).
And they don't give rain checks, either.
Try ordering on-line, and, well, fuggedaboutit! (Unless you wanted to pay a premium on Amazon or eBay, but what's the challenge in that? And, besides, I was fundamentally opposed paying above retail for this game unit. Call me crazy, perhaps, but that's the beauty of the marketplace -- the unit only has a certain value for us).
A family friend's high-school aged son works at Circuit City, so why tried to glean some intelligence from him. But he didn't know much, either, and it seemed as though store management either kept the kids who work there intentionally in the dark so that the public actually had a puncher's chance of buying a Wii (translated: even in the world of Big Box retail, passing along insider information is a no-no) or they themselves didn't know when the UPS man would arrive with the blessed units.
So, we decided for the time being to write off the "Big Box" stores, for the simple reason that the days were getting shorter and the temperatures colder, we have lives, and, well, who knows on a daily basis when the lines started outside these stores and whether they'd have units in there to sell to begin with. We just weren't going to stand outside at some crazy hour for at least a quarter of a day to have a chance to buy a Wii.
And, remember, they don't give rain checks.
We weren't despairing, however, because we made full disclosure to the kids, who are pretty patient, that we'd get the unit when we'd get it and not sooner. They were cool to it, and after checking up once or twice on my wife and her quest, only to hear that she struck out looking, they decided to give her some space and not ask.
Kind of like adhering to the adage that a watched pot never boils.
Smart kids.
I then got into a conversation with a gamer who sits near me at work, a twenty-something who seemed well-versed in all things electronic and video. I told him of our dilemma and asked him what he thought would be the best place to find a Wii.
That was an easy question: GameStop. (I trust fully that had I asked him about the fundamental interworkings of his job description, he'd be able to answer that in a heartbeat too).
That was a good answer, for while there are GameStops at strip shopping centers, they also exist in enclosed malls that have many entrances and where you really can't line up say at 10 p.m. for a 10 a.m. open. There's really no point to it. And, thankfully, there's one such enclosed mall with a GameStop in it near us.
Fortified with that information, my wife ventured to this mall before the 10 a.m. open. Once the mall opened, and fullycognizant of the precise location of the GameStop and the best entrance to the mall to get to the store as it opened, she went there on a Monday and stood in line. She was number 8, bonded with her fellow line people, and actually struck up a productive conversation about elementary education. The clock slowly ticked, and when the GameStop team was ready for the open, they announced that they had six units.
Six units.
No consolation prize for being eighth in line.
Rats!
Double rats!
Did I say they don't give rain checks?
Now, the protocol for those who are first, second, third and fourth runners up is that you wait in line until the transactions inside the store are concluded. Why? Because on occasion, those with the golden tickets, so to speak, went up to pay, only to learn that they were maxed out on their credit cards. Meaning, of course, that a runner up took his/her place and bought the precious Wii.
No such luck, for us, this time, although, quite frankly, we really didn't want to benefit from someone else's misery.
Not to let herself get defeated easily, my wife ventured to the mall the very next day. Deploying starting-block speed worthy of a participant at the NFL's annual scouting combine in Indianapolis, she improved her position to fifth in line at the GameStop. Perhaps it was a little bold showing up the very next day, as our intelligence had told us that daily deliveries had been the exception. At any rate, she struck up conversations with alumni of the line from the day before, and then the moment of truth arrived. That morning, GameStop had 24 units to sell.
Needless to say, I could tell from my wife's tone of voice when she rang me at the office that she had been successful before she even could tell me. She did add that she felt a tad envious towards those who were numbers say 15-24, because she was eighth the day before and struck out while those virtual stragglers had come up with the prize, perhaps even on the first try.
Perhaps they should have gone out and bought Powerball tickets too.
So give the Wii to the kids we did, and they proceeded to play all sorts of games. The kids beat the living daylights out of us in bowling, box each other (using the Wii, of course, in virtual fashion) on occasion, get hustled by me in golf and have some fun on the tennis court. I blast everybody to smithereens on the shooting drill, but somehow manage to steer the cow into the fence more often than not in the cow races. I have tried to teach the kids the angles of a good game of eight-ball (and failed), and the hockey game draws some of the most vicious competition among all family members, otherwise serene Mom included. As a famous coach used to say, we play to win.
I also have discovered that amidst my daily workouts, I've developed some soreness in my right shoulder from swinging the Wii "stick" (or whatever they call it) to simulate a golf swing or bowling a bowling ball. Yes, Wii is lawyered up and has all the appropriate warnings about overuse on its packaging, and it's probably a good idea to deploy ice or at least ibuprophen if you get hooked initially and play too many games in too short a period of time, especially if you sit at a desk for a living.
Overall, though, the effort was worth it and the fun is there.
New Age gurus stress the importance of the journey over the destination, and, while we take some satisfaction from the journey, it really proved to be a pain in the butt.
The destination, though, is terrific.
What will they think of next?
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Self-Righteousness Surrounding Al Golden at Temple
Why were so many Temple fans upset when UCLA was talking to Owls' head football coach Al Golden about the possibility of replacing Karl Dorrell as the head coach at UCLA?
Coaches move all the time, and Temple hadn't found a successor to Wayne Hardin until, well, Al Golden. Bruce Arians, Jerry Berndt, Ron Dickerson and Bobby Wallace all failed, most miserably. Hardin, a clever game coach who coached Heisman winners Roger Staubach and Joe Bellino at Navy, also was good at recruiting the Philadelphia Public and Parochial Leagues, the coal country of Pennsylvania and South Jersey. He gave Penn State fits a few times in the 1970's and did an excellent job on North Broad Street.
After Hardin, the program sank, almost into oblivion. They became a perennial DI doormat until a) the Owl left the Big East (okay, they really were ejected), b) they joined the Mid-American Conference and c) they hired Golden, a Penn State alum from Central Jersey who was the defensive coordinator at UVA. What a pedigree! What energy! And, seemingly, the Owls are on their way back, having put together two good recruiting years (and they're en route to a third).
Now, Temple isn't, say, Rutgers (at least not yet), and if you were a Rutgers' fan you would get upset with the prospect of a Greg Schiano talking with UCLA. Why? Because, believe it or not, the Bruins' job might not be a step up, especially when you're more known as a hoops school and you have USC in your backyard. But if you're a Temple fan, you have to understand why an Al Golden would talk to UCLA. It is a step up, has a better tradition, and is a pretty good job (and, yes, a much better job than the Temple one currently is).
Still, some Temple fans expressed their disappointment in the Philadelphia papers that Golden would look for another job. I was surprised to read of some of the rancor. Sure, Temple fans would be disappointed, because Golden has done a great job. But angry, expressing feelings of betrayal? Get over yourselves, and, at the same time, feel flattered that your once-dying program has quickly earned enough national respect for its head coach to get considered for a very good job. That says something about Al Golden and the job he's done for Temple.
Temple fans also had better get used to this type of attention. Golden isn't 40 yet, and if Temple has a .500 year or better next year, Golden will have done an (even more) amazing job in a very short time on North Broad Street. So much so that he could be a contender for a bigger job, much bigger. He's a Penn State alum, and Joe Paterno is 81, and there isn't a logical successor for JoePa (not Tom Bradley in State College, not Schiano, not Cal's Jeff Tedford). If Golden has a few more good years, who knows? Ditto UVA, where he coached the defense so ably. Head coach Al Groh isn't so young, either.
But this is a good thing for Temple fans. The attention Al Golden is getting means the program is in better shape, that the head coaching job is no longer the Last Chance Hotel of DI football and is much more attractive a position, and that the college football world thinks Temple can ably compete in the MAC. All very, very good.
I have been a Temple football fan since I can remember. My father played football for the Owls for a few years, and I recall going to many a game, first at Temple Stadium off Cheltenham Avenue in the West Oak Lane section of Philadelphia, and then at Vet Stadium. I recall them playing before sellout crowds against Penn State, once at Penn's Franklin Field and the other at Veterans Stadium and a night game against West Virginia at Temple Stadium where they upset the Mountaineers and the players carried Coach Hardin off the field (this was pre-Gatorade shower time), and I recall seeing a cornucopia of good football players -- quarterbacks John Waller, Tommy De Felice, Steve Joachim and Marty Ginestra (an Earl Morrall-like relief QB if there ever was one), running backs like Henry Hynoski and Anthony Anderson, wide receivers like Jim Callahan and Steve Watson, offensive linemen like Skip Singletary, Jim Cooper and Joe Nedney, kicker Nick Mike-Mayer and punter Casey Murphy, defensive linemen like Joe Klecko, linebackers like Wayne Coleman and defensive backs like Chris Fletcher and Todd Bowles. Most of those guys played in the NFL, and under Hardin they thought they could beat everyone.
My father's been dead for a while and I live far enough away that I don't get to games, but I always find myself checking the scores on ESPN and in the papers, hoping that the Owls won. They remain an important connection for me to my father's memory, and I'm sure that he'd be flattered that a school like UCLA was interested in his team's coach.
It's about time.
Coaches move all the time, and Temple hadn't found a successor to Wayne Hardin until, well, Al Golden. Bruce Arians, Jerry Berndt, Ron Dickerson and Bobby Wallace all failed, most miserably. Hardin, a clever game coach who coached Heisman winners Roger Staubach and Joe Bellino at Navy, also was good at recruiting the Philadelphia Public and Parochial Leagues, the coal country of Pennsylvania and South Jersey. He gave Penn State fits a few times in the 1970's and did an excellent job on North Broad Street.
After Hardin, the program sank, almost into oblivion. They became a perennial DI doormat until a) the Owl left the Big East (okay, they really were ejected), b) they joined the Mid-American Conference and c) they hired Golden, a Penn State alum from Central Jersey who was the defensive coordinator at UVA. What a pedigree! What energy! And, seemingly, the Owls are on their way back, having put together two good recruiting years (and they're en route to a third).
Now, Temple isn't, say, Rutgers (at least not yet), and if you were a Rutgers' fan you would get upset with the prospect of a Greg Schiano talking with UCLA. Why? Because, believe it or not, the Bruins' job might not be a step up, especially when you're more known as a hoops school and you have USC in your backyard. But if you're a Temple fan, you have to understand why an Al Golden would talk to UCLA. It is a step up, has a better tradition, and is a pretty good job (and, yes, a much better job than the Temple one currently is).
Still, some Temple fans expressed their disappointment in the Philadelphia papers that Golden would look for another job. I was surprised to read of some of the rancor. Sure, Temple fans would be disappointed, because Golden has done a great job. But angry, expressing feelings of betrayal? Get over yourselves, and, at the same time, feel flattered that your once-dying program has quickly earned enough national respect for its head coach to get considered for a very good job. That says something about Al Golden and the job he's done for Temple.
Temple fans also had better get used to this type of attention. Golden isn't 40 yet, and if Temple has a .500 year or better next year, Golden will have done an (even more) amazing job in a very short time on North Broad Street. So much so that he could be a contender for a bigger job, much bigger. He's a Penn State alum, and Joe Paterno is 81, and there isn't a logical successor for JoePa (not Tom Bradley in State College, not Schiano, not Cal's Jeff Tedford). If Golden has a few more good years, who knows? Ditto UVA, where he coached the defense so ably. Head coach Al Groh isn't so young, either.
But this is a good thing for Temple fans. The attention Al Golden is getting means the program is in better shape, that the head coaching job is no longer the Last Chance Hotel of DI football and is much more attractive a position, and that the college football world thinks Temple can ably compete in the MAC. All very, very good.
I have been a Temple football fan since I can remember. My father played football for the Owls for a few years, and I recall going to many a game, first at Temple Stadium off Cheltenham Avenue in the West Oak Lane section of Philadelphia, and then at Vet Stadium. I recall them playing before sellout crowds against Penn State, once at Penn's Franklin Field and the other at Veterans Stadium and a night game against West Virginia at Temple Stadium where they upset the Mountaineers and the players carried Coach Hardin off the field (this was pre-Gatorade shower time), and I recall seeing a cornucopia of good football players -- quarterbacks John Waller, Tommy De Felice, Steve Joachim and Marty Ginestra (an Earl Morrall-like relief QB if there ever was one), running backs like Henry Hynoski and Anthony Anderson, wide receivers like Jim Callahan and Steve Watson, offensive linemen like Skip Singletary, Jim Cooper and Joe Nedney, kicker Nick Mike-Mayer and punter Casey Murphy, defensive linemen like Joe Klecko, linebackers like Wayne Coleman and defensive backs like Chris Fletcher and Todd Bowles. Most of those guys played in the NFL, and under Hardin they thought they could beat everyone.
My father's been dead for a while and I live far enough away that I don't get to games, but I always find myself checking the scores on ESPN and in the papers, hoping that the Owls won. They remain an important connection for me to my father's memory, and I'm sure that he'd be flattered that a school like UCLA was interested in his team's coach.
It's about time.
Lee Corso's Great Point on Bowl Games. . . and More Observations
Coach Corso pointed out that teams were 1-7 with interim coaches coaching them in post-season bowl games. My guess is that the Vegas oddsmakers figured the coaching vacuums into the point spreads they set. Coach Corso's point was a good one -- that the assistants holding the fort together had their minds racing in many directions, and one in particular -- where will I be next year? Many of these assistants roam from city to city, campus to campus every three to five years, and it's usually the case that the new coach brings in his own team of assistants. As a result, they're not totally focused on the game. Given the turmoil that can ensue after a coach bolts, I'm surprised the overall record wasn't 0-8.
Coach Corso also pointed out that Michigan fared well despite Lloyd Carr's imminent retirement because the assistants have an additional year left on their contracts and probably were more focused. That doesn't mean, however, that they weren't wondering where they'll be next season, as I'm sure that it has to be the case that new coach Rich Rodriguez will be permitted to fire and hire whomever he pleases. You don't land a big-time coach like Rodriguez and confine him as to whom he may hire.
While it probably helped Michigan that it's assistants have a little more financial security than the average lame-duck assistant elsewhere, I'm sure that Florida's appalling pre-game stomping on the Michigan logo gave the Wolverines plenty of motivation to go Gator hunting. That type of tactic was more befitting of the U, and we all know now that the U at the moment isn't a fun place to play football. Florida's pre-game shenanigans were out of bounds, and Coach Meyer shoulders the responsibility for those actions.
Coach Corso also pointed out that Michigan fared well despite Lloyd Carr's imminent retirement because the assistants have an additional year left on their contracts and probably were more focused. That doesn't mean, however, that they weren't wondering where they'll be next season, as I'm sure that it has to be the case that new coach Rich Rodriguez will be permitted to fire and hire whomever he pleases. You don't land a big-time coach like Rodriguez and confine him as to whom he may hire.
While it probably helped Michigan that it's assistants have a little more financial security than the average lame-duck assistant elsewhere, I'm sure that Florida's appalling pre-game stomping on the Michigan logo gave the Wolverines plenty of motivation to go Gator hunting. That type of tactic was more befitting of the U, and we all know now that the U at the moment isn't a fun place to play football. Florida's pre-game shenanigans were out of bounds, and Coach Meyer shoulders the responsibility for those actions.
Puttin' on the Foil, Coach. . .
Old-time hockey, kids on a frozen pond. . . okay, so 71,000 people watched the Sabres-Penguins game on a makeshift rink at Ralph Wilson Stadium in Buffalo yesterday, and it was great theater. It was very cold outside, a goalie wore a wool cap atop his head, there were ruts of snow on the ice, and the game ended in a shootout. And, whether you like shootouts or not, this shootout was good theater and one of the best in the game, Sidney Crosby of the Penguins, won it with his usual magic (it looked as though the puck was on a string). I'm not a huge hockey fan, and I turned the game on near the end, but the NHL and NBC did a good job.
Great day for the NHL.
Great day for the NHL.
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Coaching Second-Grade Basketball
As the New Year approaches, I'd like to share my thoughts on our non-competitive league, where we have a 45-minute game each Saturday and one week night practice. So far, it's been a lot of fun and the kids have improved each week, but I have the following observations:
1. Our league's rules compel teams to play man-to-man defenses. I think this is a mistake, as does another dad, who's a middle-school teacher who coaches his school's boys' b-ball team. The reason: not every kid can handle the ball, a majority can't blow by a defender on a dribble, and not all understand the "triple threat" position. As a result, defenders play chest-up defense (even if they may not begin to guard opponents above the foul line and even if they may not double team, it's still hard for the refs -- HS kids -- to police those rules constantly), and passing has all but been eliminated. While, sure, purists love man-to-man defense, the rule that you have to play it constantly means that you've eliminated passing from all but very close distances.
2. Most kids don't have the fundamentals down. They're okay passers, and they can become decent defenders, but the dribbling is lacking. My guess is that the average kid isn't as good a ballhandler as the average kid was, say, 30 years ago. The reasons for this: 1) there are many more "little league" types of sports now than there were then, so kids don't play pick up hoops nearly as much as they did three decades ago, at least in suburbia, 2) the advent of dozens of TV channels and video games, making kids somewhat less likely to go outside and play, 3) the security consciousness of parents who don't want kids to roam the neighborhood gathering kids to play games the way they used to and 4) kids don't watch games as much on TV, which means they aren't picking up the nuances about the game that we did years ago (such as the importance of setting picks, cutting, etc.). Put differently, of the 9 kids on my team, only 4 can move the action significantly through the dribble. Of the five others, one is getting there, two sometimes dribble two-handed (and have to be reminded they can't), and two are wont to dribble in front of them, guaranteeing the ball will be slapped away.
We're drilling as much as we can, but I doubt that kids work on their games much, if at all. Why? First, it's cold in this neck of the woods, so kids won't get outside to practice. Second, they play games season to season, so they probably don't play much pickup in the off-season. Those who do will end up getting better. We'll keep on stressing the importance of dribbling, and hopefully our exhortations will resonate with the kids even after the season is over.
3. The kids work really hard and want to get better. They defend tenaciously, and they get into it. One kid really surprised me in our last game, about 2 weeks ago. He seemed tentative, but he guarded ably a kid who was several inches taller, much stronger and who called for the ball in the low post. The boy on the opposing team didn't score in the fourth quarter, and it was fun to see the smile on our player's face when I congratulated him on his effort.
4. They learn, but they're attention spans are short. We put in three new drills that helped solve a few problems. First, we started a "follow your shot" drill, where the kids take a mid-lane shot and then follow it up and get two more chances to put the ball in the basket. We also stressed to them that they needed to hit the boards when either our team shot or the other team did. We ask them a question: "who owns the ball?" and have them shout out "we do." Put differently, they're polite kids for the most part, and we want them to be more aggressive and go for the ball.
Second, we started a drill where, again, mid-lane, we toss them the ball chest high and teach them to shoot it once they catch it. Many kids are prone to trying to put in on the floor, and most will lose the ball. We worked that hard both in practice and before the game, and that drill resulted in our getting better shots and not losing the ball.
Third, we started a play to cure our most significant problem -- kids who either pick up their dribble and get stuck, with nowhere to pass because they're covered like a glove, or, alternatively, kids who are stuck because after they get the pass they're covered like a glove and aren't confident enough to put the ball on the floor. It's the old version of the dribble handoff, and what we do is have a kid dribble, with a teammate trailing him, and then have the dribbler stop and hand it off to the trailer, who then either drives toward the hoop or passes it back to the initial dribbler on a give-and-go. That play created many open looks in practice, especially among the four best players on the team. We also ask the kids a question: "What's the most important thing we do on offense?" They respond: "Protect the basketball." We have explained -- and they get it -- that they have to be careful with the ball when we have it and not lose it to the other team.
5. We still work on defensive slides, dribbling drills (including having the kids look up at me and shout out the number of fingers I'm holding up so that they get used to dribbling and not looking at the ball), passing drills (chest, bounce and overhead) and layup drills, and we'll probably teach a pick-and-roll soon. They're pretty eager to learn, they practice hard, and, in the end, and most importantly, they're getting good exercise and having a lot of fun. Typically, there aren't more than say 10 baskets scored in a game (although there is one kid whose mom played college ball who can shoot from outside; we haven't played his team yet).
It's fun to see how much the kids care -- a few keep score in their heads, even though we don't as a rule keep score. We've more than held our own, and thanks to a few books, watching games and even watching other teams practice, we've come up with some good practice plans to make things interesting. I look very much forward to the rest of the year and seeing more improvement from the kids.
The kids get frustrated because they aren't hitting that many shots, but we're making sure they're playing more under control and taking better shots. As I tell them, the thing about good shooters is that they aren't afraid to miss. That doesn't mean we want to turn these kids into gunners, but we want them to accept the fact that they have to take 'em to make 'em, and that they need to rebound from a few bad shots/misses and keep on working hard. So far they get that, and it's been fun to watch their determination.
Everyone gets to play 2 quarters in a game, and two kids each week get to play 3, and I rotate who those kids are every week. I try to split my top four into groups of two, to make sure that I have at least 2 ballhandlers on the floor each quarter. Sometimes there are 3, and that's when the team plays its best. The other kids are still learning the game. They know they need to get open on offense, but sometimes they are so far away from the action that only Chris Paul could find them open (and the average eight year-old can't begin to throw the ball that far). We encourage the parents to have their kids watch college games to get a better sense of the game, and it's hard to tell if anyone is actually doing that.
At any rate, there are always numerous plays each week to keep the kids coming back, and for me the greatest reward is to see the smile on a child's face after she or he has done something in one week that he couldn't do the week before. If my assistant coach and I can cause those smiles to recur weekly, then we're having a great time (and, hopefully, so are the kids).
1. Our league's rules compel teams to play man-to-man defenses. I think this is a mistake, as does another dad, who's a middle-school teacher who coaches his school's boys' b-ball team. The reason: not every kid can handle the ball, a majority can't blow by a defender on a dribble, and not all understand the "triple threat" position. As a result, defenders play chest-up defense (even if they may not begin to guard opponents above the foul line and even if they may not double team, it's still hard for the refs -- HS kids -- to police those rules constantly), and passing has all but been eliminated. While, sure, purists love man-to-man defense, the rule that you have to play it constantly means that you've eliminated passing from all but very close distances.
2. Most kids don't have the fundamentals down. They're okay passers, and they can become decent defenders, but the dribbling is lacking. My guess is that the average kid isn't as good a ballhandler as the average kid was, say, 30 years ago. The reasons for this: 1) there are many more "little league" types of sports now than there were then, so kids don't play pick up hoops nearly as much as they did three decades ago, at least in suburbia, 2) the advent of dozens of TV channels and video games, making kids somewhat less likely to go outside and play, 3) the security consciousness of parents who don't want kids to roam the neighborhood gathering kids to play games the way they used to and 4) kids don't watch games as much on TV, which means they aren't picking up the nuances about the game that we did years ago (such as the importance of setting picks, cutting, etc.). Put differently, of the 9 kids on my team, only 4 can move the action significantly through the dribble. Of the five others, one is getting there, two sometimes dribble two-handed (and have to be reminded they can't), and two are wont to dribble in front of them, guaranteeing the ball will be slapped away.
We're drilling as much as we can, but I doubt that kids work on their games much, if at all. Why? First, it's cold in this neck of the woods, so kids won't get outside to practice. Second, they play games season to season, so they probably don't play much pickup in the off-season. Those who do will end up getting better. We'll keep on stressing the importance of dribbling, and hopefully our exhortations will resonate with the kids even after the season is over.
3. The kids work really hard and want to get better. They defend tenaciously, and they get into it. One kid really surprised me in our last game, about 2 weeks ago. He seemed tentative, but he guarded ably a kid who was several inches taller, much stronger and who called for the ball in the low post. The boy on the opposing team didn't score in the fourth quarter, and it was fun to see the smile on our player's face when I congratulated him on his effort.
4. They learn, but they're attention spans are short. We put in three new drills that helped solve a few problems. First, we started a "follow your shot" drill, where the kids take a mid-lane shot and then follow it up and get two more chances to put the ball in the basket. We also stressed to them that they needed to hit the boards when either our team shot or the other team did. We ask them a question: "who owns the ball?" and have them shout out "we do." Put differently, they're polite kids for the most part, and we want them to be more aggressive and go for the ball.
Second, we started a drill where, again, mid-lane, we toss them the ball chest high and teach them to shoot it once they catch it. Many kids are prone to trying to put in on the floor, and most will lose the ball. We worked that hard both in practice and before the game, and that drill resulted in our getting better shots and not losing the ball.
Third, we started a play to cure our most significant problem -- kids who either pick up their dribble and get stuck, with nowhere to pass because they're covered like a glove, or, alternatively, kids who are stuck because after they get the pass they're covered like a glove and aren't confident enough to put the ball on the floor. It's the old version of the dribble handoff, and what we do is have a kid dribble, with a teammate trailing him, and then have the dribbler stop and hand it off to the trailer, who then either drives toward the hoop or passes it back to the initial dribbler on a give-and-go. That play created many open looks in practice, especially among the four best players on the team. We also ask the kids a question: "What's the most important thing we do on offense?" They respond: "Protect the basketball." We have explained -- and they get it -- that they have to be careful with the ball when we have it and not lose it to the other team.
5. We still work on defensive slides, dribbling drills (including having the kids look up at me and shout out the number of fingers I'm holding up so that they get used to dribbling and not looking at the ball), passing drills (chest, bounce and overhead) and layup drills, and we'll probably teach a pick-and-roll soon. They're pretty eager to learn, they practice hard, and, in the end, and most importantly, they're getting good exercise and having a lot of fun. Typically, there aren't more than say 10 baskets scored in a game (although there is one kid whose mom played college ball who can shoot from outside; we haven't played his team yet).
It's fun to see how much the kids care -- a few keep score in their heads, even though we don't as a rule keep score. We've more than held our own, and thanks to a few books, watching games and even watching other teams practice, we've come up with some good practice plans to make things interesting. I look very much forward to the rest of the year and seeing more improvement from the kids.
The kids get frustrated because they aren't hitting that many shots, but we're making sure they're playing more under control and taking better shots. As I tell them, the thing about good shooters is that they aren't afraid to miss. That doesn't mean we want to turn these kids into gunners, but we want them to accept the fact that they have to take 'em to make 'em, and that they need to rebound from a few bad shots/misses and keep on working hard. So far they get that, and it's been fun to watch their determination.
Everyone gets to play 2 quarters in a game, and two kids each week get to play 3, and I rotate who those kids are every week. I try to split my top four into groups of two, to make sure that I have at least 2 ballhandlers on the floor each quarter. Sometimes there are 3, and that's when the team plays its best. The other kids are still learning the game. They know they need to get open on offense, but sometimes they are so far away from the action that only Chris Paul could find them open (and the average eight year-old can't begin to throw the ball that far). We encourage the parents to have their kids watch college games to get a better sense of the game, and it's hard to tell if anyone is actually doing that.
At any rate, there are always numerous plays each week to keep the kids coming back, and for me the greatest reward is to see the smile on a child's face after she or he has done something in one week that he couldn't do the week before. If my assistant coach and I can cause those smiles to recur weekly, then we're having a great time (and, hopefully, so are the kids).
Derek Anderson: Jon Kitna or Carson Palmer?
In the movie Casablanca, Captain Reynaud talks to Rick Blaine after Blaine has finished talking to a pretty woman. The expedient law enforcement officer offered the following advice: "Rick, you shouldn't dispense with women like that so easily. They may become scarce."
And so it is with starting quarterbacks in the NFL. Those who show that they can play -- and Anderson did enough of that in 2007 -- are not a commodity -- they're the exception. And therein lies Phil Savage's dilemma in Cleveland. He has a proven starter (albeit one who threw too many picks but who can improve) and a starter in waiting in Brady Quinn. Who does he choose, and does he have to pick one right now? Reports on ESPN indicate that the Browns are willing to listen to trade offers for Anderson.
Ben Franklin once said this about telling time: "He who has one watch always knows what time it is. He who has two is never sure." So, does Savage peddle Anderson, figuring that he'll only be an average to sometimes plus quarterback (a la Kitna) and go with Quinn, whom they drafted to be the franchise QB (a la Palmer), or, does he keep Anderson (a la the Falcons oh so many years ago) and peddle Quinn (who could turn out to be the next Brett Favre)? Of course, many years ago the Cowboys tried to split the starter's job between Steve Walsh and Troy Aikman, peddled Walsh, and, well, you know the rest of the story. Walsh failed elsewhere, but Troy Aikman won three Super Bowls and made the Hall of Fame. Most recently, the Chargers opted to elevate high draft pick Philip Rivers and let Drew Brees become a free agent. So far, that looks like a bad move by Chargers' GM A.J. Smith, because while Brees had a somewhat schizophrenic season (playing like Rip Van Winkle early and then his old, excellent self for the last 12 or so games), Rivers did less well (and Brees, of course, was brilliant two seasons ago). If you trade Anderson, will you regret it? If you trade Quinn and he excels, will you end up as a GM in the Arena League?
Savage has to pick one, but he might have some time. The Browns have invested more in Quinn, but is Quinn's star still the same as it even was after he dropped to become a late first-round pick, given the horrors that Notre Dame has endure this year and the tarnishing of the reputation of the Irish's head coach, Charlie Weis (translated: was Quinn ever really as good as people said?)? Or, can he wait a year, have a spirited competition in training camp, giving Anderson a year to improve and Quinn another season to learn, and then determine whether Anderson is in fact the real deal and Quinn attractive trade bait? That course of action might be the way to go.
In many ways, Cleveland's is a pleasant problem to have.
Only time will tell, however, whether Cleveland's solution is the right one.
The decision of the GM, of course, is the one on which reputations are cemented.
And so it is with starting quarterbacks in the NFL. Those who show that they can play -- and Anderson did enough of that in 2007 -- are not a commodity -- they're the exception. And therein lies Phil Savage's dilemma in Cleveland. He has a proven starter (albeit one who threw too many picks but who can improve) and a starter in waiting in Brady Quinn. Who does he choose, and does he have to pick one right now? Reports on ESPN indicate that the Browns are willing to listen to trade offers for Anderson.
Ben Franklin once said this about telling time: "He who has one watch always knows what time it is. He who has two is never sure." So, does Savage peddle Anderson, figuring that he'll only be an average to sometimes plus quarterback (a la Kitna) and go with Quinn, whom they drafted to be the franchise QB (a la Palmer), or, does he keep Anderson (a la the Falcons oh so many years ago) and peddle Quinn (who could turn out to be the next Brett Favre)? Of course, many years ago the Cowboys tried to split the starter's job between Steve Walsh and Troy Aikman, peddled Walsh, and, well, you know the rest of the story. Walsh failed elsewhere, but Troy Aikman won three Super Bowls and made the Hall of Fame. Most recently, the Chargers opted to elevate high draft pick Philip Rivers and let Drew Brees become a free agent. So far, that looks like a bad move by Chargers' GM A.J. Smith, because while Brees had a somewhat schizophrenic season (playing like Rip Van Winkle early and then his old, excellent self for the last 12 or so games), Rivers did less well (and Brees, of course, was brilliant two seasons ago). If you trade Anderson, will you regret it? If you trade Quinn and he excels, will you end up as a GM in the Arena League?
Savage has to pick one, but he might have some time. The Browns have invested more in Quinn, but is Quinn's star still the same as it even was after he dropped to become a late first-round pick, given the horrors that Notre Dame has endure this year and the tarnishing of the reputation of the Irish's head coach, Charlie Weis (translated: was Quinn ever really as good as people said?)? Or, can he wait a year, have a spirited competition in training camp, giving Anderson a year to improve and Quinn another season to learn, and then determine whether Anderson is in fact the real deal and Quinn attractive trade bait? That course of action might be the way to go.
In many ways, Cleveland's is a pleasant problem to have.
Only time will tell, however, whether Cleveland's solution is the right one.
The decision of the GM, of course, is the one on which reputations are cemented.
Monday, December 31, 2007
Princeton-Monmouth, Men's Hoops
I just laughed because when I typed the headline, I wrote "Men's Hops" instead of "Men's Hoops." Unfortunately for Princeton hoops fans, the Tigers didn't show a lot of "hop" in Sunday's 59-50 loss at Monmouth, losing their tenth in a row, which ties a school record. Monmouth, in beating the Tigers, snapped a 7-game losing streak. The game really wasn't as close as the score indicated.
I'll defer to Jon Solomon's excellent "Princeton Basketball Blog" for the full recap, but I was there and have the following observations:
1. The kids at Monmouth clearly don't play for the glory of DI hoops that say the kids at Carolina do. The Monmouth gym is intimate, but my guess is that some high schools around the country put more money into their facilities than the Hawks do theirs. The plus side: the fans are really close to the action, and that was fun.
2. Why do they keep some of these gyms in the northeastern U.S. so warm, especially given that it's wintertime? Thankfully, the Monmouth fans were very hospitable, and no one looked twice at my kids' Princeton attire (a few years ago on a North Jersey beach I wore my Philadelphia Eagles' hat and was met with laser-like stares).
3. At Princeton, they give away about a dozen or so t-shirts during the game -- the cheerleaders throw them into the crowd. At Monmouth, they tossed in precisely 2.
4. Before the game, a Monmouth official approached the son of a former Princeton baseball and football standout to handle the shooting contest at halftime. Little did they know that a precious three or so years ago he helped lead his HS to the small-school state title game in Michigan (losing to Chris Webber's and Shane Battier's alma mater). In any event, the now-college junior made the layup easily, hit the foul shot on the third try, the three on his first, and then airballed a few half-court shots before (i) banking one that hit off the front of the rim and (ii) having one go in-and-out right at (or slightly after) the buzzer. Good job! The gift certificate will come in handy.
5. Okay, now for the serious stuff. First, I didn't understand Princeton's offense in the first half. Monmouth used a man-to-man defense for almost the entire first half, and I counted about four Princeton picks the entire half. The Tigers whipped the ball around the perimeter and then didn't shoot the outside shot particular well. They tried to hit an occasional cutter (usually center Zach Finley), but they didn't succeed much. Senior co-captains Kyle Koncz and Noah Savage have shown over the years they can shoot the three, but they had trouble getting open (Koncz did hit three treys in the game and had 14 points). The Tigers' best move was getting the ball inside to soph center Zach Finely, who has a fine back-to-the-basket move going to his left. He needs to work on the left hook a bit (and make it more of a "money" shot for him than it is now), but he is strong enough to get in position to take the shot. I did wonder why a sneaky quick Monmouth guard (and they had about 3 of them, and sometimes they played four guards at once) didn't drop down and try to poke the ball away when Finley did this move for what seemed to be the umpteenth time in the second half. Finley didn't show that he could go to his right, and he'll need to develop that ability, or else I fear a guard will drop down and make life tougher when he puts it on the floor. Especially in Ivy play.
6. The Tiger guards did not look particularly good, and there doesn't seem to be a consistent three-point shooter among them. They'll need that outside shooting to come from somewhere in order to free up both Finley and junior insider player Michael Strittmatter (who showed signs of having a pretty fluid game). Otherwise, opposing defenses will sag on them.
7. On the positive side, the Tigers tied the Hawks in rebounds and won the battle on the offensive glass 12-6. On the negative side, Monmouth was quicker, seemed to play with more energy and, yes, I'll say this here and risk the brickbats, the Monmouth kids seemed to want it more, or at least more enough to win the game (the battles on the glass notwithstanding, the Tigers looked more flat-footed on loose balls and the guards looked at sea at times). The final was 59-50, the Tigers got it within 6 early in the second half, but at one time Monmouth had the lead up to 17 and the Tigers really weren't in the ball game for most of the second half.
8. The Tigers don't seem to have a player who can, on a consistent basis, take over the game and make things happen. Scott Greenman was the last Tiger player who showed signs of that ability, but at that time Penn had guys named Zoller and Jaaber were much better at taking over a game for archrival Penn than Greenman was for the Tigers. Zach Finley shows signs of being able to do that from the low post, but he's not there yet. I liked what I saw of him though, despite the silly comments made by ESPN's Sean McDonough that dissed Finley during the Princeton-Duke game earlier in the year because Finley was all-state in South Dakota, prompting McDonough to remark that there are only 5 basketball players in that state. I know McDonough is well-respected, but that was a bit much (even if Princeton stunk out the joint for the first 15 minutes of the contest). Finley can play.
9. Sydney Johnson shows John Thompson-like patience on the sidelines. He doesn't yell, doesn't get into the face of his players, isn't overly annoying to the officials and seems positive and encouraging. The Tigers need plenty of patience from their coaching staff, and the Tiger faithful need to hope that Messrs. Johnson, Newsome, Earl and Greenman can recruit a squad that can summon the memories of the last Ivy team to win an NCAA basketball game -- more than ten years ago.
10. Times are tough for fans of Princeton's men's basketball team, but there not so easy in University City, either. While the Penn frosh look promising, Penn is a very young team that has had its ups and downs (and there have been many downs) this season. Two nights ago, the Quakers lost to Florida Gulf Coast, 60-30, scoring only 6 points in the first half while shooting 5.9% for the half and turning the ball over 23 times in the first half (the Quakers shot 19% for the game and had 35 turnovers). This is not Florida or Florida State we're talking about, but Florida Gulf Coast, a team that upped its record to 4-8 and is in its first year of DI play.
Yes, Ivy men's hoops fans from somewhere other than Philadelphia or Central New Jersey, there is a vacuum out there, there is a voice crying from the men's hoops trophy that's saying, "I'm available, take me, take the title, it's up for grabs." The question is, who will take the title. There's no question that the tough road to the automatic bid for the NCAA tournament runs through the two sets of back-to-back games against historic powers Penn and Princeton, but those games could prove to be more like speed bumps this year than the barricades they've proven to be over the past 35 years. Then again, it isn't as though the rest of the Ivies are tearing it up, either. Anything can happen -- and has happened, on back-to-back nights in the Ivies, and I suspect that it will be a fascinating League season this year.
All typos are mine, as always.
Have a very happy New Year!
I'll defer to Jon Solomon's excellent "Princeton Basketball Blog" for the full recap, but I was there and have the following observations:
1. The kids at Monmouth clearly don't play for the glory of DI hoops that say the kids at Carolina do. The Monmouth gym is intimate, but my guess is that some high schools around the country put more money into their facilities than the Hawks do theirs. The plus side: the fans are really close to the action, and that was fun.
2. Why do they keep some of these gyms in the northeastern U.S. so warm, especially given that it's wintertime? Thankfully, the Monmouth fans were very hospitable, and no one looked twice at my kids' Princeton attire (a few years ago on a North Jersey beach I wore my Philadelphia Eagles' hat and was met with laser-like stares).
3. At Princeton, they give away about a dozen or so t-shirts during the game -- the cheerleaders throw them into the crowd. At Monmouth, they tossed in precisely 2.
4. Before the game, a Monmouth official approached the son of a former Princeton baseball and football standout to handle the shooting contest at halftime. Little did they know that a precious three or so years ago he helped lead his HS to the small-school state title game in Michigan (losing to Chris Webber's and Shane Battier's alma mater). In any event, the now-college junior made the layup easily, hit the foul shot on the third try, the three on his first, and then airballed a few half-court shots before (i) banking one that hit off the front of the rim and (ii) having one go in-and-out right at (or slightly after) the buzzer. Good job! The gift certificate will come in handy.
5. Okay, now for the serious stuff. First, I didn't understand Princeton's offense in the first half. Monmouth used a man-to-man defense for almost the entire first half, and I counted about four Princeton picks the entire half. The Tigers whipped the ball around the perimeter and then didn't shoot the outside shot particular well. They tried to hit an occasional cutter (usually center Zach Finley), but they didn't succeed much. Senior co-captains Kyle Koncz and Noah Savage have shown over the years they can shoot the three, but they had trouble getting open (Koncz did hit three treys in the game and had 14 points). The Tigers' best move was getting the ball inside to soph center Zach Finely, who has a fine back-to-the-basket move going to his left. He needs to work on the left hook a bit (and make it more of a "money" shot for him than it is now), but he is strong enough to get in position to take the shot. I did wonder why a sneaky quick Monmouth guard (and they had about 3 of them, and sometimes they played four guards at once) didn't drop down and try to poke the ball away when Finley did this move for what seemed to be the umpteenth time in the second half. Finley didn't show that he could go to his right, and he'll need to develop that ability, or else I fear a guard will drop down and make life tougher when he puts it on the floor. Especially in Ivy play.
6. The Tiger guards did not look particularly good, and there doesn't seem to be a consistent three-point shooter among them. They'll need that outside shooting to come from somewhere in order to free up both Finley and junior insider player Michael Strittmatter (who showed signs of having a pretty fluid game). Otherwise, opposing defenses will sag on them.
7. On the positive side, the Tigers tied the Hawks in rebounds and won the battle on the offensive glass 12-6. On the negative side, Monmouth was quicker, seemed to play with more energy and, yes, I'll say this here and risk the brickbats, the Monmouth kids seemed to want it more, or at least more enough to win the game (the battles on the glass notwithstanding, the Tigers looked more flat-footed on loose balls and the guards looked at sea at times). The final was 59-50, the Tigers got it within 6 early in the second half, but at one time Monmouth had the lead up to 17 and the Tigers really weren't in the ball game for most of the second half.
8. The Tigers don't seem to have a player who can, on a consistent basis, take over the game and make things happen. Scott Greenman was the last Tiger player who showed signs of that ability, but at that time Penn had guys named Zoller and Jaaber were much better at taking over a game for archrival Penn than Greenman was for the Tigers. Zach Finley shows signs of being able to do that from the low post, but he's not there yet. I liked what I saw of him though, despite the silly comments made by ESPN's Sean McDonough that dissed Finley during the Princeton-Duke game earlier in the year because Finley was all-state in South Dakota, prompting McDonough to remark that there are only 5 basketball players in that state. I know McDonough is well-respected, but that was a bit much (even if Princeton stunk out the joint for the first 15 minutes of the contest). Finley can play.
9. Sydney Johnson shows John Thompson-like patience on the sidelines. He doesn't yell, doesn't get into the face of his players, isn't overly annoying to the officials and seems positive and encouraging. The Tigers need plenty of patience from their coaching staff, and the Tiger faithful need to hope that Messrs. Johnson, Newsome, Earl and Greenman can recruit a squad that can summon the memories of the last Ivy team to win an NCAA basketball game -- more than ten years ago.
10. Times are tough for fans of Princeton's men's basketball team, but there not so easy in University City, either. While the Penn frosh look promising, Penn is a very young team that has had its ups and downs (and there have been many downs) this season. Two nights ago, the Quakers lost to Florida Gulf Coast, 60-30, scoring only 6 points in the first half while shooting 5.9% for the half and turning the ball over 23 times in the first half (the Quakers shot 19% for the game and had 35 turnovers). This is not Florida or Florida State we're talking about, but Florida Gulf Coast, a team that upped its record to 4-8 and is in its first year of DI play.
Yes, Ivy men's hoops fans from somewhere other than Philadelphia or Central New Jersey, there is a vacuum out there, there is a voice crying from the men's hoops trophy that's saying, "I'm available, take me, take the title, it's up for grabs." The question is, who will take the title. There's no question that the tough road to the automatic bid for the NCAA tournament runs through the two sets of back-to-back games against historic powers Penn and Princeton, but those games could prove to be more like speed bumps this year than the barricades they've proven to be over the past 35 years. Then again, it isn't as though the rest of the Ivies are tearing it up, either. Anything can happen -- and has happened, on back-to-back nights in the Ivies, and I suspect that it will be a fascinating League season this year.
All typos are mine, as always.
Have a very happy New Year!
Monday, December 24, 2007
My Votes in Chris Berman's/ESPN's Top 10 Highlights
ESPN asks us to vote for our Top 10 highlights of all time (from a list of 100 that they provide). The pool of 100 highlights contains some memorable moments, making it tough on the reader (viewer, really) to pick just 10 highlights. But select I did, and I think that 9 of my 10 will stand the test of time (with a 10th, which I will identify) being a concession to a hometown heroic of the type that has seldom been seen in the past quarter century.
Here goes (and I will do so chronologically):
1. Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard Round the World" on October 3, 1951, giving the New York Giants a playoff win against their archrival Brooklyn Dodgers and a spot in the World Series. Russ Hodges' memorable "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" are forever etched into the sports memory banks of two generations -- the one that lived through the moment, and their children, to whom the story was repeated constantly. Drama at its finest.
2. Franco Harris's "Immaculate Reception" on December 23, 1972. The running back's controversial catch gave the Steelers a playoff victory against the 800-pound gorilla Oakland Raiders and helped start the Steel Curtain on its way to Mount Olympus status as an NFL dynasty (the others: the Packers of the 60's, the 49ers of the 80's and the Patriots now. Sorry Cowboys of the early 1990's -- you were outstanding, but perhaps not in the league of those elites). The catch itself was amazing theater.
3. Carlton Fisk Wills His Long Fly Ball to be Fair and a Home Run to give the Red Sox the win in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series on October 21, 1975. This was the walk-off home run to end all walk-off home runs. Set in Fenway Park amidst one of the greatest World Series ever, what more could a fan ask for? A true benchmark of great sports moments.
4. Dr. J. goes up and under the backboard to finish a baseline move on May 11, 1980. Yes, this is my homer pick, and it wasn't as much of a statement to me as his "cradle the baby" windmill dunk over Michael Cooper in the 1983 NBA Finals, but in a certain sense (with apologies to the likes of Earl "The Pearl" Monroe"), Dr. J showed us the future of athleticism and acrobatics in the NBA, and, well, it was just one awesome move from a great player. Yes, it's an outlier here, but I actually couldn't think of a great tenth pick on my list, so I reverted to the hometown hero.
5. Dwight Clark hauls in Joe Montana's TD Pass late in the fourth quarter against Dallas to win the NFC championship game on January 10, 1982. A dynasty begins, as this was the finishing test for the coming out party of a decade-old doormat, the San Francisco 49ers, en route to becoming a dynasty and fundamentally changing the game with the West Coast Offense. The Cowboys were the institution in the NFC, a force to be reckoned with year-in and year-out, and the 49ers broke through in a harbinger of things to come. Finally, someone was standing up to the Cowboys.
6. Lorenzo Charles' dunk earns NC State NCAA men's hoops championship on April 4, 1983. I remember watching this game with great curiosity, figuring that N.C. State would have little chance against Houston's very talented Phi Slamma Jamma squad (Hakeem Olajuwon, Larry Micheaux, Clyde Drexler, Rob Williams and Michael Young -- four would be first-round NBA draft picks). So did the rest of the country, but no one told that to Jim Valvano and his N.C. State Wolfpack. Houston's Guy Lewis stopped pushing the tempo, and N.C. State had the ball with the game tied and time running out. Guard Derrick Wittenberg took a long shot (there were no 3's then) and it was an airball. Out of nowhere, Charles grabbed the ball and dunked it as time expired, giving N.C. State the victory. Not only was this a great play, but we all remember Valvano's dashing around the court afterwards looking for someone to hug. This game put Valvano on the map, and before his untimely death, he charmed the nation.
7. Doug Flutie's Hail Mary versus Miami on November 23, 1984. Why was this amazing? Because it was a high-scoring game, and few gave BC any chance as time was running out. So what did this talented QB do? He worked another miracle, threw the ball as far as he could, where it landed in the outstretched arms of his favorite receiver, Gerard Phelan, and bedlam ensured. Flutie's BC Eagles were a great team to watch, and Flutie's grit showed the country (again) that the size of the fight in the dog trumped the size of the dog in the fight. A great ending for a deserving QB.
8. Christian Laettner's shot beats Kentucky to win NCAA Eastern Regional Final on March 28, 1992. I gave up tickets to that game to go on what proved to be a key date with the woman who would become my wife, and I remember walking out of the two semifinals thinking that Duke would wax Kentucky because Duke looked much better in the semifinal game. Kentucky played a great game, and it took a court-length pass from Grant Hill to Laettner, who hit a jumper as time ran out from the top of the key to give Duke the game (Duke was trailing by 1 at the time). Many refer to this as the greatest college basketball game ever played, and it was awesome.
9. Former team manager Jason McElwain scores 20 in a high school game on February 16, 2006. McElwain, who was autistic, gets put in a game near the end of the season. The coach did it as a reward to his loyalty, to his work ethic, and all McElwain does is rain down three after three. The homemade video is a real treat, especially when his teammates carry him off the court at the end of the game. This video underscores what sports are about -- effort, selflessness, teamwork and positive attitude. It's "Rocky" and "Hoosiers" all wrapped up in one.
10. Boise State's Statue of Liberty Play beats Oklahoma on January 1, 2007. This play got my vote for several reasons. First, few gave Boise State a chance to win this game, as it was a battle of a non-BCS conference team against a big bad wolf from a very tough BCS conference. Second, the play itself was a beauty, taking "old-time" football and shoving it right into the Sooners' (and the BCS Conferences and the silliness of those who are the BCS) collective grilles in front of an entire nation. Boise State made a great statement in that game -- namely, that the games are won on the field, and that on a given day, the school no one heard of can play its best and bloody the behemoths. That game proved to be a harbinger for a wild 2008 season, when the asthmatics and nerds of Division 1 (and, relatively speaking, 1-AA), beat up on the favorites every chance they got.
Those are my top 10. What are yours?
Check out the list. It's a lot of fun.
Here goes (and I will do so chronologically):
1. Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard Round the World" on October 3, 1951, giving the New York Giants a playoff win against their archrival Brooklyn Dodgers and a spot in the World Series. Russ Hodges' memorable "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" are forever etched into the sports memory banks of two generations -- the one that lived through the moment, and their children, to whom the story was repeated constantly. Drama at its finest.
2. Franco Harris's "Immaculate Reception" on December 23, 1972. The running back's controversial catch gave the Steelers a playoff victory against the 800-pound gorilla Oakland Raiders and helped start the Steel Curtain on its way to Mount Olympus status as an NFL dynasty (the others: the Packers of the 60's, the 49ers of the 80's and the Patriots now. Sorry Cowboys of the early 1990's -- you were outstanding, but perhaps not in the league of those elites). The catch itself was amazing theater.
3. Carlton Fisk Wills His Long Fly Ball to be Fair and a Home Run to give the Red Sox the win in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series on October 21, 1975. This was the walk-off home run to end all walk-off home runs. Set in Fenway Park amidst one of the greatest World Series ever, what more could a fan ask for? A true benchmark of great sports moments.
4. Dr. J. goes up and under the backboard to finish a baseline move on May 11, 1980. Yes, this is my homer pick, and it wasn't as much of a statement to me as his "cradle the baby" windmill dunk over Michael Cooper in the 1983 NBA Finals, but in a certain sense (with apologies to the likes of Earl "The Pearl" Monroe"), Dr. J showed us the future of athleticism and acrobatics in the NBA, and, well, it was just one awesome move from a great player. Yes, it's an outlier here, but I actually couldn't think of a great tenth pick on my list, so I reverted to the hometown hero.
5. Dwight Clark hauls in Joe Montana's TD Pass late in the fourth quarter against Dallas to win the NFC championship game on January 10, 1982. A dynasty begins, as this was the finishing test for the coming out party of a decade-old doormat, the San Francisco 49ers, en route to becoming a dynasty and fundamentally changing the game with the West Coast Offense. The Cowboys were the institution in the NFC, a force to be reckoned with year-in and year-out, and the 49ers broke through in a harbinger of things to come. Finally, someone was standing up to the Cowboys.
6. Lorenzo Charles' dunk earns NC State NCAA men's hoops championship on April 4, 1983. I remember watching this game with great curiosity, figuring that N.C. State would have little chance against Houston's very talented Phi Slamma Jamma squad (Hakeem Olajuwon, Larry Micheaux, Clyde Drexler, Rob Williams and Michael Young -- four would be first-round NBA draft picks). So did the rest of the country, but no one told that to Jim Valvano and his N.C. State Wolfpack. Houston's Guy Lewis stopped pushing the tempo, and N.C. State had the ball with the game tied and time running out. Guard Derrick Wittenberg took a long shot (there were no 3's then) and it was an airball. Out of nowhere, Charles grabbed the ball and dunked it as time expired, giving N.C. State the victory. Not only was this a great play, but we all remember Valvano's dashing around the court afterwards looking for someone to hug. This game put Valvano on the map, and before his untimely death, he charmed the nation.
7. Doug Flutie's Hail Mary versus Miami on November 23, 1984. Why was this amazing? Because it was a high-scoring game, and few gave BC any chance as time was running out. So what did this talented QB do? He worked another miracle, threw the ball as far as he could, where it landed in the outstretched arms of his favorite receiver, Gerard Phelan, and bedlam ensured. Flutie's BC Eagles were a great team to watch, and Flutie's grit showed the country (again) that the size of the fight in the dog trumped the size of the dog in the fight. A great ending for a deserving QB.
8. Christian Laettner's shot beats Kentucky to win NCAA Eastern Regional Final on March 28, 1992. I gave up tickets to that game to go on what proved to be a key date with the woman who would become my wife, and I remember walking out of the two semifinals thinking that Duke would wax Kentucky because Duke looked much better in the semifinal game. Kentucky played a great game, and it took a court-length pass from Grant Hill to Laettner, who hit a jumper as time ran out from the top of the key to give Duke the game (Duke was trailing by 1 at the time). Many refer to this as the greatest college basketball game ever played, and it was awesome.
9. Former team manager Jason McElwain scores 20 in a high school game on February 16, 2006. McElwain, who was autistic, gets put in a game near the end of the season. The coach did it as a reward to his loyalty, to his work ethic, and all McElwain does is rain down three after three. The homemade video is a real treat, especially when his teammates carry him off the court at the end of the game. This video underscores what sports are about -- effort, selflessness, teamwork and positive attitude. It's "Rocky" and "Hoosiers" all wrapped up in one.
10. Boise State's Statue of Liberty Play beats Oklahoma on January 1, 2007. This play got my vote for several reasons. First, few gave Boise State a chance to win this game, as it was a battle of a non-BCS conference team against a big bad wolf from a very tough BCS conference. Second, the play itself was a beauty, taking "old-time" football and shoving it right into the Sooners' (and the BCS Conferences and the silliness of those who are the BCS) collective grilles in front of an entire nation. Boise State made a great statement in that game -- namely, that the games are won on the field, and that on a given day, the school no one heard of can play its best and bloody the behemoths. That game proved to be a harbinger for a wild 2008 season, when the asthmatics and nerds of Division 1 (and, relatively speaking, 1-AA), beat up on the favorites every chance they got.
Those are my top 10. What are yours?
Check out the list. It's a lot of fun.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
76ers-Lakers Last Night
The family went to see the 76ers-Lakers game last night at the Wachovia Center, and I have the following observations.
1. Mo Cheeks can coach. He doesn't have many players, but he coached some outstanding offensive sets.
2. The 76ers have 2 main problems. First, they don't have enough guys who should be starters in the league. Second, they have absolutely NO inside game on offense.
3. The 76ers' dancers should have had poles out there on the floor for some of the outfits that they wore. Talk about a mixed message on the issue of family entertainment. It was A Shot of Love with Tila Tequila meets Red Auerbach. Just horrible.
4. The Lakers' bench is bad. Luke Walton (who starts) looks overmatched out there, but there's no challenger for his spot among the reserves. The other four Lakers' starters were excellent. Lamar Odom is hard to guard, Andrew Bynum showed flashes of greatness on offense (and scored over 20 points), Kobe had a good if not great night, and Derek Fisher was very clutch in the second half.
5. The 76ers should not ink Andre Iguodala to a max contract after this season. The reason: he can't take over a game night after night the way the previous AI, warts and all, could. Andre Miller drove the offense early, taking advantage of Fisher, but Iguodala disappears for periods during a game, and your megastar shouldn't do that. Someone else might be desperate enough to give Iguodala the max, but the 76ers shouldn't be afraid if that were to happen. They'd be better off, having made mistakes with Samuel Dalembert, among others.
6. GM Ed Stefanski should trade Andre Miller to the Heat before the deadline in exchange for Jason Williams, whose contract will expire after this season. Then he should make a serious run at Gilbert Arenas, assuming that Number 0's knee is in good shape. And he should find some low-post offensive players while he's at it.
7. Great tribute to the 1982-1983 Sixers at halftime. Dr. J and Clint Richardson (the third guard and a great defender) were on hand, and Dr. J is as elegant as ever. He gave a nice speech, and was most warmly received by the crowd. Quite frankly, the place should have been cheering out of its minds, but it wasn't packed, and many of the fans there were so young that they probably hardly remember him. Still, it was a nice tribute, and there were some flashbacks to his great plays during that season (including the cradle-the-baby dunk over Michael Cooper in the finals against the Lakers) and to Dave Zinkoff's public address calls, which were legendary. Great stuff for a great team, and it was fun to see Mo Cheeks as a younger man and clutch player.
8. Whoever the public address announcer is, they should can him. He can hardly hold a candle to the legendary Zinkoff, and why should the NBA create an atmosphere that resembles a mediocre MTV reality show? Where's the maturity, the dignity?
It was a fun atmosphere and a very good game. Mo Cheeks gets as much out of the talent he has as he can, but it's a team that won't win more than 40% of its games and will be in the lottery once again. The problem will be that if they keep on playing feisty b-ball, they'll end up at the bottom of the lottery and get another Thaddeus Young or Rodney Carney, when they need a Greg Oden or Kevin Durrant. That's a fundamental problem in the NBA -- that a team can stay below average if not awful -- for a long period of time. The entertainment value only goes so far.
What the fans really want are winners.
And, as Dr. J pointed out, it's been 25 years since Philadelphia has had a championship in a major sport.
And the way the 76ers and Flyers are playing in that building now, we can say "and counting."
1. Mo Cheeks can coach. He doesn't have many players, but he coached some outstanding offensive sets.
2. The 76ers have 2 main problems. First, they don't have enough guys who should be starters in the league. Second, they have absolutely NO inside game on offense.
3. The 76ers' dancers should have had poles out there on the floor for some of the outfits that they wore. Talk about a mixed message on the issue of family entertainment. It was A Shot of Love with Tila Tequila meets Red Auerbach. Just horrible.
4. The Lakers' bench is bad. Luke Walton (who starts) looks overmatched out there, but there's no challenger for his spot among the reserves. The other four Lakers' starters were excellent. Lamar Odom is hard to guard, Andrew Bynum showed flashes of greatness on offense (and scored over 20 points), Kobe had a good if not great night, and Derek Fisher was very clutch in the second half.
5. The 76ers should not ink Andre Iguodala to a max contract after this season. The reason: he can't take over a game night after night the way the previous AI, warts and all, could. Andre Miller drove the offense early, taking advantage of Fisher, but Iguodala disappears for periods during a game, and your megastar shouldn't do that. Someone else might be desperate enough to give Iguodala the max, but the 76ers shouldn't be afraid if that were to happen. They'd be better off, having made mistakes with Samuel Dalembert, among others.
6. GM Ed Stefanski should trade Andre Miller to the Heat before the deadline in exchange for Jason Williams, whose contract will expire after this season. Then he should make a serious run at Gilbert Arenas, assuming that Number 0's knee is in good shape. And he should find some low-post offensive players while he's at it.
7. Great tribute to the 1982-1983 Sixers at halftime. Dr. J and Clint Richardson (the third guard and a great defender) were on hand, and Dr. J is as elegant as ever. He gave a nice speech, and was most warmly received by the crowd. Quite frankly, the place should have been cheering out of its minds, but it wasn't packed, and many of the fans there were so young that they probably hardly remember him. Still, it was a nice tribute, and there were some flashbacks to his great plays during that season (including the cradle-the-baby dunk over Michael Cooper in the finals against the Lakers) and to Dave Zinkoff's public address calls, which were legendary. Great stuff for a great team, and it was fun to see Mo Cheeks as a younger man and clutch player.
8. Whoever the public address announcer is, they should can him. He can hardly hold a candle to the legendary Zinkoff, and why should the NBA create an atmosphere that resembles a mediocre MTV reality show? Where's the maturity, the dignity?
It was a fun atmosphere and a very good game. Mo Cheeks gets as much out of the talent he has as he can, but it's a team that won't win more than 40% of its games and will be in the lottery once again. The problem will be that if they keep on playing feisty b-ball, they'll end up at the bottom of the lottery and get another Thaddeus Young or Rodney Carney, when they need a Greg Oden or Kevin Durrant. That's a fundamental problem in the NBA -- that a team can stay below average if not awful -- for a long period of time. The entertainment value only goes so far.
What the fans really want are winners.
And, as Dr. J pointed out, it's been 25 years since Philadelphia has had a championship in a major sport.
And the way the 76ers and Flyers are playing in that building now, we can say "and counting."
Weasels, Wimps and Scoundrels
Those words describe the owners of Major League Baseball teams, the alleged journalists who covered the teams during the steroids era and the ballplayers themselves, and, particularly, the leadership of the players' union (which opted to protect the malefactors at the expense of the good citizens among the players).
The owners got dumb, fat and happy during the steroids era, particuarly after the labor-relations debacle of 1994, which culminated in the cancellation of a season and a World Series. So, enter the personally inflated Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire into the fray, capturing America's hearts with a drug-induced (and perhaps drug-addled) home run love fest. The owners loved the attention that their teams got, particularly at the gate, despite the fact that the players looked on the average significantly bigger than they had a decade and a half earlier (where most looked like relative stick figures or the average European man of today who lives in a city where, unlike the U.S., walking is not only encouraged but necessary). In scientific terms, while species evolve, they don't usually do so markedly in a period of a decade or two at most. Yet, despite the obvious evidence (i.e, visual evidence -- think East German female swimmers during the cold war) and the whispers, the owners hid beyond shouts of "hearsay" and took the tactic of accusing the few brave souls who waxed skeptical as typical cynics who were envious of someone else's success (if, even, you could have found those souls).
Great tactic, because once it wears out you simply have succeeded only in doubling the enmity that arose because of the suspicions instead of extinguishing it.
I've excoriated the national media before on posts (and am too relaxed right now to link to prior posts on the topic, but if you Google "SportsProf steroids" or "SportsProf steroids media" you'll probably find those posts). Put simply, those guys are glorified fans, not journalists, because any self-respecting journalist would have smelled a story and at least told his editors and urged his newspaper to get their investigative reporting team on the matter and draw attention to the issue. But they didn't do it. Why? Because they love being around the game, love having a special relationship with a player who might give them more access than the next guy, and they didn't want to lose that. Write what they saw? Take a stand and ask hard questions? That's what journalists are supposed to do. These guys -- and I include Gammons, Verducci, Kurkjian, Stark and Olney -- did not do that at all.
What makes matters worse is something I heard Tim Kurkjian say on ESPN radio last week, when the talk focused for a short time on Hall of Fame voting. Kurkjian said that he knew fellow voters who would not vote for anyone implicated in the steroid controversy. He didn't agree with this position, because he (and host Mike Greenberg) offered that given how widespread the scandal might ultimately prove to be, then perhaps you couldn't vote for anyone. Kurkjian, if my memory serves me correctly, then said he spoke with a writer about a few players who weren't implicated but who in the inside circles of baseball were widely suspected of using performance-enhancing drugs and wondered aloud whether that writer would vote for those players (whose names weren't mentioned in the Mitchell report). That comment irked me and should have irked any true baseball fan, who should reasonably rely on these top writers to break a story (or to have broken it years ago). Why did guys like Kurkjian sit on the sidelines and not cover those players' alleged use if the knowledge of it was "so widespread?" That's baffling, and now they're taking ludicrous positions about Hall of Fame balloting when they blew their coverage in the first place. You can say one thing about these so-called baseball journalists -- they really broke this story. Literally.
As for the players' union, well, there's a proverb out there that says "you don't always win by being right all the time." And, to a great degree, this union has won most of its arguments since its inception. But where they erred tactically is by closing ranks at all costs and harming the overall good name of players generally. If I'm a union member I have to question whether Don Fehr and Gene Orza remain fit to lead my union, especially if I believe that a majority of the players did not use performance-enhancing drugs. Because if that's the case, then why did the silent majority let a minority of players drag all players' collective reputations into the gutter? And why did Fehr and Orza lead them down such a slippery path? Then again, if there is silence and the leadership doesn't change, then perhaps the usage was much more pervasive than anyone thought? Half? Two thirds? Three quarters? It's one thing to support one another, but to contribute to a culture of damaging a great game without any regard for the welfare of all players is just wrong.
The Mitchell report is what it is. The interesting thing about it now is that certain players and former players have admitted to using either human growth hormone or steroids at various intervals in their careers. Those admissions give the overall report some credence, but the issue of Roger Clemens looms. Will he sue the Lords of Baseball to clear his name? That trial would compelling viewing, because the evidence posed about Clemens just doesn't seem to be very strong, at least at the moment. There's a catch for Clemens and others, however. Senator Mitchell had no power to compel people to come forward to testify. Should Clemens sue, both sides will have broad discovery powers to compel witnesses to testify under oath about what they know. So while Clemens can shield himself at the present time behind arguments about flaws in the Mitchell Report, what could come out under discovery in a lawsuit could be much more damning. Given the public beating Clemens has taken already, how much more does he have to lose by bringing that lawsuit?
Think O.J .trial with more sophisticated media coverage. Court TV execs should be salivating, because it might just happen.
And that trial could blow the whole roof off.
As for baseball overall, a few things need to happen. First, better urine tests for performance enhancing substances (including HGH) and, second, blood tests as well. The union should roll on this issue before Congress passes laws about this, and given how well Congress has done lately a negotiation with the owners should be much more preferable. Two, let history be the judge of what happened, don't suspend anyone for past sins, and let the Hall of Fame voters decide the fate of those with puffy numbers. And, while they're at it, they should give extra consideration to the skinny Fred McGriff, the onetime great Blue Jays' and Braves' 1B who had a great career and who at times was dissed as not being powerful enough for his position.
Probably because the only "Cream" he had in his arsenal was an occasional cream soda on a road trip. He'd get my vote.
Baseball needs to move on, but the writers themselves deserve their periodic descents into Hades during Hall of Fame balloting for their blown coverage on the entire subject. The owners will get away with it because, well, they make up the rules (unless we all vote with our feet), and the players will also, to a degree, because you can't play the game without them.
Except for one thing -- they know who did what, and they have to live with it.
And that can't be a comfortable feeling.
The owners got dumb, fat and happy during the steroids era, particuarly after the labor-relations debacle of 1994, which culminated in the cancellation of a season and a World Series. So, enter the personally inflated Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire into the fray, capturing America's hearts with a drug-induced (and perhaps drug-addled) home run love fest. The owners loved the attention that their teams got, particularly at the gate, despite the fact that the players looked on the average significantly bigger than they had a decade and a half earlier (where most looked like relative stick figures or the average European man of today who lives in a city where, unlike the U.S., walking is not only encouraged but necessary). In scientific terms, while species evolve, they don't usually do so markedly in a period of a decade or two at most. Yet, despite the obvious evidence (i.e, visual evidence -- think East German female swimmers during the cold war) and the whispers, the owners hid beyond shouts of "hearsay" and took the tactic of accusing the few brave souls who waxed skeptical as typical cynics who were envious of someone else's success (if, even, you could have found those souls).
Great tactic, because once it wears out you simply have succeeded only in doubling the enmity that arose because of the suspicions instead of extinguishing it.
I've excoriated the national media before on posts (and am too relaxed right now to link to prior posts on the topic, but if you Google "SportsProf steroids" or "SportsProf steroids media" you'll probably find those posts). Put simply, those guys are glorified fans, not journalists, because any self-respecting journalist would have smelled a story and at least told his editors and urged his newspaper to get their investigative reporting team on the matter and draw attention to the issue. But they didn't do it. Why? Because they love being around the game, love having a special relationship with a player who might give them more access than the next guy, and they didn't want to lose that. Write what they saw? Take a stand and ask hard questions? That's what journalists are supposed to do. These guys -- and I include Gammons, Verducci, Kurkjian, Stark and Olney -- did not do that at all.
What makes matters worse is something I heard Tim Kurkjian say on ESPN radio last week, when the talk focused for a short time on Hall of Fame voting. Kurkjian said that he knew fellow voters who would not vote for anyone implicated in the steroid controversy. He didn't agree with this position, because he (and host Mike Greenberg) offered that given how widespread the scandal might ultimately prove to be, then perhaps you couldn't vote for anyone. Kurkjian, if my memory serves me correctly, then said he spoke with a writer about a few players who weren't implicated but who in the inside circles of baseball were widely suspected of using performance-enhancing drugs and wondered aloud whether that writer would vote for those players (whose names weren't mentioned in the Mitchell report). That comment irked me and should have irked any true baseball fan, who should reasonably rely on these top writers to break a story (or to have broken it years ago). Why did guys like Kurkjian sit on the sidelines and not cover those players' alleged use if the knowledge of it was "so widespread?" That's baffling, and now they're taking ludicrous positions about Hall of Fame balloting when they blew their coverage in the first place. You can say one thing about these so-called baseball journalists -- they really broke this story. Literally.
As for the players' union, well, there's a proverb out there that says "you don't always win by being right all the time." And, to a great degree, this union has won most of its arguments since its inception. But where they erred tactically is by closing ranks at all costs and harming the overall good name of players generally. If I'm a union member I have to question whether Don Fehr and Gene Orza remain fit to lead my union, especially if I believe that a majority of the players did not use performance-enhancing drugs. Because if that's the case, then why did the silent majority let a minority of players drag all players' collective reputations into the gutter? And why did Fehr and Orza lead them down such a slippery path? Then again, if there is silence and the leadership doesn't change, then perhaps the usage was much more pervasive than anyone thought? Half? Two thirds? Three quarters? It's one thing to support one another, but to contribute to a culture of damaging a great game without any regard for the welfare of all players is just wrong.
The Mitchell report is what it is. The interesting thing about it now is that certain players and former players have admitted to using either human growth hormone or steroids at various intervals in their careers. Those admissions give the overall report some credence, but the issue of Roger Clemens looms. Will he sue the Lords of Baseball to clear his name? That trial would compelling viewing, because the evidence posed about Clemens just doesn't seem to be very strong, at least at the moment. There's a catch for Clemens and others, however. Senator Mitchell had no power to compel people to come forward to testify. Should Clemens sue, both sides will have broad discovery powers to compel witnesses to testify under oath about what they know. So while Clemens can shield himself at the present time behind arguments about flaws in the Mitchell Report, what could come out under discovery in a lawsuit could be much more damning. Given the public beating Clemens has taken already, how much more does he have to lose by bringing that lawsuit?
Think O.J .trial with more sophisticated media coverage. Court TV execs should be salivating, because it might just happen.
And that trial could blow the whole roof off.
As for baseball overall, a few things need to happen. First, better urine tests for performance enhancing substances (including HGH) and, second, blood tests as well. The union should roll on this issue before Congress passes laws about this, and given how well Congress has done lately a negotiation with the owners should be much more preferable. Two, let history be the judge of what happened, don't suspend anyone for past sins, and let the Hall of Fame voters decide the fate of those with puffy numbers. And, while they're at it, they should give extra consideration to the skinny Fred McGriff, the onetime great Blue Jays' and Braves' 1B who had a great career and who at times was dissed as not being powerful enough for his position.
Probably because the only "Cream" he had in his arsenal was an occasional cream soda on a road trip. He'd get my vote.
Baseball needs to move on, but the writers themselves deserve their periodic descents into Hades during Hall of Fame balloting for their blown coverage on the entire subject. The owners will get away with it because, well, they make up the rules (unless we all vote with our feet), and the players will also, to a degree, because you can't play the game without them.
Except for one thing -- they know who did what, and they have to live with it.
And that can't be a comfortable feeling.
Monday, December 17, 2007
When Team Matters the Most
Read this and see what I mean.
Late in the Dallas-Philadelphia game, with the Eagles leading 10-6 and the Cowboys without any timeouts, Brian Westbrook broke through the Dallas line and was headed for a touchdown. Instead, he put on the brakes and went down at the one-yard line. The advice came from OT Jon Runyan, but Westbrook, a running back trained to go for the goal no matter what, was smart enough to heed it. The result was that the Eagles ran out the clock and won the game.
How many OTs would have thought about that? How many RBs would have taken the advice?
Not many.
In the age of glitz, what happened yesterday was special.
The Eagles' last 3 losses were by a total of 10 points. They've fared well in Dallas in recent years, played the best game that any opponent has against New England and beat Dallas yesterday. For those Eagles' fans who despair, they aren't that many players away from being a contender.
Yes, they have to be the right players. Game-breaking receivers, of course, are at the top of the list and have been for some time. Also, certainty is needed at the QB position.
Thankfully for Eagles fans, they have smarts at OT and great ability and brains at running back.
Sometimes you win by doing the smart thing, and the smart thing isn't always obvious.
The Eagles did just that yesterday, getting a good win on the road in an otherwise frustrating season.
Late in the Dallas-Philadelphia game, with the Eagles leading 10-6 and the Cowboys without any timeouts, Brian Westbrook broke through the Dallas line and was headed for a touchdown. Instead, he put on the brakes and went down at the one-yard line. The advice came from OT Jon Runyan, but Westbrook, a running back trained to go for the goal no matter what, was smart enough to heed it. The result was that the Eagles ran out the clock and won the game.
How many OTs would have thought about that? How many RBs would have taken the advice?
Not many.
In the age of glitz, what happened yesterday was special.
The Eagles' last 3 losses were by a total of 10 points. They've fared well in Dallas in recent years, played the best game that any opponent has against New England and beat Dallas yesterday. For those Eagles' fans who despair, they aren't that many players away from being a contender.
Yes, they have to be the right players. Game-breaking receivers, of course, are at the top of the list and have been for some time. Also, certainty is needed at the QB position.
Thankfully for Eagles fans, they have smarts at OT and great ability and brains at running back.
Sometimes you win by doing the smart thing, and the smart thing isn't always obvious.
The Eagles did just that yesterday, getting a good win on the road in an otherwise frustrating season.
Friday, December 07, 2007
The Risks of Getting a Good Quarterback in the NFL
Great stuff last night on WIP Sports Radio in Philadelphia from host Glenn Macnow, who had an intern evaluate quarterbacks taken in the top 3 rounds over the past 10 years.
I didn't have a chance to take notes, but the numbers look like this:
45 were taken in the top 3 rounds.
About 5 are bona fide stars.
About 10 are good players.
The rest are either so-so are busts.
The odds:
You have an 11% chance to get a potential Pro Bowler, a 22% chance to get an above-average to good QB, and a 2/3 chance to get a QB who at some point will be mired in a QB controversy.
Which might explain why the Philadelphia Eagles gave Donovan McNabb a vote of confidence yesterday and proclaimed that he's their QB of the future. A.J. Feeley proved last weekend with his four picks that he's only a back-up (and perhaps in a more tenuous position than he was in two weeks ago after the noble effort against the Pats, where he threw three picks), and Kevin Kolb is a second-round pick with promise but certainly no sure thing. When healthy (and, yes, McNabb has had serious injuries over the past four years), McNabb is a proven winner. Sure, he hasn't won a Super Bowl, but how many QBs who are currently playing have? Not many.
Mike and Mike were unprepared on ESPN Radio this morning, allowing for the McNabb to Chicago talk after Rex Grossman went down with a bad knee injury last night. Sure, it makes sense to some degree, McNabb going back to play in his hometown, but the guess here is that for that to happen the Bears would have to trade more very good draft picks to get McNabb than they're willing to.
Good QBs are at a premium. Some QBs are given too many chances (Joey Harrington), some get them too early (Alex Smith) or without good protection for years (David Carr), and some have to wait patiently because they went to Eastern Illinois and the football gods don't think you can play in the NFL unless you played superlatively against superior competition in college (hello, Tony Romo). Others linger until the sixth round and benefit from an injury to the top-pick franchise QB (Tom Brady), while one or two come out with great expectations (the Manning brothers, McNabb). But for every Peyton Manning there's more than one Ryan Leaf, and for every Donovan McNabb there's a Tim Couch and an Akili Smith.
The verdict: if you have a good QB, find ways to keep him healthy and don't let him go. To paraphrase Captain Reynaud in "Casablanca": "you shouldn't let quarterbacks with good records go, they might become scarce."
Indeed.
I didn't have a chance to take notes, but the numbers look like this:
45 were taken in the top 3 rounds.
About 5 are bona fide stars.
About 10 are good players.
The rest are either so-so are busts.
The odds:
You have an 11% chance to get a potential Pro Bowler, a 22% chance to get an above-average to good QB, and a 2/3 chance to get a QB who at some point will be mired in a QB controversy.
Which might explain why the Philadelphia Eagles gave Donovan McNabb a vote of confidence yesterday and proclaimed that he's their QB of the future. A.J. Feeley proved last weekend with his four picks that he's only a back-up (and perhaps in a more tenuous position than he was in two weeks ago after the noble effort against the Pats, where he threw three picks), and Kevin Kolb is a second-round pick with promise but certainly no sure thing. When healthy (and, yes, McNabb has had serious injuries over the past four years), McNabb is a proven winner. Sure, he hasn't won a Super Bowl, but how many QBs who are currently playing have? Not many.
Mike and Mike were unprepared on ESPN Radio this morning, allowing for the McNabb to Chicago talk after Rex Grossman went down with a bad knee injury last night. Sure, it makes sense to some degree, McNabb going back to play in his hometown, but the guess here is that for that to happen the Bears would have to trade more very good draft picks to get McNabb than they're willing to.
Good QBs are at a premium. Some QBs are given too many chances (Joey Harrington), some get them too early (Alex Smith) or without good protection for years (David Carr), and some have to wait patiently because they went to Eastern Illinois and the football gods don't think you can play in the NFL unless you played superlatively against superior competition in college (hello, Tony Romo). Others linger until the sixth round and benefit from an injury to the top-pick franchise QB (Tom Brady), while one or two come out with great expectations (the Manning brothers, McNabb). But for every Peyton Manning there's more than one Ryan Leaf, and for every Donovan McNabb there's a Tim Couch and an Akili Smith.
The verdict: if you have a good QB, find ways to keep him healthy and don't let him go. To paraphrase Captain Reynaud in "Casablanca": "you shouldn't let quarterbacks with good records go, they might become scarce."
Indeed.
Radio Silence on Ivy Hoops
Some of you have e-mailed as to my whereabouts on the Ivy hoops scene.
There are a few reasons for this.
First, the blogosphere covers the Ivies well (sometimes for a fee).
Second, Penn and Princeton both are having down years. Evansville undressed the Tigers by over 20 points the other night, and Penn is playing mostly underclassmen.
The time is ripe for another Ivy to take the prize, but, to do so, they'll still have two weekends' worth of Penn and Princeton.
And that's never easy.
There are a few reasons for this.
First, the blogosphere covers the Ivies well (sometimes for a fee).
Second, Penn and Princeton both are having down years. Evansville undressed the Tigers by over 20 points the other night, and Penn is playing mostly underclassmen.
The time is ripe for another Ivy to take the prize, but, to do so, they'll still have two weekends' worth of Penn and Princeton.
And that's never easy.
Michigan Spurned Again
First, Les Miles.
Second, Greg Schiano.
The first one makes sense.
The second one does not.
Why is Schiano staying in Northern New Jersey?
Only one theory comes to mind: he's waiting for Joe Paterno to retire at Penn State.
Any others?
Second, Greg Schiano.
The first one makes sense.
The second one does not.
Why is Schiano staying in Northern New Jersey?
Only one theory comes to mind: he's waiting for Joe Paterno to retire at Penn State.
Any others?
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
Name Your Headline -- Philadelphia 76ers Style
I had 3 choices for this post:
The King is Dead
Is Ed Snider Next to Go?
Eddie the Reluctant Takes Over
The news: the 76ers have fired formerly teflon-coated GM Billy King and replaced him with Penn grad (and former guard) Ed Stefanski, currently the GM of the Nets.
As for the first headline, all 76ers fans (and former ones) were waiting for this to happen. The 76ers haven't made much noise in quite a while, owing to some bad signings, bad draftings, bad drama ("Practice? We're talkin' about practice!") and inability to recognize that there is talent across the ocean that could help the team. For some reason, despite significant coaching turnover, Billy King kept his job -- for 10 years. Yes, the 76ers did challenge for the NBA title many years ago, but that was much more Larry Brown's doing. Once Brown cut the tether and left town, King was exposed. Unfortunately, he didn't pan out, although the 76ers waited too long to draw their conclusion. Attendance is bad, the team is 5-12, and they won't be very good for a while.
As for the second headline, well, the Flyers have turned the corner this year after several years of being skated around and by. The 76ers, though, have been dismal, and the Flyers haven't been preeminent. I still marvel that Comcast continues to let Ed Snider run the show. It seems like he's living in the 70's when it comes to sports, and there have to be more talented executives out there to manage over the situation. Sorry, Comcast, but it doesn't seem you're holding a Philadelphia icon as accountable as you should.
As for the third headline, Stefanski was a guard on some great Penn teams in the 1970's, but he seemingly past up open looks when he got the ball. That caused Big Five play-by-play commentator Big Al Meltzer to call him "Eddie the Reluctant." His CV since his playing days has been impressive, and he seems to be over the "reluctant" phase. You have to be if you're a GM in the NBA, although I do wonder why the Nets have let him go to a division rival mid-season. What's that all about? Rod Thorn's decision does raise questions -- although I'm not sure whether about the Nets or the 76ers.
At any rate, while you hate to see people lose jobs, you need to see improvement. Hopefully a new GM will cause the 76ers to view the pro world through a different lens and make better player personnel decision.
The King is Dead
Is Ed Snider Next to Go?
Eddie the Reluctant Takes Over
The news: the 76ers have fired formerly teflon-coated GM Billy King and replaced him with Penn grad (and former guard) Ed Stefanski, currently the GM of the Nets.
As for the first headline, all 76ers fans (and former ones) were waiting for this to happen. The 76ers haven't made much noise in quite a while, owing to some bad signings, bad draftings, bad drama ("Practice? We're talkin' about practice!") and inability to recognize that there is talent across the ocean that could help the team. For some reason, despite significant coaching turnover, Billy King kept his job -- for 10 years. Yes, the 76ers did challenge for the NBA title many years ago, but that was much more Larry Brown's doing. Once Brown cut the tether and left town, King was exposed. Unfortunately, he didn't pan out, although the 76ers waited too long to draw their conclusion. Attendance is bad, the team is 5-12, and they won't be very good for a while.
As for the second headline, well, the Flyers have turned the corner this year after several years of being skated around and by. The 76ers, though, have been dismal, and the Flyers haven't been preeminent. I still marvel that Comcast continues to let Ed Snider run the show. It seems like he's living in the 70's when it comes to sports, and there have to be more talented executives out there to manage over the situation. Sorry, Comcast, but it doesn't seem you're holding a Philadelphia icon as accountable as you should.
As for the third headline, Stefanski was a guard on some great Penn teams in the 1970's, but he seemingly past up open looks when he got the ball. That caused Big Five play-by-play commentator Big Al Meltzer to call him "Eddie the Reluctant." His CV since his playing days has been impressive, and he seems to be over the "reluctant" phase. You have to be if you're a GM in the NBA, although I do wonder why the Nets have let him go to a division rival mid-season. What's that all about? Rod Thorn's decision does raise questions -- although I'm not sure whether about the Nets or the 76ers.
At any rate, while you hate to see people lose jobs, you need to see improvement. Hopefully a new GM will cause the 76ers to view the pro world through a different lens and make better player personnel decision.
Broad Street Bullies, Y2K Version
The NHL has made sure that the Philadelphia Flyers got the memo this time.
The Broad Street Bullies have minored in headhunting this season, and Commish Gary Bettman and discipline honcho Colin Campbell have connected the dots, whether or not there is a team theme here or people have acted rashly and independently. The message: we're watching you, and if you continue to headhunt, we're going to force some of your boys to watch games for a very long time.
I recall the hip teacher at my high school. She was attractive, she knew it, she was popular, and she kept on getting into car accidents and getting hurt, to the tune of four accidents in two years. I remember discussing her automobile issues with my father, who offered the following sage advice: "Son, if you get into one crash, it could well be an accident. If you get into four in two years, you have a driving problem."
The NHL office has diagnosed the driving problem, and the Flyers are now in traffic school. If some continue to transgress, they'll lose their licenses or go to jail, or some combination of both.
Now that they've gotten the memo, hopefully they'll be smart enough to read it.
The Broad Street Bullies have minored in headhunting this season, and Commish Gary Bettman and discipline honcho Colin Campbell have connected the dots, whether or not there is a team theme here or people have acted rashly and independently. The message: we're watching you, and if you continue to headhunt, we're going to force some of your boys to watch games for a very long time.
I recall the hip teacher at my high school. She was attractive, she knew it, she was popular, and she kept on getting into car accidents and getting hurt, to the tune of four accidents in two years. I remember discussing her automobile issues with my father, who offered the following sage advice: "Son, if you get into one crash, it could well be an accident. If you get into four in two years, you have a driving problem."
The NHL office has diagnosed the driving problem, and the Flyers are now in traffic school. If some continue to transgress, they'll lose their licenses or go to jail, or some combination of both.
Now that they've gotten the memo, hopefully they'll be smart enough to read it.
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