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Road Trip

2008-05-04T09:10:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, I rode in my second MS150. The MS150 is an annual charity cycling ride that originated in Minnesota and raises funds for Multiple Sclerosis research. It has since spread nationally and there are 3 in Texas, though the Houston-to-Austin two-day April ride is now the most popular in the country. Registration, soft-capped at 13 thousand, opened in October and closed inside of two weeks, despite an increased minimum pledge of $500 ($100 due upfront). My father wanted me to join him in the event two years ago, and I did so with only 3 months preparation and a newly purchased road bike. Crash course.

In the time since, I’ve moved and started to bike commute to work each day along the Houston Bayou (paved) Trail. Almost 18 miles a day, everyday barring significant rain in the morning. I have a second, more rugged, bike for the commute and slapped on literally thousands of miles of experience on it. I started licking my chops for a rematch with the MS150.

I missed last year’s MS150 when registration capped and closed 2 months earlier than I registered the year prior. Not to be caught off guard this year, I hit the online registration site the hour it opened, as if I were trying to score Police tickets on Ticketmaster. Similar to that experience, the site crashed immediately and I wasn’t able to actually get registered until several hours later. It speaks volumes of the ride’s popularity when you have to try this hard to make sure you will be one of the thousands to give them hundreds of dollars in exchange for dehydration and a sore rear end.

At the time, I was still in training for my alleged final marathon that took place this past January. The gameplan would be that I would do the 26.2, take a couple weeks off, and then break out the higher-end road bike for long rides on alternate weekends. The Houston Greater area has a surplus of them from February through April, and this would give me opportunities to reacquaint myself with that bike. Bikes are like horses, you need to take the time to build a rapport before going out for long stretches. Unfortunately, week after week, life got in the way. My sister was married in West Texas in early Feb., then the wife ensured I celebrated on my birthday weekend, the bike took a while getting tuned up, my buddy called us out for an Austin weekend, I was sidelined hours before a morning race with out-of-the-blue back spasms, another Friday late night birthday celebration, and the next thing I knew, it was the final hour.

This left me with a midnight hour 63-miler “warm up” ride 6 days before the real thing. It was great, because it let me get all of the ‘went wrong’ out of the way. Took forever prepping the night before, including tire inflation troubles, too over-anxious to sleep well, etc. The ride took place close to the Gulf, and the winds were tough to cut through on much of the loop course. By the end, my cockiness was completely replaced with humility and a tough of uncertainty about the looming 150. Jacked up backs have a way of doing that to your self-efficacy. This settled the debate of whether I would be getting a deep tissue massage. In fact, what I pushed for and got might qualify as illegal interrogation tactics on my back.

Game time, Saturday morning pre-dawn. We head out with little incident and meet up with my dad at a ‘bandit’ start location off I-10. Leaving from the official (there are 3) starting lines isn’t something I’d recommend, as you would start in the midst of literally thousands of cyclists, all slowly sifting apart into natural paces and lines. It’s like trying to get out of parking lot following a major concert. We arrive a few minutes late to the bandit starting spot, which means I have to go double-time getting the bike off the rack and into my pedal shoes – Dad’s not waiting and I can’t blame him. The upside is, starting with a jolt of adrenaline beats hanging around waiting 10 times out of 10.

The start is decently chilly, but not so much that I would regret going out in short sleeves. I’m not wearing a standard cycling jersey, but a F.C. Bayern personalized (#25, Teufel) soccer jersey. Individuality and standing out is as much the point to jerseys as functionality. One of the many ways cycling is a lot like NASCAR. I like the soccer jerseys since they’re just as functional, a guarantee for uniqueness, and oftentimes a conversation starter. Sure enough, a guy starts riding next to me in the morning wanting to talk about Munich. Helps the time go by. Not as much chatting happens during a marathon, shockingly. I’m also killing the time with a bike-specific iPod mono-boombox. Like my jersey, it is popular amongst the riders around me. Clamps into a water bottle cage and blasts out surprisingly quality audio (remote is affixed to the handlebars). Every old-school running and cyclist frowns upon the use of iPods, usually because they don’t think you should be so laid back that you’d actually listen to tunes. They’re like a cranky parent in that way. Big difference between runners and cyclists, though, is that seasoned cyclists are very likely to curse out and throw a fit over the issue. That’s because a cyclist zoned out with headphones on is the equivalent of a cell-phone driver, and there’s nothing more infuriating than someone oblivious to riders trying to pass from behind or more dangerous than a wreck caused by someone being oblivious to their surroundings. And with clip-in shoes, no protective equipment past the helmet, and speeds exceeding 20 mph, a crash can be extremely serious on rides. You don’t have to know many big riders before finding someone with a broken collarbone or elbow.

That 20 mph mention didn’t make you gasp, did it? Allow me to expound, sticking with the cycling-driving analogy. In my estimation, every 2 mph on a bike is the equivalent of 5 mph for a car. Cars drifting in idle travel somewhere around 10 mph, so that’s 4 mph on a bike. Slow riding on a bike is 8-12 mph, which would be 20-30 mph in car terms. A good easy pace for me is typically 14-17 mph, which would be a suburban traffic-like 35-43 mph. 20 bike miles per hour would convert to 50 mph (makes the wrecking speed seem a little more serious, now, huh?), and 30 on the bike would be 75. 30, not coincidentally, is where you have to start watching yourself on the bike, because a pothole seen too late at that speed is going to ruin your day in a flash. My current high speed (flat sprint) is 34 mph (85) and my top downhill, braking some to my chagrin, is 46 (115). That was a speed that induced a healthy bit of fear to go with my main dish of thrill.

There are plenty of other biking/driving parallels. Staying to the right is a big deal and needs to be ingrained as habit. It’s more than annoying when abreast riders or a random slower-paced rider is eating up passing lines/lanes like a granny that figures going the limit in the far left lane is more than fast enough and you can just live with it, or worse, truckers eating the left lane. Your biggest issues tend not to be catching your breath or keeping your legs fresh as much as getting bored, getting stiff and sore, and having to pull over for quick pit stops, just like on a regular road trip. Just like on the highway, there are those that constantly play leapfrog (passing you only to slow below your speed) instead of maintaining an even pace, and those that get hypercompetitive if anyone passes them. There’s general etiquette for passing (stay right, call up to rider you’re about to pass, pass swiftly and bike decently ahead before going back to pace) that is ignored by far too many on the road. Lastly, cops will pull you over if they catch you pulling stunts (sneaking into a actual car lane to pass a crowd) and tear you a new one.

Back to the ride itself. The MS150 treks from Houston to Austin mainly so that the gulf winds are on the riders’ back. More than hills, heat, and gear, winds will define a ride. More than in running, wind drag can turn you into the Flash or turn your day into a nightmare. <8 mph are light to moderate, depending how they line up (direct, angled, or side), 9-15 mph winds are moderate to strong, 16-24 mph are strong, and above that – well, stay home if it’s a headwind. In a cruel twist, a front moved in days before the MS and reversed the winds, providing 11-15 mph direct headwinds over both days. BAD NEWS. Heading to Houston is on an incline with hills, and adding moderate to strong headwinds to them is a bad cocktail to drink. SAG (Support & Gear) vans are on the course, mainly to transport a rider and damaged bike to the next stop for repairs. This year, the conditions wiped out so many people that the SAG vans were overwhelmed with those bowing out to the extent that buses had to be called in to transport riders to the Day 1 finish area. I surprised myself, maintaining a good speed (17+) until I detoured to the ranch that Lori and I were staying with her cousins. I was hammered by a ruthless combination of strong winds and endless climbs, knocking my speed down to 8 mph and my effort through the roof. For comedy, ask Lori to recite the phone call I put in to her halfway through. If her cousins her it, let me say I no longer wish any of those things on your lives or home.

That evening was very relaxing and nice – nothing soothes like being done for the day and off the bike. Joyriding a golfcart across a ranch helps, too. The next trick? Recovering in time for day 2. As my friend once pointed out to me in regards to the Tour de France – it’s just not natural to kill yourself biking through hills all day and be able to just get up and do it again the next day (the point? They’re all doping. Had I learned the lesson, I would be using some EPO myself).

Alarms again at 5, stuff some bananas and aspirin down and off we go to the Day 2 bandit start. It’s a full 40 mins to get there, and of course I’m in need of a port-a-john before I can go. More than anything, you don’t need to ride with a swollen bladder. Of course, bandit starting points are short on port-a-johns, so off to the other side of the street I head for the shrubbery. Morning Two was much colder than Morning One (about 45 degrees). It’s tricky to be discreet taking care of your business when you’re producing smoke signals of steam. I’m braving it again without warm gear – with no place to stash layers, it’s the right choice. I do steal a pair of Lori’s socks and cut thumbholes to manufacture myself some makeshift mittens. At the first rest stop an hour later, my feet and hands are a touch numb, but it’s warming and won’t be a problem anymore.

Day Two is slightly shorter than Day One, but that’s because Day Two throws hills and climbs at you at several stretches. The course briefly splits, giving the choice of riding on a highway shoulder with cars buzzing you (not as fun as it sounds, and pretty loud) or going through a scenic park. Only that park is known as the Challenge Course – the toughest climbs on the ride make you pay for the wooded scenery. I’ve done the Challenge Course before and had to walk up a couple of the climbs off my bike; so, after yesterday’s murderous finish I conclude that I’ve fulfilled my “challenge” quota for the ride and opt for the highway. That path is far from flat, and with this wind, I am more than okay with my choice. The only real downside aside from the traffic noise is the high “New to This” vs “Experienced Rider” ratio – forget about people knowing how to keep lanes up for passing. Still, it’s a small price to pay and I find myself at the lunch stop at 10 am.

Like with driving and working, I’m very much a “head down, power through” type. I just want to be done and finished. I take most of the rest stops since it’s such a big help to get off the bike each hour, but I’m only there for 3-5 minutes before resuming. Ditto for lunch. Why hang around and let the heat and wind pick up even more? Sooner done, sooner a beer will be in hand. I take a few bites of my Subway sandwich and I’m gone. There’s 30-some more miles for me to get through, and a good number of stretches of direct head winds. Eventually, I cross under the first outer-Austin bypass and reach my final pit stop before the finish.

The finish takes you under I-35 and through the University of Texas, and smelling the end gives me all I need for the home stretch. Still, I grab a couple watermelon slices before getting on the bike one last time – you have to love a sport that lets you pull over and eat some fruit. I cross under highway 183 and get my first glimpse of the UT Tower. This, unfortunately, is followed up by a series of insult hills: steep drops and climbs that can break the spirit of anyone worn out from the day. You also have to be practiced with your gear shifting – gear up as your speed increases down the hill to maximize your momentum for the climb, and be able to gear down rapidly enough to “stay under” the climb. Gear down too slowly, and you won’t be able to maintain a minimum speed and the bike will stop. Gear down too quickly, and you run the risk of the chain slipping off the gears.

Finally, I across under I-35, and enter UT or, as I call it, Victory Lane. I burn through the campus at over 20 mph and hotdog a little bit to the finish line. There’s a very full crowd, and nothing in the world beats being finished. I dismount, find my wife, sister, and brother in law, and grab a complimentary celebratory beer courtesy of St. Arnold’s. Mission Accomplished. Next time though, I won’t mind having the gulf winds on my side.

A King Lost, cont.

2008-05-04T09:07:00.000-07:00

In the first half of this informal essay, I put forth the argument that much of LOST appears to be derived from the Stephen King universe of fiction. I would like to further that here, but specifically to King’s Dark Tower series. The seven Tower books are King’s self-described magnum opus: an epic borne out of his youthful desire to pen a Lord of the Rings epic melded with the Man with No Name western film trilogy and Browning’s “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came” poem, as well as an ocean of other works and influences such as Arthurian legends and the Wizard of Oz. The project became too much for King at the beginning of his career, and the seven books were eventually written over a span of more than 25 years (published over a span of 22), with King abandoning and re-engaging the project multiple times.

The basic plot involves an other-worldly “gunslinger” Roland who bands together with 3 New Yorkers from different times of the 20th century while on his quest to reach The Dark Tower. The Dark Tower is a binding nexus of the multiverse; an infinite number of alternate dimensions or parallel Earths. The tower is in peril and should the tower fall, all of the multiverse would be snuffed out.

The Dark Tower’s relationship to LOST is apparent from a number of connections. The tower exists on each Earth in the form of a rose, and this rose gives of a sort of anti-radiation that draws people to it and conveys a healing touch. The rose extends the life of some and cures a minor character of cancer. In LOST, the Island displays a similar ability, suspending the paralysis of John Locke and, more interestingly, curing cancer in a character named Rose. Roland emphasizes the role of “ka” (fate) within his band of “ka-tet;” Locke is similarly convinced that fate and destiny have called and banded the castaways to the island. The Dark Tower is threatened by the actions of vague, shadowy corporations (North Central Positronics, Sombra) whose abandoned machinations are continually come across by Roland’s band; Dharma and the Hanso Corp. play a seemingly identical role on LOST. In the fifth book, Roland’s ka-tet encounter and seek to put an end to a series of raids on a village by mysterious bandits that kidnap somewhat psychic or gifted children and return them as mentally inert; in season two, the castaways on LOST suspect the Others of the same evil. The Dark Tower is held by 3 crossing beams anchored at 6 ends by portals named after mythological animals (The Portal of Shardik the Bear, for example); Locke discovers a map of the Island which shows the 6 hatches, including The Swan, laid out in a similar manner around the hatch later to be revealed as “The Pearl.”

As LOST rumbles into its 4th season, my theory on what the Island represents as become largely shaped by The Dark Tower. I believe that the holy grail of King’s epic became the template for Team LOST’s mystery. I call it the Pinhole/Snowglobe Nexus Theory.

I take the central core of the Dark Tower’s essence: it is a binding nexus and integral to the fabric of our world. Unlike the Tower, I do not believe it is a physical place (or object) on Earth, I believe that it sits outside as in a parallel dimension or whatever comic book geek label which would more accurately fit. Desmond tried to sail away from the Island for months (Michael made a similar attempt with Jin and Sawyer) only to keep arriving back at the Island. I believe that is because that is all there is to find; that the Island is its own world. Obviously, there are ways to leave and enter; I believe there are several (if not many) “pinhole portals” that are not visible to the naked eye that allow crossing between Earth and the Island.

In The Dark Tower, portals allowed Roland to travel between his world and ours (and other parallel Earths) but were in the form of magical doors. An interesting aspect of Tower’s portals is that time was not aligned between the worlds: a different portal opened up into a different time, and time on one world did not pass with the same speed that it did on another. As Roland eventually approaches the Tower itself, time slowed and eventually came to a halt. This becomes very interesting, as LOST has increasingly planted allusions to time, most pointedly with Daniel Faraday’s rocket experiment. The head of the freighter has the last name Minkowski, shared with the scientist who built upon Einstein’s Theory of Relativity to form his theory of the Space-Time Continuum. It is my impression that the Tunisian Dharma bear fossil indicates that the bear wandered through a portal and found itself transported not just through space (Island to Northern Africa) but also through time (hundreds of years, at least), and that the Island sits outside of our Space-Time Continuum, acting as a nexus point.

Entering the Island is reminiscent of the Bermuda Triangle, always a favorite sci-fi Twilight Zone-ish premise. Only, there may be numerous Bermuda Triangles from which to enter; a sub leaves Portland, a plane takes off from Sydney, and plane takes off from Africa, a ship sails in the Indian Ocean…all of which arrive at this same island. Once in the Island, exiting may lead to anywhere or anywhen, depending on what portal you take. At the end of season 3, it was revealed that Ben had been rigorously jamming radio transmissions, and it could be that this was to keep outsiders from gaining access to the Island. Rousseau claimed that the boat she was on followed a radio transmission of The Numbers to the Island, perhaps suggesting that radio frequencies can travel through the portals just like people, or planes. This leads to my snowglobe theory. I think of the Island’s world as a snowglobe, painted black, and sitting in a dark room rendering it invisible. The portals act as pinholes around the snowglobe. Should a light glow from within the snowglobe, you could see the pinholes, and the way to enter the globe. The radio transmissions may be acting as this sort of beacon, showing the Others or Dharma the way in. Ben presses on Michael to follow an exact bearing so that he may leave the island, and Faraday presses to Frank that he must follow the exact same path of entry when he exits. The entry and exit points are both particular and crucial. Coupled with the Rocket experiment (note that the rocket would not have approached the island in the same way his the helicopter), I am led to believe that you may also enter the island at different time points, depending on “where” you enter.

So if the Island is a non-world nexus of space and time, its appeal to scientists (and opportunists) becomes evident. The extraordinary properties of the Island, from the healing to the magnetism, are intriguing enough (we were enraptured with the moon, too), but the prospect of using the Island as a stepping stone through time and space makes it a marvel that wars would be fought over.

To go back to the Dark Tower theory, it is my assumption that exploitation of the Island by people endangers it and likely threatens not only its existence but could touch off apocalyptic effects upon Earth and the Space-Time Continuum. Metaphorically, it acts as a statement about our ecosystem: corporations set against nature-communing hippies.

Maybe I’m correct about this, maybe I’m completely off base. If I am wrong, I will say that the Stephen King connections (Jeff Fahey also played the lead role in Stephen King’s Lawnmower Man film adaptation!) are so numerous that this was the greatest Red Herring of all time. Time, and the remaining 46 episodes will tell.

A King Lost (Part I)

2008-02-18T17:08:00.000-08:00

Trying to crack the nut that is LOST is a handful; any fan of the show can clue you in on that. Desperate Housewives doesn’t immediately send thousands to message boards following each show. One of the most time-consuming aspects of LOST decoding is sifting through the endless pile of hints, nods, winks, conspicuous lines, three-frame visual clues, and everything else crammed into the episodes by the producers to tease or illuminate. The team from CSI would need a few months to go through the mountain of details piled up over the course of the 70 shows already aired.

Making matters worse for LOST’s detective corps is that relevancy is a major concern. Viewers quickly caught on to the show’s endless “easter egg” plants, ranging from music nods (Mama Cass played on the Hatch’s record player; episode titles such as “White Rabbit”), book nods (Sawyer’s catalogue of beach reading material), film nods (Star Wars being the most popular), to the more intriguing ones. Any cameo by The Numbers sent the fan base into a frenzy well before the season one finale, and the producers became so aware of it that while they admitted that The Numbers weren’t “an answer,” they decided to keep tossing them out there for fan enjoyment. Point being, when Hurley runs past some soccer girls whose jersey numbers are The Numbers, fans may leap on it but aren’t actually being given anything to figure out the show’s puzzle. Though it stops a LOST apostle’s heart when it unexpectedly pops up, seeing another Dharma Logo or catching a glimpse of another coincidence amongst the backstories does not answer any questions. Some things are just superficial and warrant no more than a smile and nod. Charlotte Staples Lewis (C.S. Lewis) acts as such a superficial nod. Having said all of that, I do believe one recurring plant in the show has a deeper meaning that may in fact go a long way in theorizing what is at the heart of The Island’ mysteries. Stephen King.

The love affair between Stephen King and Team LOST (J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof, and Carlton Cuse) is not a secret. In his Entertainment Weekly column, King has made no attempt to hide his affection for the show, often referencing it or recommending it to television viewers. Likewise, the producers of LOST have cited King as an inspiration/influence on commentary in both the DVD box sets and their pod casts. In a significant show of mutual respect, King has given Abrams, Lindelof, and Cuse the greenlight to adapt his Dark Tower series to film. Besides all that affection, there are the numerous intersections between King’s works and LOST.

Starting with the superficial, Team LOST has cited The Stand as a key influence, and that is most readily seen in the sharp divide between the Castaways and The Others. But how original or profound is that? Good and evil, black and white; it’s been the most common play in story telling’s history. There are also the book plants: The Gunslinger, Carrie, and Hearts of Atlantis; there for the never-blinking eye, but may not be any more telling than when a Judy Blume showed up. There are also the dialogue plants: Carrie made the rounds in Juliette’s book club, possibly prompting Ben to ask Locke for some Stephen King reading material two months later. There are also graphic matches. In Season One, Locke and Boone dig away at The Hatch, which would be difficult not to connect with Bobbi Anderson’s backyard woods dig in The Tommyknockers. In Season Two, Henry Gale’s balloon carriage is scouted out by Sayid and Kate, it bears a few sponser logos on it, including one for Nozz-a-la Cola, an alternate dimension Earth soda encountered by The Dark Tower’s quartet in their travels. In On Writing, page 97, King describes, “a cage the size of a small fish aquarium. Inside the cage is a white rabbit with a pink nose and pink-rimmed eyes… On its back, clearly marked in blue ink, is the numeral 8.” In Season Three, Ben mentally cons and tortures Sawyer using this exact same #8 white rabbit.

There are other similarities, which could just be chalked up to great minds thinking alike (or one plagiarizing from the other). King has long loved to plug literary references into his books; it can be shocking how well-read some of his rural Maine characters turn out to be. LOST and King make common mention of Watership Down, Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass, the Wizard of Oz, Harry Potter (honest), Lord of the Flies, Of Mice and Men, and several other novels. Both have used dreams as a device, with characters being either guided by them or receiving glimpses of their future. LOST also (seemingly) borrows on another King staple: Daddy Issues. Few, if any, on the Island had a harmonious two-parent upbringing. Neither did King, whose father left his wife and two sons while King was still a tot. In his books, King very often inserts dysfunctional or single-parent (or parent-figure) relationships: Jack and his mother in The Talisman; Ben, Eddie, and Beverly’s single parent families in IT; Roland and Jake in The Dark Tower; Clayton and his son as well as Clayton and Alice in Cell; Carrie and her mother in Carrie; and, Ben Mears and Mark Petrie in Salem’s Lot. Danny Torrance from The Shining is a prime example of a character with an ongoing father issue, though I don’t believe anyone on LOST was chased around a hotel by their ax-wielding dad.

Then the parallels take on Kennedy-Lincoln level connections. LOST sees a plane crash land into a Twilight Zone-ish island, The Langoliers sees a plane cross into a Twilight Zone-ish Earth. Both LOST and The Stand have a young and pregnant character carrying to term without a father (Claire, Frannie). LOST’s two main male characters are Jack and Sawyer, and the protagonist of The Talisman and Black House is Jack Sawyer. Walt on LOST is a youth possibly endowed with psychic abilities, something seen in numerous King works (The Shining, Carrie, The Dark Tower, The Children of the Corn). Lost has Charlie struggling with substance abuse, and King often wrote similar such characters often modeled after himself (Jack from The Shining, Eddie Dean from The Dark Tower, Father Callahan from Salem’s Lot, Gard from The Tommyknockers, and Larry Underwood from The Stand, to name a few). The characters in LOST are dogged by a “monster” that assumes the appearance and memories of key people from their past to torment them or lead them to their deaths, this is also the modus operandi of Pennywise from IT.

Now, take any one of the previous examples, it’s reasonable to argue that it may just be a coincidence. Altogether? I suspect they’re as much coincidence as the intertwined backstories of the LOST castaways. I have also reached the conclusion that King’s Dark Tower series may offer LOST fans the biggest possible clues to what the Island is.

Deja Viewing

2007-02-05T13:01:00.000-08:00

One of the toughest things about marathon training is the insane amount of time you have to run.  Sounds Yogi-ish, I know, but what I’m getting at is the time, not the running.  When you’re out there for over 4 hours, that’s a lot of time to pass.  Picture yourself sitting in a chair for 4 hours with no TV to watch or Hulk comics to read.  You’d go nuts.  It’s crucial when running to have something distracting you, beyond the boredom.  From the moment you start to the moment you finish, all you hear in the silence is “let’s just stop now, this sucks,” echoing within your skull.  It’s critical that you have something, anything, taking your mind off the actual running; it’s a big reason why marathons are 80% mental.

I have some tricks.  I’ve found that starting the run a couple of hours before dawn leaves you in such a deliriously tired state that most of the time flies by.  The more awake you are, the more alert you are to the fact that you are in fact running and it’s not pleasant.  While running with my iPod, my imaginary band and I are throwing one heck of a concert.  We tend to open with ‘Standing on the Moon’ and close with a wicked ‘The End’ segueing into ‘Paint it Black,’ and it’s a good time.  I’ll go ahead and admit that Michelle Branch sometimes comes out for a number during our set break.

Going into my 22.4 mi training run this past Saturday for the Austin marathon, my running support group mentor Rob suggested I go with one of his mainstays, coming up with a ranked list, in this case, for the most rewatchable movies.  Now, deep thinking tends to go out the window once I’m a few miles in as I become increasingly more loopy and fixated on the thought of being laid out on our sectional at home, but I figured I’d give it a go.  Here’s what I came up with.

First thing I wanted to do was clarify my definition of “most rewatchable” movie.  I didn’t want to let it meld into my list of favorite movies or my list of most highly regarded movies.  I realized the penultimate litmus qualifier was:
If I watched this movie yesterday, would I be game to watch it again with others today?

I think that bumps off a lot of great/cherished movies right off the bat.  I’ve never been able to watch the entire thing, but I can’t see even the most girly Gone With the Wind fans sitting through that behemoth twice in two days.  The first two Godfathers validate the cinematic medium as a form of art on their own, but back-to-back viewings wouldn’t be possible without a healthy amount of No-doze.  The time commitment is a factor; I’m less likely to plop and watch if I need to clear out 3+ hours to do so.  Major dead spots hurt - the final 40 minutes of Wedding Crashers got that one disqualified.  The date-movie scenes/subplots that I have to tolerate the first time around become crippling with repeat viewings (no Rocky).  Eye candy is certainly a bonus factor – there are more than a few movies where I’m not paying any attention to anything (audio or visual) that might make the movie unenjoyable thanks to effects, cinematography, or, you know, maybe an actress.  Another qualifier was: If in a conversation it comes to light that someone hasn’t seen movie X, how compelled would I be to slap them into the couch and watch movie X with them on the spot?  Similarly; how excited would I be to rewatch this movie right now?

As a final rule, I only considered movies I’ve seen at least 4 times total and at least once in the past two years.  That helped me resist the temptation to add any ‘heart grows fonder’ pity cases into the mix.  I also only considered DVD-watching.  Seeing a movie as I flip through cable was taken out of the equation, for reasons I’ll explain later.  As a final disclaimer: this is not a ‘best movie ever’ list, it’s my personal list of movies I’d be most inclined to rewatch.  If you find yourself getting huffy looking through this, I’d (a) recommend you go with Trek bikes instead and (b) rather not hear about it.

My Personal Top 25:

Animal House

Psycho

Drop Dead Gorgeous

From Russia with Love

Bela Fleck & the Flecktones: Live @ the Quick*

Arrested Development Season 2*

The Office Season 1 (BBC)*

Dazed and Confused

Pulp Fiction

The Blues Brothers

Billy Madison

This is Spinal Tap

The Wizard of Oz

Goldfinger

The Empire Strikes Back

Back to the Future

Temple of Doom

Raiders of the Lost Ark

Mallrats

Coming to America

The Matrix

A Few Good Men

Tommy Boy

MST3K: Pod People*

Ricky Bobby**

Honorable Mention:
Austin Powers 2; The Wrath of Khan; The Princess Bride; Matrix Reloaded; A Christmas Story; Brahm Stoker’s Dracula; Gone in 60 Seconds; Goldeneye; Desparado; Chris Rock Bigger & Blacker; 10 Things I Hate About You; Vampires; Army of Darkness; Shrek 1&2; Trainspotting; Young Guns; Beverly Hills Cop 1&2; Kill Bill Volume 1; Jackie Brown

Missed the Cut:
These movies are close, but need at least some air between viewings before I’d sit through them a second time.
The Godfather 1&2; Heat; the Lord of the Rings Trilogy; Top Gun; Swingers; Breakfast Club; Batman; Dusk til Dawn; Waynes World; Vacation and European Vacation; Clerks; Sixteen Candles; Ghostbusters; Usual Suspects; Goodfellas; Reservoir Dogs; Terminator 2; Ocean’s 11; Aliens; Old School; Wedding Crashers; Chasing Amy; Boogie Nights; Office Space; Austin Powers; Happy Gilmore; the Blade Trilogy

TV versus DVD:
A trend I noticed when compiling the list was that guilty pleasure movies popped up a good deal.  Further, I realized I had to separate the movie watching into DVD and TV categories since what I’d be inclined to watch changed dramatically.  I can’t explain why, but I’m ten times more likely to watch a semi-bad movie over and over on cable than I am to rent or even own it.  I don’t know why, but it happens.  I think I’ve seen Blast From the Past almost a half-dozen times on cable and there’s no actual draw to it; even Alicia Silverstone is at her career low in it.  I can tell you right now there’s not a single thing that would get me to switch from Josie and the Pussycats if it aired on a Saturday afternoon, not even college football or March Madness.  Despite all that, this bizarre genre of movies wouldn’t cut it in my “proper” list above.  A few would get honorable mention, maybe, but nothing higher than that.  Maybe with some time and self-reflection I’ll be able to put forth a thesis on this crazy DVD-Cable movie phenomenon.  I promise, you’ll be the first to hear it.  Til then, go rent a movie from my list and enjoy!

* - That’s right.  I put two TV show box sets, a Mystery Science Theater 3000, and a concert DVD on there.  I’d watch any of them end to end sooner than The Breakfast Club (and I do!)
** - I want to put this much, much higher, but not enough time has passed for me to do so with a clean conscience.

Sunset Vs Sunrise: Which wins?

2007-01-15T18:09:00.000-08:00

I always felt Grease 2 was just as good, if not better, than the original. You had Michelle Pheiffer, some fun songs, an enjoyable plot, and a cool rider. It held a place in my heart, you see, because I didn’t see the first movie until years later. We have a tendency to reset the bar for sequels, follow up albums, and later seasons following grand debuts in entertainment. Sometimes this prevents us from accepting (decently) good examples of media as anything but pale forms of their predecessors. Was Godfather 3 truly that unwatchable or did it just fail to stay in the same room with the rest of the trilogy? If he never enjoyed the Police era, wouldn’t Sting still have a decent solo career? If I started watching the Sopranos at or after season 3, would I notice or care about the heavy soap opera slant?

This is the question that’s boiling about for me as 24 returns for its 6th season. 24 debuted in the late fall following 9/11, and critical acclaim more than ratings (8.6 million viewers averaged for a #76 ranking) kept the show going. FOX made an ingenious move last year by slating all episodes to air as a single and continuous block across the first half of the year. As the most continuity-driven show in the most ADD-addled country on the planet, this worked out wonderfully for the network (13.8 million averaged for a #24 ranking). This has led to an interesting situation where a very large segment of the 24 fanbase consists of viewers that got hooked 4 seasons late. As I see and hear the most widespread mainstream excitement and acclaim over the show, the series seems to be on an obvious nosedive to myself and other longtime watchers.

The first 3 seasons of 24 were fantastic movies stretched out and cut up over 24 (17, if you cut the commercials out) hours. I don’t want to overstate the case – they had their fair share of blemishes, usually found in the subplots needed to round out the series and change the pace each episode. Tough-to-swallow romantic interludes and the intolerable Adventures of Kim Bauer (I can’t control my heart rate! There’s a live cougar about to pounce on me!) in particular kept me from ever nominating 24 as the best thing on television. Still, the first and third seasons have clearly stood above the rest of the series in my book. Both were well-written, well-acted, compelling, and were the most creative of the seasons.

The two seasons following and, at first glance, the current one have embraced the formula of the earlier seasons and seem to simply rotate through previously established scenarios (a mole in CTU! Jack disobeys an order and is arrested!) and confine themselves to the box (the terrorists are in Los Angeles, Jack must work as a member of CTU despite leaving it at the end of each ‘day’, you can travel anywhere within the greater LA area in the span of a commercial break, etc). Season 5 took the series to a low point; fully integrating Days of Our Lives writing, inserting overt political soapboxing (there was an instance in season 2 well), and becoming a film study course in shark jumping. In most movies or TV series, you can read the foreshadowing and figure out some major plot points when you want to (or if you read LOST spoiler boards). When the show has become so formulaic and transparently telegraphic that you’re groaning at the first contrived “subtle” give away, you’re treading on Robocop 3 ground. By the time it wrapped up in May, myself and 2 others that watched it live weekly took to simply giving it the MST3K treatment (call me Joel). The series, like James Bond’s Moonraker days and Michael Bay movies, realized that as long as the explosions and effects remained high quality, there was no need to worry about anything else.

In the first glimpses of the new season, it seems that the drop off has managed to become more pronounced. The soapboxing has become openly preachy to the point you would think it was a Lifetime Original movie. CTU’s human resources department has ordered a young models only staffing decree, terrorists haven’t learned that taunting Jack Bauer is akin to cutting off Bruce Banner in traffic, an ’86 Caprice Classic on LA streets can outrun military artillery coptors, and the weasley member of the President’s advisors and the annoyingly outspoken Palmer family member have been reincarnated yet again. Worse, the acting has become so shallow and the writing so stilted that I have to wonder if George Lucas is pulling the strings.

Just like America will fill the seats for Die Hard 4, they will watch 24 and not ask for anything higher. Since so many missed out on the earlier seasons, there isn’t a frustration concerning the drop off in the writing and ingenuity.

Let me revisit what I first mentioned – what is more important, my soured perspective of the series as a longtime viewer or the enthralled take of someone who just discovered it a year ago? I figure it doesn’t matter at all. It’s entertaining, and still in the top ten of current TV shows for what it delivers weekly. People like myself have the dilemma of the shared time slot with Heroes solved and still have the upcoming 24 film to look forward to for a shakeup to the formula that has staled for us. People that are eating up the show as it is are happy and loving it. Hey, I know I didn’t like it when people got on my case for liking The Color of Money when I had never seen The Hustler. I won’t mention anything about Return to Oz.

Run the Rock, by Rob W.

2006-12-11T08:20:00.000-08:00

After completing my first marathon in November of ‘05, missing were the feelings of euphoria and elation that most runners indicate as the main motivation for the grueling 26.2.  My race crashed and burned like a Hindenburg into an oil tanker.  My calves started cramping at mile 16, forcing me to do the walk of runner’s shame for the last 10 miles.  In addition, the selection of the San Antonio marathon was an ill-fated one.  It was double out and back course (meaning you run 6.5 miles out, turn around and run back in, then rinse repeat) which forced you to pass the finish line 3 times before you actually crossed.  If I die and go to hell it might actually be a lifetime of running an endless marathon where I pass the finish line every few miles.  On that day, I crossed the finish line exasperated and angry and embarrassed.  I knew even before finishing that there was to be another marathon in my future.  Sunday was my redemption—my “remember the 5:13 at the Alamo.”

Training commenced in July.  I switched up my training routine from last year by adding an extra day of running and ramping up more quickly to long runs.  I also spaced said long runs out 2 weeks, with “shorter” long runs in between.  The first few months of training could not have gone better.  When I completed the first of 3 planned 20 milers, I called my running buddy and told him “I’m ready.  I only worry that I’m 6 weeks out and something screwy might happen.”  The following Thursday screwy happened as I woke up w/ some pretty significant pain in my right knee.  Exercising caution and playing it “safe,” I took what amounted to a week off sitting out a 3 miler, a 13 miler, and a 6 miler, respectively.  That proved to be a turning point as I struggled from that day out.  I completed another 20 miler on “dead” legs.  My third attempt at 20 resulted in me walking the last 7 miles.  I then attempted a 15 miler and had to walk the final 3.  The race was 2 weeks out, and I couldn’t have lacked more confidence.  After a grueling active release massage session, some serious stretching, and many plates of pasta, I was a day out and on the road to Dallas.

I selected the Dallas White Rock Marathon for the sole reason that it was the antithesis of the San Antonio course.  It was a full loop course that was easy mentally to break up into segments:  9 miles from the start to lake, 10 miles around the lake, 7 miles to glory.  What I didn’t know, what I couldn’t have known, was how great the people of Dallas were in supporting this event.  Of the 16 non-lake miles, I’d say about 12 of them were through residential areas.  And oh how the neighbors came out in full support.  Front lawns were turned into tailgates, sidewalks into stages w/ bands, and a grueling activity into a fun, social event.  As a runner I felt appreciated, respected, and supported.  You couldn’t ask for more.  I definitely left town yesterday w/ a new found appreciation of the city and its people.

My favorite story from the day comes as a result of the residents’ support and humor.  Between mile 7 and 8 there was a group of guys standing on a lawn drinking beer.  They had placed a case of beer on a table w/ a huge sign saying “free beer for runners.”  I chuckled and thought “fat chance pal—maybe at mile 25.”  About a quarter of a mile past this table I run by an older gentleman who’s walking and drinking a beer.  As I pass I say “hey, you took them up on their offer, huh.”  He looked at me and replies “you never, ever pass up a free beer.”  Point well taken.

The race started at American Airlines Arena.  After the Star Spangled Banner and an inspiring F-16 flyover, we were off.  The first 10 miles were cake.  We wound through the streets of Dallas, through the “West End (?),” and into the aforementioned residential areas.  The route really highlighted the beauty of this city.  One thing I noticed is that while it’s definitely a “modern” or “new age” city, it manages to maintain an old town feel.  There’s history in this town and you definitely feel it as you wind through its streets.  At mile 7 I run into the tambourine lady and her husband.  They got an Ipod docking station playing what I later told is the theme from “chariots of fire.”  Unfortunately I can’t hear it due to my own Ipod and miss the opportunity to do the Clark Griswalk arm pumps.  They also have water (praise jesus) and a goo pack.  You definitely have to appreciate, and be humbled by, friends that will drive 4 hours to have at most 2 or 3 chances to spend about 30 seconds cheering for you.

The first signs of trouble for me surfaced between mile 11 or 12.  The hamstrings were beginning to tighten up and the dead legs were coming.  I think the wall hit at about mile 14 or 15.  I had felt as though I had nothing left and starting at mile 16 I found myself searching for the next mile marker and counting em down in my head (it’s not bad, only 10 more miles left / you can do it, only 9 more miles / bloody hell, how can I freaking run 8 more miles).  The run around the lake was grueling as the crowd support thinned out a bit.  However, every time I thought I was about to fall over there’s a beautiful woman telling me I’m looking good (another neat thing about this marathon is they put your name on the bib—great great idea especially in a town w/ as much eye candy as Dallas), or a little kid holding their hand out for high fives, or a water station looming in the distance.  As they have a contest every year for the best water station, they go all out.  My favorite was obviously the Hooters water station.  Of course, it was a little de-motivating b/c I found myself with the sudden urge to eat some wings or perhaps curl up in a lap or two.

The “Dolly Parton Hills” start at mile 19.  They are a series of gradual climbs culminating in a 140 foot incline at mile 20 through 21.  At 19, I start walking through the water stations and up hills.  I can’t feel my feet and my calves are a minute from cramping.  I also feel cramps creeping on in my hamstrings and my thighs are raw at this point.  My arms feel like I’ve been carrying 40 pound dumbbells all day and I swear there are knives sticking in my sides.  However, I somehow manage to run most of 19 and grab some water and orange slices at 20.  After walking about a quarter of a mile, Fredo helps out and cues up Bruce Springsteen’s “Born To Run.”  This gets me to the top of the hill and to the 21 marker in full stride.  I pump my fist and search for my theme music who had planned on meeting me at the top, but apparently I had beaten them there.

To say the last 5 miles were the hardest 5 miles of my life would be a gross understatement.  At this point, my run vs. walk ratio was probably about 60/40.  I feel like curling up in the middle of the street and taking a nap.  In moments like these, you get inspiration wherever you can.  I remember one shirt I read that said “at mile 18, you wonder why you do it.  At 26.2, it becomes clear.”  Mile 22.  I think of another, “I miss you every day mom.  Every step of this is for you.”  Mile 23.  Fredo helps out once again, ~what you see, what you see, what you see is human~  Mile 24.  I see 2 runners practically carrying a third who can barely walk.  Mile 25.  At this point, thinking I’m on a 4:45 pace I see the most beautiful face I’ve ever seen.  Like an angel, Maria the 4:15 pace girl runs by me.  I catch up to her, tail her for a bit, always keeping her in my sight.  So close, yet so miserably far.  I can’t run another step.  I need something.  Fredo steps up in a major way:    ~And now the end is near, and so I face, the final curtain…….  For what is a man, what has he got / If not himself, then he has naught.  The record shows, I took the blows, and did it MY WAY~   As Frank ends his crooning, I pass the 26 mile indicator already welling up.  I pull out the ear phones and try to take in as much of the last .2 as I could:  The crowd screaming, the finish line coming closer, that sweet race clock reading 4:18, the announcer saying “Rob Walter, Austin, TX.”  I cross the finish line, put my hands on my head and break down.

A marathon is more than 26.2 miles.  It represents months of grueling training.  It represents months of focusing on one goal, on one objective.  You give up weekends, you give up happy hours, you give up trips.  You sit in ice, stretch endlessly, and live w/ pain constantly.  And you roll the dice.  When things go bad on race day, it’s as deflating as any non-tragic life circumstance.  After San Antonio, I didn’t even want to talk about the marathon.  Every “you finished” was a kick to my gut.  I buried that experience yesterday.  From the minute I crossed the finish to the time I put my head down on my pillow yesterday, I was purely happy.  I was completely satiated by a sense of accomplishment.  What’s in 26.2 miles?  In a word:  everything.

Putting Stock in Bond

2006-12-03T15:25:00.000-08:00

I’m no Bond authority, but giving an opinion on the 007 series is a basic human right, especially in the wake of Daniel Craig’s debut. I find the history of the series to be fairly interesting, and without further ado, here’s my take:

Starting off, Never Say Never Again never happened. For good reason, this is often mentioned as the worst Bond ever, but it wasn’t an official (EON Productions) film. Let’s just wipe it off the list. I’ll also skip over Lazenby’s single stint; some say it would wear the best-ever crown had Connery stayed in the role and that it was unfairly panned since no one wanted a new, no-name Bond. Regardless, it was a mistake, and I’m not going to acknowledge it. In fact, I wouldn’t be against it being redone for the Daniel Craig era.

An interesting aspect of the franchise has been its faith in its directors, helping to maintain continuity. Of the first 27 years and 15 movies (excluding Majesty), only four directors were used: Terence Young (3 of the first 4); Guy Hamilton (Goldfinger, Diamonds, and the first two Moore outings); Lewis Gilbert (Only Live Twice, Spy Who Loved Me, and Moonraker); and John Glen (all five films from the ‘80’s). This, along with the 1996 loss of master producer Cubby Broccoli, changed with the four-movie Brosnan stretch. Another form of continuity was the regularity of releases: all movies came out within two years of one another until the franchise fell into turmoil at the close of the 1980s.

Because of the longevity of the series and its regular release schedule, it strikes me that each movie’s success largely depended on the popularity of the previous. Viewers would still have the previous installment fresh on their mind when the next was on the way (studio execs routinely keep sequels in the freezer if an installment bombs – see Teenage Mutant Ninga Turtles 2; 5 years wouldn’t be enough to let the Vanilla Ice scars heal). When you follow admissions rather than gross, keeping an even playing field across the years, I feel this bares fruit. The first three Bond sequels with Connery each saw an average of 30 million more admissions than the film they followed, likely a carry-over from the buzz each film generated. I do not think that it is a coincidence that the first 3 Bond films (No, Russia, and Goldfinger) are on everyone’s best of Bond list. Thunderball (taking in the most admissions of any Bond films at 166 million) was probably the first 007 film that could not keep up with audience expectations. Thunderball, still an excellent film, would be hard pressed to live up to impossible hype. You Only Live Twice (Bond #5) probably paid the price for this initial letdown, as ticket sales dropped by more than half. It didn’t take more than one look at Dalton for audiences to make up their mind; his second Bond outing marked the fewest admissions of any from the franchise. New-Bond curiosity also seemed to have a substantial effect; the debut of every new actor aside from never-happened Lazenby was accompanied by admission increases versus the previous movie.

The most notable difference between the Bond films and novels is the Hollywood emphasis on gadgets and high speed chase scenes. As the films progress, the departure becomes increased as the films seem to try and top one another with wilder and wilder Q inventions and adrenaline scenes. In my opinion, this ultimately led to the campy lesser era in conjunction with the end of Fleming novels as the basis for screenplays. As an example of Bond gone awry, studio execs put off For Your Eyes Only in the wake of Star Wars, Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind, and other space sci-fi films in order to put together Moonraker, whose connection to the Fleming novel begins and ends with the title and the name of the villain. Instead of the ground-based plot involving Cold-War missiles, EON Productions slapped together a space-oriented rehash of previous ‘destroy the world’ 007 plots and recurring nemesis Jaws, who finishes the film as a lovable goof.

At this point, in my eyes, the Bond legacy had fallen into silliness and self-satire. Seemingly aware of how far from the Fleming origins they had gone and how the grosses were slipping as well, a pair of attempts to re-establish the franchise were made. Roger Moore’s final outing, A View to a Kill, bore little resemblance to his more campy films, and the Dalton experiment stood out for its more serious and real-world-based approach. However, audiences did not accept Dalton and License to Kill’s plot was so routine (Bond seeks vengence while tackling a drug lord) that it was difficult to identify as a 007 adventure. When the dust settled, the Dalton box-office disasters along with legal infighting nearly sank the franchise as the 1980s closed.

The Pierce Brosnan stint brought about original stories, fully divorcing the films from Fleming novels. The failed attempt to move away from campy movies led to a second correction and an increased Hollywood blockbuster feel for the movies: the budgets and effects soared and seemingly overshadowed the plots. A new director was brought in for each installment, recurring CIA operative Felix was removed, and the Brosnan era ended with an Ice Castle showdown that nearly matched Moonraker in the ridiculousness category. Bond embraced Hollywood glitz until Brosnan walked away in 2003.

At this point, a best/worst list would be redundant, assuming you’ve read the above. Which brings us to Casino Royale. I can’t say I fully buy Danial Craig as James Bond, but that’s mostly for superficial reasons. He’s a rock-solid actor; declining to go the easy route by transplanting his Layercake role into this one and managing to give a distinctive take on the character. What I enjoyed most about Royale was its return to Flemings’ vision. Royale is the first book in the Bond novel series, often regarded as the best, but was not used in the films until now because EON founder Cubby Broccoli did not want to disrupt the films’ continuity by returning to Bond’s origins. Following his death and the loss of Pierce Brosnan, the Bond franchise found itself in yet another crossroads and decided to push the ‘reset’ button. The new movie freed itself of past Bond traditions while still paying homage to most. The quips, effects shots, and gadgets are minimized (Q and Moneypenny are not included) in favor of a strong plot, faithfulness to the novel source, and nods to the Bond mythos (the Goldfinger Aston Martin, a return to a warm Thunderball locale, a Moneypenny line, and the origin and recipe of a certain martini, among others). It was a bold move, but executed perfectly. Director Martin Campbell (Goldeneye) was brought in, the first returning director in over 15 years. A SPECTRE-esque criminal organization is alluded to as the film goes on, perhaps making another return to the original formula. All in all, this film only resembles the first two Connery (No, Russia) films, which is an extremely good thing in my personal opinion. It seems that Bond is in good hands.

Flashbacking

2006-11-28T12:35:00.000-08:00

Last Wednesday evening, after getting home from work, I headed upstairs to check a couple of things on the computer before hitting my post-bike commute shower.  I flicked on the TV to Vh1 for no particular reason and noticed they were showing “ 100 Greatest Songs of the 80s.”  Shows like this are notoriously terrible in that the rankings are horrendously off base.  I suppose no one would watch the first few installments (#’s 100-50) unless they swapped out a #18 to #81 here and there.  Great example was “Every Breath You Take” landing at #46 while Hall & Oates’ "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)" and “Come On Eileen” managed to land in the top 20.  These lists are always going to be flawed, which is partly why I refuse to do top 10 lists.

     In any case, just before I flicked it off, Salt-N-Pepa’s “Push It” showed up, resulting in memory blocks falling like dominos.  “Push It,” in my childhood experience was the quintessential roller rink song, followed closely by Snap’s “I’ve Got the Power” and Scandal’s “The Warrior.”  The Fatboys also did well in that category.  Good times.

     That nostalgia led to my thinking about how much of my childhood I’ve mostly forgotten about, which would otherwise be great guidance for my future fatherhood.  No, wifey’s not pregnant, but it’s only a matter of time.  We’ve got bunny duty pretty much down, but they tend to be a little more self-sufficient than children are rumored to be.  I’d like to really sit down and mull over the pluses and minuses of my little man career to hopefully make sure my kids have good youthful glory days.

     Getting frustrated and yelling that I’ll send them to foster care?  Probably needs to be out.  Camping trips, especially backpacking into places like the Adirondacks, definitely in.  Year-round City Rec league sports (soccer, basketball, etc) is iron-clad, no matter how much chirping I get from the wife.  One I can’t fully decide on is day care.

     While imprisoned in Children’s World Penitentiary Center, I was unhappy about not being allowed to stay at home unattended (my sister and I had a nice afternoon sitter for a year or two, but she quit and Deadspin  has reported she had some sharp words about my character on the way out).  Humility is getting out of school and having to board the short bus with smiling suns and rainbows on it; you have to hang around someplace and dart onto it immediately once it arrives with your face in your chest.  Looking back on it all, there were positive and negative aspects of it, but a lot more positives than I could have recognized back then.

     Positive:  great social immersion.  Sitting at home or playing with a couple of buddies doesn’t teach you how to make friends or deal with social circles anywhere near as much as Kid Pen.  Don’t take that as only entailing the make-believe superhero adventures outside during recess, you also had to learn how to hold your own.  The Day Care adult-to-child ratio is anywhere from 5-10, but when everyone’s outside, it becomes one huddled and chit-chatting mass of 5 burnt-out adults to a half-ace of 30-45 kids.  Believe me, there are plenty of darkened back alleys in the afternoon because of this.  So I literally knocked teeth out here and there as I got older.  You had to be ready to go.  Going to the supervisors was always the wrong move in the long term, so was turning the other cheek.  Clearly, I can’t apply this literally to life today, but bursting the bubble on life conflicts has to happen sooner or later.  You shouldn’t wait until you’re halfway into a career to have Vito slap you across the face and tell you to act like a man.

     Positive: takes you places.  Tons of great field trips, especially during the summer: the roller rinks, the movies, the zoo, NASA, science museums, etc.  Takes pressure off the parents to think of them all, and it’s a lot more fun when you’re with a pack of friends instead of just your parents.

     Negatives: the shame, oh the shame.  Letting on that you’re in child care is never cool.  Even if you’re 6, you’ll be shamed by it.  At the latest, you need to get out by 6th grade.  It won’t be hard, because by that age, the staff will be helping to persuade your parents.

     Hey, I survived.  I’m probably better for the experience: allowing me to kick back at home watching cartoons by myself probably wouldn’t have offered much benefit in my development.  We’ll have to see what I do when my demon seeds become school age.

Highway to Hell

2006-11-02T15:32:00.000-08:00

It was almost exactly a year ago that I started writing on this site, and it’s only appropriate that I celebrate it with a second annual marathon diary.  Maybe I should just start referring to it as the Icarus log, however.  Second run, second time to get slapped back to earth by the 26 miles.  Without further adieu…

Punishee War Journal, Saturday.
Here’s the gameplan: last year, I made a horrific mistake by spending the day before the San Antonio marathon at Sea World with my wife and sister, awaking the slumbering beast in my shin and returning to the hotel with aching legs.  With that in mind this year, I choose to forego even staying with my friends in northern Virginia and booked a room in the Arlington Ritz-Carlton.  The hotel sat on top of a Metro and was only a stop or two from the start and I fully planned on shutting myself in as soon as I got my registration packet, rebuffing friends that suggested we hang out that night.  Sorry, not hitting the country western bars hours before the race.  Not this time, you wily tricksters.

Confident in my plan, I got to the airport at 7 a.m. for my 8:20 flight out.  As I’ve previously griped, airlines are focusing on all options for getting their losses under control while knowing that $500 fares will mean they’d lose 70% of casual flyers, and one of the tactics they’re rolling with is cramming people onto the smallest “jets” possible for the trip to maximize the fuel economy (Civics versus Suburbans thinking).  Well I’m sorry, I’m not the President, it’s not the 50’s, and I don’t feel I should deplane onto the tarmac when I’m flying across a third of the country.  The flight was awful, moderate turbulence from end to end, only room for my legs if they were crossed and pointed into the aisle, and I swear I could still see cars on the road when we were at cruising altitude.  Needless to say, I landed with a massive headache and a foul mood.  As an aside, I feel the adage about not marrying someone until you’ve gone on a cross-country road trip with them first also can be true of learning everything you need to know about strangers on your flight.  Maybe sneak yourself on the plane to spy on future in-laws or roommates.  Is this a person who feels entitled to both armrests and the guy next to them better just deal with it?  Do they treat the attendant like their maid?  Have a hissy fit when there’s not room for their oversized luggage in the overhead and start shoving other people’s bags around?  Knowingly buck the rules and keep playing their iPod or take off for the bathroom even if it holds up takeoff?  Maybe they’re like the one on my flight there’s always one of these) – I was in seat 1A, with 3 seats behind me before the other row began, yet had Outtamywaymom pin me in my seat as we landed in her desperate bid to get off first.  Think she’s trying to make a tight connection?  Nope – there she was at baggage claim.  Flights let you peg someone’s consideration/self-absorption rating quick.

So I land with my headache, and slight hunger as I skipped breakfast for no good reason.  Ted and his girlfriend Katie grab me at Dulles and we scoot over to the Pentagon so I can check in.  I toss my bags in the room and we grab the subway to the D.C. Armory to grab our registrations.  We come out of the station at 2 to find a line going out of the building…down the sidewalk…out of the gates…around the block….doubling on itself to the far street corner…and doubling on itself again to wrap around the other block.  Sweet Jesus I Thought They Were Kidding©.  Apparently, in this 31st annual Marine Corps Marathon, the organizers had come to expect 90% of the 34 thousand registrants to be kidding.  Two hours of standing while hungry later, we got our race bibs and freebies.  I was a bit too weary at this point to care about the vendors, despite a notion to grab some cold weather insurance because of worries that race temperatures would be in the low 40s.  I just wanted to get out and get some food on the way to my room.  Unfortunately, Katie had an ADHD moment and made like a 7 year old in Toys R Us, I can only complain so much since it netted me some complimentary Tylenol and some cheap running gloves.  By the time we returned to Pentagon City, Ted looked like he’d had a one-night stand with Dracula, and we parted so I could haul off for Subway and Eckards.  With a sandwich and Gaterade in tow, I finally got back to the Ritz at about 6.  The worst of it was, the one thing I had masterfully planned around came about anyway – my legs were shot.  I munched on my single meal for the day, watched a DVD, called the wife, and thanked the merciful lord that clocks rolled back overnight, essentially keeping me on central time for a 5 A.M. wake up.

I should mention that the Pentagon Riz-Carlton was very pleasant; a great view of the Lincoln Memorial and Kennedy Center and a cushy bed that seems to be laced with sedatives.  Usual nickel-and-diming that you find at all high-end hotels (as the clientele wouldn’t notice or care), with $9 connect charges on long distance calls.  One of the few situations that I’ll admit I could use a mobile telephone.

Punishee War Journal, Sunday Morning.
Woke the next morning, flipped to the weather channel, and the encouraging lady in the screen let me know that “it’s going to be a great day to stay inside and read a good book.”  Temperature is low, and winds are high.  Swell.  Flip to ESPN, and I find out that Red Auerbach died.  We’re 2-for-2 with ominous starts to the day.  I do what I can with a protein bar that could possibly be so dry that it could replace sandbags as your best defense against rising floodwaters; I get only a third of the way in before chucking it for Gatorade.   Decent stretching in the shower; the heat’s helpful, though this is a leading contender for my eventual embarrassing cause of death.  I stretch and get my superhero costume on before Ted and Katie arrive at 7.  For decades, the comic book obsession with spandex has finally leaked into reality with the advent of microfiber.  Cyclists, Runners, and Aerobicizers have all gone Spiderman.  Cotton shorts are months away from being joked on by F-list celebrities on VH1 shows.

I’m pretty antsy about the weather.  I haven’t run in temps below the upper 50s as far as I can remember.  I think 11pm intramural football in Virginia Novembers a decade ago is the closest I can come up with.  I’m a Heat Index pro, but Wind Chill territory is not my thing.  I don’t want to try and run while shivering, and dehydration does a number on your ability to maintain body temperature.  I go with a long sleeve Under Armour undershirt, a zip up vest shirt with lower back pockets for my goo packs, and semi-long shorts.  I’ve got a cheap fleece sweatshirt that I can toss a couple of miles in.  Plenty of runners do this, but Rob labeled me a snob for it when he heard my plan.  I chose not to mention the hotel plan to him.  Ted arrives and is freaked out because he was freezing in his sweatshirt coming over.  We haul together our drop off bags, I leave my luggage with the concierge, and we take the Metro to the Pentagon.  From there we walk a good mile with a herd of other people to drop off our bags.  With the sun out, the weather’s surprisingly nice, so I stuff my fleece into my bag along with my jacket.  No need to be a snob.  Ted takes a half hour in a port-a-john, so long that others in line wonder if someone’s really in there or not.  We run into another friend (Junior) who’s doing the race and I force our group to weasel up to the front of the start of our race wave.  I’ve learned that it’s far better to be passed than have to skirt through a tangled mess of stragglers in the races.  It’s go time.

Punishee War Journal, Gametime.
Well, maybe not just yet.  The first wave took off, but our second wave is being held up.  There are ambulances just 200 feet down the road; the race is already over for someone.  This has me slightly anxious, because a key part of this race is the bridge at mile 20.  The 395 bridge connecting DC to Arlington re-opens at 1:45 pm and if you don’t get there in time, you to take the shuttle of shame to the finish line.  The first participants take off a little after 8, and it’s now creeping up on 9 as we wait for EMS to clear the road.  This sends each of us to the trees for anxiety pees.  Social rules are lifted in these events.

9:05 - The Power Rangers cap gun finally goes off!  Here I come fame and glory!
Mile 1     - This isn’t so bad; the road isn’t congested, and the elevation map showing 2 miles of uphill climb had me worried for no reason.  This is light.

Mile 1.5 – Nevermind, found the hills.  This sucks, but I’m going to power through.  The rest of the course will be gravy after this.

Mile 3 – Whee!  2 miles downhill to the Key Bridge; this is fun!

Mile 4 – Key Bridge to Georgetown.  Georgetown really looks beautiful.  AC/DC count is already at 2 (no one has a better collection of testosterone music) and Stairway has made an early appearance on the iPod.

Mile 5 – The first time marker has me pegged at a pace that is a full minute per mile faster than my training runs.  I’ll play along.  I’m sure this won’t last, but I’m not going to slow myself down if I can sneak some bonus time off the clock.

Mile 7 – Out on Rock Creek Parkway, and I start getting put off by the poor showing of the spectators, who apparently are not about to cheer for anyone they don’t recognize.  The vast majority are literally standing around with stone faces and crossed arms, looking down the road for their runner.  I finally start letting them know that it’s perfectly okay for them to clap for people they don’t know, to the horror of this misplaced golf gallery and the delight of the runners around me.  This is where the riding high wave of my day flags.

Mile 9.5 – Fool in the Rain gives me some pep as I approach the Lincoln Memorial.  It’s nice jogging next to the Potomac and trying to picture GW’s famous raft ride up it in the Revolutionary winter night.

Mile 11 – Definite sense that the smooth ride is over with.  The Capitol building seems to be creeping away from me somehow.  I have a nice official photo op robbed, as an idiot girl lunges from the far side to jump and mug right in front of the camera before walking again.  I figured the mall to be clogged with cheering, since well-wishers could see friends as they pass both sides of the mall and zig zag at nearby Potomac Park as well.  Wrong.  The place is mostly empty, and I start to realize how much of a boost friends and family are when you run these marathons.

Mile 13 – Halfway there!  Unfortunately, the path has narrowed and it seems to be slightly clogged.  To my horror, my back, hip, and knees, announce their displeasure with the day’s events.  This is particularly alarming since I haven’t had to deal with aching joints all summer during training.  What’s the deal?  Boy in the Bubble welcomely hits my ears.  The sun was beating on the soldiers by the side of the road…

Mile 15 – I hit the latest time marker, which has me still on pace for finishing in good time, but I can tell the wheels are coming off.  I’ve thrown back nearly 4 grams of aspirin in an attempt to get my back to zip it.

Mile 16 – The 5 hour pace runner just zoomed by me like I was using a walker.  THAT’s not a good sign.

Mile 19 – The aches have mostly subsided, but now I’m dealing with an absolute truckload of run-walkers.  You know when you’re using cruise control, but some joker keeps passing you just to slow down a minute later?  It’s a lot worse when that goes on when the joker is a pack of four, and you end up having to weave from side of the road to side of the road when you’re already weary.  With all of this east-west garbage, it feels like I’m doing two-for-one miles.

Mile 20 – Made the bridge!  Got there a little shy of 4 hours, which is still better than may training runs.  The downside is my running pace has absolutely plummeted and is still going down the drain.  6 miles to go, but I feel like that should have been the finish.

Mile 21 – Still on the bridge, and I can tell I’ve got small blisters on both feet.  Appropriately, Diamonds on the Soles of Our Shoes starts playing.  My iPod has a sense of humor…

Mile 22 – Finally got off the bridge, but I’m having my spirits broken repeatedly as the course keeps turning me further and further from the finish line.  I know where home is, and that’s where I want to be going.  Instead, I get dragged all around Crystal City and through an apparent Target piece of advertising that I can only describe as the Red & White Bullseye Sonic Tunnel of Discomfort.

Mile 23 – Crystal City was done up as a street festival of sorts, a “don’t you wish you were here” atmosphere for us appreciative runners.  The spectators are much better, but no one has the will to care anymore.  One group was handing out cups of beer, which struck me as a little too soon.  Sure enough, less than a mile later, I pass a girl pulled over to the side, hands on the knees, preparing for what was not the first or last attempt at watering the street.

Mile 42 – The Pentagon.  Oh come on!   I’m convinced that the mile 24 marker is a typo.  The iPod siezes the moment and kicks into a nice stretch for the final push:  (Talk Talk’s) It’s My Life, Solsbury Hill, another AC/DC (Dirty Deeds – during which I mull over which I’d rather: cyanide or this run?  Neckties or this run?  High voltage or this run?), Hoedown (the Flecktones), Don’t Fear the Reaper at mile 25, and the greatest live version of Halloween popped up right at…

Mile 26 – Like a cruel psychological test, the mile 26 sign (don’t forget, marathons are 26.2 miles!) sits at the foot of a steep hill with the finish at the top.  If I were a camel, this would be a ten-ton straw.  F that.  I punch through it with everything I don’t have left and make believe that I’m not a corpse for the cameras at the finish.

Punishee War Journal, Epilogue.
I spend the rest of the day unhappy about my time – nearly identical to my San Antonio time (on a torn shin, remember?).  There are a host of things I could blame: Saturday, the flat atmosphere, the endless weaving on the back 10 miles, overextending the first several miles, an overfixation on getting to the bridge, etc; but nothing evens up to an injured shin.  I have to just say that I had a bad run.  There are worse fates.  Only 20 thousand of the 34 registered finished the race.  2 people had heart attacks, with only one surviving.  I didn’t limp through an injury.  Which reminds me, Ted did indeed push himself through and finished, despite taking narcotic pain killers toward the end and he even managed to find time for another half hour Port-a-john stop.  Kudos!

The best part of the race, by a long stretch, was the marines.  I was humbled starting the race once I got to thinking about who they were and how they were out here catering to us as if it were a privilege.  These guys put the spectators to shame, pumping up anyone they could and shouting hoo-rah chants through mega phones.  I didn’t see a single face that questioned “why am I here again?  This sucks.”  Not one.  All positive, all great.  It was honor to shake their hands at the finish line.    Hoo-rah.

NBA Preview 2007

2006-10-25T13:46:00.000-07:00

The Contenders:
Heat:  The champs return intact with no major losses or additions.  On paper they look to have the same warts as last year’s squad:  vulnerable perimeter defense, concerns of reining in Walker and Williams on offense, and major questions about whether O’Neal is much more than a shadow of his former self.  The biggest point to make in response?  They worked through those problems just fine against the Pistons and the Mavs to take the title last season.

Mavericks:  The Mavs were a choke job away from the title last year, but choke jobs have a way of meshing themselves into their victims; ask Brad Lidge and Nick Anderson about that sometime.  Moving past that, this is still a deeply talented team of athletic role players built around Dirk Nowitzki.  No position has an outstanding weakness on either end of the floor, and Avery Johnson has been fantastic in motivating his charges.  The only thing in their way is the possibility of Dirk continuing to clam up in the 4th quarter of big games.

Spurs:  Have the Spurs become dinosaurs overnight?  Duncan and Parker couldn’t keep up with the athletic Mavs last year, and Phoenix is another team that can put fear into the Spurs.  The NBA is moving further towards fullcourt play, which is not the forte of this team despite Manu and Parker.  The numerous leg injuries endured by Duncan over the years may be aging him rapidly, and the loss of both Rasho and Nazr coupled with bottom-end draft picks over the years has left the team in danger of being outgunned by younger teams.  Popovich is still as good an NBA coach as you’ll find, so don’t pity the Spurs just yet.

Kicking at the Door:
Phoenix:  The story starts and ends with Amare Stoudamire.  Every Suns preview this year will include the words “if he is 100% healthy,” and I can let you in on something: he’s not.  Both knees continue to bother the PF sensation, and what’s worse is, grumblings are going through the franchise that his dedication and effort to getting back on the floor have been lackluster at best.  The Suns last year rallied and played above their collective heads behind Steve Nash.  Amare Stoudamire can either make them the deadliest team in the league, or he can shatter their Musketeer chemistry.

Chicago:  Is Big Ben the missing piece or an overrated grumbler past his prime?  Wallace may either use this season to stick it to the Pistons team he left (in spirit, a year ago) or he could continue what some believe has been a slow decline.  PJ Brown will join him to form a frontcourt that is fairly long in the tooth, but solid defensively.  Ty Thomas, if he makes good on his potential, could be a wrecking crew on offense in the form of the original LJ.  Rumors continue to swirl over Ben Gordon’s future with the team, but Kirk Hinrich should keep the Bulls moving along.

Cleveland:  LeBron made a leap in his development last spring, as he nearly knocked off the Pistons on his own.  If Larry Hughes can be his Robin, this team may become the new kings of the Central Division.  At some point, Ilguaskas is going to be reduced to a shuffle, and Drew Gooden needs to show up more than once a week.  The point guard position remains an embarrassment, but LeBron lightens the load in that regard.

Detroit:  Wallace quitting on the Pistons put a nail in their tires last season.  His apathetic play is gone, but can Nazr Mohhamed patch the hole?  The Piston’s bench has been woefully thin, and shot-happy Flip Murray was the only infusion of talent this summer.  More than ever, an injury amongst the remaining Fab Four could mean an early summer.

Playoff Fodder:
Nets:  Not much changes in the Meadowlands: it’s still a high octane trio with a thin frontcourt and bench.  Marcus Williams was a steal in the draft, but his wrist injury means it’ll be a little while before he can start contributing.  Boki Nachbar has been drawing praise as a versatile backup forward and Krstic has been improving at the 5, but the situation at PF is still desperate enough to require the services of Cliff Robinson.

Pacers:  With Artest gone, it seems that Stephen Jackson is out to fill in the loose cannon void.  Bird has not managed many changes despite tough media talk, with Al Harrington replacing Peja in the lineup as the only big move.  Aside from Danny Granger, it’s difficult to argue that this Pacers team is making moves in a forward direction.

Rockets:  The Rockets have dug massive holes in their past two Novembers and Jeff Van Gundy is on his last letters in hangman.  New additions Shane Battier and Bonzi Wells, as well as addition by subtraction with the departure of clueless Stromile Swift, should boost the Rockets depth.  Rookie forward Steve Novak has given observers whiplash with his sniper-like shooting, which should mesh well with Yao’s post game.  McGrady’s health will mean everything to this club’s success.

Clippers:  The Clippers must maintain.  It’s that simple.  Rad-man was switched out for Tim Thomas, but other than that, this is the same team that genuinely threatened to overtake the Lakers in their inter-city rivalry for the first time in memory.  Self-proclaimed player-coach Sam Cassell needs eek out one more healthy year out of his worn down legs, Elton Brand must continue his near-MVP play, and Chris Kaman has to play the center position as strong as he did last year.

Kings:  In most respects, this appears to be a dangerous team, with interchangeable pieces, a couple of stoppers, several scorers, and most players in their prime.  The only questions are the 2-guard spot, first-year coach Eric Musselman, and whether there is a clutch go-to scorer.

Lakers:  Things began to look up in the playoffs last year, with the entire team acting like a unit until Kobe reverted to his old ways in the losing half of the Suns series.  His opting to change his number to 24 (one above MJ?) may signal a new era, and it is time for him to fully come into his own.  The roster is largely unchanged, with Lamar Odom’s role a central question.

Wizards:  The Wizards chief problem in the last two years has been running the offense through a pure scorer (Gilbert Arenas).  It was for this same reason that Team USA cut Arenas in tryouts.  In the playoffs, teams that rely on one-on-one scoring get exposed (unless we’re talking about Jordan or Wade), and that’s happened to the Wiz twice in two years.  With virtually no offseason moves, there’s little reason to expect things to change.

Bucks:  A good team that is a full step or two below the big boys.  Bogut moves to his natural center position this year, which should allow him to be more successful.  Trading for Charlie Villaneuva helps maintain the PF spot, but there is added pressure on Mo Williams to run the point now that TJ Ford is gone.  Michael Redd will need to stay at an All Star level for this team to compete, as the bench is painfully shallow.

Hornets:  The Hornets were the darling surprise story of the league last year, much like the Saints are for the current NFL season.  The addition of Peja and Tyson Chandler to a frontcourt with gem David West solidifies this group on paper for the Run & Fun offense.  Chris Paul was far and away the best selection in last year’s rookie class, and he should be able to avoid the sophomore slump.  Be wary of trouble as Stern rings his PR bell for the Hornets to return to Louisiana and owner Shinn squirms.

Spinning Wheels:
Denver:  Owner Stan Kroenke has stewed quite a mess in Colorado.  Undermining and cutting loose GM Kiki Vandeweghe has left the roster an overpaid, unbalanced mess.  The team has found itself stuck with the unwanted Kenyon Martin and managed to shoehorn in 4 other PFs that want his playing time.  JR Smith is the only player that could pass for a shooting guard on Halloween, but George Karl has already challenged his professionalism and attitude (JR, in return, commented that he wasn’t a morning person).  Andre Miller came to camp almost 20 pounds overweight, and Karl doesn’t feel he’s in shape to handle starter minutes.  If you think this is a playoff team, keep them in pencil.

Minnesota:  Someone will make the playoffs by virtue of winning the Northwest division, and the Wolves have a good shot at overtaking Denver for that spot.  Mike James and Randy Foye join Ricky Davis to form a trio of wing players that can put up numbers, something that offensive facilitator KG thrives on.  Center is shaky in the hands of Mark Blount, but a small ball approach with Garnett in the post may match up better with the Suns and Mavericks of the world.

Golden State:  Speaking of small ball, it wasn’t hard to figure that Don Nelson’s arrival meant the bench for Adoynal Foyle and the starting center position for Troy Murphy.  Mike Dunleavy should see plenty of action as a point forward (Nelson created the concept), giving him his best chance to get his career going.  Richardson should thrive in an offensively-bent system, and pressure is on Baron Davis to grow up and help before he becomes nothing more than a punchline.

Memphis:  When Pau Gasol went down with a fracture in his leg, it likely shut the lights out on the Griz hopes for this year.  However, more than once in NBA history has a team rallied together after the loss of its star to scrap together an overachieving year.

Orlando:  They may not be there yet, but this is a team on a serious rise.  Finally free of Steve Francis’ ball-hogging, Dwight Howard looks to be a very legitimate All-Star center in the East.  Darko Milic should cease the laughter and find his place as a reliable frontcourt piece.  Grant Hill begins his farewell tour, while Trevor Ariza and Carlos Arroyo look to establish themselves as quality starting material.  They still need a couple of pieces, but this team is tearing down the road in the right direction.

Boston:  Paul Pierce is surrounded by players that may or may not ever be ready to take the next step.  Al Jefferson, Delonte West, and Gerald Green ooze with potential, but are they going to realize it anytime soon?  Most of this supporting crew (also including Wally Szczerbiak and Sebastian Telfair) is made up of good secondary players, but none of them are capable of winning games.  Tayshun Prince can win games for the Pistons, Richard Jefferson can win some games for the Nets, Tony Parker can win some games for the Spurs, but can Al Jefferson win a game for the Celtics?

New York:  That’s right, I’m not putting them under ‘miserable.’  Isiah is an overrated coach, but Larry Brown soured the players to the point that they would gleefully embrace Stalin if he had a clipboard.  The entire team wants nothing more than to stick it to Brown with a winning season, and that may be good enough for a surprisingly competitive run inspite of an ill-conceived roster.  Eddy Curry will be a key factor in their fate this season.

Philadelphia:  This franchise will remain stuck in second gear so long as Chris Webber is there to impede the progress of Iguodala and Dalembert.  Unfortunately, Billy King has elected to stay the course while this ship is caught in rocks.  Rodney Carney should add some pep if Iverson elects to run and gun with the kids.

Toronto:  Another franchise that is making some strong moves to compete.  Bryan Colangelo is today’s Jerry West, and his initial moves have been outstanding.  Bosh wants relief from the 5 spot?  Here’s Rasho Nestrovic!  The PG play has been shaky?  Insert sparkplug TJ Ford!  Sick of Americans leaving Canada?  Draft promising Italian Bargnani!  With Joey Graham as well, this roster looks balanced and ready to grow.

Charlotte:  A lot of eggs are in Adam Morrison’s basket.  Scoring has not been dependable in either the front- or backcourt, and scoring is his calling card.  If he shows promise, it may be time for Bernie Bickerstaff to move upstairs and bring in a more fiery coach to instill some fight in this sometimes passionless team.

Miserable:
Hawks:  There’s not much positive that you can say, but Shelden Williams may represent the first good draft the Hawks have had since taking Kevin Willis in 1984.

Blazers:  As long as Zach Randolph and Darius Miles continue to bring the team down to their level, they won’t turn a corner.  But they had a great draft, and Brandon Roy looks to be a class act.  A rivalry has kicked off between Jamaal Magloire and Joel Pryzbilla over the center position minutes.

Sonics:  There may finally be hope for this franchise now that the endlessly frugal Howard Schultz has sold the team to investors from Oklahoma.  The future Oklahoma City Cyclones won’t be ready to go into the playoffs this year, with Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis are slightly jaded with the team, Chris Wilcox is primed to revert to apathy, Luke Ridnour feels betrayed by the Earl Watson acquisition, and the regrettable mistakes brought in to imitate centers.

Jazz:  Larry Miller and Jerry Sloan are experiencing a Stockton/Malone hangover that is as crushing as what Chicago endured post-dynasty.  The healing might start once the infuriating Carlos Boozer is sent off (preferably, to Eastern Russia).

Runners 2: The Sequel!

2006-10-18T08:16:00.000-07:00

The [morning after running a marathon], nothing puts the cherry on top of quads that feel like pulled pork BBQ like discovering that your shin started to bleed internally…I walk like I’m on tranquilizers, and my shin will keep me sidelined for no less than 3 weeks.  But do I regret anything?  No.  I just ran a marathon on a bum leg.  One day, when I’m out of this wheelchair and forget how traumatic this all was, I’m coming back for vengeance.

     Those were my words not quite 11 months ago.  In less than 2 weeks from today, I’ll be attacking a second marathon, this time in Washington D.C.  I swore I wouldn’t train in the Houston summer again, and I broke that oath.  Won’t blame Rob this time, I was bound and determined to finish a marathon stronger than the disaster-filled San Antonio run, and Washington’s Marine Corps marathon appealed to me for a few reasons.  I know a slew of people in the area, mostly from college, which’ll ensure a few cheers and perhaps some cold Propels tossed my way.  It doesn’t hurt that a race course taking you through the D.C. Mall ensures you a few miles of blissful distraction from the fact that you’re running.  The flirtation became a done deal when Teddy called me up in June to let me know that (a) he and Junior were signing up and (b) registration had just opened and typically closed within 36 hours.  The thought of the humor ensured in my future if I helped force Ted into going through the training was a bigger influence than I should admit.  In any case, I registered and bought myself a dandy MCM running cap within minutes of hanging up.

     A major after-effect of the first marathon was a substantial rebound in the weight department.  Despite eating better than I had before the training began a year prior, I put on more weight than ever in my life within a few months.  A year of marathon training dropped 5 lbs; stopping threw on 20.  That was frustrating, to say the least, and this put me in a seemingly worse situation than before for training round 2.  This is a very upsetting lifestyle and makes about as much sense as taking up smoking as a weight control measure.

When I kicked off the DC training in June, things were looking dim – I was struggling on 8 milers, I was shuffling along even slower than before (think of a city bus rolling on flat tires), and the Houston heat was slapping me down like I was an arcade game hedgehog.  Still, things started to turn around in a surprisingly short time.  One of the nice things about my newly purchased home is that it sits by a paved bayou hike & bike trail that runs doorstep to doorstep to my work (a shade under 9 miles*).  I’ve been biking it (~40 mins, less risk of getting crushed by cars than riding the actual streets) and it’s done wonders for strengthening my back and legs.  Thankfully for my coworkers, I have ready access to a shower.  As a bonus, the biking helps me get cardio without pounding my knees, taking off the pressure to do runs 4-5 times a week.  When your commute is your daily workout, it’s a beautiful way to recapture the time you would have spent hauling off to the gym, plus burning calories isn’t a bad tradeoff for saving gas money.

So thanks to the bike regiment, I decided to cut the weekly runs down to three: two “commute runs” and one long one on Saturdays.  The 9 miles can be tough (especially after work with the sun still up) but doable; I leave my secondary bike and run home one day, then run in and take the bike home later in the week (using the primary bike in between).   Beats the pants off of getting up before 5 A.M. three or four times a week to wedge in a 4-5 mi run before work.  That was incredibly draining on me mentally between the lack of sleep and the hours it was robbing from my life.  Two commute runs aren’t a big deal at all, and this means I only have to wake up pre-dawn twice when you include the Saturday haul.  Plus, 9 miles is a third of a marathon, and that’s a nice thing to remind yourself of to keep the confidence up.

Between fewer runs and the biking, I’ve enjoyed much stronger legs.  Every postseason, one or two NBA players will suit up for a game despite a moderate injury like a sprained ankle or swollen knee (of course, this player would not be named Peja), bringing about the following yearly quote: After an 82 game season, everyone’s banged up and playing with pain.  You just got to play through it and rest in the summer.  Ditto for a marathon: usually from the mid-point of training on, pain management is a part of every runner’s experience: you wake up with a stiff back and legs, you pop some aspirin to keep your knees quiet on the run, you lose toenails, (and if you’re lucky) you battle fun things like IT band inflammation and tendonitis.  Get a stress fracture or a MCL tear, and you’re out of the game.  This year, my PM has been absolutely minimal – I’m just over two weeks out and all I’ve got is a foot and knee that get sore post-run.  That’s fantastic!  For further comparison, see Ted; he got a cortisone shot in his increasingly bum knee a week ago.  And he’s still looking to do the race.

All of the things I learned last year have been a big help; once again, you’re not ready to do a marathon until you’ve done one – don’t fall for that “15 and you’ll be fine” load of (Mike?) malarky.  One new trick I’ve learned is, in the same vein as Vaseline, Immodium AD can be quite the friend.  Some emergency pit stops send a boy to the nearest grouping of trees, some aren’t that easy to deal with.  You can roll the dice on a McDonald’s being inside the rapidly shrinking red zone, or you can head things off at the pass with a couple pills.

I’ve developed a fierce loyalty to the Adidas a3 collection of gigarides, megarides, and microrides and refuse to lace up anything else.  I’ve discovered I really prefer wearing those running caps that I’ve always thought were the dorkiest piece of apparel in sports.  In the spirit of NBC’s Heroes show, I’ve developed a superhuman ability to hear cars and bikers coming up from behind me at ranges of a quarter mile, even with the iPod on full blast.

Being able to play the cars like Frogger is a key skill to hone in this training.  They’re out there to kill you, period.  You’ve got 4 populations out on the road/paths: the cars (aka flying missiles) out to run over everything, the bikers, the joggers, and the walkers.  The cars are simple enough to understand; they mistakenly believe they have 60/60/24/7 right of way when they almost never do, and they’re rarely aware of anything that isn’t a car, car radio, lane, or a traffic light.  Suburban mom on a phone in a Lexus RX?  Better stop, cause she won’t even glance or drop a single mph as she hooks the right turn despite your crossing signal.

The bikers are nowhere near as deadly, and they come in two subgroups: the Lances and the Kermits.  The Lances aren’t hard to recognize, since they pour hundreds to thousands of dollars into their outfits and bikes as if they’re bound for Europe.  They can be a pain to deal with, since they’re the most obnoxious and entitled.  Lances treat each ride as if they were being stopwatched, won’t give friendly waves back since it would upset their aerodynamic posture, and expect you to dive out of their way if they’re coming up ringing their bell.  The Maverick Top Gun fly by is their calling card, and they get out and out PISSED if you force them to touch their brakes for any reason.  All that said, if a Lance sees another Lance with a flat, they’ll pull over in a heartbeat.  If a walker was on the ground shot in the chest, though…The Kermits are your more casual, upright cyclers.  Probably the happiest people on the road, since they’re getting a breeze and are relaxed.  Hard not to like the Kermits.

The walkers can be somewhat frustrating, as they’re typically the most oblivious and take up the most space, especially since they’re the most likely to be two- or three-across or wondering into the middle of the path.  Dog-walkers can add even more potential for trouble, since you never know what Astro is going to do.  On my bike commutes home, the afternoon stroll moms are far and away the most likely to shoot me a “how dare you” gawk when I yell up that I’m going to pass them on the left.  On the whole, they’re not too bad.

In the end, we’re all hypocrites.  We curse the bikers while driving, we flip the cars off while jogging, we’re freaked out when the bikes zip by with no warning, we cut off cars while biking, we don’t always shout up a warning to joggers while biking, etc.  We’re hypocrites.  Oh well.  I just have to hope that karma doesn’t come swinging in the next two weeks before the marathon.  The law of averages would have to figure that I’m due for a Navigator to pulverize my knee into powder as I bike through the 610-feeder, but just let me nail D.C. first.

*8.85 according to my bike odometer

Discs for Donations

2006-10-17T08:12:00.000-07:00

As you may know I hate fundraising.  All sides of it.  However, I find myself in that situation again, as Lori has signed us up to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma society.  Good cause, it’s hard for me to argue that as a cancer researcher.  She’s putting forth serious effort to make it happen, and I need to contribute.  I’d prefer to offer something in exchange, rather than a pass the hat method, so here’s what I’ve got:

Discs for Donations!

The deal: donate at our Team-In-Training site, send me an email at evan.and.lori@gmail.com with an appropriate subject line (ex: Discs for Donations) and I’ll send you a live show or a few.  Fairly simple.  None of these shows are violating copyright laws, and they’re all nice quality.  The selection:

Counting Crows August and Everything After Live Compilation
     Compilation of live performances from their debut album
     (same as playlist of AAEA CD)
Dave Matthews Band, 10-31-1996, McNichols Arena, Denver
     Old school Halloween show.
     http://nancies.org/tour/reviews/19961031/
Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds, 2-7-1999, Weis Center, Lewisburg, PA
     My favorite D&T show, loaded with little song teases and hilarious conversation.
     http://nancies.org/tour/reviews/19990207/
Grateful Dead, 7-27-1982, Red Rocks, Morrison, CO
     Soundboard source.  No word on the flaming torches.
     http://www.deadbase.com/homebase.html
Gomez, 5-08-2003, The Odeon, Cleveland, OH
Brian Skalinder says it was a good crowd for a Thursday night show.
(setlist at bottom of email*)
Guster, 8-16-2003, Radio City Music Hall, NYC
     Dan Myers and Ben Kweller sneak in for some fun.
     http://www.guster.com/archives/setlists.html
Jack Johnson, 10-30-2005 (Vegoose, Las Vegas)
     His fans like to sing along.
     http://setlist.com/index.asp
John Mayer, 4-10-2006, Hotel Café, West Hollywood, CA
     Private show to unveil Continuum album material.
     http://db.etree.org/shninfo_detail.php?shnid=75215
Phish, 5-03-1991, Somerville Theater, Somerville, MA
     Soundboard source with a bunch of old favorites like Divided Sky and YEM.
     http://www.phish.net/setlists/1991.html#05-03-91
Pearl Jam, 3-16-1992, Kaufman Astoria, NYC
     MTV Unplugged, plus the soundcheck.
     http://www.theskyiscrape.com/setlists/display.php?id=79
If you would like another artist or show that you don’t see listed, I’ll see if I can’t make them happen (various artists have various friendliness in regards to fan taping).

While it’s not going to be a set “price” in terms of donations per show, I’d put forth the following as a suggestion:

1 show - $20
2 shows - $35
3 shows - $45
5 shows - $60
10 shows - $100

Again, the point here is not the shows, it’s the donations to charity.  No money goes through me, it goes directly to the society via the website.

*
DISC ONE  (74:59)
01. Miles
02. Shot Shot
03. Love Is Better Than A Warm Trombone
04. Silence
05. Rhythm And Blues Alibi
06. Bed Hair
07. Breeze
08. Sound Of Sounds
09. In Our Gun
10. Bring It On
11. Mississippi Boweavil Blues
12. Get Myself Arrested
13. Tijuana Lady
14. Detroit Swing 66
15. [ encore applause ]
16. [ fade out ]
DISC TWO  (22:37)
ENCORE
01. [ fade in ]
02. Army Dub
03. Whipping Piccadilly
04. Revolutionary Kind

Getting LOST Again

2006-10-02T14:35:00.000-07:00

Last week, I walked by the newspaper vending machines at work and my eye caught LOST on the cover of USA Today.  Guess that means that it’s time for me to follow up on the first LOST column I wrote about 4 months ago.  I should start off by letting it be known that I am personally spoiler-free in regards to this show.  There are plenty of sites out there that reveal plot points several episodes in advance and let litters of kittens out of the bag weekly.  I think Star Wars fanatics brought about spoilerism as a professional career, and plenty of amateur Jedis watch ABC on Wednesday nights.  In either case, I’ve found through personal experience that satisfying curiosity cravings does little but ultimately ruin the fun.  With that said, anything you read here comes from me without any inside knowledge.

     Speaking generally about the show, I suspect that the creative direction is changing on the show, with the bottom line (as normal) dictating things.  The ratings for Season 2 took a sharp dive over the winter months, and when a show like this has such a terrifyingly large budget, the powers that be won’t sit idle.  Two heavy complaints have been addressed this year, as the season will be shown in two uninterrupted blocks (6-episode fall run and a 16-episode run in the spring) and the series will be given a jolt of action (and sexiness!  Woo!) to liven up the episodes.  The deliberate pacing contributed to atypically low rerun ratings, which have been pulled completely by ABC for the time being (they may resurface in the summer).  In what I read to be a pre-emptive move to side step a common fate for high-budget shows, it has been put out there that LOST will run for a total of 5 seasons and will be resolved on the big screen.  If the ratings cannot justify the expense, networks have shown that they will slash budgets and pull the plug on shows before their time (ask Joss Whedon about that).  By shortening the show by 2 seasons, it will be easier for the creative team to keep the cast together, speed up the action and plot advancement, and hold off antsy studio execs.  I’ll see this though – no matter how LOST ends, you can put a healthy amount of money down that it will be galling and upsetting to millions of frustrated fans.

     To recap from what I wrote before, LOST can be broken down into four elements:  Understanding the island and its purpose; understanding the inner workings and background of the survivors; watching how the characters reconcile their pasts with their new lives; and the soap opera interplay between the survivors.  As I said in the previous writing on the subject, that final element is superficial and fluid.  A Michael-Sun-Jin love triangle was abandoned after season 1 in response to viewer apathy.  The Jack-Kate-Sawyer triangle, however, will go through the typical 90210 pacings (Kate’s pregnant!  But who’s the REAL father?).  In contrast, the mysteries of the characters and the island were determined in advance of the pilot and will be revealed in drops over the next few years.  I walked through the character pasts a few months ago, so I’ll tackle the island now.

The Island
     Fan theories on the island have been far-reaching for two years: limbo or purgatory, the Bermuda triangle, a dream, a man-made base, an alternate reality, a time warp in the past, etc.  The producers have systematically refuted nearly all of these theories, claimed that all things are scientifically explainable, and the season finale helped eliminate several possibilities.  In the final minutes, an observation crew took notice of Desmond’s EM blast on the island, demonstrating that the island truly is a part of “the real world.”  Still, it’s tough to buy that this is a standard Pacific isle in the vicinity of Tonga.  The producers have proven themselves to be sly and amused by inserting obscure clues for the ravenous diehard fans of the show.  Nine episode titles are playful puns, four happen to double as famous song titles from the 60s and 70s*, and one of those song titles happens to be White Rabbit, which very likely is also a nod to Alice in Wonderland.  Another reality-altered story that is referenced is The Wizard of Oz, by way of the Others’ so-called Henry Gale.  Coupled with the Island’s healing of Locke, Rose, and possibly Sun and you have to pause and question whether there truly could be a scientific explanation.  Oh, and there’s the matter of that quasi-alien statue foot seen by Sayid, Sun, and Jin.

Gale’s assertion that God could not look down upon the island was fairly ominous, as was the exchange between Hurley and Sayid regarding where “or when” a discovered radio broadcast was originating.  Finally, why could Desmond not escape the island on the boat?  Gale instructed Michael to follow a very specific heading in order to leave last season, which would suggest that there is some manner of a “portal” in and out of the Island’s otherwise invisible and inescapable bubble keeping survivors trapped and outside eyes out.

     Still, supplies are being dropped on the island, and it is highly likely that Desmond’s fiancee will find her way to the island with the aid of her observation crew.  Perhaps we’ll be told that it was an electromagnetic cloaking field that rendered compasses useless and possesses healing properties a la magnet bracelets.  That would ask for plenty of belief to be suspended but alas, we have to go along with TV reality.  Speaking of which, ask your friendly neighborhood physicist if it’s a good thing to be able to see and hear an EM blast.

     There are plenty of other island questions to be asked: what is the purpose of the thick cable that runs into the ocean?  Is it an electric cable, a transmission wire, an achor, or something else?  Just what is the empathic, machine/dinosaur-sounding, pilot-snatching, ground-hole-exploding smoke monster that tried to drag off Locke and stared down Eko?  We’ve been told that it’s a security system, but I’m pretty sure that’s not in Brinks’ catalogue.  What was Dharma trying to accomplish there – was it all about psychological tests or was there a higher purpose?   Is Dharma even in charge at this point?  There’s been no clear connection between the agency and the Others as of yet.  Season Three should shed light on the Darma/Widmore agenda and whether it is still the driving force on the island.

     What do I think?  Again, I think we’re all going to be crabby when it’s all revealed and is less than what we wanted.  Until then though, I’m just going to enjoy the journey.

* Jefferson Airplane’s White Rabbit, The Animals’ House of the Rising Sun, Springsteen’s Born to Run, and Marley’s Exodus.  I’m not sure how to fit in the apparently made-up 70s band Geronimo Jackson, but I’m sure that has to do with something somehow.

Lock the Closet

2006-09-29T05:13:00.000-07:00

Growing up, I flip-flopped living between Houston and Virginia, with a little upstate New York sprinkled in.  While it always made me wonder if I had a real home to root in, I always appreciated the perspectives it gave me.  In my opinion, the best thing anyone can do to open their mind is spend time in completely different environments.  That may be why I typically bypass tourist attractions while visiting cities to try and get a feel for what everyday life is like there.  One difference I picked up on is that once you leave the South (and I am very particular in that definition, it does not include Virginia, Maryland, Florida, or several other states that were politically affiliated with the Confederacy), being a country fan is akin to being gay.  If you were to meet someone in Virginia or New York, a few months pass by, and they find an Alan Jackson CD in your car, you’ll no longer be the same person to them.  Under that premise, I’ve found myself in similar type of closet over the past 5 years as Dave Matthews fan.

     Somewhere in the past few years, liking the Dave Matthews Band became as divisive a trait as being a Christian.  Years ago, these were things that people could say without a second thought, but today there is a serious stigma that follows.  I can accept that in today’s overly-politicized society, the socially conservative nature of the church can be polarizing.  With DMB’s flock, the answer isn’t as obvious.  Dead Heads and Phish Phans were more amusing than irritating to society, and the serious jam band scene generally shuns Dave Matthews Fans as if they were plague-infested rats.  Matthews hasn’t been a Terrell Owens of music, a Toby Keith, or even a George Clooney.  No one really cares either way about Dixie Chicks fans, it’s usually just the artist or celebrity that takes the backlash if they go Tom Cruise on us.  Dave Matthews himself has made a couple of comments, particularly when performing solo in England, that he himself can get weary of his diehard followers.  Bassist Stefan Lessard has blasted fans on occasion through his online website.  With DMB, the issue lies fairly specifically on the fan base.

For the longest time, I didn’t really get why, just lumped it into the same category as the aforementioned country closet, and kept things to myself as I traded for concert bootlegs and joined the fanclub for easy ticket access.   Couldn’t wear the T-shirts around in public and made sure I had DMB-free mixes to play in the car if others were riding with me.  Most certainly, when I began to see them in different states, I had to make up a lie about where/why I was really going.  It wasn’t ever done out of shame – it was because I knew full well that I would cease being me to 75% of the people that knew about the DMB interest.  I’d no longer be one of the 5% of Hostonians that love the Rockets, the 0.00003% of America that could pick Mark Price out of a lineup and carry on an hourlong conversation about his career, a science guy with a decent hold on sports medicine and medical imaging, a music and Arrested Development nut, or anything else.  I’d be boiled down to one single label: DMB fanboy.  And call me crazy, but I’d rather not become a label.  That’s the same reason that I decided against joining a fraternity years ago.

Zip up to present day, when I got a chance to reflect on the state of this fanbase while enjoying a little extended weekend in Virginia with a few college friends and the two-night tour finale in Charlottesville (note – see how I just deflected the DMB part of the visit there?  It’s such a habit at this point).  Seemed like the show to go to; I can never see my friends in the Old Dominion commonwealth enough, Charlottesville would represent a homecoming for the band (they played in town weekly in their formative years, but have only returned once in the past decade), and the tour finales tend to have special songs and guests that you might not otherwise catch in a typical show.  Turns out, tickets for this show were almost exclusively available to fan club members.  For most shows, the percentage is roughly 45% and in Charlottesville it was bumping closer to 80%.  Because of this, I got to get a full up-close look at whether this fan base’s stigma was deserved or not.  Turns out the general public may be letting them off light.

It’s tough to put this in a better way, but the only way to really describe this fanbase in Charlottesville would be to relate it to a Star Trek convention.  It’s hard not to pick them out of a crowd, the girls prefer a hippie-hobo chic, and a large number wear DMB shirts.  Now, most any fanbase wears shirts, but with this crew there’s an underground one-upmanship about the shirt-wearing.  Can you believe I was at this show?  Well, I was going to shows as far back as this tour!  I was one of the select few that had enough money to get myself to this show!  I found where the vendor kiosk was at the arena last night!  I’m wearing this shirt that I made myself that has a personal message to the band on it!  Taking shrewd advantage of this unofficial sport was Miller’s, the well-known C-Ville bar that employed Dave before he was Dave.  Miller’s sold their normally $8 T-shirts outside for $25, and took in a killing while numerous fans took group pictures outside by the door.  Each fan inevitably had the same exact unique thought that wearing a Miller’s shirt would be ultra-credible since it would prove that they knew about Miller’s.  I’m not sure if people make pilgrimages to the old community theaters in Boston that Leonard Nimoy acted in, but this couldn’t be too far off.

I should also clear up that hippies really aren’t found anymore on the DMB scene.  They certainly used to be, peaking around the time that DMB was a H.O.R.D.E. tour mainstay in the mid-90s.  They seemed to drop out of sight at concerts almost in step with the turn of the century, which could be correlated with the steep rise in ticket prices, the in-pouring of Abercrombie&Fitch-wearing fans, the band members cleaning up, the heavily criticized Everyday album, or any combination of these and other factors.  Either way, they’re gone, and this second generation fanbase remains.  This may be the only time I say it, but it was better with the hippies.  They may have the annoying habit of wandering wherever they please at shows and dancing into your beer, but that group was fairly pure and focused on enjoying the music.  DMB fan 2.0 is a much more competitive sort, and the game seems to be proving oneself the biggest fan in the arena.

The competition is one aspect that I can fully appreciate being a turn-off to those only mildly interested in the band.  After a show I saw not terribly long ago that I thought was fantastic, I turned to a nearby attendee and said, “wasn’t it awesome when they did____?”  I was caught off-guard when he openly scoffed that they’d already done something similar a handful of times during the tour.  It stripped the fun out of it for him, and disallowed the moment from being cool.  This is a fanbase that reads nightly setlists as if they were stock reports, hoard bootlegged shows as they surface as if it were research, and openly pan good shows if they weren’t as “special” as ones that took place the week prior.  Also, don’t mention that you like any Dave song that you may hear on the radio.  The fanbase has a long history of viciously turning on singles, even the ones that were universally loved when they were first debuted on stage.  Only a few singles have escaped this persecution, while stunningly mediocre songs are lauded when they don’t make the cut in the studio following concert road testing.  Then there’s how they interact.

For instance, looking around Charlottesville, it’s clear that they travel in tight cliques, are mildly competitive socially, and some even seem to seek the status of message board celebutantes, not that I necessarily want to say that they’re all high schoolers.  Several go to great lengths to maintain a show-traveling lifestyle that their personal finances can’t keep up with, driving them into debt in the effort to maintain some supposed status.  This takes me back again to the Trek analogy; for many of them, it seems like this setting replaces “regular” friends and social circles back home.  It also makes me think back to Daredevil comic books.  Obvious connection, you know?  Well, comics teach you more as a kid than they get credit for.  In this instance, I remember a Daredevil annual (featuring a Spiderman crossover) containing a subplot of a disillusioned alcoholic realizing that the man he considered his lifelong best friend had never considered him to be anything beyond a drinking buddy.  At the time, it took me awhile to understand why that connection wouldn’t make them friends, but I think that pertains to this Dave following well.  Within the DMB fan(atic) social circles, it seems that there are tons of people mistaking “show buddies” for true friends.  If one of them were to drop out of the scene or if the band were to dissolve this winter, I think most of them would find that it was all ephemeral.  Maybe I’m being presumptuous because I shy away from these circles in preference of seeing shows with friends outside this community.

Like with any band, TV show, sport, or hobby, it seems to me that everyone follows the same basic curve: intrigued( interested( casual fan ( big fan ( fanatic ( critical fan ( cynical/disillusioned fan ( jilted/jaded former fan.  You can hop off directly at any point in the process at first, and the time at each phase completely depends on the individual.  Myself, the timeline would look like mid-1994 (intrigued) ( fall-1994 (interested)( early 1995 (casual)( mid-1999 (big)( mid-2001 (addict/-atic)( late-2002 (critical)( mid-2005, dropping me off at cynical.  The secret to happiness, I suppose, is to ride the big fan phase for as long as possible.  Once you start seeing the circus up close, of course, some of the magic melts away.  Only sports seem to be able to take fans back and forth on that circuit, not surprisingly tied to winning and losing cycles.  What took me over the Dave Matthews fan hill was the regrettable decision in 2002 to join in with the big fan tradition of traveling to see multiple shows on a tour.  Being somewhat still fresh out of college with no understanding of money, I met up with friends and show buddies for a total of 13 concerts and found myself miserably tired of many songs by the end.  It was like forever ruining the taste of pizza by eating so many of them that you were sick for a week.  However, this doesn’t faze others in the same way – they can go to countless shows and love them all.  For them, seeing the Dave Matthews Band across the country each summer is the best possible vacation and it makes them extremely happy.  In the end, that’s all that matters, and everyone has to find it for themselves.

No friends of Evan that enjoy the Dave Matthews Band were passive-aggressively slandered in the writing of this piece.  It’s those other people he doesn’t think much of, not you.

Reviews, Previews, and Musings

2006-09-20T13:16:00.000-07:00

-Robert Randolph and the Family Band Colorblind
Haven’t been able to hear this one yet, unfortunately, though I’ll get a preview when I see them in concert this weekend.  Regardless, they reside in my ‘buy as soon as released’ bin.  Encouraging, as opposed to the Barry Privett’s struggles I’ll soon mention, Randolph and the fam found their album overflowing with material.  The group took their time building up material, road testing some, and collaborating with the likes of Dave Matthews, Carlos Santana (who does not appear on the recordings), and Eric Clapton to put together others.  Indications are this album will lean more towards the 70s rock and funk sound that the Family Band frequently covers on tour (Hendrix covers are astonishingly faithful) than their debut album which was more soul and spiritual.  Colorblind is an album worth getting excited about – when studio work fills the cup to the point that unreleased cuts will spill into other artists’ albums, it’s almost always a good thing.

-Carbon Leaf Love Loss Hope Repeat
The Richmond, VA eclectic rock group released their follow up to the mainstream Indian Summer last week, and seem to be offering more made-for-radio sound rather than the more wide-ranging music that made up their first 4 studio albums.  This is an understandable route for a band still trying to break out after 11 years of playing, but it also washes out the color that made the group so distinguishable from the rest of the crowd on previous efforts.  It’s been talked about that lead singer Barry Privett struggled with writer’s block halfway through recording this album, and it does show as half the album seems polished and intriguing (the title track, Block of Wood, and Texas Stars, most notably) and the rest comes across as if it was written on the run.  The album is hardly bad, but it doesn’t measure up to the band’s ability.

-The Chuck Klosterman Trilogy
This is really more of a run up for Chuck Klosterman IV, which my thriftiness will preclude purchasing until it’s on paperback.  I had held a pre-conceived notion that Klosterman was an older drugged up Rolling Stone “journalist” that was a typical űber-political type (see: PJ O'Rourke).  Not half, and I’m thankfully that my friend Rob shoved Killing Yourself to Live down my throat this summer.  He works for Spin!  He’s almost my age!  He likes Fleetwood Mac!  That’s huge – I don’t understand why, but Fleetwood Mac is the anti-Simon & Garfunkle; they were big, but no one really likes them at all.  Well, in no time, I digested all three of Klosterman’s books: Sex, Drugs, and Coco Puffs, Fargo Rock City, and Killing.  Puffs and Killing are similar with a Seinfeldian feel; they’re about nothing, but wholly entertaining.   Puffs is a large collection of pop culture columns that covers a span of topics ranging from Born-again Christians to Klosterman’s hatred of Coldplay (righ with him there – nothing good associates itself with the likes of Paltrow).  Killing is ostentatiously about a pilgrimage to famous landmarks of deaths in rock, but is more built around a Klosterman stream of consciousness and assorted romantic stress.  Rock City stands apart from the other two works as more of a fan’s yearbook of 80’s metal.  It’s easily the most focused of the works, and is semi-scholarly.    Klosterman IV was written in a similar vein to Puffs and largely is a collection of previously published columns.

-Damone
The band that Avril Lavigne looks like.  Pop-metal, power-punk, however you’d like to label it, it’s like discovering a band that missed the memo that Nirvana killed 80’s rock.  Singer Noelle sounds so much like Avril, I assumed the single “Out Here All Night” was a B-side from Let Go (when Avril was still pretending to be punk rock), but don’t hold that against the band.  The band writes their own material, and all 4 members play their instruments even when not filming for TRL.  It lands more on the side of guilty pleasures, but isn’t that what Skid Row and company were back in 1987?

-Wolfmother
Speaking of bands that remind you of someone else, Wolfmother is apparently the result of genetic engineering from the DNA of Plant, Page, Jones, and Bonham.  Singer Andrew Stockdale is unapologetic in taking cues from the greatest rock band in history, and the evidence is plain from the album coverart, the vocals,the song subjects, the riffs, and more.  Maybe this sounds like they should be docked points for originality, but I can’t stress enough that Wolfmother honestly comes across as a reincarnation, not a knock-off.  This group sits firmly at the very top of my list of acts to see live.

-Layercake
A smarter, more serious movie from the Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch crew.  James Bond 2006, David Craig, stars in what can be simply described as a “one last caper before I get out” movie.  Don’t be deceived into thinking that the story itself will be so simple.  The direction and writing is sharp and top notch, but don’t try to watch it unless you’re able to pay attention.  If nothing else, the dialects can be something to cut through.

-The Departed
What’s this?  A crime thriller directed by Scorsese?  Jack Nicholson playing a seriously evil bad guy again?  What are the odds that this one will be a stinker?  1 in 250?  Damon and DiCaprio are double agents, one for the mob and the other for the cops.  Did I mention that Nicholson wanted to make his character to be the ultimate carnation of evil?  I’m excited.

Guide to Getting Arrested

2006-09-01T12:46:00.000-07:00

With all 3 seasons of Arrested Development now released, you no longer have an excuse for not taking in one of the greatest comedy series of all time.  To help get you started, here’s an introductory guide.
The Family:
George and Lucille Bluth – George is a corrupt businessman under indictment throughout the series, and helped all of his children develop series complexes as their father.  Lucille is at least equally manipulative, controlling, and is alcoholic.
Oscar Bluth – George’s identical twin brother, a penniless hippie pothead with feelings for Lucille.
GOB (George-Oscar Bluth) – Oldest son.  Professional magician that has been cast out by his peers, and dramatically compensates for an inferiority complex.
Michael Bluth – The good son, but with control issues.  Constantly tormented from the lack of approval from his father.  Widower and father to George-Michael.
Lindsay Bluth Fűnke – Michael’s twin sister (or is she?).  Airy and a part-time activist for causes that catch her eye.
Buster Bluth – The youngest son, that in many ways remains a child.  Has an oedipus complex.
Tobias Fűnke – Lindsay’s closeted husband.  A former psychiatrist that becomes infatuated with acting.
George-Michael Bluth – Michael’s son.  Follows in his father’s footsteps but struggles with asserting himself.  Develops a major crush on his cousin Maybee.
Maeby Fűnke – Tobias and Lindsay’s daughter with disputed origins, but certainly inherited her grandparent’s ethics.
Annyong Bluth – Adopted from Korea by Lucille to teach Buster a lesson about eating his peas.
The Presentation
A.D. is vaguely similar to the BBC’s The Office in two general ways: no laugh track, and a large amount of hand-held (documentary-style) filming.  The absence of a laugh track, confusing and upsetting to many of today’s King of Queens viewers, allows for much more panned humor and a more fluid pace.  Arrested episodes are crammed full of jokes, and with no laugh track to emphasize them, rewatching shows is almost requisite.  Numerous gags are also subtle and away from the action.  The show often times explains a dialouge reference through a quick cut-away, several of which are so brief as to require pausing the DVD.  In general, Mitch Hurwitz and the rest of the show’s creative control force refuse to pander to “the idiot demographic” (their words, not mine!).
     To other defining traits of the show are its continuity and its near-improvisational rewriting.  All post-pilot episodes feature numerous running jokes from prior shows, and more interestingly, several key jokes are planted many episodes before their “punchline.”  The specific nature of George’s chief crime is teased at in clever ways throughout Season 1, there are several planted clues that foreshadow a major Season 2 turning point for Buster as early as Season 1, and Annyong’s major revelation at the series end is foreshadowed 24 episodes earlier.  Coupled with multi-episode story arcs, this makes Arrested best watched sequentially, and multiple episodes at a time (I fully expect that you have Netflix at this juncture, otherwise we’re going to fight).
     The writing on the show is taken very seriously, as the plots themselves do not always provide the majority of the humor.  Sharp, witty dialogue carries much of the load instead.  David Cross (Tobias) largely improvises his lines, and most of the cast is free to deliver their lines in styles that they choose.  Writers were kept on set, and the lines were constantly tweaked based after rehearsals.
The Running Themes
     As mentioned, there are many running jokes on the show.  Many of these take the form of running themes that are presented in a host of different ways.  On of the best examples of this are allusions to The Wizard of Oz, and in particular the Tin Man.  This stems from two basic sources: regular guest Liza Minelli (daughter of Judy Garland), and the Tin Man’s symbolism (“I’m a friend of Dorothy’s”) in gay culture.  One particularly buried gag/allusion takes place in the second episode of Season 2, when Tobias finds himself in need of medical attention.  After covering himself in metallic-colored “diamond cream,” he finds that he’s inhaled too much diamond dust.  This is a particularly clever reference to a lesser-known piece of Oz trivia; the first actor to portray the Tin Man had to bow out after developing severe lung complications from an aluminum powder-based makeup.
     Other themes to watch for:
Ron Howard (producer/narrator) – references to The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days.  Example:  Ron’s narrator expresses indignation in Season 1 after George-Michael is insulted by a woman who refers to him as “Opie.”
Peanuts – The connection to the show is unclear to me, but consider Lucille’s name, GOB’s puppet, how Buster refers to his privates, oh…and there’s that “Good Grief” episode in Season 2.
Henry Winkler – endless allusions to Fonzi, of course.  One of the most brilliant of which takes place during the Season 2 “Motherboy” episode (notice how I’m not spoiling it for you?).
FOX – Arrested regularly pokes at FOX, other FOX series, and its relationship with the network, often by way of allegorical plot devices and dialogue.  John Beard, a Fox News anchor for Los Angeles, appears regularly as…a Fox News anchor for Los Angeles.
The Rest of the Cast – GOB regrets a hasty marriage to Amy Poehler, the pair are married in real life.  Tony Hale (Buster) re-enacts a rather famous Volkswagon commercial he did prior to joining the cast.  Portia de Rossi was once married to a man, mirroring her relationship with Tobias.   Many former castmates of David Cross (Mr Show with Bob and David) cameo.  In fact, the cameos alone could count as a theme.  We’ll leave it by saying this show had a LOT of friends.
Incest/Sexuality – not that you were going to have a hard time picking up on this one.
The Top Six:
I still hold that this show should be watched straight through, but here’s my list for the best single episodes of AD (unranked):
Motherboy XXX – Season 2, Episode 13
Afternoon Delight – Season 2, Episode 6
Mr. F – Season 3, Episode 5
Missing Kitty – Season 1, Episode 18
Staff Infection – Season 1, Episode 15
The One Where They Build a House – Season 2, Episode 2

Summer Stream

2006-08-30T07:57:00.000-07:00

Miss me? Anyone? Hello?

Been awhile – but absence, fondness, and melting of writers blocks. With no sports but baseball, a paltry selection of summer movies, and little in the news, it’s been one of the longer summers I can remember. Dog days became months. Thankfully, football is gearing up like storms in the gulf, and fall TV isn’t all that far off either.

My summer recap of thoughts, anecdotes, and impressions:

We need a new airport hub for NYC. LaGuardia (est. 1939) is tiny and dingy – even its President’s club reminds me of an abandoned downtown lounge. Newark (est. 1928) is just a mess and its cabbies charge extortion rates ($16 for a 6-block drive). JFK (est. 1947) is slanted towards international flights, but I hear it’s undergoing a serious facelift, so I might check it out soon with Jetblue.

That’s right, Jetblue. I’m a card-carry Continental man, but these guys are getting an audition for a couple of reasons: (1) they were offering ridiculously cheap roundtrips ($200) at the right moment – I’m giving up a quarter of my annual income on flights right now and had to tack on another East Coast wedding, (2) no layover, (3) Direct TV and XM radio for everyone!

That last one’s a biggie. I can’t sleep on flights, even after a week of carousing 20 hours at a pop. It’s not the flight itself, even though I always regret napping in cars/planes because of the pinched neck and groggy headache that follows. I stay awake because of the in flight movie. Even one-star disasters have a hold on me like late night cable. I’ve only been able to resist two movies in my flying career: ‘White Chicks’ and ‘The Shipping News.’ On the August flight to LaGuardia, I surrendered to ‘She’s the Man,’ which was a blatant puree of ‘One of the Guys’ and ‘Ladybugs.’ Amanda Bynes was alarmingly more convincing as a boy than as an attractive female lead. I really hope that Direct TV frees my soul.

Only a few discoveries on the June and August trips to Manhatters: Joe’s Pizza in the village (seen in Spiderman 2, I swear that wasn’t what brought me there) has completely altered my understanding of what good pizza is supposed to taste like; it’s worth the trip to Magnolia’s not for the place or the cupcakes (in fact, I prefer their mini-cheesecakes), but for the Chronicles of Narnia poses to send to friends via camera phone; PJ Clark’s on 55th and 3rd is the ultimate early morning stop on the way home after a home night – full menu until 3am (get the bubble and squeak!) and Cheers-esque feel; the staff at the 57th St Four Seasons may be worth your room price by themselves – they’ll have you confused about your personal celebrity status within two days; like finding out that you have a grandmother with racist tendencies, I was shocked to realize the shopping bigotry while accompanying on a trip to Bloomingdales – that place sends its unwanted customers to the derelict subbasements like they’re morlocks. We shan’t have our valued vistors setting their eyes on the likes of you! Down below with the low ceilings, dim lighting, and dingy tiled floors is where you’ll be!

Only other rough spot in NY was the asscab we mistakenly got into one day on our way to Dinosaur BBQ (far East side of Harlem, though the Rochester location remains my favorite). We hop in and I let the cabbie know that we’re headed to 132nd and twelfth.
“Whut?”
(in unison) “132nd and twelfth”
“132nd Whut?”
“132nd and twelfth”
“132nd Whut?”
(in retrospect, this is the point I should have started Lil Jon-ing)
““132nd and TWELFTH!”
“132nd EAST OR WEST?!!”
“East!”
“What the hell is the problem with you!”

Note – this would have been a ‘my bad, I don’t know NY like I wish’ moment, had 132nd been bisected by Central Park. However, CP runs from 60th to 110th, so why this guy blew a gasket is past me. We go east a bit and swing south, which perplexed us a little, but I’ve learned from experience that the worst thing you can do in Manhatten is be a backseat driver in a cab. I assume he just needs to take a zig-zag roue to hop onto the Eastside highway, which we’ll need to run up to the 125th/132nd exit. Unfortunately, he continues past two different signs for the highway and is halfway to the Village before my friend finally, gratingly, double checks that he understands that 132nd is in Harlem. The response we get is that he figured we were trying to get to “the hospital downtown.” That cemented him in my hall of fame for good. We eventually get to the best BBQ in NY, but I was disappointed that the fare wasn’t $19.99 so I could give him a twenty and an earful. Oh well.

Speaking of foreigner service, I returned to Outer Banks, NC, to find that 30% of the people working there were from Eastern Europe or Russia. That was a tough one to reconcile fully. The island is thankfully still the strip of heaven that I remember. A lot of new construction, but nothing gaudy or corporate, aside from an out of place Applebees and Outback. Because OBX is a sliver less than a mile wide and is a hurricane front line, it’s resisted the Myrtle Beach treatment. Almost all of the new stuff is welcome – a new bar/club with a concert stage, a few more grocery stores, and 5 Guys. 5 Guys is a hamburger joint that would capsize every fastfood place in my world if it opened up in Houston. Put simply, the burger patties themselves aren’t unbelievable, but the whole package is. Toppings that outdo a picnic in terms of freshness. Fries that you douse in vinegar (I can’t articulate how big a draw this was for me). One “small” burger will leave you in need of a wheelchair. If you ever see one, make the move.

Had to counteract those burgers somehow, so I continued my (unfortunate) marathon training while out on the island. If you weren’t aware, the marathon’s back, despite how the inaugural one went. DC’s Marine Corps marathon on Halloween Sunday and the Houston one in mid-January. Thank the wife for the second one. She decided that the running needed to serve a higher purpose than my misery, so she had us registered for Team-In-Training, a group that prepares amateurs for endurance events in exchange for cancer-related fundraising. Wifey’ll be paying a rather high price, in that she’s signed up for Houston’s half-marathon (she’s never run before). Anyway, a nugget from my OBX running – even if you’re not in Houston’s swamp-like atmosphere, jogging 11 miles in the sun without water isn’t the best idea in the world. That disaster led to a pre-hurricane-esque run on CVS’ water/gatorade supply later.

Only other mentionables from the NYC/OBX trips: seeing a car with bumper stickers for Grateful Dead….Phish….and O.A.R. Sure enough, they were no older than 19. One of these things is not like the other…Hit a wedding in VA and got a classic: the groom involuntarily struggled and failed to repeat “to be your faithful husband…by not being able to get in the “faithful” part on to separate tries. This sits with (outdoor ceremony, self-written vows that became spontaneously inspired) “Jasan, it’s easy to love you on a day like this” in my all-timers. A funny development in our days of technology: all the upper class people huddling like hobos on the floor at airports so they can plug in their laptops.

On the music front, I fell into a re-discovery of Bruce Hornsby; realized he’s ten times the artist I ever realized. Completely went past me that he’s close with guys like the Dead and Floyd. Saw a fantastic show from Paul Simon (The Boxer nearly broke me, it was so good). Only movie that I really enjoyed was Ricky Bobby (“I’m all jacked up on Mountain Dew!!!”), though I have to say that Devil Wears Prada isn’t a bad choice for a bullet to take on a date night. Fairly painless way to make sure you can go see Jackass 2.

So that’s just about it for my summer. I hope to get back to more regular posting again, and hope that all 3 of you will be here to read them. I’m going to try and leave more of the sports stuff on the Fox blog if I can. Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s time to go grab the just-released Arrest Development Season 3 DVD set and enjoy a nice evening with the Bluths.

NBA Offseason Kickoff

2006-07-03T12:07:00.000-07:00

And they’re off!  The NBA offseason has hit the ground running like seldom seen before.  Many teams are unhappy with where their roster stands and are determined to make moves.  The draft was a free-wheeling event for slightly different reasons: this was a weak and shallow draft, and with first rounders due guaranteed contracts on the same payscale as good drafts, if a team didn’t see someone they liked where they were slotted, they dealt up for a better player, dealt down for future picks or cash, or simply sold their pick to get out.  Others picked foreign projects to keep them shelved overseas.   Pretty entertaining results, nonetheless.

There’s a lot to go through, so I’m going to hash things out team-by-team and toss everything in one write up.  Their immediate situation, what they’ve done to address it, and what they still hope to accomplish this summer.

ATLANTA
Still embroiled in an ownership battle involving castout owner Steve Belkin that originated in the Joe Johnson S&T (looking more and more like Belkin was right to contend that they gave up too much for him) and determined to improve attendance (virtually tied Protland for last).  The Hawks know that a true superstar is a better bet to fill seats than a winning team (see the Lenny Wilkins/Steve Smith era vs Dominique) and have been in the midst of Allen Iverson rumors.  They made a solid draft pick in power forward Shelden Williams, despite Billy Knight’s talk of taking yet another 6-8 SF with potential (they passed on Rudy Gay).  More than their $18 million in cap space, Al Harrington is the key to the Hawks’ plans.  Using him in a S&T is a far more effective way to bring in players (Atlanta wants a center in return and the Lakers and Bucks are rumored suitors), seeing how marquee free agents more often negotiate with the Hawks to gain leverage than to sign on the dotted line.  Sam Cassell, for example, used the Hawks to twist the Clippers into giving him the two-year contract he was after.

BOSTON
Paul Pierce has made it abundantly clear to Danny Ainge that he won’t sign an extension unless the team ends its youth movement and brings in veterans to win now.  That’s the reason the Celtics dumped their #7 pick to Portland for Telfair.  Ainge has been hellbent at bringing in Iverson, but Wally Sczcerbiak has been nowhere near enough.  Almost the entire roster (Al Jefferson, Gerald Green) is up for grabs as Boston actively looks to give Pierce a reason to stay.

CHARLOTTE
Michael Jordan wasted no time upon arrival in declaring the build-slow strategy over and saying the time to compete is now.  The addition of Morrison fits into that.  While I question whether his game translates to the pros, he is a scrappy scorer and therefore the perfect compliment to the rest of this roster.  Charlotte also has $24 million in cap space, but they’ve been uninterested in courting free agents in previous summers.  That may change under Jordan, and his presence may help draw players to North Carolina.

CHICAGO
The Bulls feel they are in a position to make a push at the East’s elite after years of post-MJ suffering.  They are most interested in adding a frontcourt scorer and adding size to the SG position.  They played Portland tremendously, bluffing with LaMarcus Aldridge (too similar to Tyson Chandler to the Bulls’ liking) in order to get Tyrus Thomas at #4 (read: cheaper) and considerations.  Thabo Sefolosha is a 6-6 Euro guard that they are said to be excited about, but I’d wait before penciling him into their starting lineup.  One of the 5 teams with significant cap room ($17 million), the Bulls are making serious overtures to disenchanted Ben Wallace.  Bringing him in would be a two-fold victory; sending them into contender status and bringing up their division rivals.  Tyson Chandler and/or Ben Gordon could be moved in a contined effort to improve the froncourt.

CLEVELAND
Highly encouraged by LeBron’s first foray into the postseason, the Cavs are looking to build on their success.  Drew Gooden may be retained if he comes cheap, but they’d be just as happy to ship him out in a S&T for a more reliable role player.  Larry Hughes is available for the right price, and they would like to upgrade their situation at the point.  Unsatisfied with the self-proclaimed “greatest shooter in the world” Damon Jones, the Cavs drafted a couple of high-scoring combo guards to make him expendable.

DALLAS
Dallas feels that they have a good roster that they can ride for several years, so they are primarily focused on keeping everyone together.  Jason Terry resigned for a very reasonable price, Dirk was extended, and Josh Howard is next.  Maurice Ager will fit in perfectly as another interchangeable backcourt piece, and may free up the Mavericks to move Marquis Daniels for a target such as Mike James.  Depth at the two forward positions may be the only concern.

DENVER
It’s a tumultuous time in Colorado.  Kiki Vandeweghe is gone, the players are divided and somewhat disgruntled, the owner has been bearing fangs, and George Karl has made enemies with several on the roster.  Nene Hilario has been resigned at an extremely generous rate for a forward that never realized his potential and has yet to begin running on the court (per George Karl) after a major knee injury.  Kenyon Martin is being shopped as hard as any player has ever been and will be moved for virtually anything under the allowable rules, if possible.  Revelations of a Sam Cassell courting heightens speculation that Andre Miller is not safe.  Ruben Patterson and Reggie Evans are free agents, but it is unclear whether they want to stay or if they are even wanted by the team.  Evans is the forward more likely to stay.  This time could find itself in dire straits soon, an extended Carmelo Anthony notwithstanding.

DETROIT
Detroit finds the top of the hill to be a difficult place to remain.  Uncharacteristic in-fighting and finger-pointing marked a dismaying end to a season that began with a 70-win pace.  Joe Dumars made moves to resign Billups and Wallace, but it could be that Big Ben, clearly playing without passion in the postseason, has decided that he’d be happier elsewhere.  With an ever-thinning bench, a defection of this magnitude could seriously wound a previously close-knit team.  Don’t look now, but Darko just might make them regret sending him to Orlando.  Detroit has opened talks with Bonzi Wells in an effort to get the backup swingman that Carlos Delfino has failed to become.

GOLDEN STATE
Chris Mullin finds himself in a mess of his own making, with a roster full of overpaid and underperforming pieces that show little promise for success.  Jason Richardson is perhaps the only piece that the Warriors are happy with.  Baron Davis has been difficult to coach and play with, Mike Dunleavy continues to flounder, and Derek Fisher and Adyonal Foyle have terrible contracts.  The Warriors went after developing center Patrick O’Bryant with the ninth pick, but that may or may not bear fruit.  Troy Murphy and Baron Davis are on the block.

HOUSTON
Feeling the wrath of the fans (#28 in attendance) and with Jeff Van Gundy entering the final year of his deal, the Rockets are under major pressure to turn things around after an out-and-out disastrous season.  Underachiever Stromile Swift found himself kicked out the door after only one season, packaged with rookie Rudy Gay for the unspectacular but reliable Shane Battier.  Traded away for Rafer Alston just last summer, shooter Mike James has been Houston’s primary offseason target.  The most important pieces of the puzzle will be McGrady’s back and Yao’s plagued feet.

INDIANA
Bird and Walsh have suggested that it is time for a roster overhaul, in the wake of two seasons marred by immaturity.  Most of the locker room does not get along, and there has not been enough success to turn a blind eye to it any longer.  No one is untouchable, but Larry Bird will not approve lopsided deals, especially concerning Jermaine O’Neal.  Many experts were surprised to see the Pacers pass on Marcus Williams in the draft in light of Jamal Tinsley’s neverending injury woes (has missed over a third of the season in each of the past 3 years).  They instead took forward Shawne Williams.  As I have opined for months, Peja Stojakovic bolted Indianapolis immediately, though surprisingly to Oklahoma City.  This leaves the Pacers with nothing to show for Ron Artest.  Al Harrington and the Pacers have expressed mutual interest.

LA CLIPPERS
The Clippers are in a highly unusual position, trying to keep together a winning team.  They kept Sam Cassell after he deftly used Denver and Atlanta to bluff Elgin Baylor into accepting his terms.  Radmanovic switched Staples Center lockers by defecting to the L.A. Kobes, but they managed a very equitable replacement in Tim Thomas, who shares almost all of his strengths and weaknesses.  All that’s left on the to-do list is some low-cost depth.

LA LAKERS
The Lakers have abandoned last season’s plan of clearing cap space for a 2008 run at Dirk, Amare, or Yao, now that they’ve all been extended.  Plan B is to make trades to give Kobe a better surrounding unit.  Jordan Farmer will split the point with Smush Parker, though I found it odd that they didn’t opt for Mardy Collins, the sort of big point guard that Phil Jackson loves to have in the triangle.  Lamar Odom may not be hot for a move anymore.  A package including Chris Mihm has been circulating as a possible deal for Al Harrington, with Kwame Brown penciled in as a starting center.  Free agent Devean George may not have a place on the team after L.A.’s deal for Maurice Evans.

MEMPHIS
Jerry West felt that his team needed to make moves or it would flounder, and kicked things off by moving treasured role player Shane Battier for prodigal big man Swift and potential star Rudy Gay.  Swift is reportedly unhappy with the involuntary return to Memphis, but West may be planning to move him again before long.  Bobby Jackson left the team, but Kyle Lowry was drafted to help shore up the point.  In short, the Grizzlies look to maintain their hustling philosophy by reloading for high energy atheletes.

MIAMI
Miami is basking in its first championship, and may keep everyone together for no other reason that a lack of alternatives.  Very few pieces are viable trading chips, and it may be simple to sell the fans in South Florida that they want to defend their title with the same cast.  An improved back up point guard and power forward would be high on the wish list.

MILWAUKEE
Milwaukee is trying hard to hand the center position over to Andrew Bogut, who had a difficult time as a 4 in his rookie campaign.  To that end, they swapped T.J. Ford and his tenuous neck condition for wishy-washy PF Charlie Villanueva.  The second item on the list will be moving Jamaal Magloire for a SF, PG, or 2007 first rounder.

MINNESOTA
Minnesota, somewhat like Boston, is making every effort to keep Kevin Garnett by convincing him they can bring in the pieces to compete.  Randy Foye may not be as solid a bet as Brandon Roy, but the Wolves are more concerned with their shaky point guard play (Jaric was a disaster) and they have shown that Kevin Garnett thrives with quick-triggered 1s (Starbury, Sam Cassell).  Eddie Griffin has again allowed his off-court troubles to threaten his employment, and Rashard McCants may not be back for sometime after an alarming microfracture surgery.  SF and center are critical needs.

NEW JERSEY
The Nets continue to try and crawl back into the elite, and were helped by an extremely fortuitous draft.  Marcus Williams and Josh Boone project to be near perfect answers for the Nets terrible need for a backup point and help at the 4.  Boone is the shakier pick of the two, but you don’t need much to cut into the minutes of Jason Collins and Cliff Robinson.  There have been whispers that Richard Jefferson is not on good terms with Jason Kidd and could possibly be dealt, but nothing seems immediate or certain.  New Jersey would figure to target another forward with their MLE.

NEW ORLEANS
The Hornets are looking to capitalize on last season’s surprising success, both on the court and in the box office.  The Hornet’s chief concerns have been size and dumping immature SG J.R. “Rider” Smith.  Despite needing a center more than a 4, the Hornets settled on Hilton Armstrong and Cedric Simmons in the draft with no viable centers remaining.  While neither is a sure bet, the odds are good that one of the two will be a contributor on the boards.  Also surprising because of the need for a center, the Hornets quickly used their cap space ($17 million) to land Peja Stojakovic and Bobby Jackson.  The team may want to play an uptempo style modeled after Phoenix rather than pursue centers such as Nazr Mohammed or Joel Pryzbilla.

NEW YORK
With the Larry Brown mess and James Dolan’s declaration that Isiah has a single season to right the ship, there is a strong likelihood of desperate moves by Isiah Thomas.  If he didn’t mind mortgaging the future before, it makes all the more sense now.  In the draft, Isiah had people rolling in the aisles after using his #20 selection on a swingman with no offense that admitted he wasn’t sure about being taken at all.  Isiah followed that up with a less-criticized pick of playmaker Mardy Collins.  The two players bring to the table attributes that Steve Francis, Stephon Marbury, and Jamal Crawford do not: defense and creating for others.  Isiah may not necessarily overhaul his roster, despite his natural inclinations, in part because he feels a need to vindicate the roster that Larry Brown publically trashed.

ORLANDO
The Magic feel that they are back in an upswing, after the McGrady era fell apart and the transition was a similar wreck.  Step 1 was filling the gaping hole at shooting guard, which the Magic looked to do by drafting J.J. Redick.  Whether he can man the position fulltime remains to be seen, as he may be best suited in a situational role off the bench.  Orlando is very optimistic about their frontcourt duo of Howard and Darko Milic, who averaged a very decent 7.6 points, 4 boards, and 2 blocks in 20 mpg upon joining the team.  That said, Orlando is not likely to extend his contract this summer and would be wiser to wait a year and allow him to become a restricted free agent instead.  Trevor Ariza may help as a swingman if he is retained (the Magic do not have Bird rights), and Grant Hill is entering the final year of his max contract.  It would not be surprising if he is bought out or moved if he struggles with even a minor injury, though the team values his locker room presence as a class act.

PHILADELPHIA
Philadelphia appears ready to end the Iverson era.  With wins coming and going, Philly has been content to stay the course in part because Iverson kept attendance high.  Last season, it plummeted to 21st in the league, and reports are flying the ownership wants to pull the plug on the second-highest payroll in the league.  Webber and his unfathomable contract (he’s now the top-paid player in the NBA) are virtually impossible to move, but Iverson is still attractive to teams.  With that in mind, the Sixers drafted swingman Rodney Carney to pair up with Andre Iguodala on the perimeter and are fielding phone offers for the franchise’s biggest star since Charles Barkley.

PHOENIX
Phoenix continues to toy with becoming a true-blue title contender, but owner Robert Starver may be tightening the strings rather than making a Miami-like push for the trophy.  This upcoming season, Amare Stoudamire begins to enjoy his max contract extension, giving Phoenix three players (Nash, Marion, Amare) earning 8-figure salaries and threatening to send the Suns deep into the luxury tax.  Starver is strongly opposed to spending the dollar-for-dollar penalty and may instead rely on Nash’s ability to make YMCA pick ups look like stars, especially with Leandro Barbosa and Boris Diaw due for big pay raises in the very near future.  It’s hardly a sure thing that they would have retained Joe Johnson at the max even if he hadn’t pushed for a trade to Atlanta.  Now, we’ve seen them sell their two first round picks for cash and Tim Thomas walk out for a better deal in Los Angeles.  High-dollar but invaluable Shawn Marion has been making the rounds in trade rumors, but Mike D’Antoni has flatly denied them.  Phoenix could face a whisper-thin bench for their backcourt unless they sign some guards soon.   Perhaps as a sign of things to come, Phoenix made aged sharp shooter Eric Piatkowski its first addition for two years at the minimum.

PORTLAND
Portland is one of two teams currently for sale.  When that happens, a roster firesale is usually attached at the hip.  Darius Miles and Zach Randolph, in that order, have repulsed management and the city with their heartless play and juvenile behavior.  Coupled with their unsightly contracts, this pair could be had for a stick of gum and a trade exemption (Atlanta?  Charlotte?  Please?).  The flurry of trades that netted the team 4 first rounders was a likely push to replace the roster with low-rent youth, a far more attractive sell to potential buyers.  Expect Paul Allen to continue to unload veterans rather than sign for them.  Center Joel Pryzbilla is all but a lock to walk out for nothing.

SACRAMENTO
The Kings are in a transition period with a new coach and a roster in flux.  Their draft pick, Quincy Douby, looks to take over Bobby Jackson’s old role off the bench as a combo guard gunslinger.  While the Kings have a fairly well-rounded roster, they could stand to improve the power forward position and are interested in defensive stoppers.  Bonzi Wells is a key free agent that is unlikely to consider any hometown discounts.

SAN ANTONIO
The Spurs may have to begin wondering if they are sliding down the hill.  The roster is aging, recent acquisitions have not substantially reloaded the magazines, and the team look outmatched at times against Dallas in the postseason.  Getting a better back up swingman than Brent Barry and replacing the departing centers (Rasho and Nazr) has to be top priority.  Popovich could alternatively move Duncan to center in the face of the league’s move toward smallball, and instead focus on getting more athletic wingmen.

SEATTLE
The other team with a for sale sign out front, the Sonics are more likely to part with pieces than add them.  The Sonics took a head-scratching foreign center project with the #10 pick (Sene), that can only be so much worse than Robert Swift and Johan Petro.  Rashard Lewis may be moved as a consequence of his rumblings about opting out of his contract next summer, and Danny Fortson is unwanted.

TORONTO
Bryan Colangelo has made his mission clear – focus on foreign players that are more willing to stay in Toronto.  The franchise has lost every major star but Bosh to States defections, and Colangelo looks to adjust rather than repeat mistakes.  Partially to that end, the Raptors stuck with Bargnani with the top pick, after numerous smokescreens to entice teams to trade up failed.  The Italian figures to start as a 3 until he bulks up sufficiently to start playing inside.  Colangelo traded for Slovenian center Rasho Nesterovic and moved inconsistent power forward Charlie Villaneuva for PG T.J. Ford in order to help balance the roster.  The team does have significant cap space ($12 million) but Toronto has historically struggled to lure free agents.  A swingman would be a nice piece to add to the roster.  Mike James has never been in the Raptors plans, as he gets his eye-catching numbers by forgetting about his teammates and the game plan.

UTAH
Owner Larry Miller is at his wits’ end with his team, spoiled from almost 2 decades of Stockton-Malone professionalism.  Reportedly sour on Carlos Boozer and staging on-court tirades at his players, Miller has almost assuredly declared open season on the roster.  Utah had to be thrilled to have swingman Ronnie Brewer fall to them, if not the other way around.  He fits in well with Okur, Ak47, and Deron Williams.  Matt Harpring isn’t likely to be retained, and Boozer is being shopped hard for blue collar types.

WASHINGTON
Gilbert Arenas took a cue from Paul Pierce and turned the screws on management, letting it be known that he was unhappy with the current roster and would leave at first opportunity unless there was a push to improve the team.  He got one wish when coach Eddie Jordan was extended.   The draft provided less optimism, with super-skinny forward Olexsiy Pecherov less than certain to contribute this year.  This is a team that may regret passing on Marcus Williams, who could have shifted super-scorer Arenas to a more natural 2-guard role.  Arenas does not want to see Jared Jeffries leave like Larry Hughes did, but Jeffries seems very open to going elsewhere.  There is lingering tension between Brendan Haywood and coach Jordan involving his defensive effort and he may ask for a trade.  This is connected to reported intial talks between the Wizards and Bucks involving Jamaal Magloire.  Most important for this team is to add size and a backup point guard that is able to execute the offense rather than simply throw up shots.

NBA Draft Look-Over, Part 2

2006-06-26T14:16:00.000-07:00

NBA Draft comes Wednesday, followed by the kick off of free agency shortly after that.  Time for everyone to get excited about the possibility of their team finally making the moves that jump them into the elite.  Unfortunately, this almost never happens.  Kudos, however, to Pat Riley for proving everyone like myself wrong that thought his major action with the Heat last summer was a fool’s errand.

Big bummer for me this year, as I got invited to the Rockets’ draft party, but can’t attend because of my wife’s birthday.  In fact, this might be the first draft in recent memory that I won’t watch end to end.  I’m pretty sad about that.  Especially this year, which has the potential to be chuck full of dealing.  Admit it, nothing beats the commissioner coming to the podium and saying “we have a trade to announce…” – it should be a drinking game.  Take a shot for each 4-yr senior in the lottery, a shot for each foreign player that no one in the room has even heard of before, and a double for any trade.  Swapping second rounders only merits a round of waters and Doritos.

To recap the ground rules: 1 - no mock drafts.  2 – I have my biases, and they will be in full effect.  3 – no foreign player chatter.  Bargnani has to be mentioned because he’s a possible top choice, but I’m not going beyond that.

The key players:
Andrea Bargnani:  Strongly linked to Toronto, with Bryan Colangelo’s push for foreign stars that won’t bolt for the U.S. and the team’s recent hiring of his European GM.  Is tossed around as the next Dirk (which is getting as irritating as the “next Jordan” and “next Bird.”  Just stop it.  It’s tough to see him as a star anytime soon: he may eventually become a terrorizing PF in the Dirk/Garnett mold, but right now he’s small forward that isn’t quick enough to stay on the court.  He is about 20 lbs underweight for a seven-footer.  Luckly, he might be able to hide behind Chris Bosh for a while.

JJ Redick – Took a huge dive recently; not so much over his DUI, but more because of a back problem that has stopped his workouts.  No one saw him as an athletic 40-minute guy, but he couldn’t afford a red flag like this. He should have a career in the league as a Eric Piakowski/Eddie Johnson niche player.  The best thing about him is that he’s learned to play around his weaknesses at Duke and won’t have to adjust his offensive game if the right team drafts him.  The Jazz and Sixers have shown recent interest, having him in town for interviews.

Adam Morrison – I have doubts about his transition to the next level.  He seems to throw himself into traffic and launch nothing but contested shots, and there’s no way he can get away with that against NBA defenses.  Rudy Gay reportedly tore him apart in a joint workout in Portland, but Adam impressed the staff in Charlotte (pre-Michael Jordan).  Does everything well, nothing great, and that could make him another Devean George.  His diabetes has been a key issue in his interviews, but he points to Chris Dudley as an example of a player that made it work.  His mature character has been very appealing to Portland.

Rudy Gay – Strikes me as a Caron Butler type.  Good shot but with limited range, classic SF size, surprisingly decent in the post, not much of a handle.  Would be a fantastic fit with the Bobcats but a disaster in Portland or Atlanta.  His stock hasn’t really taken off, and his name has been lost in the shuffle to a degree.  He could go as high as #3, or he could become the big drop in the draft.

Lamarcus Aldridge – No one seems to be too high or low on Aldridge, another buzz mystery.  Some reports say that the Raptors or Bulls want him in the top two slots, others peg him as falling.  Little word as surfaced from his workouts, but it’s not as if he’s auditioning for more than four franchises.  He’s got a reputation for being soft, but can still get after boards and doesn’t simply depend on his size to get his shots.

Tyrus Thomas – Thomas has a lot of excited suitors, including Michael Jordan with the Wizards.  His explosive potential as a 3 or 4 has many teams looking at him as the next Larry Johnson (pre-back).  It’s always a gamble with frosh, but he does have the look of a dynamic player with All-Star potential and the ability to draw paying customers.

Brandon Roy – A guy I would feel very safe picking in the draft.  Solid all-around SG with everything you’d want at the position, aside from one or two more inches.  Makes excellent snap judgements, quick reflexes, good shooter, playmaker, everything.  He might not be an All-Star, but he could start for someone today.  The rest of the league is catching on to that, but no one in the top of the draft seems to be willing to grab a shooting guard over a potential star big man.  The Rockets are supposedly hot to trade up for him.

Patrick O’Bryant – A sophomore center that came out of nowhere to become Bradley’s big prospect in this draft.  “Raw” is to be in any and all scouting reports.  Natural on defense with good size but still trying to catch up his offense.  Chad Ford loves him, which has me all the more convinced that he could be the next Michael Olowakandi.

Shelden Williams, Josh Boone, and Hilton Armstrong – I lumped these guys together before, saying that none of them have much of an offensive repertoire, but all have the look of the mythical rugged power forward that every team in the league seems to be desperate for.  Shelden has separated himself from the pack, with his name being linked to the Hawks (sitting at #5).  Big move up for him from a project mid-rounder.  Armstrong looks to go later in the first, and Josh Boone may not make it into the first round.  Scouts that saw his workout described it as terrible.

Ronnie Brewer – The perfect opposite of JJ Redick.  Gifted playmaker and ballhandler at the 2, but with the ugliest shot since Anthony Mason.  Has done a good job in workouts showing teams that the shoot is more accurate than it is pretty.  Decent defense with good size.  In a league with too many one-dimensional scorers, he could really help as a distributer.  I wouldn’t recommend the inevitable attempt to convert him to  point guard, though.

Marcus Williams – My pick for the top point guard in the draft, primarily because he can play the position, unlike his shot-oriented peers Foye and Rondo.  He’s no Jason Kidd or Steve Nash, in that he can make some horrifyingly bad judgements in high-pressure situations.  The Celtics seem to be intrigued, but where he goes greatly depends on how the top of the draft falls.

Rodney Carney – A senior swingman with serious explosiveness, but is a rather streaky shooter from the outside and could get exposed against ball-hawks when he goes into his helter-skelter offensive mindset: he doesn’t have the ballhandling or smart shot selection needed to get away with his Kobe impressions.  Some teams have him above Brewer on their boards.

Randy Foye – Amazing offense that covers up the fact that he’s one of a million SGs masquerading as points.  At 6-4, he could get away with a Bobby Jackson/David Wesley game, but he needs a coaching staff that will use him correctly.  Numerous teams are interested, as the small shooting guard seems to be viable in the recent move toward small ball in the league.

The talk amongst the teams:
Toronto is actively looking to maximize its use of this pick, with Colangelo at the helm.  Everything is being discussed, from trading it for a veteran, taking Bargnani at #1, swapping with Charlotte to take Bargnani lower (and for less money), or trading down for someone else.  This really has the look of a franchise that is going to pick itself up off the floor.  Villaneuva and Mike James (via S&T) are being put out there, and the acquisition of Rasho may not mean Magloire is not coming home.

Chicago is also said to be wavering between using the pick and swapping it for a veteran.  Brandon Roy might be taken here as part of a deal.  Tyson Chandler has been shopped to at least Denver and Phoenix.

Charlotte is expected to go after a 3, be it Morrison, Gay, or Thomas.  Michael Jordan’s arrival as a decision-making owner has made it much harder to decipher what they might do.  Anything that was planned might be thrown out the window by MJ in tomorrow’s meeting.  The most intriguing rumor was a Bobcat-Raptor pick swap, with Charlotte taking Thomas.

Portland has been talking to teams as well, but might wait to see who drops into their lap.  Don’t underestimate their desire to get rid of Darius Miles.  Adam Morrison makes a lot of sense for this team, and is a major favorite amongst Portland locals.

Atlanta is said to have a deal in place with Houston to select Brandon Roy at 5 and swap him for Shelden Williams at 8 (and Luther Head).  This hinges on Roy and Williams not going earlier than those two slots, obviously.  The Lakers have also been targeting a move up for Roy, and might attempt to trump the deal using Lamar Odom.

The Celtics and Rockets have been actively looking to better themselves, whether that means trading up or down in the draft.  Most of the time, teams elect to stay pat in the end.

Other NBA chit-chat:
Gilbert Arenas is turning the screws on Wizards management, threatening to opt out in 2008 if the team doesn’t make moves for a title run.
The Denver Nuggets are willing to talk about any and everyone on the roster other than Anthony.  Camby for Tyson Chandler and Andre Miller for Wally Szczerbiak are the latest on the vine.  How they’ll move Kenyon is anyone’s guess, but the price is quite open for negotiation.
Seattle may be breaking up its core, with Lewis (to Phoenix), Earl Watson, and Allen (to Toronto) being talked about.
Phoenix has been talking to teams about Shawn Marion, with Amare’s extension kicking next year not a coincidence.  Marion is due over $15 million next year (3 years remaining overall) and owner Robert Starver is said to be firmly against paying the luxury tax.  In my humble opinion, it would be a great mistake to move Marion as he is completely irreplaceable on offense and defense.  The Suns will obviously remain competitive as long as Nash’s hamstrings and back hold out, but Marion was crucial to their success.
Newly circulating by the New York press is that Larry Brown talked trade behind Isiah Thomas’ back several times last season.  This and his roadside interviews that violated Knick policy that PR reps be present will be among the reasons James Dolan will give David Stern as to why Brown is not due a full $40 million payout in the wake of his firing.  I’d suspect that he’ll be lucky only to pay $38 million, even if Brown was indeed trying to unseat Isiah all along.
Sam Cassell is being his usual self, pressuring the Clippers to pay anyone and everyone, glorifying Elgin Baylor every other sentence.  His true goal, of course, is to make sure he’s given a $16-million, two-year deal in the process. The Clips would much prefer a one-year deal to allow Shaun Livingston take over sooner.

Finals Recap

2006-06-21T14:32:00.000-07:00

Well, this is too bad on a couple of levels.  First off, I’m going out be out of excuses for why I haven’t been writing real stuff.  Maybe the draft will help me prolong things some.  Also bad because the wrong team won.  I picked Miami before the series started, so it’s not about that.  It’s not even fair to say that Miami wasn’t the best team, even if they needed Detroit to implode and Dallas to fall apart.  Miami persevered and the others didn’t.  That’s why they are getting rings sized today.

The wrong team won because I can’t be happy for these guys.  Shaq and Haslem are fine with me, but Walker represents every coach’s worst nightmare.  Wade won by abandoning his ability to create in favor of tunnel-vision scoring.  Mourning’s been a back-biting, self-serving poser hiding behind his kidney PR free pass for several years now.  Jason Williams is tough to cheer for.  Payton finally rode enough coattails to get his ring.   And then there’s Riley, who managed to displace Larry Brown as the worst backstabber in the league.  He ducks into the President’s chair as soon as his playoff-disaster-prone Mourning-led Heat fall apart, giving Van Gundy the chair, swears off coaching like it was a curse for several years, then slams Stan right out the door the moment the team was on the verge of a title again.  Despicable.  At least Karl Malone didn’t somehow wedge himself onto this roster.

Every year, the champions set the new trend for the other GMs to copy.  The last few years, the champs have been the Pistons and Spurs, fantastic models built on intelligent spending and teamwork.  Now, we get Miami, whom I’ve referred to as a collection of individuals on several occasions.  This may set off another round of silly spending, like Portland’s All-Star stuffed squad of 2000.  I hope this doesn’t happen, and the league doesn’t forget the lessons learned from the last few Dream Teams: gathering a room full of guys that want to be the main scoring option doesn’t work.  The Heat got away with it because over half the roster has a foot in the grave and conceded the load to Wade.  It’s a bad formula, and it’s not good for the league.  The best case scenario is for the league to keep moving towards teams built like the Suns, Spurs, Pistons, and Mavs, where big names are created through success and not the other way around.

(sliding the soapbox back under the desk)

Why did Dallas lose the series?  It’s simple: Dirk never got off the floor.  In Game 6 of the Spurs series, he disappeared in the clutch, the bottom fell out on the Mavs, and their double-digit lead became a Spur’s win.  He erased that in Game 7 with a bulldog performance.  Game 3 of this series kicked off the exact same scenario.  Dirk was nowhere to be found as Wade exploded in the Miami comeback.  The difference was, Dirk never responded.  He tallied good numbers overall, but he never figured out how to break down Miami’s defense so that he could score at will.  Dirk kept trying in vain to stick with the plays that carried him through the western conference, refusing to adjust.  It was unsurprising to me that last night he again was AWOL in the 4th (0-4).  Dirk establishes the Dallas mindset, and he was in a shell from Game 3’s 4th quarter on.

Where do the Mavs go from here?  They have a fantastic team in place, but must resign Jason Terry in the offseason (looks like a good bet from here).  Stackhouse is the only other major contributor not signed long term (entering final year).  They should be fine as Howard, Daniels, Diop, and Harris are all still young and developing.

The Heat have a shakier future ahead.  O’Neal and Mourning clearly do not have much more miles to travel in their careers, and there is no prospect to replace them at the moment.  Walker is signed long-term, and that may be a good or bad thing, depending on your point of view.  Payton may take this as an opportunity to retire on his own terms, and Williams will stay on board.  Wade is up for an extension, and will probably take it.  The Heat are said, per the Miami Herald, to be interested in bringing in a combo guard in the offseason.   Haslem is signed for several more years, but Posey has a player option that he may or may not take.  It would be foolish of the Heat to sign him to more than the $6.4 million he’s set to make next year.  The Heat will have a tough time defending their crown as the cast around Wade ages.

Additionally, I’m concerned about Wade’s development.  I’m seeing too many disturbing parallels to Steve Francis.  This isn’t to say that Steve was ever at Wade’s level, but Flash is starting to pick up the same bad habits.  Like I mentioned earlier, Wade stopped creating for others and just looked to score himself.  That may have been necessary, but it’s a tough habit to break.  Consider: after averaging almost 7 assists in the regular season, Dwayne Wade handed out as much as 6 only in the Finals’ opener.  He averaged less than 4 for the series.  In his clutch drives, it was plain that he wasn’t even interested in hitting a wide open teammate when he had the opportunity.  Again, maybe the necessary action at the time, but a hard habit to break.  Are teammates going to enjoy playing with him down the road?  Isn’t this exactly what we roast Kobe for?  At least Therapist #8/24 has a jumper; Wade has seriously become a one-trick pony.  And defenses in this league catch up to those players.  Wade’s turnovers are also disturbing; he had 4 or more in 4 of the 6 games and averaged 3.9 for the postseason.  This is the exact same road that Marbury and Francis took.  Wade may draw the annoying Jordan comparisons now, but will it last?

Evaluating Game 5 and Extra

2006-06-19T13:34:00.000-07:00

Well, what can you say? Fantastic game with a somewhat dubious ending. A few thoughts:

Home cooking has been a part of basketball for as long as the NBA has been around. Joey Crawford dances onto a court tweeting his whistle to get attention before making a call, Dick Bevatta is very loose and veteran-favoring with his calls, Jack Nies aims to T up no less than 3 guys on any given night, and the home team in a tight series is going to lap up all of the calls. It is what it is. It’s an outrage when you’re receiving it, and it’s sour grapes from the opposition when you’re reaping it. Dwayne Wade earned about two thirds of his trips to the line last night, but Dirk steals just as many in Dallas. What should worry Miami is how dependent Wade has become on the leap-into-traffic aspect of his game. His jumper is atrophying, and when the calls don’t come, they’re all left high and dry.

I don’t know for sure what went on with Josh Howard’s timeout. On one hand, he did make a bone-headed TO call in college and the refs were pretty adamant that he called a time out with no mention of “if the next FT goes in.” If Avery tried the “what else would we be trying to do” card, that’s not going to fly. Icing the shooter is common enough if a team has extra timeouts. It’s not up to the refs to interpret your intent. On the flipside, speaking as a one-time ref from my 4 years in college, in a stopped clock situation like last night, all the ref had to do was clarify. This wasn’t in the middle of play with the clock running down. He had freedom to ask “Howard, you calling for time?” Asking “hey, I really don’t think you want to call a time out right here, you only have one left” would be out of bounds, but the former request for clarification gives Howard the chance to say “after the free throw.” Once the TO was given, however, Salvador and Crawford dug in their heels and wouldn’t wave it off (rightly so).

It’s tough to say that Stackhouse’s suspension downed the Mavs. Terry and, surprisingly, Howard rose to the occasion and put up 60 points. Dirk has yet to have one MVP showing in this series, being kept well below his regular season scoring average and shooting percentage (26.6 and 48% becoming 21.6 and 37%). The story of the 3-game Miami streak is that Wade has broken loose while Dirk remains bogged down.

As previously mentioned, the team that breaks a 2-2 series tie eventually wins the series about 85% of the time.

No names mentioned, but Avery Johnson has hinted that a few Mavericks have succumbed to South Beach Party Disorder, the Heat’s bigget homecourt advantage. Avery is irate, switching hotel accommodations to Fort Lauderdale and forcing the team to sleep two to a room to knock out what he’s described as a “vacation mentality.” I would have to lay some suspicions that Nowitzki has been one of the culprits, given his notorious party habits.

Riley has certainly reined in Walker (26 minutes), instead playing Posey 44 minutes. Walker only tossed up 7 shots last night, making his FGA a big stat differential in the wins and losses.

The Extra:
Richard Jefferson is said to be available in trades and has a declining relationship with Jason Kidd.
Also to be added to the trade block list (according to rumor): Iverson, Ben Wallace, and Carlos Boozer.  Yep, Ben Wallace.  His obvious sulking and disinterested play during their playoff run not only conveyed his displeasure with his role on the team (Flip doesn’t call plays for him to nurse his sensitive ego like Larry Brown did), it ticked off Joe Dumars and the owner to no end.  With Wallace asking for a silly 6-year max contract, the team might be secretly hoping that a S&T opportunity arises.
There’s a growing number of Jay Williams comeback stories starting to circulate as he works out for numerous teams, but I’ve yet to see a single report that indicates that he’s anything close to what he was before his bike crash.  He’s worked hard, but his lateral quickness and leaping ability may never come back.  Add that to the fact that he was a disaster in his rookie year and I get the feeling that he may have the same destiny as fellow alum Bobby Hurley.
The Denver Post is in the midst of a three-part report on the behind-the-scenes drama that plagued the Nuggets this year, focusing on the division brought about between George Karl, Kiki Vandeweghe, and owner Stan Kroenke as well as Kenyon Martin’s immaturity.  Put simply, no one comes out looking all that well.  It’s a spectacular gloves-off report based on actual interviews instead of conjecture, maybe the best since Phil Jackson’s book on the Lakers.  I highly recommend: denverpost.com

Evaluating Game 4

2006-06-16T09:35:00.000-07:00

Let me jump things off by reviewing my long time keys for the series:

Miami, unlike any previous Mavs postseason opponent, as the pieces to make the paint a no-man’s zone and take a way a crucial aspect of Dirk’s new game.

No one single player can guard Dirk, Wade, or Shaq in this series.

Miami has to keep Walker on a leash or on the bench.

Dallas needs its secondary players (Terry, Stackhouse, Howard) to be aggressive against Miami’s poor perimeter defense, either by attacking or with outside shooting.

Last night, the Mavs got handled.  Pure and simple.  What I saw:
Miami playing to its full potential on defense, creaming anyone trying to establish an inside game, and maintaining its intensity for 48 minutes instead of 15.
Shaq and Zo finally dominating the center position, totalling 21 points (70% shooting), 19 boards, and 5 swats.
Walker chilling out, hoisting only 11 shots instead of the 17+ he had been averaging in the series.  Williams kept his shots to 5.
A continuation of game 3’s final 7 minutes for Dirk and company.  Like I said before, the Mavs completely take their mental and emotional lead from Dirk.  When he’s got swagger and a wagging tongue, they all light up.  When he’s flummoxed, they all look like they need to change their contacts.  That was just a horrific shooting display last night, with the Dallas big four putting up a combined 17-58 (29%).

Looking ahead to Sunday…wait, stop.  Let me get this off my chest first.  Major bone to pick with ABC and the NBA’s willingness to go along.  First, there’s no need for a two day lay off during the middle three games of the Finals.  There’s no travel, and if anything, it gives an additional edge to the team without homecourt, letting them cool their jets at home longer than they have to be on the road in the series.  I say, make one of those three games a back-to-back.  Let’s see a champion show some fortitude.  Second, the late starts are completely out of hand.  All seven games in this series in this series are slated for 9:20 pm ET tips?  Even the ones in Miami and the two Sunday games?  Are you serious?  Last I checked, the Suns weren’t in this Finals.  Consider things from this angle: how many Florida kids are being shut out of watching their home team because ABC is catering to the west coast viewers in this way?  It’s pathetic and upsetting.  I’m pretty the 15 people in L.A. that are even aware that the NBA season extended past the Lakers’ would be okay tuning into the second half of games after work (6 PT, 9 ET).  That would give us 7:30 tips on the East, and I’d even be cool with them tipping at 8.  No big deal.  The late night Sunday starts are particularly galling as well, though.  Boo, ABC, boo.

Anyway, what to look for in the now best of 3 series.

History is pretty definitive that whomever breaks a 2-2 tie has almost certainly locked the series (right around 85%, if I recall correctly).

I doubt we’ll see all 4 Mavs ground out like that again. Howard hasn’t broken through yet, and Nowitzki’s been up and down, but Stackhouse and Terry aren’t going to go long before their next tear. That was a bad night for them more than a Heat defense snuffing them out.

That was the first night that the Heat played with energy all the way through. They might be able to repeat it at home with the two days off, but I’d keep a close eye on their gas tank.

If Stackhouse gets suspended, it would be unfortunate as it was maybe a tenth of what Shaq normally gets each night. It simply looked bad because he was airborne and carries the momentum of a runaway train.

My guess? Dirk brings the Mavs’ offense back to take the next two games and close things out. I would look for this Miami team to get a little high on itself, especially the secondary players. Bare in mind, we still have not seen a game where the Mavs have run on all cylinders. If they break loose, it’s finished.

Gossip Mongering

2006-06-15T15:28:00.000-07:00

Just passing along a few things, which may or not shape the world in the upcoming weeks.  Rumors are always tricky, since you have the following possibilities:
It’s true, it’s serious, and it’s going to happen
It’s true, it’s serious, but things might change
It’s true, but it’s not something that’s serious
It’s false
So odds favor nothing coming of these things.  Too bad Peter Vescey never figured that out.  Still beats Sam Smith, who just wastes his Chicago Tribune readers’ time by playing GM on his playstation and writing about all the make-believe trades that excite him.

Still, where there’s smoke, there’s a player on the trading block.  If the same name keeps coming up over time, it tells you that there may be something to the talk.  Gary Payton’s last two or three years as a Sonic were rife with trade speculation.  While I know they are adamantly opposed to doing so now, I would think the Wolves will start listening to KG offers within a year’s time.

Without further ado, here’s the chit-chat I find most credible:
The Knicks circus isn’t about Brown-Thomas so much as it is owner James Dolan vs. Larry Brown.  Dolan is the one that feels most undermined by Brown throwing players under the bus and whining to the media.  It’s almost a certainty that Thomas will take over, and since there will be no need to interview coaches, Dolan is leaving Brown to twist in the wind.  Consider: Thomas can take over at any time, seamlessly, so Dolan can wait for other franchises to shore up their coaches and ensure that there’s no job waiting in the wings for Brown.  It would take nothing short of a miracle for Brown to quit and leave $40 million on the table, but this way he can’t take Knick money while making some other team look good.

Toronto probably has not made up their mind with the number one pick in the draft.  The players that fit their backcourt needs (Roy, Williams) would be a reach at #1, but nobody’s breaking the bank to trade up with them either.  In this draft, there’s only marginal difference in value in the top 6 picks.  The Raptors seem to have Bargnani penciled in, but would love it if Portland made them a nice offer to swap picks.

Portland (this ties into the above) and Charlotte seem to really like Adam Morrison.  The only thing that seems to hurt him as he visits teams is his diabetes, which has spooked a few clubs.  He’s made up for it by looking brilliant in workouts and even impressing GMs by not placing conditions (I won’t scrimmage against rival players, etc).

The Lakers and Phil Jackson are said to have a major love affair with Brandon Roy, my way too early pick for rookie of the year (it’s only fitting that he be R.O.Y.), with Jackson seeing him as a Ron Harper type.  This is said to be the real reason why Chicago has been surprising people with rumblings that they’d take him at #2, despite their strong 3-man guard rotation.  It’s been suggested that there may be a draft day deal involving (who else?) Lamar Odom.  That sounds like a hefty price, but bare in mind that Chicago is under the cap and could take his $12.5 million 06/07 salary in return for a trade exemption.  That would give L.A. Roy, end the Odom experiment, and give them the ability to trade for a big salary forward (Carlos Boozer?) to help build up their team.

People are also scratching their heads in the wake of Shelden Williams’ pronouncement that he’s been promised to go in the top 5 by some unnamed team.  That team has been backtracked to Atlanta.  Kudos for them not going after Rudy Gay and having the bravery to end their search for more underdeveloped 6-8 small forwards to stack the roster with.  Shelden is ready to play, though he’s unlikely to be much of a scorer.

It’s sounding more and more like the Pacers might blow up their team, with Jermaine O’Neal’s name surfacing in multiple trade rumors.  It’s still my bet that Peja has his sights set on a different city, and Stephen Jackson could be had for lunch at Subway.  This is another team that may make a draft day deal.

Off the NBA beat, the baseball scandal centering around Grimsley’s as of yet unleaked finger pointing may become an even bigger deal once the names are known.  Dan Patrick claims to have been told some of the names, and that “two will shock you, and one will surprise you.”  Add this with talk that Chris Mihlfeld is a central figure in this along the lines of Gary Anderson (Bond’s trainer).   Mihlfeld is said to be a major source of the steroids, amphetamines, and rock candy that players were dipping into…and he’s also been Albert Pujols’ personal trainer since before he was drafted.  Refer again to my opening disclaimer – I’m not going to say that this is 100% ironclad and FDA approved.  However, I’ve ALWAYS hated the Pujols-defenders’ arguments that he didn’t morph from skinny to huge like McGwire and Bonds.  The man was drafted in ’99, right in the thick of the juicey-juicey era.  You think he couldn’t use in high school?  In the minors?  He doesn’t pass my sniff test - the guy is abnormally huge.  When you could hop in the ring and blend in next to the Rock and Stone Cold, I have questions.  Again though, it’s not like I have any of his used needles with me.

Evaluating Game 3

2006-06-14T14:05:00.000-07:00

Thank goodness. I sat through 3 quarters of last night’s game in a slight funk because of this write up. What the heck was I going to say? The Heat kept on doing the same moronic things that had plagued them so far and were a colossal train wreck. My game 2 evaluation was all but the same as my Game 1, and about all I could mention new was that the Heat finally used a repost with Shaq a couple of times (each time ringing up Diesel points). Other than that, all I had was a joke about Antoine Walker being forcibly committed to Chuckers Anonymous 20 minutes after the game ended.

Then the Heat came back. FANTASTIC! I have something to write about! Here’s my take on how Miami finally pulled a 180:

Antoine Walker got yanked. Riley may have finally figured out how he took away 3 points (on defense or through terrible shot selection) for every one basket he made and pulled him in favor of Posey, allowing…

Dwayne Wade tearing up Dallas. Dallas has no single defender that can contain Wade, period, and they made a horrible mistake of relaxing their strong help defense. Wade found a rhythm and lanes to slash through, once again looking like the terror he was all season.

Déjà vu; namely, Dirk completely re-living his 4th quarter from game 6 of the Spurs series. Everything was the same – the swagger evaporated, his face became as blank as paper, and he disappeared, taking the team’s moxy with him. A look at his 4th quarter:

Missed close-range jumper
Makes a layup
Makes a jumper
Makes a layup (8-minute mark, enter the clutch stretch)
(Wade catches fire)
Misses 18-footer (4-minute mark)
Offensive foul
Turnover
Loose ball foul (3-minute mark)
Hits 2 free throws (next possession)
(Miami takes lead)
NOTHING from Dirk until the final 3 seconds, when he misses the critical free throw

When the game turned, Dirk went poof.  No two ways about it.  Now again, this is almost exactly the same way Dallas choked away a similar lead and lost to the Spurs in game 6, and Dirk responded in a very big way to put away the series.  I would have to think that he could do so again, seeing as he started to get into a comfort zone in the first three quarters last night.  Watch for him to perhaps ring up his first 30- or 40-point night of the series when it resumes.

Can the Heat build on this?  Well, Dwayne Wade certainly looked sharper than he has since suffering a flu and may have renewed confidence in his ability to tear apart Dallas’ defense.  If Riley keeps Walker off the court and spares the team the head-shaking 13 misses a game he’s been averaging, the Heat can better focus on their two real scoring options.  More re-posting with Shaq in the early quarters still needs to take place, as he simply runs out of gas in the second, fumbling away half the entry passes that reach him.  In the end, however, I don’t think it well happen.  This team is now falling victim to the flaws of its make-up: a cast of role players that were almost all once main guys on offense.  Among Payton, Williams, Walker, and Mourning, none show the same enthusiasm, grit, and willingness to bleed on the court that the Mavericks do.  Only Haslem comes close.  If James Posey was still his do-everything Denver self, he’d be a match for Josh Howard, but he pawned off his heart during his Memphis stay (coincidentally, this was when he befriended Bonzi Wells).  Pat Riley is going to have to continue choking on the dry bread he put on Miami’s plate.

Oil Slick Ahead

2006-06-13T13:57:00.000-07:00

Well, summer’s here; time to start planning those road trips!  Oh wait, that was 5 years ago.  Can’t do that anymore.  Not in an age of $3-plus gas prices.  Whatever it cost you at the turn of the century to head out to a different coast, it’s double now.  I used to joke that taking I-95 up to New York was a trip that had to be put on lay-a-way because of the Delaware and Jersey tolls.  It’s not as funny anymore.

Oil is a topic on everyone’s mind these days, and to be honest, it’s about high time.  It’s shocking to me how many people I talk to are in disbelief when I say that the prices are never coming down.  Of course, this is the same country that decided that Hummers were the way to go when faced with rising gas prices.  Unfortunately, this means we’re all being set up for a massively rude awakening in the coming years.

Hubbert’s Peak
Hubbert’s Peak, or the Oil Peak, is the accepted theory that points to eventual depletion of oil as a natural resource.  Fossil fuels are relatively non-replenishable and extraction is related to natural supply.  Basically speaking, it’s easier to scoop peanut butter out of a full jar than when you are forced to scrape the sides for the last bit.  As oil fields begin to deplete, it will be come more energetically expensive (lower energy yield) to retrieve it, and prices will go up.  The Oil Peak itself refers to the point that oil production begins to decline, and it has been argued whether this point has already occurred.  I, for one, strongly believe that it has.

Are We Out of Oil?
There are still many major untapped reserves of oil in the world, including the deep ocean, Eastern Russia, and Northern Canada.  Unfortunately, these reserves are not readily accessible and the financial and energy costs to retrieve would represent a net loss at this point in time.  Future drilling technologies may make them a viable option.
The oilfields in the protected Alaskan Wildlife Refuge have sparked controversy for some time, with some pointing to them as a way of reducing dependence on foreign oil supply.  While this may be true, it’s highly unlikely that this supply is great enough to significantly solve our supply woes for any length of time.

So I Should Get a Hybrid, Then?
Color me skeptical when it comes to hybrids, at the moment.  While the gas mileage is better, all of the car’s power is still generated from gasoline.  It’s just much more efficient about it, primarily by reducing the amount of gas burned for accelerations.  You won’t save an awful lot of money, given the approximate $10, 000 premium that most hybrids sell for versus their conventional counterparts.  Today, all hybrid repairs have to be done by dealers (and they don’t exactly spare you much on the bill) and replacement batteries will cost you as much as three thousand dollars.  The pessimist in me is also wary that no one can say how well a hybrid holds up after six years.  Yes, a hybrid is much better for the environment, and one major way of conserving, but don’t expect any real financial relief.

So Should I Hold Out for My 2010 Toyota Hydrogen Car?
Many are holding out hope that Hydrogen Fuel Cells will be the alternative fuel of the future.  Shell already has a Hydrogen fuel gas station, and many manufacturers (BMW, Mazda, GM) have prototype engines for development.  The plus: pollution free energy that can produce nearly equivalent horsepower to today’s cars.  The minus: it takes as much energy to isolate hydrogen as you get from it’s combination with oxygen.  In short, HFCs are at best a battery.  Dedicated power plants would most likely be required to generate pure hydrogen for use.  Additionally, storing the hydrogen is problematic since gas is more expansive than liquid fuel (requiring bigger tanks or compression technology) and any exposure to air would be incredibly hazardous.  It could be like living in Knight Rider – any car wreck would result in an explosion.  Hydrogen Fuel Cells aren’t inconceivable, but there are numerous obstacles that still need to be overcome.

So if Power Plants Help Make HFC Cars a Reality, Are We in the Clear?
Not exactly.  Cars and Oil are the most immediate connection, since 70% of petroleum use goes to transportation and 97% of the fuel used in transportation is petroleum.  However, fossil fuels as a broad group (petroleum, natural gas, coal, etc) represent over 85% of our energy supply.  Heating, cooling, electricity.  All fossil fuels are subject to peaks and depletion as mentioned above, and we’re draining the world of them in a fairly consistent manner to oil.  Point?  We’ve got to start shifting from our nearly-complete dependence on fossil fuels before it has to happen the hard way.

We Hippies Are Happy to Hear that You Agree Green Energy is the Way to Go
Yes and no.  First off, don’t think I’m not still sending you all to Northern Canada when I take office.  I haven’t forgotten about that incident at the Bela Fleck show.  And as far as the renewable energy sources…
There is serious doubt from this corner that renewables (wind, solar, hydropower, ethanol) can meet current energy demands.  Almost all seem to be far better suited as power supplements rather than sources.  Also, these green sources have been shown to be less environmentally friendly than historically viewed.  To generate the levels of power consumed today, large amounts of land would have to be built on for the number of wind turrents required, and there has even been some concern raised that with a large enough number of turrents, world currents would be affected.  Solar panels are still expensive to build and maintain, though they continue to lower in price as the technology develops.  Dams have a profound impact on the surrounding environment and habitats.

So What’s Your Master Plan Then, “Future Prime Minister?”
Nuclear power.

Okay, Well, So Much For Reading This.
No, no, stick with me for a second.  The nuclear field has had as bad an image as any new technology, even worse than genetic engineering, but a lot of that is bunk and solely public perception.  For example, an MRI exposes you to no ionizing radiation while a CT scan (or, to a lesser degree, a planar X-Ray) delivers relatively high amounts.  However, people were initially reluctant to have MRIs done because of their original name: NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance).  Following the name change, everyone’s happy to have one.
3-Mile Island is still a buzzword on par with Chernobyl, but lost in the paranoia is that (a) Chernobyl was a power plant disaster because of the combination of a terribly unsafe design and negligent operators, (b) 3-Mile was a horrific disaster only from a PR standpoint: no deaths, no radiation fall out, a contained meltdown that was brought under control.  Raise your hand if you already knew that.

I Don’t Know That I Buy It, but Go On…
Thanks!  Today, we get less than 7% of our power supply from nuclear power plants.  Coal fuels half of the energy we use (non-transportation).  Worried about the environmental impact of nuclear plants?  Coal plants are established polluters in a major way while nuclear plants vent…water vapor.  Worried about worker safety in nuclear plants after watching Homer on television?  Stop and consider the number of coal mining-related deaths that have occurred in recent history.  What about the toxic, glowing, neon green ooze being dumped into rivers?  Well, there you’re thinking about chemical waste, not nuclear.   Nuclear waste is typically sold materials such as depleted uranium and is buried underground, usually with concrete, as the radioactivity fades over time.  To be blunt, nuclear waste is handled and disposed of far more efficiently and safely than most any other kind of waste on the planet.

Advanced Reactors
Today, light water fission reactors using uranium-235 (slow/thermal neutron reactors) are the most commonly used.  Light water indicates standard H20 as opposed to heavy water’s deuterium (isotope of hydrogen with a neutron).  These reactors are popular because they do not require extensive enrichment of uranium.  Ur-235, however, makes up less than 1% of naturally occurring uranium, and is a wasteful fuel source.  In fact, Ur-235 likely does not exist in sufficient quantities to serve as a valid long-term global source of energy.
Fast reactors produce less waste by more efficiently generating energy in a fissle chain reaction, but require highly enriched uranium or plutonium (Pu-239, generated by fusing a neutron to Ur-238).  There is plenty of fission source material to last for thousands of years, and the prospect of deep sea deposition of waste would further improve the low environmental impact of this energy field.

Holy Grail
Fusion reactors are the ultimate prize in energy production – self-sustaining, non-polluting energy modeled after the sun.  Unfortunately, we are still extremely far off from realizing it as an option.  A couple of early-generation reactors have been built in Europe and show some promise, but it will be some time before this technology is honed and accepted.

So Where Are You Going With All This???
The answer to the world’s future energy supply question will need to be as complex as the problem.  Clearly, the immediate concern is in oil and natural gas reserves.  Calm me crazy, but I would caution against trusting OPEC in regards to the state of supply.  I believe there is less than we are led to believe (world oil production has plateaued) and when we get a handle on how much is truly left, it will be uncomfortably late in the game.

-The U.S. is fortunate in that it sits on a quarter of the world’s coal reserves.  That will help provide a stabilizing crutch as we transition away from oil.  Expanding our use through more coal-based power plants would be unwise, however, due to the heavy production of air pollution.

-Green renewables, especially solar panels, would help keep energy bills down for individuals and businesses.  Roof-mounted solar panels supplement energy needs and are non-intrusive.

-Diesel and Jet fuel are the petroleum products most necessary in our economy, supplying fuel for shipping (air, truck).  Those guzzling gas in dense urban areas behind the wheel of an SUV are most wasteful of the diminishing petro-supplies.  The country is beginning to shift away from its obsession with monster trucks, but I would suggest a pseudo-luxury tax on any vehicle that gets less than 20 mpg (city), an additional tax on any that gets less than 10 mpg, and a new 3% tax on gasoline (non-diesel) in major metropolitan areas (i.e., mass transit available) that would go to funding local mass transit as well as nationally subsidizing diesel and jet fuel.  Pinch hurting?  Carpool.  Use mass transit.  Get over your single-person Tahoe commutes.  Me?  I bike to work.  Over 8 miles each way.  Maybe that’s not a viable option for you, but there is an option out there that you’re choosing not to employ.

-Build new Nuclear plants.  Easy to see that one coming, I know.  There are advanced new designs out there, generation 3 boiling water reactors.  There’s major room to improve the efficiency and safety, and this is already a highly underutilized source of power.  Yes, we’re still spooked by the name, but China, Japan, and India are hot on the field, realizing its energy potential.  I propose we stay ahead of the curve while we still can.

-Push for Hydrogen Fuel Cell car technology, with the hydrogen production powered by dedicated nuclear plants.  Give my hydrogen gas tank an extra layer of titanium, if you could.

Yes, the future can be frightening, but no, we’re not careening into a Mad Max apocalypse.  This country built itself on innovation, and I expect that innovation to power the next major world economical revolution.

Evaluating Game 2

2006-06-12T10:02:00.000-07:00

What the Heat did well:
Maintained a strong defensive scheme that focused on zone coverage and a collapsing defense against penetrators that continued to make life difficult for Dirk and Josh Howard.  Focused a little more on Jason Terry.  Jerry Stackhouse was the only scoring threat that managed to hit over half of his shots.

How the Heat failed:
Doing everything that was wrong in game 1, but worse.
Allowed Walker and Williams to again abandon the gameplan and go into a trigger-happy mindset.  Pat Riley and Shaq were ruthlessly critical of Stan Van Gundy last year for abandoning the post in their Eastern Finals loss to the Pistons.  Imagine what Riles would have done to Stan if Shaq had a 5 point, 6 rebound game.  Ultimately, it falls on the coach’s feet if players go off on their own agendas.  Yes, Shaq should kick it out if he’s swarmed by defenders.  No, that does not license the perimeter players to gun away.  Reposting is a technique that any team with a dominant big man must employ.  Wait for the help defense to leave, and then pound it right back inside.  It could not be clearer that the Heat, and especially Walker, are acting like weak-willed dieters passing by a McDonald’s.  Walker and his volume shooting need to be benched.
Dwayne Wade is looking more and more like Steve Francis each passing game.  The laughable Michael Jordan comparisons have stopped cold for good reason.  Specifically, through two games:
1.16 points per shot1, down from a 1.44 regular season average
4.9 shots per assist, way up from his 2.8 regular season average
1.00 assist/turnover ratio2, well below his 1.88 regular season average
What does that tell me?  Wade is acting less like a playmaker and creator and more like a Kobe Bryant without a jumper.  He’s passing less, shooting more, but is actually scoring a less.  He’s wasting possessions.
Altogether, the Heat are acting like anything but a team.  They are trying to win out on individual talent and refuse to work together on offense.  This team reminds me of the parable of hell: everyone seated at a great feast, everyone starving, but no one able to eat because their forks are far too long.  All they needed to do was feed one another, but they never would become part of a larger whole.  Shaq has talked a lot about his legacy; will this open talk about his two other embarrassments in the Championship round instead?

What the Mavs need to fix:
When you’re up two games?  Not an awful lot.  Still, Nowitzki still has not found the comfort zone he enjoyed in the first 3 rounds, still having trouble attacking inside against Miami’s collapsing frontcourt.  At the same time, he’s been able to get to the line and be a factor there.  As long as Miami stays in a zone, he may be best served as a 20-foot sniper if he starts to struggle.
Josh Howard still isn’t picking his spots as well as he could, but he’s maintaining his aggressiveness and finding that outside shooting will come easily against this defense.

Why the Mavs won:
Effectively using a zone to tempt loose cannons like Walker from sticking with Shaq.  Shaq managed only 12 attempts in game 1, now it’s down to 5.  Wade, Walker, and Williams let loose for a coach-killing 17-45 shooting performance.
A flexible, unselfish offense that fells out the defense and rides the hot hand of the night; in Game 1 it was Terry and in game 2 it was Stackhouse.  Once again, Miami is struggling to contain perimeter players, and Dallas is eagerly exploiting it.
Taking advantage of the available outside shot.  To hold back Dirk, Miami is leaning on a collapsing zone but they simply don’t have the quickness or focus to rotate on outside shooters.  Dallas may not have any Dell Currys in their pocket, but wide open jumpers aren’t too difficult for them to hit.  Howard, Stackhouse, and Van Horn hit a combined 7-10 from beyond the arc.

Looking forward:
The number one thing the Heat must do in the next game is re-emphasize Shaquille O’Neal in their offense.  Shaq likewise has to play with enough energy to merit that gameplan.  Dallas is simply not equipped to stop him or Wade with regularity, but when Walker starts firing recklessly it gives them a free pass.
The NBA’s 2-3-2 format makes it extremely difficult for the team with homecourt to maintain momentum, however, Miami’s falling apart at the seams and needs more than a shot of enthusiasm at this point.
The ultimate question is, can Riley nail down the collection of individuals on his roster and get them on the same page?  Dallas has really unified as a team, the common denominator among all championship teams.  If Miami continues to try and win with players pulling in multiple directions, they may not be coming back to Texas.

1measure of shooting efficiency, with a 1.5 or higher being excellent, a 1.25 being good, and a 1.0 being poor
2best benchmark for effective playmaking and handling, with a 2.5 or higher being excellent, a 1.7 being good, and below a 1.0 being poor.

Evaluating Game 1

2006-06-09T14:08:00.000-07:00

What the Heat did well:
Came out to an explosive start, trashing Dallas in the opening quarter.
Frustrated Nowitzki.  Don’t buy the “I was nervous” excuse from my MVP pick.  Riley wisely did not allow Walker to guard him, instead using Posey, Haslem, or zones.  The zone coverage allowed Miami to crowd and fluster Dirk even on the perimeter and stymying his drives to the middle.  They also made sure that the rim would be very unwelcoming, punctuated by Shaq’s elbow to his jaw.  Dirk became a force this postseason by focusing on getting inside to compliment his jumpers, Miami has made it a priority to not allow him to do so.
Neutralized Howard.  Similarly done by crowding the lanes.

How the Heat failed:
Look tired and lethargic by the end of the second quarter on, especially O’Neal.  Once they lost their legs, Dallas was able to start attacking and running.
Lost control of Antoine Walker on offense.  Like he’s done his whole career, Employee #8 went buckwild as soon as he saw Miami falling behind.  With Shaq and Wade struggling in the second half, Walker began to run-and-machine gun, missing as many shots as Shaq took in the entire game, including 6 errant threes to match his 6 turnovers.  Miami rarely plays as a team, but they’re at their worst when Payton, Walker, and Williams go on shooting sprees instead of re-establishing Shaq.
Allowed Jason Terry to rip them apart.  Miami has had abysmal defense on opposing guards that can penetrate throughout the playoffs, so they have to recognize that this leak must be plugged.  Jason Williams and Gary Payton will be swinging doors, so it’s on the others to provide help.  Walker all too often gets lost, especially in zones, Posey and Haslem can’t leave Dirk alone, but Wade and Mourning can be very effective at cutting off Terry’s lanes.  If Shaq could regain a step, this would all be moot.

What the Mavs need to fix:
It’s fairly obvious that they need Dirk and Howard in order to take the trophy.  Avery needs to free Dirk up by running him through screens to shake free of his man coverage and press him to shoot from the outside whenever Miami sags into a zone (where Nowitzki hit his two 3-pointers).  Howard needs to pick his spots better and not just foolishly challenge Miami at the rim.
Whenever Shaq begins to tire, go to a run-focused small ball lineup.  The Heat struggled in transition after the first quarter and don’t have the bench to keep their legs fresh.

Why the Mavs won:
Jason Terry pressing his advantage over Miami’s defenseless points.
Effectively using a zone to dissuade the Heat from sticking with the post.  They made it difficult for O’Neal to receive the ball and, even better, baited the Heat’s machine gunners to fire away from the outside.  The Heat hit a terrible 5-20 from the outside while Shaq managed only 12 attempts.
Used a team approach to seal the rim from Wade.  The Mavs relied on its quickness and help defense to rotate on his drives.  When Wade adjusted and went with jumpers, he became containable.

Looking forward:
The number one thing the Heat must do in the next game is re-emphasize Shaquille O’Neal in their offense.  Shaq likewise has to play with enough energy to merit that gameplan.  Dallas is simply not equipped to stop him or Wade with regularity, but when Walker starts firing recklessly it gives them a free pass.
Miami only needs to take one game in Dallas to put tremendous pressure on the Mavericks.  The NBA’s 2-3-2 format makes it extremely difficult for the team with homecourt to maintain momentum.
The ultimate question is, can Riley nail down the collection of individuals on his roster and get them on the same page?  Dallas has really unified as a team, the common denominator among all championship teams.  If Miami continues to try and win with players pulling in multiple directions, they’ll be done in six.

Stir Fry

2006-06-01T12:17:00.000-07:00

Sorry about this, but it’s going to be another casserole entry. I swear there are singular topic write ups coming in, but it’s been a month of upheavals for me. Which brings me to topic #1 – my nose is adamant that Bill Simmons is closing up his ESPN shop. In the last couple of years when an NBA loser plays above his head right before becoming a free agent, Simmons has cheerfully mentioned that he’d be stuffing the site with columns come 2006, the final year of his ESPN contract. Now that we’re here, we’ve witnessed something more along the lines of the American budget surplus-to-deficit swing, with only the occasional topical columns and a seeming reliance on mailbag responses. What happened? I am inclined to think that Bill is looking to head in a new direction once his obligations are complete. He’s hinted in his writings that achieving his ultimate goal (covering a Boston championship in person as a professional sportswriter) has left him searching for new inspiration. Considering how his own columns last year began to become to drift into a shtick, I wouldn’t be surprised if Simmons is feeling like a writer for a sitcom 3 years past its prime. He may have further hinted at his tuggings by experimenting as an ESPN radio host about a year ago. Maybe he’d like to become the solution to his oft-described dislike for Boston sports radio by joining the scene on the airwaves. Maybe this has to do with the success of his first book or newborn daughter. No matter what, it would be nice to continue to enjoy the Sports Guy for a good while longer, in whatever form that may be.

Continuing with information I’m relaying from my nose, I’m becoming more and more certain that a story will break in the next few weeks about what’s really been going on with the Pistons. Their offensive decline has been far too stark and the struggles against the inferior Cavaliers and uneven Heat simply haven’t been explained well enough by a single expert or pundit yet. No, this is bigger than a tender Rasheed Wallace ankle (3-point individual drop off versus the team’s 15-point drop-off) and was present several games before he turned it. The theory that the team is worn out from several years of extended play doesn’t seem right either: no one has had the nagging injuries that come from wear and tear, and their defense, always the first to go with fatigue, is as solid as it’s been all year. They aren’t collapsing and allowing teams to ring them up each night, they just aren’t clicking offensively like they were three months ago. Billups has gone from a near-MVP season to ho-hum, not taking advantage of the porous Heat perimeter defense to the same degree as Kirk Hinrich or Jason Kidd did, either as a scorer or playmaker. The fastbreak that was their new-found strength has vanished, and Flip’s imaginative offensive schemes have fallen to the wayside. Have they turned on a coach with no Finals experience? Has Ben Wallace decided to mail it in after 4 years of being the thankless hero? Does the team simply not have a fire in them anymore? Their elimination game survival aside, Joe Dumars should be concerned when he looks down on the team he built.

Like the nose previously predicted, Clemens has resigned with the Astros to what I continue to believe was a no-bid contract. Clemens clearly broke down last fall and knows how much help it would be for all involved if he were to come in midseason to avoid meaningless wear and tear. Additionally, the silence from the Sox and Yankee camps was deafening. Despite all the media and fan based talk about interest, Steinbrenner and his rivals made almost no public pitches to lure the Rocket back to the Northeast, far from their normal practices. I take that as a clear sign that he was never really on the market.

Fun scoop of the moment: the Miami Herald reported that Vince Carter partied until almost 4 a.m. on South Beach at B.E.D.that night before the Nets were eliminated by the Heat. He was so close to rehabbing his poor playoff reputation…

Speaking of reputations, I still can’t quite decide if Dirk has emerged as a postseason warrior or if he still suffers from a shrinkage problem. One thing is clear, though; the Mavs follow his cue. When he’s sticking out the tongue and killing teams, they’re all systems go. When he disappears, so do they. Last night, he disappeared. His last no-show was the 4^th quarter of Game 6 in the Spurs series, but he turned things around to get Dallas into the Conference Finals. What happens when they head back to Texas for Game 5? My guess is we’ll see Diggler again. I hope we’ve seen the last of his Peja impersonations, if only because the league could always use another hero.

From my favorite Congo export:

If you were the Knicks owner, who would you fire between LB and Zeek and why?
-Kadim

A: Both of them.

Neither of those two are ideal for this situation and both have actively made things worse for the Knicks. Larry Brown is as sharp a basketball mind as you will find, but he’s a notorious roster tinker-er and has proven to only be loyal on a per minute basis. As this season finished, he reportedly made a long-anticipated play to take control of the roster decisions by undermining Isiah Thomas. Today, he’s playing the now-familiar tune of an bewildered innocent victim, claiming he doesn’t understand why the Knicks have so suddenly turned cold on him. To bad we had less than a year to forget this exact same song and dance he put on with the Pistons. Larry knows he can force the team to pay him $40 million to leave after creating the mess himself, and he will.

Isiah is far from blameless, still heaping million-dollar band aids on a hemorrhaging wound. His foolishly desperate grab as left him a goat now that the Chicago Bulls have what would have been their #2 pick in the draft and will almost certainly have the Knicks’ pick again next season. Every player on the Knicks roster today was brought in by Isiah directly, and there is not a single 17-point scorer, 7-rebound grabber, or 7-assist man among them. Words cannot express how poor a return that is for a team with a $123 million payroll. Isiah has turned New York into the NBA’s garbage dumb.

If I were to take over this team for the summer, this is what I would do:

Fire Isiah, fire Brown. The severances represent a third of the money they wasted in the past 8 months alone.
Hire a steady, if unspectacular, GM to clean up the roster over the next 3-4 years. John Nash is a recently released guy that might work well. Keep in mind that a general manager is first and foremost a negotiator that seals deals, not necessarily the decision maker. Impress upon the GM that quick fix moves are off limits. Hold onto draft picks and expiring deals (Rose, Taylor) with clenched fists and push hard to lose the max deal guys (Marbury, Francis) even if it’s for poor value. Stephon plus cash for Blount, Jaric, and Hudson? Jump on it. In today’s NBA, it’s impossibly rare to bring in a young top tier talent via free agency or trades. You need lightning to strike in the draft, as it might next year with manchild Greg Ogden. Then, you make your big plays to surround him with talent.
Hire a steady, if unspectacular, coach to maximize the potential if the unfinished roster until it is ready to contend. The Doug Collins’ caretaker to the Phil Jackson closer, if you will. Paul Silas might work if he can stop feuding with players. Rick Adelman is available. Isiah is too much of a politicking cancer.
Pray.

Two rumors have been butting heads in the wake of Toronto winning the draft lottery. Rumor 1, which pre-existed the #1 pick, holds that Colangelo and the Raptors are going to focus on more Canadian-friendly foreign talent to side step any bolting by American stars (Vince, McGrady). This points to a Andrea Bargnani selection. Rumor 2 has the Raptors shopping the top pick in the draft since they don’t need a frontcourt player next to Bosh as much as a backcourt stud (shades of Orlando’s Webber for Penny draft). It’s always tough to tell what to believe, especially since half of the game is leaking misinformation.

Leftover Stew

2006-05-24T15:14:00.000-07:00

One thing is for sure – I’ve really missed posting on this blog.  In the past few weeks, I’ve stressed over the FoxSports blog, trying to wedge in at least one post a day on varied sports topics.  I brought some of them over here, but only a handful.  What added to the stress was that I didn’t have the time to write non-sports posts at all.  Left me a little pent up, but happily, I can start letting loose again.  Hope you’re ready.

Update on the Duke case that I wrote about a while back: pile some more “oops” onto the News & Observer and Mike Nifong, who were so unprofessionally quick to try and convict 46 members of the Duke lacrosse team.  The semen sample, recovered during the medical exam that set off the rape allegation and used unsuccessfully to try and match team members’ DNA twice, has finally found a match: the accuser’s boyfriend.  Odd that the DA did not include him in their first two rounds of testing, but this of course is the same office that violated standard procedures by having the accuser identify her three suspects out of mugshots that only featured Duke lacrosse players and refused to accept a player’s polygraph test offer (he took his own anyway).  With each passing day, this rat stinks a little more.  What’s truly upsetting is that the exculpatory evidence continues to be ignored by the same mainstream media that was happy to pile on the players in April.

Invasion, we hardly knew you.  ABC has pulled the plug on the show, which I’m a little sorry about.  This was a show that simply didn’t drum up enough of an audience to merit its relatively high budget.  I myself barely stayed with it, despite it’s LOST lead in and the wife’s intrigue, since the fall episodes were, in my opinion, only passably scripted, directed, and acted out.  They seemed to be trying to keep the hurricane-covered “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” premise as a smoking man-like mystery when any child would have caught on within minutes.  Then something strange happened in the second half of the season: it got good.  Unforseen twists and layers to the show emerged and ran up to a fairly engrossing finale that was armed with a legitimate series-shifting cliffhanger.  Unfortunately, we don’t live in a country that appreciates cooking with charcoal when propane is so much quicker.  I’ll say this though – a big screen leap a la Firefly would be backed in this corner.

San Antonio, we know you pretty well, but you also bowed out earlier than expected.  I was tremendously impressed with Duncan’s heart and determination, but can’t say the same about the overall team maturity.  I am thankful not to have to endure any more of the whistle-induced childish sulking that was spread across the entire team.  In tasteless order: Bruce Bowen and his slumping eye-roll; Ginobilli’s horrified reactions that make you think he’s witnessing a family member being stabbed; Duncan’s 11-year old “it wasn’t my fault” hysterics; and, Parker’s dazed and confused bit.  Popovich’s demeanor after game 7 spoke volumes – he really struck me as a father completely exasperated by his children, especially when asked about Ginobilli’s moronic block attempt/foul on Dirk that allowed Dallas to tie the game with the and-one free throw.  Q: Did you tell them in the timeout not to allow 3-pointers and not to foul anyone going to the basket?  Pop: (vein pops out, sinks back in) Yes.  Q: Where you surprised when Ginobilli fouled Dirk going to the basket?  Pop:  (vein pops out, sinks back in) Yes.

The Dixie Chicks are back, and the return has been awkward, at least in Texas.  Now, I really liked this group a few years ago; I saw them in concert I was invited to, and was greatly surprised to find they were far more than the radio country girl group I had taken them for.  They tend to dumb things down when on tour to pander to the younger 3-minute attention span crowd that pays the bills (or rather, their parents), but there’s some real musicianship inside that trio.  Unfortunately, the infamous incident in London happened.  Unfortunate not in that it sparked controversy, but unfortunate in that it led to Natalie Maines taking the low road and tossing fuel all over the place.  The group has chosen an antagonistic path rather than leaving well enough alone, kicking off their new album with the sharply pointed single “Not Ready to Make Nice” and following it up with quotes to the media saying they’d “rather have a small following of really cool people who get it, who will grow with us as we grow and are fans for life, than people that have us in their five-disc changer with Reba McEntire and Toby Keith. We don't want those kinds of fans. They limit what you can do.”  So in short, unless you enjoy their soapboxing, the door’s that way.  Strikes me as not being far off from Lauren Hill’s notorious take on the Fugee’s popularity with white kids.  Hey look, I want to enjoy music.  I don’t really care what your thoughts are, one way or the other.  If you’re a hippy, a Bill O’Reilly zealot, a rabid PETA member, a militant Islamic, a scorpion, a follower of Zeus, I don’t mind so long as you can pop out a good tune.  Just don’t go Tom Cruise on me, it’s a turnoff.  Songs with a political slant are cool – Dylan certainly hung his hat on them, and Born in the U.S.A. didn’t exactly end Springsteen’s career.  It’s ranting put to music and concerts that are halfway rallies that annoy the tomfoolery out of me.  Eddie Vedder – take the Bush mask off and play Better Man.  Bono – quit making up intros about how “One” is about the plight of Norwegian wildlife.  Sting – change the lyrics to “Every Breath You Take” one more time and I’ll put a hit out on you.  Natalie – just STFU.

The NBA Lottery was last night and it was pretty interesting.  Toronto “won” the first pick, unfortunately they badly need a backcourt stud in a draft where the top 5 guys are frontcourt players.  Rumor has it that Brian Colangelo has decided that the team should focus on foreign players since Americans can’t get out of Toronto fast enough while Europeans are perfectly comfortable there.  With that in mind, they’ve repotedly made some inroads at bringing over an assistant GM with ties to Italian prospect Andrea Bargnani.  Personally, I think they’d be best off trading down and grabbing Brandon Roy or Marcus Williams, but second guessing a Colangelo as about as smart as bending over in front of Reggie Evans.  The real losers from last night were the New York Knicks, who were mentioned at every possible opportunity for handing the #2 pick over to Chicago for Eddy Curry’s 6 rebounds a game and Portland, falling to the #4 pick despite having the worst record in the league.  Let the misery continue.

24 ended with a somewhat limp finale Monday as a show that is rapidly becoming stale and formulaic.  The anticlimatic wrap-up was sadly predictable though it closed with a quick twist of a cliffhanger.  The Chinese got to Jack!  Don’t get too excited or lose sleep this summer and fall.  The show has ended with a cliff hanger before, when President Palmer fell prey to a poisoned handshake in the closing minutes of season 2.  Expect this cliffhanger to be resolved similarly – forgotten and explained away with some dialogue in the next opener.  As the producers themselves have already admitted, bringing Jack home from China would eat 16 of the show’s 24 hours…

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again.  Something’s wrong with the Detroit Pistons.  They averaged 97 PPG over the season, and all of a sudden this group can barely manage 85.  Rasheed’s ankle isn’t enough for me, and he turned it after the drop off began.  Nothing jumps out at me when watching them and I’ve yet to see anything to suggest strife within the locker room.  This clearly isn’t the same team that managed only 9 losses over the first 4 months of the season, however, and isn’t a team that will get the remaining 8 wins they need unless something drastic changes in a hurry.

LOST Questions

2006-05-24T13:39:00.000-07:00

With the season finale for the greatest show on network TV being aired today, I would be negligent if I didn’t devote a post to it today (and tomorrow and Friday and each day this summer).  Clearly, there will be more to talk about after it airs – revelations and new questions.

Open ends that I believe will be tied off tonight:
Will Michael be reunited with Walt?  Will Michael find the death that seems to follow character resolution on this show?
Will Desmond return or have his experience on the island revealed?  It would stand to reason that we saw his (unmanned) boat at the end of the last episode.
What has happened to Walt since his abduction?
What was Libby’s full backstory?
What happens if the numbers are not pressed?  Can we be certain that Henry Gale did not punch them in?
How does the island ensnare passing by craft (Flight 815, Desmond’s boat, Rosseau’s boat)?
Do Jack and Claire share the same father?

Questions that I suspect will continue to linger:
What is Rosseau’s full backstory, before and after arriving on the island?
What are the large cables that extend into the water?
What is driving the dreams and hallucinations that guide (for good or bad) many of the survivors?
What is the “smoke” security system that seemed to telepathically read Eko?
What is the extent of the security system (trees, smoke, sharks, etc)?
What is the ultimate goal of the Hanso Foundation and what are the machinations of their work?
How is the island healing individuals (John, Son)?

We’ll just have to see.  I’ll enjoy the unfolding events tonight over fish tacos and mango.

A Look at the 2006 NBA Free Agent Class

2006-05-24T12:57:00.000-07:00

What, this topic hasn’t been burning a hole through your brain?  Well, maybe it will be now.  Here’s a glimpse at the money chasers in this pending offseason.  I’m going to omit the non-difference-makers and sure-to-resign types such as Ben Wallace and Jason Terry. The starting horn is July 1st!

Big Boys
Joel Przybilla and Nazr Mohammad are rarities: unrestricted centers that can actually play.  Neither are All-Stars, but both are capable starters that can plug the middle for donut teams such as Chicago or Seattle.  The more typical damaged goods are Michael Olowokandi, Kelvin Cato, and Lorenzen Wright.

The power forward collection is fair, though not exhilarating.  Chris Wilcox played like a demon after the Clippers gave up on him, but buyer beware when an upcoming free agent with a reputation for a poor work ethic “just happens” to double his career averages in March and April.  Reggie Evans is also out there, with a reputation of his own that was augmented with his uninvited jock check on Chris Kaman.  Nene Hilario is available, but with health concerns and failed to meet expectations before his injury.  A major shocker out of Philadelphia: Chris Webber may not exercise his player option to see if he can do better on the open market than the $21 and $22 million seasons remaining on his contract.  If you’re keeping score, that will make him the highest paid player in the league for the next two years.

Three’s A-Plenty
Al Harrington and Predjag Stojakovic should be the two big dogs on the open market this summer.  As I’ve noted before, I don’t buy that Peja (or as I might call him, Preddy) plans on staying in Indianapolis.  Chicago has cap space, so do the Clippers, and he’s long been connected to those cities because of their Yugoslavian communities.  Harrington will likely let the money do the talking, though one would think his Hawk tenure has shown him that winning is a lot more fun than being the main man.  Tim Thomas certainly won’t make half the money he did on his last contract, but has to be happy with the way the Suns system is making him shine.  His rebounding and defensive deficiencies are almost unnoticeable on this team, and the open court style covers up the fact that he struggles to execute designed plays.  He will either face a tough rotation with the returns of Amare Stoudamire and Kurt Thomas in Phoenix or a sour fanbase elsewhere if they bite into his lemon-filled career.  Vladimir Radmanovic will kick his agent all summer for turning down the Seattle offer last year, but he’s a tough player to use with his almost stereotypical European game.  Devean George, Matt Harpring, and Jared Jefferies can’t give a team big numbers, but they are fairly reliable role players that would help good teams.

Backcourt Offerings
Bonzi Wells figures to cash in this summer, for two reasons: his eyepopping showing against the Spurs and the fact that he is the only true starting shooting guard on the market.  His competition is principally from combo Iversonian guards (Jason Terry, Mike James, Flip Murray, Bobby Jackson, Marcus Banks).  However, as much as I’ve poo-pooed undersized 2’s in the past, it’s become very apparent that the NBA rule changes have paved the way for Phoenix-style small ball to dominate the league.  Playing a Kirk Hinrich next to a Ben Gordon may become more attractive when it was originally a forced hand.  If Dwayne Wade (6-4) is so successful next to Jason Williams (6-1), a Mike James-Andre Miller backcourt might be intriguing to Denver management.  Strike that, George Karl’s assuming GM input.  If Dwayne Wade (6-4) is so successful next to Jason Williams (6-1), a Mike James-Chris Paul backcourt might be intriguing to Hornets management.

I hope your team isn’t in need of a point guard this year, because the selection (aside from the above combo guards) is awfully bare.  You could choose the soon-to-be 37 Sam Cassell, but bare in mind he was recently owned by a 32 year-old Canadian with a congenital back condition and he only plays well when he’s gunning for a new contract.  Aside from that, he’s fantastic.  Gary Payton should retire, but won’t, so he’s available.  That leaves Speedy Claxton, who’s better than currently advertised but nobody’s point guard of the future.

The Fatcats
The teams that can make at least some splashes in free agency by virtue of being under the cap and not restricted to the approximately $5 million MLE:  Utah, Toronto, Atlanta, Charlotte, Chicago, L.A. Clippers, New Orleans/OKC.

Rest in peace, Senator Bentsen

2006-05-23T12:19:00.000-07:00

Any writing I would have done today is going to be pushed aside in deference to this morning’s passing of former Senator and Secretary of the Treasury Lloyd Bentsen. In a world were politicians are generally held in the same contempt as lawyers, this was a truly good, able, accomplished, and sincere man. He was unquestionably one of the great statesmen that this country produced. I’d like to republish the Houston Chronicle’s write up as I certainly could not do better:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3882276.html
Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr., a Texas patrician who made a sizable fortune in private business and an even bigger name in national government as a U.S. senator and Treasury secretary, died today. He was 85.

Bentsen, in failing health for more than a decade after a stroke in 1995, died at his home in Houston, said family spokesman Bill Maddox.

A handful of family members and friends arrived late this morning at the guarded gate of the Bentsen home on Indian Circle in the Tanglewood area. Shortly before noon, the gate opened and a hearse from George H. Lewis & Sons drove out, followed by two cars.

There will be a private graveside service at Forest Park Lawndale Cemetery in Houston and then a memorial service at First Presbyterian Church. The dates have not been set yet.

On the state political stage for almost half a century, Bentsen was a link to the heyday of Texas Democratic politics, when the regular wing of the state party was the fiefdom of then-Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson and House Speaker Sam Rayburn, Bentsen's most influential early mentor.

Although Bentsen helped Johnson in the 1950s to fend off a conservative challenge for control of the party, Bentsen gained his own first statewide victory in 1970 by defeating Texas' reigning liberal icon, Sen. Ralph W. Yarborough, in the Democratic primary. In the general election that year, Bentsen beat Republican George Bush, delaying his fellow Houstonian's national political ascent.

True to his Tory Democratic roots, Bentsen was an unabashed advocate of his state's oil industry and an early proponent of cutting corporate and capital gain tax rates.

Bentsen was a member of a prosperous Rio Grande Valley family, and almost everything he touched seemed to turn to gold, be it far-flung personal investments, the insurance company he founded in the 1950s or his political career, which stretched from being Hidalgo County judge immediately after World War II to taking a seat in the Cabinet during President Clinton's first administration in 1993.

His political career, at least, was not without its disappointments. His campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1976, only six years after returning to Washington as a senator, cratered in the early caucuses.

Bentsen, however, could pull laurels even from the ashes, and he enhanced his standing as an astute politician in 1988 as the dogged Democratic vice-presidential running mate of Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis.

In the vice-presidential debate that year, Bentsen hammered Republican Sen. Dan Quayle, with an artful putdown that found its way into everyday speech.

When his younger opponent compared himself to President John F. Kennedy, Bentsen, his voice dripping with disdain, retorted: "Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy."

Ever the pragmatic politician, Bentsen made it clear he knew he had establishment Republican supporters in Texas who would support his simultaneous Senate re-election bid even though they would forsake Dukakis-Bentsen in the national race for the Republican ticket led by Bush, who was moving up after eight years as Ronald Reagan's vice president.

During much of the last three decades, Bentsen was one of the most respected and important voices in the nation, and sometimes beyond, on federal fiscal policy.

Throughout his business and political career, including more than a quarter-century in public life in the the nation's capital, Bentsen became known as a savant who could spot a trend before it became one.

He was also ahead of his time in private commerce. He built a financial services company in Houston in the 1960s, long before such institutions became a dime a dozen.

Bentsen was a serious man and a no-nonsense operator in a trade sometimes known for easy — and often phony — affability. Bentsen was sociable, but his public style stopped far short of the voluble, chummy demeanor that was the hallmark of many Texas colleagues.

He could freeze staff aides with a glare and insisted on virtual perfection from his assistants — and sometimes from his notional superiors.

An autographed picture from President Clinton was inscribed: "To my friend Lloyd Bentsen, who makes me study things until I get it right."

Bentsen returned to his high-finance roots when he left government, taking on the leadership of the advisory panel at Beacon Group, a New York-based inverstment bank.

When he suffered a mild stroke in 1998, Bentsen conceded it came at the end of a three-month travel marathon during which he had been to 15 countries on four continents in three months.
"I enjoy challenges and being involved," Bentsen said.

Bentsen had an expansive life outside of commerce and politics. He was a voracious traveler, personally keeping notes and filing away clippings about places he wanted to visit — in the 1970s sometimes aboard the yacht he captained. And he indulged his sporting side, once buying a house in a resort development near San Diego, Calif., because he liked its tennis pro.

Bentsen and his wife, the former Beryl Ann Longino from Lufkin, were for years among the most attractive and sought after couples on the Washington social scene.

Bentsen, with silver hair and a handsome, angular visage that spoke of his Danish heritage, outfitted himself spectacularly, whether it was a carefully tailored business suit or smartly casual chamois windbreaker.

Bentsen's wife — known universally as B.A., which he said stood for Bentsen's "best asset," — became a political personality in her own right as a member of the Democratic National Committee from Texas for many years.

Lloyd Millard Bentsen Jr. was born Feb. 11, 1921, in Mission, where his father had moved after a hardscrabble upbringing in the Dakotas.

The son attended the University of Texas, receiving a law degree. He enlisted in the Army early in World War II and was a major by the time of his discharge in 1945. He flew 50 mission in Europe and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Bentsen was among the young veterans who stormed the political barricades soon after returning from military service. He was elected county judge of his native Hidalgo County in 1946.

When a Rio Grande Valley seat in the U.S. House — the one once represented by Vice President John Nance Garner — opened in 1948, Bentsen won a special election.
Highlight of the tenure, which would make Bentsen wince with embarassment in later years, was his proposal in 1950 that President Truman threaten to use nuclear weapons against China in the Korean war.

He was, however, not an orthodox conservative Southerner. Bentsen was one of only seven House members from the old Confederacy in 1949 to vote to outlaw the poll tax — a registration fee that effectively kept many minorities and poor people from voting. As a businessman in the 1960s, Bentsen insisted that a Houston hotel in which he was the primary investor be open to black customers, making it the first in the city to take that step.

In 1970, Bentsen narrowly defeated Bush. The Democrat widened his margin in 1976. And in 1982, playing paterfamilias to the remainder of the state Democratic ticket, Bentsen won by almost 20 percentage points and helped gubernatorial candidate Mark White across the finish line.

In 1988, Bentsen won the Senate race by an even bigger margin, even as he and Dukakis were losing the state to Bush-Quayle.

When Clinton was elected in 1992, he asked Bentsen to become his Treasury secretary. Some presidential aides indicated the move was principally to get Bentsen out of the Senate — and the chairmanship of the Finance Committee, a position from which Bentsen could have blocked some of the new Democratic leader's more liberal economic proposals.

Many intimates believed that not long after arriving at the neo-classical Treasury Building next door to the White House, Bentsen wished he had never left Capitol Hill.

Bentsen refused to be drawn out very far on the question and rejected several proposals that he write about his long, varied career and ties with the most famous politicians of the post-World War II era.

Bentsen recorded an oral history with the University of Texas which cannot be opened until five years after his death.

By CRAGG HINES
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle Washington Bureau

Larry Brown on the Road Again?

2006-05-15T16:20:00.000-07:00

Most of the New York Media outlets (including the Daily News, Times, and Newark Ledger), starting with Peter Vecsey at the Post, have been reporting that James Dolan is leaning toward a buyout of Larry Brown’s contract in the wake of his dismal 23-win coaching debut in Madison Square Garden.  While this would be understanding following the biggest NBA train wreck since the Pacer’s cursed ’04-05 campaign, numerous factors may have led to this.  From my vantage point they were, in reverse order of influence:

Larry’s Nomadic Nature:  The Knicks make stop #11 for Brown, and he has a reputation for backdoor exits to greener pasturers.  Specifically this time, numerous outlets connect him to Golden State due to his East Hampton connections to owner Chris Cohan.  The Maloofs in Sacramento, fresh off closing the door in Rick Adelman’s face, are very likely to have the interest to go along with the deep pockets needed to pull in Brown.  The New York Times also mentions the Charlotte Bobcats as a possible destination.  However, unlike last year, Larry Brown himself has not tipped his hand if he has a different “dream job” on the brain.

Isiah’s Coaching Impetus:  Speculation that Isiah has wanted the New York coaching job has been around since he was brought in the organization.  It stood to reason that Thomas would build his perfect roster as a GM and then slide into the bench to lead them directly.  He has remarked to the press that he sees himself coaching again, but was vague about when that might be.  Still, Isiah did not sign Larry Brown to a 4-year deal simply to oust him.  This was a disaster and reflects poorly on Thomas as well.

Larry’s Collegiality:  Tony Soprano’s mother may be a fair (or unfair, I don’t know the man) comparison to Larry Brown.  Since leaving the Pacers, Brown has apparently alienated far more players and management than he has won over.  He left on horrendous terms with Pistons management, nearly caused LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony to disavow their future Olympic careers, and somehow created greater disharmony this season.  Almost no one on the Knicks’ roster was safe from caustic public chastising, with the top persona non grata’s being Trevor Ariza, Jerome James, and of course, Marbury.  One had to wonder if Larry even tried to develop a rapport with his charges, leading to what I sense was the biggest reason…

Larry Brown versus Isiah Thomas:  These are two powerful NBA personalities with reputations for politicking, controlling, and duplicitousness.  Half the columnists in America predicted one or the other would not last Larry Brown’s 4-year contract because both would attempt to undermine the other and either Isiah would try and take over the coaching or Larry Brown would try to stage a coup for team president.  Mike Greenberg of ESPN/ESPN Radio has pushed the notion this year that Larry Brown was purposefully allowing the Knicks to fail this season as a way of discrediting the assembled roster and Isiah.  I believe that’s somewhat accurate, in that Larry did set up his system, told the players their roles and what he wanted, but allowed them to break away and tune him out.

To entertain a slight tangent, where the coaching line is drawn with player rapport is an interesting subject.  Larry Brown and George Karl both have top-notch ratings as coaching minds, yet both have also developed a track record of grating the nerves of their stars.  While this is a non-issue in college by comparison, being able to coddle egos has become just as important to NBA success as teaching.  Phil Jackson may be the best at incorporating both as a coach.

Brown has been a notorious roster tinker-er during his career, and would seem to prefer a less ambitious GM to work with.  It would be an understatement to say that the two sought out different types of players.

So where will this send Larry Brown if the buyout does indeed take place?  While the Golden State rumor seems to have the deepest roots, I would think it would be a dubious fit.  If Larry Brown brings one thing to the sidelines, it is tremendous pressure on the point guard position.  Baron Davis does not figure to be the Eric Snow-type PG that Larry demands, and the relationship could be as acrimonious as it was with Iverson and Marbury.  I have trouble seeing the Brooklyn-raised coach head to small-town Charlotte, and smallish Brevin Knight also would not be an ideal Brown point man.  Mike Bibby of Sacramento would seem to be more coachable and in line with what Larry demands, and though Bonzi Wells could represent a powderkeg, the Kings could be attractive as a project.  I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that other franchises might make a play for the future Hall of Fame coach either.  I would suggest, though, that they make note of the fact that he’s being paid by two franchises if they open contract negotiations…

Fresh Squeezed Corn

2006-05-12T12:49:00.000-07:00

I’m going to start off by saying I’ve been driven crazy this week.  I know, nobody wants to hear how anyone else has had a week from hell, cause we all have 50+ ones each year.  The Fox blog has sucked me away from here more than I expected, and it’s been frustrating.  At least I now know that this has become an addiction – it’s as irritating as when I go a week without working out.  I was hoping to do double-duty, but work, our electric company, the IRS, and tons of other intervening agencies have slammed that door shut.  Ugh.  I have a couple of write ups that I’m DYING to get done, but in the meantime, here’s an assortment of things that I can squeeze out quickly (just like corn!):

Damon Jones: STFU.  You were annoying as a limelight-moocher last year with the Heat, and when you wear exotic animal’s fur to get your 15 minutes in the locker room because you can’t get 15 minutes on the court…it’s time to just be quiet.

As Alonzo Mourning gets his wind back, it will slam the chances of a Nets’ upset shut.

Ashlee: you have to be kidding if you didn’t think we’d notice.

If you haven’t seen Stephen Colbert’s White House Correspondants’ Dinner speech yet, get with the program by going here.  In fact, pass it along to Jon Stewart so that he might be reminded of how to roast the administration and still be funny at the same time.  The Colbert Report is killing the Daily Show now like the Daily Show used to kill Saturday Night Live in the late 90s.

IRS:  Chris was right, you all are gangsters...and on the pipe.

24 and LOST are hurtling towards their season finales with only a couple weeks left.  I’d have to say that my interest in the Bauer Hour has declined, partly due to weariness of increasingly formulaic writing and partly due to my exposure to the far superior Shield.  The series has been extended for 3 more seasons with Keifer and, more promisingly, has been greenlit for the big screen.  I could see the movie adaptation (rumored to be set before the events of the first season) being a well-needed breath of fresh air.  A second LOST column is one of the write ups that I’m kicking myself over.  Specifically, the unanswered questions on the island, more numerous than you might believe.  At this point, you can reflect on the first season and realize we were kept virtually in the dark.  Further, at least 5 more seasons of revelations doesn’t seem to be that bad of a pace when weighed against the unknown.  I’ve strongly suspected all year that this season will end with the re-emergence of Walt (though not the Walt we knew), which will tie into the death of Michael.  I don’t know that for fact, those aren’t spoilers, just what I suspect.

Tom: crazy doesn’t pay.  If you believed in psychiatrists, they could have told you that.

I would pay attention to New Orleans’ reclamation efforts in regards to its two pro franchises.  There was quite a blow up last year when Tom Benson played his hand a little too openly and was engulfed in a Cajun firestorm over his desire to permanently relocate to Texas.  Now, after a season full of return guarantees by commissioner David Stern, Hornets owner George Shinn sounds like a man who’s hedging.  He first made some ripples by bemoaning the “discouraging” lack of progress in the Crescent City’s rebuilding, mentioning that the season ticket deposit numbers would be monitored.  Now, his lawyer may have paved the way for a lease loophole, stating that a Louisiana-funded practice facility would need to be set up in order for the Hornets to return.  This all has the familiar ring of my buddy Ted, who builds in his excuses over five months in preparation for a midnight hour pull out.  The smoke signals look the same from here.  I can’t really blame the owners, though.  Their commissioners seem to be purely concerned with PR and image, knowing the backlash they’ll get for abandoning a city that needs credibility to rebound.  Yet the owners are faced with the reality that this was a city that was struggling to support them before and whose prospects have been obliterated for at least a decade.  As every traded player will tell you, pro sports is a business.  It’s bad business to put a big money attraction in a small market town.

Note to all non-Oregon NBA teams: resist the urge to sign or trade for Darius Miles or Zach Randolph, arguably the two worst personalities in the game today.  Maybe there’s a glimmer of hope for a Rasheed-like redemption in a new setting, but I don’t personally recommend guys that get suspended for leaving a game early because they had to “get to a party.”  Montell Williams needs to send those two malcontents to boot camp.

Bonds, Babe, and Big Mac

2006-05-10T16:04:00.000-07:00

As he prepares to tie Babe Ruth for #2 all-time in career home runs, Barry Bonds has become a staple conversation piece for every sports radio show in America.  Bud Selig’s decision to snub Barry’s tying and passing home runs has added plenty of firewood for the topic.  I suppose I could hop on board the filler wagon (hey, one less original idea to come up with), but I won’t bother with the main topic of whether we should or should not celebrate the achievement.  I’m more drawn in to the Bonds-McGwire comparisons that have been used in arguments lately.

The pro-Barry camp and the devil’s advocates within the anti-Barry camp frequently declare that it is a double standard for America to root against Bonds passing Ruth when America revered McGwire passing Maris.  Inevitably, the race card is pulled after the “friendly image” discrepancy.  I don’t think that’s fair nor accurate, at least for the majority of fans, and I’d like to explain my thoughts as to why.

Cheating Some History Revisionists like to claim that “no one was calling McGwire a cheater” back when he chased 69.  That simply wasn’t so.  There was a stir over McGwire and his watermelon-sized forearms.  However, it was a gray area in that (a) baseball had no steroid policy at the time and (b) McGwire openly told the media that he was using Andro, a steroid precursor that was legal in the U.S. at the time.  It was after this time that Congress banned the drug.  Bonds, however, has denied using anything at all and is accused with mounting evidence of using illegal and banned substances.  That isn’t to say that McGwire did no wrong, but rather McGwire’s size was not brushed under the rug nor was it as upsetting as what is alleged of Bonds.

Race There’s little I detest more than the race card being pulled like a knee jerk reaction.  It’s demeaning and too often abused in today’s society.  If this were simply about a black man threatening a white man’s record, why was hot rival Sammy Sosa so beloved during McGwire’s 1998 campaign?  Bonds himself is commonly reported to accuse the media and fans of racial bias, but little evidence ever backs these claims up.

In my opinion, Bonds has such an anti-fan base because he’s had a long career building an undesirable reputation and image and because many believe that he is lying about steroids.  I think the public is far more forgiving about substance use than they are given credit for right now; Giambi and Sheffield are hardly outcasts in the MLB.  More precisely, I believe that it is the (possible) lying that galls Americans.  McGwire may not be the correct comparison for Bonds and his treatment.  A better comparison might be Pete Rose.

Cheers to a Fantastic NBA Postseason Tipoff

2006-05-02T15:46:00.000-07:00

Let’s give a round of applause to the most entertaining opening round of the NBA playoffs in some time.  Last year, the postseason seemed to drag, with the headlines dominated by daily Groundhog Day-esque forecasting on Phil Jackson’s possible return to the Lakers and he-said, she-said bickering over Larry Brown allegedly hunting for a new job while still coaching the contending Pistons.  The games themselves couldn’t seem to justify the front pages.

This year, we’ve got all the entertainment we could possibly hope for.  My personal highlights:
All the Bad Blood - In today’s free agency era of 3-year team nucleuses, rivalries have been few and far between, with none as deep as the 90s Knicks-Heat rivalry, as heated as the 1990 Pistons-Bulls, or as fabled as the Lakers-Celtics.  Players stopped leaving their sweat and blood on the court, but that’s changing in a hurry.  In the past several days we’ve seen Rip Hamilton throwing an elbow at Michael Redd, Kwame Brown channeling Muhammad Ali after knocking down Boris Diaw, Chris Kaman throwing Reggie Evans out of bounds after Evans set a new standard for dirty plays, and James Posey giving Kirk Hinrich the Rodman-Pippen special.  Dwayne Wade, Gary Payton, and Kenyon Martin extended the rage to include in-house tirades.  Stu Jackson’s office wasn’t this busy all season, and it’s astonishing that Ron Artest’s suspension came from the lightest of all the aforementioned love taps.  The league should be concerned that Mike James intends to take up boxing this summer as a free agent.

Sam Cassell in a Contract Year - I honestly can not remember the last time Sam was headed to free agency; he signed a 5-year rookie deal with the Rockets in 1993, a lowball deal with the Nets in 1998, griped about said deal, yet inexplicably extended it while a Buck despite raising cain over its value on a near-annual basis.  His contract gripes have played no small part in the fact that the Clips are his 7th team, and his pending free agency is almost assuredly a major reason behind his stellar play.  In hopes of a big-money extension, Sam played with similar heart in Minnesota his first year there, and it’s a joy to watch.  If only he could be signed to one-year contracts every summer.  Sam leads me to…

The Chance of an All Los Angeles Showdown - Maybe Bennett Salvatore helped things along at the expense of the Suns in Game 4, but I might understand if it gives us this second round series.  With both essentially playing all home games, each team should be able to play at their peak, and the individual matchups are such that each squad has significant advantages and disadvantages.  Kobe wouldn’t face too much resistance at small forward, while Brand and Kaman have little too worry about in the low post.  Phil can coach rings around Dunleavy, while Cuttino and Cassell should overwhelm the Laker’s backcourt.  The idea of the first all-city playoff pairing since the Yankees-Mets World Series is the really intriguing thought, however.

Tanking Can Be the Right Thing to Do - The Clippers dropped out of the number 5 seed of the Western bracket in less-than-veiled fashion, allowing the Grizzlies to finish 2 games ahead of them and take the number 5 seed and the Dallas Mavericks.  The ploy was clear when, in the final meeting between the two teams on April 18, L.A. ensured a loss by starting the likes of James Singleton and Vin Baker, sitting Sam Cassell and Chris Kaman, and limiting Elton Brand to 22 minutes.  It’s awfully tough to argue with the results.  The Clippers won their first playoff series, 4-1 against a team tied for the poorest record in the bracket, and the conference’s second best team pancaked the Grizzlies.  David Stern and his league office will almost assuredly correct this seeding loophole over the summer, but for now we have to applaud Dunleavy for doing what he needed to succeed.

Peja Stojakovic Finding a New Way to Disappear in a Big Game - I know it’s too easy a slam, but compare his plight with Tyson Chandler’s.  Chandler has a very severe ankle sprain with a suspected torn ligament that he could not walk on yesterday without an aircast boot.  His response?  “I’ve had worse.”  (Chicago Tribune)  Peja has a “sore and swollen right knee” (New York Post) and no one on the Pacers seems to expect him to join their lineup.  Last I heard, every professional basketball player has sore knees and most wear ice packs because of swelling.  My guess is that Peja expects a tight game and wants to spare innocent spectators from being pelted by his trademark airballs in the clutch.

It can’t all be great, however.  A surprising development in the opening week of postseason games has been the unspectacular play of the great trio of 2003.  LeBron has been scoring, but the Cavs have slipped into a bad habit of standing as James attempts to go one on five against the Wizards.  More Magic than Michael when he entered the league, LeBron has been slightly disappointing to watch.  Dwayne Wade has taken a similar cue, taking nearly twice as many shots as Shaq (to average only 6 more points per contest) and perhaps contributing to the dissent among his teammates.  Carmelo was simply taken apart by the Clippers and unable to carry the load for the short-handed Nuggets, averaging over 5 points less per game and a woeful 33% shooting.

Still, the playoffs this year has had an excitement that has been missing for some time.  The only series missing much zip has been the Pistons-Bucks and the Mavs-Griz, but that’s mostly because they’ve been so one-sided.  Here’s hoping the later rounds can keep up this thrilling pace.

Fox Blog

2006-04-28T14:20:00.000-07:00

Got another blog. I’m apparently going wild with them. I wasn’t looking to do this, but a sportswriter’s contest caught my eye while browsing through foxsports.com, and I figured what the heck. They’ll never pull your name out if you don’t toss it in the hat, right? So anyway, sports stuff is going to dominate what I write for a while. Bare with me if you can!
http://blogs.foxsports.com/EMJohn

Pass With Caution

2006-04-26T14:25:00.000-07:00

First and foremost, I’d like to sincerely thank everyone that helped me raise well over $500 with the MS150.  I can’t emphasize enough how much I detest asking for money, and I was truly grateful for your generosity.  Much appreciated.

As to the ride itself, the biking wasn’t quite the horror I was dreading.  Of course, I did everything in my power to try and make it so, forgetting my race numbers at home as we left home at 5 am.   Note to self – pack the car completely and sleep in your clothes from here on out.  Well, aside from the biking shorts. Between the padding and the strongly advised inner vasoline rubdown, wearing those shorts feels like you creamed yourself.  You do what you have to do to end crippling diseases like MS.

Right off the start, the first spectator sign I saw read “Austin 5 miles (.”  I could smile at that, but knew that if I saw that sign 50 miles later, I’d swerve and ram dead on into the joker.  The ride was terrifically organized, allowing people to take off whenever they wanted and from different starting points if they so choose.  The uber-athletes who looked at this as a training run for twisted endeavors like the Ironman Triathalon (hint: it’s capped off by running a full marathon) took off before 6 am, more casual riders between 7 and 8, so the 13,000-person pack separated fairly nicely; which was great since you’re mostly relegated to one lane of road that allows 2-3 make-believe lanes of bikers.  At each break point (one every 12 miles or so), there were a bunch of volunteers giving out oranges and drinks and tons of port-a-potties.  No lines of any significance, even at lunch (Subway given out).

What sucked: hills.  The entire hill country is off my Christmas card list.  There were two major sections of them: a state park roughly 60 miles out and a last call for brutality over the final 3 miles to the finish.  The park I could stand because I was forewarned about it and it was nice being in the woods and off the highway for a bit.  The last stretch was just a purified form of cruelty that didn’t come far off from breaking me.  The only other thing that bothered me on the trip, aside from saddle sores, numbing wrists, a strained back, and an aching knee, were people that had philosophical issues with staying to the right.  It was like relieving traffic on Virginia’s 64 all over again.  Most people would let you pass if you let them know you were coming up from behind, but some were just oblivious and deserved to be hit by a Tundra.  I was guaranteed to have a patch of these guys in front of me right before a hill, and if you aren’t hitting an incline with a full head of steam, it’s over.

The most humorous part of the ride was when a speed limit/Your Speed Is sign’s radar gun tagged me and was flashing.  I don’t think less reliable technology exists in the world.  It was also one heck of a thrill to hit 43 mph on my bike, an obvious all-time high.  If only that idiot in front of me had stayed right, I wouldn’t have had to brake.   I had a shot at breaking 45!  Gah!  BTW, that speed is right there with most roller coasters and is just as fun…

There was an eery moment on the ride, when a hundred off us had to come to a stop and slowly march around an accident.  As I passed through, all I saw was a guy in a neck brace being loaded into a medic van and 8 bikes lying off the side of the road with no owners in sight.  When you’re clipped into the pedals and get undercut going 20+ mph in a crowd of bikes, there’s no chance that it won’t be ugly.  Not a fun thought to be stuck with.  Word later got around that they had to helicopter out at least one or two guys.

Seeing the UT tower from 5 miles away was awesome, and entering the university knowing freedom was a half mile away was a powerful thrill.  Despite losing my lower body two miles back in the Hills for Good Measure, I went into kick off your heels and run mode.  Tip of the hat to all the teams that massed before the finish to wait for everyone to cross together.  I hot dogged through the end, lapping up the crowd, crossed the finish into the slow down stretch, and instantly felt each and every one of the muscles in my legs spasm and cramp with full effect at once.  When your quads, hams, and calves all manage to clench at once, it’s a feeling you can remember.  Thankfully, I did not take a dive into the spectators.  Sure, the wife and sister missed my finish because they were off at the mall and didn’t show up until later, but I was content with a victory Bud Light.

How did this compare with the marathon?  With the running, I trained for a year, worked up to 22 mile workouts, and couldn’t walk properly for a week afterwards.  With the MS150, I hopped in with next to no preparation (a couple 10 mile rides and one for 15) and was fine and dandy afterwards.  Maybe a little dehydrated with a mildly stiff back.  No comparison.  Which makes me wonder why I’m determined to get a second marathon under my belt yet have zero inclination to ride in the MS150 again.  It’s best that I not ask the wife, I run the risk of getting pelted with anything in arms reach.

We Report, We Decide

2006-04-21T13:59:00.000-07:00

I may regret writing this column, but I’ve been so wrapped up in this topic it’ll be cathartic. I’m going to keep Peter Gabriel going on the iPod as a safety measure; it’s awfully difficult to rant and rave with In Your Eyes stuck in your head. By the way, this’ll be a long one, so you may want to highlight the text and print it out to avoid getting a computer monitor-induced headache.

What’s had me so fired up? The Duke Lacrosse Scandal that’s managed to somehow make the birth of Tom and Katie’s Scientologic Love Child second page material. Some things I want to throw out before going one character further:
-I believe a forcible rape and assault took place, and that the accuser is a victim. I believe that there are few crimes that could possibly be as reprehensible.
-I believe the Duke Lax squad earned its reported reputation as hard partiers that had difficulty staying within the lines.
-I could not possibly say with confidence that members of the team did or did not sexually assault the victim.

Those three statements out of the way, what has worked me into a lather is the unprofessionalism of the Raleigh News & Observer in its coverage of this incident. Let me provide a timeline, which can obviously be no more than what I have followed through various media outlets:

The event in question took place (March 13th beginning close to midnight) with a medical examination providing strong evidence that a rape had occurred.

The N&O reports that the Lax team was ordered to submit to DNA testing following a police search of the house (Mar. 24)

The N&O runs a 1,000 word interview article with the unidentified accuser, listing the address, general location and a picture of the Lacrosse team house, touching off local protests and vigils there (Mar. 25)

Ruth Sheehan (a previous victim of rape) of the N&O pens an editorial calling for the team to be shut down, openly certain that the players committed or were complicit in the alledged rape, that the players were racist, and that Durham police “shouldn't have to wait for 46 DNA samples to be returned.” (Mar. 27)

The N&O reports that 15 of the players had prior arrests (all petty misdemeanors) (Mar. 28)

Duke forfeits a home game. (Mar. 28)

Duke suspends the lacrosse season pending the outcome of the investigation (Mar. 29)

Defense lawyers accuse the prosecution of trying to convict the team members in public without charges and predict that DNA evidence will clear the players (Mar. 30)

Police disclose that two 911 calls connected to the case were made in the early AM of Mar. 13: a 12:55 am call from a woman alleging racial harassment as she and a friend walked by the Lacrosse House and a second from the accuser at approximately 1:25 AM. It is later revealed that the accuser’s companion made the initial call and that the accuser did not make the second; a security guard made the call because she was intoxicated at a grocery store and refused to leave. (Mar. 31)

DA Mike Nifong states that if the DNA evidence did not result in matches it would not exonerate the players and is admonished by defense attorneys for speaking about the case in the press without disclosing evidence. (Apr. 01)

Ted Vaden of the N&O writes an opinion piece questioning the fairness of the N&O’s coverage of the scandal. (Apr. 02)

Ruth Sheehan writes a second editorial on the subject, accusing the Lacrosse house of being an out-of-control frat house and Duke University of turning a blind eye to it. She calls for the resignation of the team coach. (Apr. 03)

N&O devotes a Ruth Sheehan blog to the scandal, largely biased in nature (as blogs are by nature) and featuring numerous picked reader responses. (Apr. 03)

Duke opens a committee to probe student behavior (Apr. 05)

N&O details a prior arrest of Collin H. Finnerty, the first time a team member is cited by name and pictured (Apr. 06)

Reporting his full name and picturing him, N&O prints out the complete email that Ryan McFadyen wrote approximately two hours after the incident on Mar. 13. The typo-laden email spoke of having dancers come to the house again but that he would kill them. The report also names team member Daniel Flannery. After the report it became known that the email was one of many between team members but was the only one released to the media. (Apr. 06)

Duke announces the resignation of the lacrosse coach and the official cancelation of the lacrosse season.

Defense lawyers bring forth the team’s side of the incident for the first time, alledging “two dancers arrived at the house about 30 minutes apart and did not perform adequately. "They actually danced for three minutes and decided they were going to leave. They took a tremendous amount of money and just left.” (Apr. 07)

It is revealed that the accuser had multiple prior convictions (DWI, stealing a car, resisting arrest, and assaulting a government official). (Apr. 07)

The N&O runs a second article detailing prior arrests involving Duke players, this article examining incidents as early as 1999. The article asserts that while the individual offenses are minor, they are indicative of a “swaggering sense of entitlement and privilege.” (Apr. 09)

Defense attorneys release time-stamped photos revealing the accuser to be intoxicated to the point of being unable to stand at the party where she was hired to dance. The pictures also show pre-exisiting injuries that the prosecution alleges occurred during the rape. The pictures reveal that the exotic dancers performed for less than 5 minutes. The defense declines to provide the N&O with copies. (Apr. 10)

DNA evidence results fail to connect any of the Duke team members. (Apr. 11)

The N&O runs two articles that question whether a lack of DNA evidence exonerates the Duke lacrosse players. (Apr. 11)

The N&O runs a third article casting doubt over the import of the lack of DNA evidence, though its citations mostly center on cases in which DNA samples could not be found on the victim, which is not the situation in this case. (Apr. 12)

At a tense and vocal public forum at North Carolina Central University, Mike Nifong declares that he will press on with the case and that the accuser had recently identified one of her assailants. Defense attorneys hotly question the timing of the identification, in particular that media outlets had been naming and picturing numerous players in the month since the incident. (Apr. 12)

Ruth Sheehan writes a piece centered on Tawana Brawley and the damage that can come from a false rape claim. (Apr. 13)

Police records surface describing the accuser as “passed out drunk” and “not in distress” when found the night of the incident. (Apr. 14)

Ted Vaden writes an article for the N&O defending coverage of the scandal, while admitting that he found much of it questionable. (Apr. 16)

Jesse Jackson offers the victim a full college scholarship. (Apr. 16)

The N&O prints a 2,000 word write up on the accuser, including a section detailing her troubled past. (Apr. 16)

Durham mayor Bill Bell, and the presidents of NC Central and Duke universities make a public plea to the community to allow the investigation to be kept within the police and the court systems. (Apr. 17)

A grand jury indicts two members of the lacrosse team. (Apr. 17)

The N&O runs a second article on Finnerty’s prior arrest in the wake of his indictment. (Apr. 18)

The N&O runs a statement provided by DA Mike Nifong, indicating that he is seeking a third arrest. (Apr. 18)

The N&O runs three background pieces on Finnerty and Seligmann, largely concerned with their home wealth, including tax records of home value, and asserting a background of privilege. (Apr. 19)

It is reported that a second round of DNA tests was requested by DA Mike Nifong. (Apr. 19)

Duke suspends the indicted students. (Apr. 19)

Cell phone, ATM, and entry card records combine with a cab driver’s testimony to strongly support Seligmann’s claim that he was not present at the lacrosse house at the alleged time of the assualt. (Apr. 20)

One heck of a read, I know. Before I proceed, I’d like to repeat what I put down before:
-I believe a forcible rape and assault took place, and that the accuser is a victim. I believe that there are few crimes that could possibly be as reprehensible.
-I believe the Duke Lax squad earned its reported reputation as hard partiers that had difficulty staying within the lines.
-I could not possibly say with confidence that members of the team did or did not sexually assault the victim.

So, with all of that out of the way, let me formalize what got me so upset (hey Batfans, have you figured out the Riddler’s clues yet?). It is my perception that the News & Observer staff, Samiha Khanna and Ruth Sheehan in particular, convicted the entire Lacrosse team almost as soon as the story broke and proceeded to call for their heads through their offices. They dug up dirt at a level not seen since the Kobe Bryant trial and John Kerry’s presidential bid, and the N&O toed the line of yellow journalism as if they graduated with degrees from the Rupert Murdoch School of Modern Media. Article after article painting one picture of the team and using a completely different palette for the accuser. Researching like Team Matlock on the players but sticking to sob story interviews with the victim, giving the boys priors front page headlines while burying her past convictions in a back page paragraph.

Ruth Sheehan apparently watched too much Charles Barkley and adopted the “you can’t handle my truth” persona to wage her holy war against the college kids she instantly convicted, but wouldn’t offer up a retraction as mounting evidence seemed to exonerate much of the team. How much did her own personal experiences as a rape victim affect her evaluation of the events? The N&O allowed itself to become Mike Nifong’s mouthpiece, rather than be a neutral observer. By quickly publishing details about where the students could be found, their pictures, and their names, the N&O has left itself open to suspicions that they knowingly invited locals to harass the players (none of whom had been indicted). Just honestly ask yourself: out of the above rundown, which items were you previously aware of? Which were news to you? This isn’t just the News&Observer, it’s all the major media outlets.

The News & Observer professes that it was simply being thorough in its reporting. I feel they set themselves up as the judge of a public court. How many of those players who had nothing to do with what might have happened in that house have seen their personal lives wrecked by this coverage? How many are facing unwarranted persecution? How many won’t graduate from Duke when the dust settles? You might say that they put themselves in a bad situation, a la Kobe, but did they really? They hired strippers for a party, which isn’t illegal.

Everyone forms an opinion. Everyone has made up their mind about Barry Bonds, OJ Simpson, Ken Lay, and Brangelina, one way or the other. In this case, I fully believe the victim was raped, though I believe there could be an alternative story that’s not being examined. What if she was assaulted and intoxicated prior to arriving at the house, she and her fellow dancer quit performing for whatever reason shortly after beginning, were chased out of the house by drunk and belligerent preppies, and chose to lie about the attack after being examined at the hospital? Remember, the accuser did not call 911, nor was she examined after coming forward. She was examined because police were called in to find her “passed-out drunk.” After the examination, the police probably asked her who committed the assault, not the other way around. I’m not saying that’s what happened. I don’t know. If it hits the news tomorrow that damning evidence against a yet-unnamed lacrosse player has been found, I wouldn’t be stunned. My point is it’s one thing to speculate with buddies. It’s grossly irresponsible and dangerous for a media outlet to report on stories such as this through colored glasses. Whether or not these guys are innocent, I would be happy to see Khanna reprimanded for her obviously loose personal standards of journalistic integrity and Ruth Sheehan fired for her attempts to rally all of Carolina’s torches and pitchforks. The editorial staff should publically apologize if not resign.

To finish off, I understand that everyone’s biased to some degree. I can put up with Jon Stewart’s jadedness, even if he is choking the life out of what was once the funniest show on television. No one should ever fully buy into local coverage of their favorite sports teams, unless they’re just that fond of Kool-Aid. But it absolutely galls me when a newspaper feels that it has the right to condemn 46 college students without needing anything more than a first impression.

NBA Playoffs

2006-04-21T13:48:00.000-07:00

As Friday’s freedom beckons, here’s a brief take on how I suspect the NBA postseason will shake out:

Eastern Conference
-First Round-Detroit Pistons 4-0 over Milwaukee Bucks
Miami Heat 4-1 over Chicago Bulls
New Jersey Nets 4-2 over Indiana Pacers
Cleveland Cavaliers 4-3 over Washington Wizards

-Second Round-
Pistons 4-0 over Cavs
Nets lose 4-1 to Heat

-ECF-
Pistons 4-2 over Heat

Western Conference
-First Round-
San Antonio Spurs 4-2 over Sacramento Kings
Phoenix Suns 4-1 over Los Angeles Lakers
Denver Nuggets lose 4-3 to Los Angeles Clippers
Dallas Mavericks 4-2 over Memphis Grizzlies

-Second Round-
Spurs 4-2 over Mavs
Suns lose 4-3 to Clips

-WCF-
Spurs 4-3 over Clips

-Finals-
Pistons 4-2 over Spurs

Notes:
I don't believe in running donut teams come Spring. Always put your money on dominating frontlines. Spurs don't seem to be even 80% healthy this year. The Bulls went on a terrific run to finish the season, but they simply do not have the real go-to guy that every team must have in order to win in the postseason. Reggie Miller called out the Pacers in Nov, saying he couldn’t believe in them being privy to their locker room and chemistry. This riled up his ex-teammates, but proved to be dead on the money. They look like their heart was torn out a long time ago, and Peja is notoriously ineffective when the bright lights are on. The Clips could scare the living daylights out of the West, so could the Kings. Detroit is the only elite team that looks like they have everything in place, including intangibles.

Last Plea for Help! (MS150)

2006-04-17T11:36:00.000-07:00

I swear this will be the last I write about this, and I will keep it brief. First, a very sincere thank you to those who were kind and generous in helping me with my MS150 pledge. Second, I could still use some help from anyone else, again looking only for $10 or $20 pocket change from those who wouldn’t mind. No pressure, no obligation. If you’d like though, you could think of this as paying in advance to read the high comedy recap of my biking into Austin without feeling in my wrists, back, or feet.
Paypal to: EvanMS150@gmail.com
Or
http://www.ms150.org/ms150/donate/ (enter Evan Johnson, emjohn@hotmail.com)

Wrapping It Up

2006-04-17T09:19:00.000-07:00

Easter is past, which means the NBA regular season  is winding to a close.  For me, it’ll be a welcome relief from the most discouraging Rockets season since the Francis & Mobley And-1 tour got out of Rudy T’s control.   It’s best if I don’t start dwelling on that, so quickly moving along to my award handouts for the regular season, which are as biased as I choose them to be:

All-NBA First team:  Billups, Kobe, LeBron, Dirk, Yao
I pick this list on based on real positions (point, SG, SF, 4, center), which is always extremely fuzzy in the real voting.  Billups executed the league’s best offensive and defensive halfcourt sets, period, and I’m sick of people completely discounting him because of Detroit’s starting 5 while turning a blind eye to Nash’s weakness on D and how he becomes hampered in halfcourt situations.  Kobe’s obvious.  LeBron is almost on all cylinders and is a full level above Melo, Marion, and Pierce among SFs at this point.  Duncan was barely 70% all season, Big Ticket is looking like he might be the next Barry Sanders, and Bosh and Brand aren’t quite at a level where they beat teams on their own; therefore, Dirk gets the crown at 4.
Yao (22 and 10) is the year’s best center almost by default.  If you don’t believe Shaq is tumbling down the hill faster than Jack (career lows in points and minutes, and the first time in his career to have single digit rebounds), you should stick with watching the PGA.  The media’s brief love affair with Chris Kaman was a pretty silly fad, and he got absolutely torched by Ming each and every time they met this year (7 and 6 vs Yao’s 23 and 13).  Would Yao have made this based on his season a few years ago?  No way.  The entire center position is the worst it’s been since the 80s, if not the early 60s.  The complete de-emphasis on post play by the league and younger players alike has killed the 5 spot.  Many media analysts (Kerr, S.A. Smith, etc) have been fairly transparent in their reluctance to accept this obvious fact, but Yao Ming is now the best center on the planet.

All-NBA Second Team:  Nash, Wade, Marion, Brand, Bosh
Honorable Mention (i.e., screwed over): Iverson, Melo, VC, Arenas
I feel terrible bumping Iverson out of the pack.  This a former MVP who is #3 all time in scoring average and just set a new career high in scoring for a season as well as nearly a new high in assists.  Unfortunately, I can’t fathom putting him above Billups, Nash, Kobe, or Wade.  Wade comes closest, but he led his team to over 50 wins, while AI couldn’t get his to 0.500.  Even the Los Angeles Kobes managed a winning season.  Nash makes the 2nd team based on leading the league in tangibles, and Wade gets there for becoming one of the top do-everything players in the league (26-6-7-2 stat line).  Marion didn’t make my first team by a hair.  Brand is a pseudo-MVP candidate, and Bosh is now seeing virtually all of his time at the center position.

Most Unappreciated Player:
Billups and Marion aside, it’s a split between Jason Richardson and Dwight Howard.  Richardson is just plain spooky, upping his average for the 5th straight year despite having to pry the ball from Puffy the point guard, and managed three 40+ games in March (not coincidentally, Puffy tallied a combined 50 minutes in those 3 games).  Howard is morphing into a man-beast even faster now that he’s no longer being blackballed by Steve Francis.  For the season, he’s put up nearly 16 and 13, and it’s not a crazy notion that he might be an All-Star next year as Orlando’s main attraction.

Coach of the Year: Avery Johnson
Dallas wasn’t supposed to be better without Nash and Finley, but here they are looking more legit than any of the Maverick teams in the past decade.  AJ has expunged Nelly’s defensive excuse-making and injected his more steely personality into the team.  This team still does not have a true point guard or a defensive stopper, but they’re somehow executing sharply and slowing down opposing offenses.

Everyone’s Favorite Executive of the Year: Isiah Thomas
Let’s take a journey back in time and revisit what he did just this past summer for the team: signed Jerome James (3 and 1 this year) to a 3-yr, $20 million deal, traded warhorse Kurt Thomas for Q Richardson (5-yr, $40 mill uninsurable contract due to his degenerative back, 8 and 3), brought in Larry “Miracle Worker” Brown who just might be sabotaging the entire team in order to purge the roster and Isiah in order to take full control of the franchise, and wasn’t there something else?  Oh yeah!  Traded what will be a top-3 pick (LaMarcus Aldridge?) and will likely have to swap picks next year with the Bulls in order to pick up phony franchise center Eddy “Happy Meal” Curry (14 and 6).  All eyes are on him in anticipation of this summer’s wheeling and dealing.

Most Valuable Player:
Last year, it was a tough pick because there wasn’t a good candidate.  Shaq and Nash fought it out with intangibles alone in their corner; neither one had production remotely close to an MVP level.  This year, there are too many candidates, and almost all have holes in their resumes.  To keep things short, I’ll only talk about those who made my first-team list.  Right off the bat, Yao’s out because he’s simply not on par with the others in terms of carrying his team (Rockets were 27-30 with him this year).
I’m not very good at disguising my love for Billups and his play this year.  Again, he’s running the most efficient (not prolific) offense in the league and is most responsible for the Pistons’ apparent harmony.  Only Tayshun Prince is capable of scoring without being set up by CB3.  Unlike any of the league’s other upper tier PGs, Chauncey can play solid defense as well.  What hurts his case is that you could replace him with other guys at his position (Kidd, Chris Paul, Andre Miller, Captain Kirk) and the Pistons would still be a serious title contender.
LeBron is chewing teams up and even made the media swallow their clipboards after the mini-LeBron-chokes-late wave crashed.  He’s there with Kobe and Iverson as 30+ PPG scorers this season and is officially unstoppable, but he seems to have slipped a touch in the “makes teammates better” category.  He entered the league looking more like Magic than Jordan, but now seems to feel obligated to score at the expense of creating.  If he fuses both aspects into his game, he’ll kill the league.  For now, both he and the Cavs are just shy of creme de la crème status.
Therapist #8 has got the league buzzing this year with what is easily the most spectacular individual season since 80’s Jordan (averaged 36 a game between 86-88).  When Jordan got his first MVP in ’88, he had led the Bulls to their first 50-win season in his career.  The previous year, he led the league with a walloping 37 per game, but they won only 40 games, so no MVP (went to Magic).  I’m going to apply that historical precedent here: unbelievable production without team success does not get my MVP vote.  I expect him to win it from the media, but I wouldn’t give him more than a 2nd place vote on my ballot.  Legendary scorers/showmen Elgin Baylor and Dominique Wilkins never got an MVP either, and their teams were playoff locks most years.
This year’s MVP, in my mind, is Dirk Nowitzki.  60-win team, despite a supporting cast whose collective All-Star appearances total at 1 (the now washed up Stackhouse).  Quite simply, no one has done more with less.  Diggler has developed an intense edge in the two seasons apart from Nash and has stopped treating the game like one.  He’s the lone guy that fits my personal MVP criteria: leads a title contender, is one of the league’s top producers, and was consistent all season.  I suppose I should go back and see what my formula says about all this, but I don’t feel a need.  Kobe’s phenomenal scoring is blinding, but Dirk’s season perfectly fits the MVP mold.  Too bad he won’t even come close in the actual voting.

LOST Backtracking

2006-04-14T11:27:00.000-07:00

No secret at all that I’m a LOST fanatic; it’s a mindbender in the vein of X-files and Twin Peaks that sucks in wannabe sleuths like myself.  Its acting blows away any other show on television, with one of the best ensemble casts in memory.  The cinematography, writing, effects, everything is first class.

     The downside for the average fan is that LOST moves in inches, infuriating huge numbers of viewers.  The questions far outweigh the answers, and vague hints and clues are often more puzzling than the initial mysteries.  While I’d like to, I don’t know if I could put together a complete rundown in anything smaller than a novel.  What I will do is segment out 4 basic components of LOST and vainly attempt to gloss over what sticks out to me for each.

     The four components that LOST is comprised of:

What is the island, its purpose, and will the survivors escape it?

Who are the survivors, what drives each of them, and what led them to be on the flight?

How are the survivors changing with their new lives and how is it affecting their actions?

How do they mesh with each other?

The first component is the biggie, and covers a lot of ground less than 40 episodes in.  I’ll leave it for later.  The final component is the soap opera aspect that every show needs and it may be played with based on viewer feedback.  It’s superfluous and I won’t worry about it.  The middle two are a little easier to go after in a general take.  I’ll start with the back stories, then move on to their second lives later.

Jack Shephard:  A Los Angeles surgical prodigy who has a responsibility complex as a result of his overbearing father.  He successfully operated on and healed a woman with a hopeless prognosis that he would later marry, but failed to save a late-stage cancer patient who’s daughter Jack nearly began an affair with.  Shortly thereafter, his wife left him.  After his father caused the death of a pregnant trama victim by operating on her while drunk, Jack gave damning testimony to the review board.  This sent his father in a downward spiral that culminated with his drinking-induced death in Sydney.  Jack was sent by his mother to reconcile with him but instead had to return with the body for burial.
Daddy Issue: Jack’s father dominates his past and shaped much of his issues with responsibility.
Tangents:  Shannon’s biological father died while Jack was operating on another victim in the same room.  Jack’s father met Sawyer in a Sydney bar.  Jin was behind Jack in the line at the Sydney airport.  Jack and Ana Lucia shared a flirtatious drink before boarding the flight.
What’s in a Name:  Jack’s last name clearly touches on his role on the island and suggests a connection to Jesus’ miracle-working.

John Locke:  John Locke is easily the most sympathetic of the survivors pre-flight with his tragedies.  He’s maliciously manipulated by his uncaring father, losing a kidney and later his love.  John is seen with a new job each flashback episode, suggesting that he never found his true calling.  Locke takes great issue with anyone that says he “can’t” do something once he is wheelchair bound.  Locke differs from his island persona more than any other survivor.
Daddy Issue:  Locke’s father systematically destroys Locke’s life for his own gain, and leads to John’s control issues later on.
Tangents: Locke performs a house inspection for Sayid’s lost love from Iraq.  Locke’s mother was a patient at the same mental institution that Hurley was in.
What’s in a Name:  John Locke was a philosopher that wrote about society and civilization.

Kate Austen:  Kate was a fugitive after murdering the abusive man she thought was her stepfather, who turned out to have fathered her during an affair with her then-married mother.  She later employs the aid of a former flame (Tom) to see her dying mother, only to be greeted with hysterical fear.  Tom was killed helping her escape the hospital.  Kate feigned a relationship with a criminal to get his help in retrieving a toy airplane memento of Tom from a bank safety deposit box but shot him when he threatened to kill a bank officer.  Fleeing to Australia, she was given up to an obsessed US Marshall by a man that sheltered her and was captured when she pulled her betrayer to safety instead of leaving him after a truck crash.
Daddy Issue:  Kate killed her abusive biological “step” father and was devastated to learn that the man she thought was her father was not.
Tangents:  Sayid met Kate’s father figure in the Gulf War and he is seen on TV when Kate goes to speak to her father (figure).
What’s in a Name:  Austen might refer to English author Jane Austen (Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice).

James Ford/Sawyer:  Witnessed his father kill his mother and then take his own life as a child, which was brought on by a man (“Sawyer”) that conned them.  James vowed revenge but later takes on the name and persona of the man he had been hunting.  Was manipulated into killing a man under the guise that it was the Sawyer he had been searching for.  Primarily targets women in his cons.  Shows the darkest side of any of the survivors outside of Eko in the flashbacks.
Daddy Issue: The murder/suicide he witnessed established Sawyer’s future.
Tangents:  Met Jack’s father in a Sydney bar.  Was taken to the police station where Boone was making a complaint.
What’s in a Name:  Ford’s adopted name of Sawyer seems to be a reference to his Tom Sawyer-esque personality on the island, though his pre-island adventures have been revealed so far to be decidedly less juvenile.

Sayid Jarrah:  A member of the Iraqi Republican Guard, Sayid was twice coerced by American authorities to betray his countrymen: his CO at the end of the Gulf War, and, more reprehensibly, his friend post-9/11.  Sayid also shot a fellow guardsmen and his own leg to free an old love who was imprisoned for treason.
Daddy Issue:  His father has not been mentioned.
Tangents:  Met Kate’s father figure in Iraqi.  His lost love met Locke in LA.
What’s in a Name:  Jarrah is a type of eucalyptus.  It’s the best I could come up with.

Jin and Sun Kwon:  Jin was born to a village fisherman and was ashamed of his upbringing when he met his future wife on the streets of Korea.  The more prestigious Sun, who had recently been spurned in an arranged marriage, began to see Jin in private and valued their sincere love for one another.  In order to marry Sun, Jin agreed to work for her Mafioso father, a job that hardened Jin and tore their marriage apart.  Sun became reacquainted with her near-fiancee and learned English in hopes of leaving Jin for America.  She had a change of heart while at the airport when Jin, recently reconciled with his father, reminded her of the man she married.
Daddy Issues:  Sun’s father taints Jin with his criminal affairs, which nearly leads to the couple’s split.  Jin was ashamed of his father until he reconciled with him shortly before the doomed Oceanic flight.
Tangents:  Hurley is seen on TV when Jin intimidates a local inspector.  Jin is behind Jack in line at the airport.
What’s in a Name:  ?

Charlie Pace and Mr. Eko:  Two survivors with notably similar, if reversed, backstories.  Charlie was a musically talented religious youth that slid into a heroin-addicted street criminal due to the influence of his older brother.  Eko became a drug-trafficking warlord after killing a man in place of his brother but became a self-made priest after his religious brother died in his arms.  Charlie never seems to accept what he’s become or his responsibilities for his fall, while Eko’s guilt becomes ingrained.
Daddy Issues:  Only Charlie’s mother has been seen so far out of the two.
Tangents:  Eko deals with Middle Eastern heroin traffickers, possibly suggesting a link to Sayid.
What’s in a Name:  Much speculation has been made about a name pronounced “echo,” possibly referring to the mirrored past he shares with Charlie.

Michael and Walt Dawson (Lloyd):  Michaels past and present revolve around his tortuous forced separations from his son.  He was a gifted artist and technical designer but was unable to stay focused on his work as much as he was with maintaining a relationship with Walt.  One of the most interesting aspects of their background are Walt’s mother’s reasons for keeping Walt distanced from his father, with no apparent animosity toward Michael himself.  It is unexplained why she kept letters Michael wrote to Walt hidden (but not thrown away), and Michael accused her of traveling the world to prevent him from seeing his son (which was not denied).  The other interesting aspect is the show’s suggestion that Walt may have supernatural mental abilities.  His adopted father refused to care for him after his mother died, obviously disturbed by what he had experienced with Walt.
Daddy Issues:  Walt is forcibly kept from his father for unclear reasons his entire life, reunited just days before boarding the ill-fated 815 flight.
Tangents:  None are springing to mind.
What’s in a Name:  George Walter Dawson was a turn-of-the-century (circa 1900) watercolor landscape artist.

Hugo “Hurley” Reyes:  Hurley’s backstory is riveting to fans as he is the only future castaway to have a direct connection to the infamous numbers.  He is exposed to them while institutionalized following a fatal (23 people) deck collapse that he blames himself for, leading to his eating disorder and mild schizophrenia.  After leaving the hospital, Hurley wins the lottery using the numbers he overheard from a patient but quickly discovers it to be a curse, losing loved ones around him as his fortunes multiplied.  Believing the numbers to be supernatural, he wen out to Australia to seek their origins (the patient and another man, while both in the Navy, heard them while monitoring Pacific radio signals) and his story was met with ominous horror there.
Daddy Issues:  Hurley’s father is not seen in any backstories, only his mother and other relatives.
Tangents:  Hurley owned the box company that Locke worked for.  Hurley was seen on TV in the house of a man Jin visited in Korea.  Libby was also a patient at the mental hospital (Santa Rosa) when Hurley was there.  Locke’s mother was also institutionalized at Santa Rosa, though likely before Hurley’s time there.
What’s in a Name:  Victor Hugo was a famous writer in the 19th century (Les Miserables, The Hunchback of Notre Dame).  Reyes is Spanish for ‘king.’

Boone Carlyle and Shannon Rutherford: Step-siblings with no blood relation (her father married his mother), there was sexual tension between the two that was consummated but then summarily dismissed by Shannon the night before the Oceanic flight.  Boone, the son of a Martha Stewart-type wedding mogul, was consumed by his taboo attraction to Shannon.  Shannon dealt with feelings of inadequacy and ironically used her image as a callow looker to manipulate men around her by way of hallow love.
Daddy Issues:  Neither step-sibling had a father present by the time of the flight; only Boone’s oppressive mother was seen.
What’s in a Name:  The Carlyle Group is a well-known empire, invoking the wealth Boone seems to have.  Thomas Carlyle was a 19th Century writer, but it would be a stretch to connect his works with the show.  Ernest Rutherford was a major founder of nuclear physics (circa 1900) with his theories on atomic nature (nucleus with orbiting electrons), possibly alluding to the Dharma Initiative’s studies in physics.
Tangents:  Shannon’s father died in the same surgical room while Jack attended the other member of the fatal car crash.  Shannon played a malicious prank on Sayid in the Sydney airport.  Sawyer is brought into the station by Australian police while Boone is making a complaint to a detective.

Claire (and Aaron) Littleton:  Claire’s backstory has been limited only to a single pre-island flashback, which may not bode well for her survival on the island.  Her hesitance to become a mother, from the discovery of the pregnancy to the departure of the father, was the center of her pre-island life.
Daddy Issues:  Claire’s parents have not been discussed, Aaron’s father walked out on Claire mid-pregnancy.
Tangents:  ?
What’s in a Name:  Aaron’s name is connected to the brother of Moses and hints, along with the interest from the psychic and the Others, at a predestiny.

Ana Lucia Cortez:  The most despised character/actress on the show, Ana Lucia’s flashback illustrated the origins of her overly-aggressive on-edge personality.  A Los Angeles police officer, Ana Lucia was shot during a routine burglary call and lost the child she had been carrying.  The trauma hardened her and she developed a degree of paranoia in place of a general loss of trust in people.  After refusing to identify him in the police station, she murdered the man who had shot her and ruined her life in a back alley.
Daddy Issues: No father is seen or mentioned, only her mother as the police chief.
Tangents:  Ana Lucia shares a drink with Jack before boarding Oceanic Flight 815.
What’s in a Name:  ?

So what is there to take from all of this?  First, it seems that if a character has an overly one-dimensional backstory and/or a paucity of them, it may indicate that they won’t be around in season 5.  Personally, I have Michael and Ana-Lucia at the top of my (major character) death board, followed by Claire.  You also are given the lines to read between, which I’ll go into more detail at another time.  Suffice it to say, it gleans much light into the motivations that drive the characters and the decisions they make.  Interestingly, the is only one backstory that I can’t yet pair up with the island story counterpart.  Sayid’s history has yet, to my knowledge, to become significantly relevant to his experiences on the island.  Sure he’s interrogated a couple of guys, but he’s not been put in a position (forced to betray his commander, friend) that echos his past.  It would be something to watch for.

An additional question comes from these backstories as well: why do none of these survivors seem to have a healthy relationship with their fathers?

myspace

2006-04-06T10:13:00.000-07:00

Wanted to pass along that I've now got a myspace site. Will you be my friend?

The Wall Has Fallen

2006-04-06T09:26:00.000-07:00

You may now leave comments on the site - be good!

The Bad Movie of the Month Club

2006-04-05T13:39:00.000-07:00

A few years ago, hitting Blockbuster became dreadful for me.  Seemed like fewer and fewer watchable movies were coming out, and I was becoming alarmed at the number of times I’d drop $5 or so to only make it halfway through a C-grade effort like Tomcats.  After college, I swept through every classic movie I hadn’t seen but wanted to, including the Hitchcocks and 007s.  Unfortunately this well was tapped dry before too long, again leaving me with hour-long triple rounds through the New Releases aisles.  My saving grace arrived when my sister founded our Bad Movie of the Month Club.

In a nutshell, you play your own game of MST3K.  Go for ridiculously bad movies that are unintentional comedies.  You have to pick selectively, though, there are many films out there that are just upsettingly bad.  I nearly lost my wife over Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and lasted 2 minutes into Dude, Where’s My Car (I should note that I later endured the entire thing during a work trip in Detroit – beat going downtown by a mile, maybe 8 miles.  Anyway, by the end of the movie, aliens get involved in the plot.  Stay away for your own sake).

So what to go for?  Worried that you’ll mistakenly grab a crappy movie instead of a funny-bad one?  Put the training wheels on by getting a MST3K classic like Santa Claus versus the Martians or Pod People.  You’ll quickly get the feel and be ready to move on as a sophomore member.

You can rarely go wrong with crossover movies featuring pop stars (Glitter, Cold As Ice), rappers (anything directed by Master P is a lock), or athletes (Shazzam, Suburban Commando, Simon Sez).  If we’re lucky, Jessica Simpson might one day costar in a 50-Cent-directed action thriller featuring Terrell Owens.  That’d be off the chizzle.

Straight-to-video efforts by no-name directors with no budget thinking they can make up for an allowance-provided budget can work well, as American Movie taught us.  The no-money horror movie far and away owns BMOTM Club collection.  Makes sense, considering how incredibly hilarious the 70s/80s horror films have become over time.  Usually the good picks stand out in the horror movie section.  Rodentz (hide your cheese!) is easily an all-timer for me, with its paper-mache creature of fright, terminator-rat-eye shots, and endless bloopers passed off as scenes.

Sequels are clearly the goldmine though.  It’s like a guy in his thirties letting himself go.  Thought the above list has it all?  Take it to the next level with Jack Frost 2: Revenge of the Mutant Killer Snowman, The Dentist 2 (Truth or Tooth!), Sleepaway Camp 2: Happy Campers, Leprechaun: Back in da Hood, and others!  Another big one in our household was Bring It On 2.  Really classic stuff there.  Even Bond isn’t invincible.  The Dalton-piloted License to Kill is an abomination, featuring a Van-Damme styled plot, a tied-up Felix being fed to sharks by drug dealers (he’s okay!), Hispanic clichés across the board (the Mexican villain is introduced with a Spanish guitar riff in most scenes and can’t help but slip back into his native tongue when trying to say difficult English words like “Mister” or “Thank You” or “One moment please.”  Isn’t it strange how those words are always such a language barrier?), and more.  I’m telling you, Segal or Vin Diesel is filming the remake as we speak.  I honestly need to revisit this as its own topic – a few sentences couldn’t possibly cover how L2K is definitively the worst Bond Film ever made, including Never Say Never Again.  At least you can laugh at this one; Connery’s is just depressing.

There’s one final blue chip to look for in the BMOTM Club: the R-rated pornos.  When Showtime gets jealous of Skinemax but won’t totally cross the line, you get…Naked Ambition!  Or some of these other fine jems: Sex Court, The Sex Substitute (2), and more.  All the acting you’ve come to expect in an X, but with a laughable attempt at character development instead of 15 minute sex scenes!  Fantastic!  You may take this and try to tangent off into Lifetime original movies, but I would strongly caution against that ill-fated decision.

So, when you hit the video store this weekend (why in the world haven’t you gotten Netflix yet???) and are playing Russian Roulette with Derailed, Elizabethtown, The Man, and Rent, remember that you have an alternative.  Say no to time-wasting flicks and get yourself some real entertainment on the Bad Movie Train!

Goulash

2006-03-29T13:23:00.000-08:00

I briefly considered writing up a whole spiel on My First Mortgage to continue the Fischer Price series, but couldn’t convince myself that anyone in their right mind would get past the title.  So I’m going to land it here as the headliner of another grab bag.  Hmm.  Now that I think of it, maybe I should hide it in the middle.  You’ll never see it coming that way...

I’ll be happy when Bonds retires.  No reason other than getting past the endless carrying on about his steroids.  Yes, it sucks that he’ll probably overtake some of the most hallowed baseball milestones as a cheater.  But will history forget that?  Look at how Pete Rose’s legacy has been torched.  I think the biggest issue people have with Bonds is simple, and it’s not about his juicing.  No one can stand being lied to.  It’s like a wife that knows where her husband’s been.  Just tell me, we both know, just say it.

Absolutely fantastic March Madness this year.  You don’t have to really care one way or the other about the teams, but the games will just suck you in.  How many regulations have gone down to the wire with two squads that outright refuse to lose?  It’s also nice to see an outmatched team like GMU knock out major schools by putting their unit up against of collections of individual talent.

A lot of Pacer talk now that Jermaine is back.  Please.  This may be the most overrated franchise of the past decade.  They’ve NEVER gotten over the hump, and this team looks no better than any previous incarnations.  Swapping out a defensive force for Peja makes them a better playoff team?  Peja?  The same guy that develops vision problems in the clutch?   On the other end, there’s nonstop buzzard-circling over the Pistons now that they’ve lost some momentum and aren’t gunning for 70.  It’s the annual habit I had with Jordan’s Bulls, and was annually forced to watch them win despite my wishes.  With the Spurs hobbling some, the Suns limping, Dallas unproven, and the Heat still far below expectations, Detroit is still the obvious choice.

This is where I was going to warn against reading too much into Amare’s surprisingly strong 20 pt/20 min season debut, but was beaten to the punch when the Suns staff shelved him again.  He’s not injured, to be clear.  The trick with coming back from major injuries like this isn’t getting back to leaping and playing again, the trick is being able to recover quick enough to play 3 games a week again.  He can’t.  One of the alarming things happening during his rehab was soreness and swelling in his good knee and back trouble.  D’Antoni’s staff is making the smart decision to ensure his future health.

Hey, so I closed on a house this week.  Surprise!  Very anti-climatic, despite what all those Sallie Mae commercials led me to believe.  Maybe the wife and I will share a moment watching the bunny dart around his new mini-backyard.  The biggest thing for me was discovering how badly Mary Poppins misled me.  I was under the impression that banks stayed in business with the savings accounts of small children, and that you should feed the birds since it’s only toppins for a bag.  Well, ho ho ho.  Turns out mortgages may play a small role in the bank budget.  It all sounds so innocent and un-scary at first.  5.8% interest!  That’s only a few thousand dollars, not bad!  Then I sat down and crunched the numbers to see what the total loan repayment would be.  Nearly fell out of my chair.  Here’s what I’ve since garnered: front load until you’re relegated to eating 35-cents burritos.  Need to make it a little more real?  Take a mortgage and compare a 25% down 15 yr (fixed) repay versus a no-money-down 30:  the former has you on the hook for about 37 dollars in interest for every $100 of the total house price ($200k house --> ~$70k in interest).  Owch!  The latter?  You don’t even want to know (hint – you’ll effectively buy the house more than once).  Here’s the trick – if you double up on some payments and dump a big tax return onto the first year or two, you’ll cut into the principle which will slash the interest like a magic elixir.  The unfortunate truth is, we live in a world where this so much easier to realize than to implement.  Looking around, I don’t know too many people that could just toss in an extra few hundred a month on their mortgage, and if you could, I doubt that you’re that worried about interest.  Life can really suck.  But the Joes always told me that knowing was half the battle, so there you go.

In continued life sucks news, Mitchell Hurwitz has decided enough is enough with Arrested Development, which is most likely the nail in the coffin for the series.  No one seems interested in trying to continue without him and Showtime considered his invovlvment to be a key contingent for bringing the show over to their network.  There’s still faint hope for reconsideration or a film, but only faint.  The Season 3 DVD (2-disc) is expected to be released June 13th.   God speed!

Speaking of AD, we’ve got a TV to life jumper in Jessica Simpson pulling quite a Lindsay.  Turns out her Operation Smile interest came about through her hairstylist.  Her astoundingly for-show appearance in Washington with the organization really came across to me as a PR campaign in response to her pending divorce and revelations of her cheating.  Now she’s let it be known that she wants to adopt orphans a la Angelina and her publicist is letting the media know about all of the “anonymous” donating she does.  God bless celebrities.

Now that I’ve finally gotten through the first 4 seasons of The Shield, I can definitively say that this show runs rings around 24, even before the writing for Bauer & Co slid so badly this season.  What kills me is that now I’ll have to wait until Christmas to watch Season 5 on DVD, made worse by the fact that its finale had legions of people doing backflips and chatting about it for a solid week.  Ugh!  Grabbed the first disc of The Wire to see if it might work as our next show via Netflix, but we voted it off before the first episode finished.  Extremely realistic, but extremely boring because of it.  Sopranos it is!

NBA Draft Look-Over, Part 1

2006-03-28T16:01:00.000-08:00

Now that my daily reading of the NBA beat writers includes several pages devoted to whether fringe-2nd rounders will declare, I know it’s time to start some draft prospect watches.  I’ll throw out what I see when I watch some of the guys possibly coming out.  Who I like as pros, who I question at the next level.  Won’t be all-inclusive, since that’ll just increase the number of times I’d talk out of ignorance.

First, my ground rules: 1 - no mock drafts.  Even from experts they’re silly and less reliable than March Madness Brackets.  Once you’re past pick 4, it’s almost always a game of craps.
2 – I have my biases, and they will be in full effect.  The most notable of them: I devalue frosh and foreign guys because of the higher bust probability and the time it takes to develop them; combo guards are almost always 6-1 SGs or PGs with Iverson syndrome and rarely make teams better; if you didn’t know ahead of time that a 7-footer had star written all over him, he’s probably a thrown away pick; athleticism coupled with good height is everything.
3 – no foreign player chatter.  Very clearly, I haven’t seen any of these guys play of late.  Even if I had, our post-Dirk and –Peja foreign gold rush has established these guys as big a risk as high schoolers.  It’s been ugly the last few years, with teams taking on Euro scrubs like there was a quota: Sasha Pavlovic, Zoran Planinic, Tskitishvili, Boki Nachbar, Marko Jaric, Jiri Welsch, Rafael “Hoffa” Araujo, Andris Biedrins, Korolev, etc.  It’s getting bad.  In short, the points have been wretched floor generals that are only useful as haphazard scorers and the bigs have been pansy perimeter players.  Yes, if you pit a NHL-like USA vs the World NBA all-star game, I might be tempted to place money on the Yao-Dirk-Peja-Ginobili-Parker (Gasol off the bench!) squad.  But the odds of finding a guy overseas that’s ready to contribute are low.  The big name this year is a skinny 7-foot sharpshooter out of Italy, of course hyped as the next Dirk.  Paint me doubtful.

With the rules out of the way and in no particular order:
JJ Redick – Always the first guy that people want to talk about.  He should have a career in the league, but as a Eric Piakowski/Eddie Johnson niche player.  The best thing about him is that he’s got a Reggie-like ability to run through staggered screens all game and doesn’t depend on his devoid playmaking skills to create opportunities.  He’s only 6-4, but that’s taller than Ben Gordon.  Needs to be on a playoff team with a post player.

Adam Morrison – I have doubts about his transition to the next level.  He seems to throw himself into traffic and launch nothing but contested shots, and there’s no way he can get away with that against NBA defenses.  Does everything well, nothing great, and that could make him another Devean George.  He’ll be out-quicked on both sides of the floor by any 3 he meets.

Rudy Gay – Strikes me as a Caron Butler type.  Good shot but with limited range, classic SF size, surprisingly decent in the post, not much of a handle.  Would be a fantastic fit with the Bobcats but a disaster in Portland or Atlanta.

Lamarcus Aldridge – I really like him as a pro, though that could be the Texas bias talking.  The biggest reason is my aforementioned love of athletic guys with size.  He’s got a reputation for being soft, but can still get after boards and doesn’t simply depend on his size to get his shots.  When a guy like this has moves outside of “tip-in” and “alley-oop”, it’s a major plus.

Tyrus Thomas – This year’s biggest March stock leaper, aside from Noah.  Seems to have an NBA-ready body, but strikes me as an Antawn Jamison without the outside game.  I have to wonder if he’s simply out-talenting guys on the floor with no real discipline.  I can fully appreciate the hype and don’t think it’s off-base, but would love to see another year from him to justify the recent #1 pick talk.  This is why scouts and GMs prematurely gray.

Brandon Roy – A guy I would feel very safe picking in the draft.  Solid all-around SG with everything you’d want at the position, aside from one or two more inches.  Makes excellent snap judgements, quick reflexes, good shooter, playmaker, everything.  He might not be an All-Star, but he could start for someone today.

Josh McRoberts – A freshmen big with questionable footspeed?  I think this might qualify for one or two of my frowny-face stickers.  At no point in the tourney did I see him on the court looking like he could succeed at the next level.  Yet, there he is as a projected top-10 pick.

Shelden Williams, Josh Boone, and Hilton Armstrong – I think there’s a place for these guys in the NBA.  None of them have much of an offensive repertoire, but all have the look of the mythical rugged power forward that every team in the league seems to be desperate for.  Ben Wallace and Dennis Rodman proved that offense doesn’t matter if you can secure boards and play defense, and I think this trio would fit the bill as a complimentary frontcourt addition in the Udonis Haslem mold.

Ronnie Brewer – The perfect opposite of JJ Redick.  Gifted playmaker and ballhandler at the 2, but with the ugliest shot since Anthony Mason.  Decent defense with good size.  In a league with too many one-dimensional scorers, he could really help as a distributer.  I wouldn’t recommend the inevitable attempt to convert him to  point guard, though.

Marcus Williams – My pick for the top point guard in the draft, primarily because he can play the position, unlike his shot-oriented peers Foye and Rondo.  He’s no Jason Kidd or Steve Nash, in that he can make some horrifyingly bad judgements in high-pressure situations.  It’s possible that he won’t become much more than a bench guy.

Joakim Noah – From “who” to top-3 talk.  The wife thinks she’ll have a great WNBA career.  He has a chance to make it as another Camby, but don’t forget how bad Gumby was on the boards his first 4 years.  I just can’t picture him starting for anyone for a while, and keep in mind that Jenny Craig companion Hakim Warrick has been virtually AWOL as a Grizzly this year.

Rodney Carney – A senior swingman with serious explosiveness, but is a rather streaky shooter from the outside and could get exposed against ball-hawks when he goes into his helter-skelter offensive mindset: he doesn’t have the ballhandling or smart shot selection needed to get away with his Kobe impressions.

Randy Foye – Amazing offense that covers up the fact that he’s one of a million SGs masquerading as points.  At 6-4, he could get away with a Bobby Jackson/David Wesley game, but he needs a coaching staff that will use him correctly.

Dogs, Cats, and Rabbits

2006-03-23T10:49:00.000-08:00

Got hit with a double shot of I Hate You juice Saturday night - Phoney Friend Jane came over to drop off her mangy cat for the week cause she's tagging along with her parents on a cruise. Wife swears I okayed it, but I had to have been watching LOST or a game and was in "uh-huh, uh-huh, sure, sounds fine" cruise control when that happened.

I’m sure a lot of it has to do with Jane being one of those friends that isn’t really a friend that we all put up with in life.  Known the wife for two decades, but doesn’t call on birthdays or when someone’s in the hospital.  Just shows up occasionally when she wants a favor.  So she sucks.  And having a cat brought into the house was a cathartic moment for me – I got definitive understanding that I would never be the owner of one of these misbegotten creatures again.

I did have a cat once.  In college, I ran across a perfectly black kitten and unlawfully adopted it via Ted and Curtis, who had a lodge on campus.  Remembering that, Ted got me a replica for Christmas a few years ago, whom I named Azrael for its arch-angelic look and demeanor.  I have some fond memories: the shave and a bath in which I discovered that a wet cat resembled a cobra and would strike like one (nearly lost my thumb), and the fun play wrestling.  If you’re worried about all the past tense, Azrael is still above ground; I had to give her up because my roommate was allergic.  Still, I don’t want to go down that path again.

As much someone may love cats, you can’t argue that you have to put up with a lot: they’re inherently whiney and fussy creatures, their litter odor is a stench that would send homeless out the door, and the claws slice your arm like butter if they’re not removed.  Cats offer their owners ridiculously little in return – your best reward is that they’ll rub on you, even though that’s far more about them getting a massage than saying I love you.  Better have a change of clothes, too, cause you just became a walking hairpiece.

I’ve been a lifetime dog guy, which probably invalidates this whole argument for all the twisted cat lovers.  Republican and Democrat, Dog and Cat.  Strange, the battles that matter to us.  Anyway, dogs are infinitely superior companions: fiercely loyal, will protect you and yours, understand and obey the words out of your mouth (some more than others), and reserve the barking for either perceived threats or (this is huge!) giving you a let-me-out-before-I-unload-on-the-carpet alert.  They’re thinking about you.  Cats are thinking about them.  Cat lovers cling to the dogs-as-lemmings cry, but hey; I want my pets and my friends to look out for me.  Independent types can feel free to wander the 4 corners like Kwai Chang Caine or David Banner.  (play piano theme)

Another key part of my no-more-cats decision as been my experience as a rabbit owner.  I’m not really a fan of any pet that has to stay encapsulated (fish, hamsters, ants) since they don’t offer much in return, which you may be realizing is a crucial point in my book.  So I was wary of how this would work out, but I’ve been awfully surprised at how nice a pet our rabbit is: litter trained with a bonus of dry odorless poop, no shedding, no barking/meowing or neediness, nothing to endure!  He recognizes us and comes over to be petted, is fine with being picked up, and is semi-playful over on the coach. Best apartment pet I could imagine!  No guilt leaving him in his playpen during the day or even overnight.

Now I would still go for a dog first and foremost: their plus/minus differential is the greatest of the three, with cats sitting in the red.  Peerless Petability.  But the message here is this: the next time you’re thinking of getting a small apartment companion, walk away from the cat.  As to my personal purgatory, which will last another few days, start taking your bets on when I go Dutch Wagenbach after one too many meows.  Though I got a little bit of satisfaction the other day: the wife, in one of her attempts to get the rabbit and cat on good terms, allowed the cat to wander over to bunny’s pen only for it to get slammed by our rabbit’s front paw pounding attack (Mortal Kombat combo: down-over-left + A, B, R).  Keep that pecking order straight.

I’ll Take the Reins, Paul

2006-03-22T12:57:00.000-08:00

With Tagliabue’s surprising announcement that he is stepping down this summer as NFL commissioner, I think it’s time for my ascent to global overlord to begin.  NFL commish seems like a good first step to me.  It’s not a broken system at all, but there are a few major rust spots that I’d like to overhaul.  This’ll let millions of Americans see how great things can be when I’m given unchecked authority.

First off, the notion of parity was the worst memo to ever go through the board of governors.  We might as well have GMs line up all 1600-odd players and re-pick teams each year.  I for one am getting tired of it.  I want rivalries.  I want superpowers.  When the Olympics come around, I can look forward to US vs Russia clashes.  When the World Cup comes, I like knowing that Germany, Brazil, Italy, and England are going to come with a thunder.  It’s helpful in my March Madness brackets to know Duke will be in the Final Four.  We need teams we can depend on to love or hate.  No one gives a flip about the Arizona Cardinals, yet it wouldn’t surprise me if they were in the 2008 Superbowl thanks to parity.  No one wants that.  We want butt-kickers, and if that means some cities are perpetual butts, so be it.  The Kansas City Royals haven’t gone anywhere and the Atlanta Hawks are somehow still in business, so I don’t see a need to rotate NFL champions to give every fanbase a turn.

The center of parity stems from the hard cap and revenue sharing.  I’m not looking to abolish these two things; I actually appreciate them to a good degree.  The Yankees and Knicks are examples of what’s wrong with the MLB and NBA systems, with payrolls that triple the league averages.  However, a system that forces teams to cut major pieces each year needs work.  The Cowboys drop Larry Allen?  Without the obligatory suitcase full of uncut crack cocaine?   Shameful.  And let’s see a raise of hands from those that get ill when trying to figure out all of the funny economics involved with restructured contracts and bonuses to cook the books for this hard cap.  It’s got to stop.  Here’s what I propose:

Keep the hard cap, though it will need to be adjusted to maintain players receiving 56% of revenue after my subsequent changes take effect.

Keep revenue sharing as it is currently conceived: based on licensing, TV rights, and other league-wide sources. Knock down the shared ticket sales shared from a third to a quarter. Revenue sharing should ensure that every team can financially meet the cap, which it currently does.

(Here’s where I start swinging the hammer) No more backloaded deals – 10% annual raises max. This means no more players being cut over ballooned final years or teams promising money that will never be there. This should also cut down on a reworked deals.

Bonuses are limited to 30% of total contract value (player agents will lose it with this). Now again, the cap will get adjusted and total player revenue doesn’t go away. Plus a key idea is to knock down the number of roster cuts each year, meaning that players get their cash. Point with this is to get rid of the shenanigans involved with Dan Snyder and Jerry Jones moving bonus figures around like they were overseas shell corporations. A bonus should be a bonus; not an under-the-table contract. I may even choose to flip things around and make the bonuses all non-guaranteed annual roster bonuses and the base becomes guaranteed. Haven’t made a firm decision yet, but I’m leaning toward it.

To encourage team cohesiveness, draft picks get an exception to the above rule with 40% signing bonuses if they stay with their original team after their rookie deal.

On the other side of the table, teams get a crack in the hard cap: a luxury tax that is capped at 20% above the real cap, and is a $3 per $1 penalty (penalty becomes shared revenue). It’s not much, and it’s a poison pill, but it’s also a release valve for those that are missing that one last piece or need just a little more room to keep their team intact. The Patriots shouldn’t have to bleed off two franchise guys until it’s time to turn off the lights and rebuild.

The Franchise tag has to be agreed upon by both the player and team. That or lose it altogether and replace it with more restricted free agency. It’s like watching a hooker try to walk away from an abusive pimp. Give players the right to include an out clause to enter RFA partway through their contracts. If they’re underpaid, they can shop for value, and the team can’t lose them without compensation or a right to match.

This is what you’ll get from me as commissioner of the NFL. Teams that can have eras again instead of fluke titles. Let teams stay together and you’ll have legendary runs and hot rivalries. No more cap bloodshed and no more token musical chairs system for champions. Because otherwise, you know that the Saints are going to be phoney Super Bowl winners in 2007. So please, this week, write me in as your 2006 NFL commissioner candidate.

Out of Fuel

2006-03-14T11:56:00.000-08:00

So my Rockets lay an egg last night against the Nets and may have pulled the plug on their postseason chase in the process.  It was already a steep hill after wallowing at the bottom of the conference for much of the year, and it may finally be lights out.  The Rockets would need to go 14-4 the rest of the way to garner a tepid 43-win season and maintain a sliver of hope that the Lakers might fall apart, but it’s doubtful either scenario will unfold.  The Rockets face harrowing matchups against their conference leading in-state rivals next without Tracy McGrady, who is possibly done for the year because of a bulging disc in his back.

In any case, I figure I may as well not put off writing the obituary.  The obvious is that Houston’s season was essentially over by January, marred primarily because of injuries to McGrady and Yao that were both major and staggering, leaving the roster one-handed for over half of the year.  Still, why did no one seem to step up?  Was the roster that shallow?  Was the coaching not up to the task?  Wait…hold on…it’s….REPORT CARD TIME!

I would not incriminate:
-Dawson: a GM is your negotiator that finalizes deals. The coach has a large amount of input on what type of players to bring in, and the GM needs to make it happen for value (contract or trade). CD has done a fine job, IMO. The only bad contract on the roster (Juwan) came as part of the price for McGrady.  B+

-Yao: growing into an elite center, not just relative to today’s players, but historically (PPG per season: 13.5, 17.5, 18.3, 21.8). He's not far away, and the Ric Smits stuff can be tossed in the trash pile.  Leads the league not only in scoring at the center position (yes, that includes Shaq) but as the target of critics that talk out of both sides of their mouth.  A

-McGrady: you can't play through a slipping disc in your back. Anyone that thinks he could or should needs to moonlight in an orthopedic clinic for a week. My only hope is that he properly treats it before he walks down the path of Larry Johnson.  B

-Alston: he's done a great job since getting over his fibular fracture. Mike James can pile up points and 3s, but he can't run an offense.  Skip can.  B-

-Howard: been playing smart and effectively all year, with nothing but professionalism and stepping up with some 20-point nights when we've been decimated.  B

-Hayes: scrappy guy who's playing above most expectations. By rights, he should be a practice only guy, but his hustle on the boards has been fantastic.  B-

-Wesley: his wheels have fallen off, but he's given everything left in the tank.  C+
-Barry, Anderson, Sura: Likewise, when you're done you're done.  INC

In between:
Luther Head - he's a rookie, so he gets a pass, but he's got to smooth out his game. Avg'ed 8 PPG, but he isn't a 8ppg guy: he's 15 ppg combo guard that is a ghost for week+ long stretches. Part of that is his youth, part of it is indecision on JVG's part regarding his role as a 2 or a 1. He's a keeper either way, but his progress will determine if he's a bench guy or future starter.  C+

Bogans - nothing impressive either way. Good defense, limited offense, can't comment on his character yet.  C

Mutombo - minutes are declining, but that's mostly because Yao's been so hot. C+

Focus of my disappointment:
Stromile Swift - the only good thing about him right now is his contract is a good value. The majority of local fans were determined to keep their heads in the sand regarding his Memphis track record, but lo and behold he's every bit the tantalizing talent & underachiever here. Minutes are on par with his time in blue, but his numbers are barely on par with his career averages. Absolutely disinterested in hitting the boards. Meanders on defensive rotations and switches. But puts down one or two terrifying slams a game to keep half of the fanbase thinking that making him a starter with big minutes is the only thing keeping him from being Amare Stoudamire.  D

Jeff Van Gundy - Let's start off by noting my absence in any in-game Fire Gundy chants at the Toyota Center. That said, a ton of blame lands on his shoulders for this season. Two general reasons why I feel so:(a) his push on Dawson for older players. Rudy was obsessed with bigs that played on the perimiter like himself, JVG wants grizzled vets for role players. Unfortunately, this saps the team of athleticism and quickness, sticks us with guys that are out of gas, and has taken precedence over real niche needs (shooting). As a result, McGrady (when 100%), Head (maybe), and Alston are the only players on the roster able to get around their man or hope to stay in front of him on the other end. Our defensive rotations are horrible because guys just don't have the footspeed to make them. Our scoring hits a brickwall when there is no one on the court that can create their own shot, let alone for others.(b) resistance to adjust to his roster. There are two kinds of coaches in the league - ones that install a system with the postseason in mind (JVG, Phil, Pop, Brown) and those that focus on maximizing the strengths of the roster (Don Nelson, Doc Rivers, etc). JVG is therefore stubborn to allow adjustments that go away from what he feels is necc for a championship (ex. his reluctance to put Yao in the high post as a passing center). That stubborness contributed to the collapse when Yao and McGrady missed so many games. He is adverse to bandaid solutions, even short term, and it may have cost us the few games we need for an 8th seed.  D+

All that said, I can live with writing this season off as snakebit. Bring in some fresher legs, especially a SG that can drill with range, and we should be just fine next year. There's little you can do when your top two players both miss a third of your games.