Owners vs. Players- As we head toward the one month mark in the NFL lockout that can’t technically be called a lockout there was a slight bit of good news that came out on Sunday afternoon in that a judge will be ordering the NFL and its players to begin mediation at some point this week. I may have missed something but it seems that one of the issues preventing both sides from getting together to mediate was a disagreement on where to meet and discuss the future of the NFL. Obviously the location of where the players and the NFL meet is an incredibly stupid thing to argue about but its not like they really have any more serious priorities to resolve do they? For once I’m going to agree with the NFL and not the players in this one because the NFL wants to mediate in Washington D.C. while the players want to mediate in Minnesota. Why Minnesota of all places? The only explanation for the players choosing Minnesota for mediation is that Adrian Peterson was in charge of location selection but even this is a stretch, who likes anywhere in Minnesota over Los Angeles, Miami, Eugene (ok maybe this is a stretch), or a hundred other cities. I digress, this forced mediation is a step in the right direction but this doesn’t guarantee that an agreement will be reached anytime in the near future, translation don’t get your hopes up too much.
Now on to everyone’s favorite part, the Madden cover-voting breakdown. The white running back continued its shocking underdog story with both Peyton Hillis and Danny Woodhead advancing to the Elite Eight, unfortunately still no comment from the endangered species committee if the white running back will be taken off the endangered species list. Peyton Hillis (51% fan voting) advanced past Matt Ryan (49%) in a game for the ages that will live on for future generations through ESPN Classic replays. If you were wondering which matchup certainly won’t be on ESPN Classic it would be the week 1 matchup of Matt Ryan (89%) advancing past Jordan Gross (11%), further proving that there are no Carolina Panther fans. Quick side note I might be the only person on the whole West coast with any Panther apparel as I chose a half price Panther sweatshirt over a half price Cleveland Browns sweatshirt a couple years ago. If you were wondering yes, this is the moment that I regret the most in my life. Team Johnson who placed three Johnsons; Andre, Stevie, and Calvin, in the tournament has been eliminated, I still maintain that if you want your son to go the NFL just name him Johnson. Upon further review I think that naming your son Johnson also gives him the best chance to make it in the NBA so the bottom line is if you want to live off your kids later in life name them Johnson. Looking back on the bracket the one thing that I wish had changed was the Bears having Jay Cutler as their representative instead of their actual representative Julius Peppers. This would have been hilarious I’m quite sure that after what Cutler did during the playoffs, which may have been justified but no one cares, opposing fans would have voted Cutler to the Madden Cover just to spite Cutler and the Bears. Good news for Cutler is that Rory McIlroy after his Masters performance has passed him as the person I mention when I screw up in the clutch, which is never but if I were to hypothetically screw up I would now say “I pulled a McIlroy” instead of “I pulled a Cutler”, I’m sure Cutler is rejoicing.
Because I’ve already run out of NFL and Madden stuff to talk about I will include my thoughts on the Masters in the Owners vs. Players section, if including golf in the NFL section doesn’t spur the NFL to end the lockout before fans lose interest I don’t know what will. Sunday was the only time in my life that I actually thought I had to be watching golf or I would be missing something. Some of this had to do with Tiger being in the chase for a Major but even with Tiger falling out of it at the end the roommates and I stayed glued to the Masters as it came down to the final hole. Sorry I lied most of it had to do with the competition between myself and friends about whose three person squad could register the lowest combined score and take the forty buck prize. Unfortunately team Waterman ended away a far away second place, 14 strokes behind 1st place, but it wasn’t all bad as I was able to recoup half of my buy in due to my team registering the lowest combined round on Friday. As hinted at before Rory McIlroy, who entered Sunday with a four-stroke lead, enjoyed a truly legendary meltdown by shooting eight strokes over par on Sunday en route to finishing outside of the top 15. If you ever want to look up the definition of choking watch McIlroy’s three hole stretch in which he registered a combined plus eight strokes, the other definitions of choking are the 2001 Blazers blowing a fifteen point lead in the fourth quarter of game 7 and the 2004 Yankees losing four straight to the Red Sox in the ALCS. Not the best day for McIlroy, who is only 21 years old, but I think he gained infinitely more fans with the way he handled himself after he finished than he would have if he had won the tournament. Tiger Woods who is still golf’s main attraction, didn’t disappoint on Sunday as he used a hot start early to tie himself for the lead before fading to his eventual position of fourth, three strokes behind the leader. I’m convinced that the 99.98% of viewers thought that Tiger was going to win after he became a co-leader but it just wasn’t meant to be as Tiger missed too many short putts to keep up with those he was tied with. The .02% of viewers that thought Tiger wasn’t going to win was the families of the other golfers, seriously no one thought Tiger wasn’t going to win. Even though he didn’t win it was great to see him back on the prowl (cheesiness alert) and seeing Tiger walking down the fairway dressed in his Sunday red ranks up there as one of the cooler sites in sports.
NBA- Were still not quite to the playoffs but at least we now know who the sixteen teams will be. This week I’ll give out awards, some real and some fictional, and next week I will try and predict out the playoffs and the winner of the NBA finals (Blazers!!!).
MVP- LeBron James
Derrick Rose is probably going to win the MVP largely due to the media becoming infatuated with him at the midpoint in the season but I would still vote James as the MVP of the league. I think that basketball is the one major sport where statistics don’t give the whole picture, but James throwing up a line of 26 points, 7 rebounds, and 7 assists per game can only be described as remarkable. There isn’t a true definition for MVP but I think the best way to look at it is if you replaced James with any other elite player at his position how would the Heat fare? Kevin Durant is the best small forward besides James and while I think he would be successful on the Heat I don’t think he or anyone else brings anything close to what James brought to the Heat this year. James along with Wade had to do everything for the Heat this year as it was 2.5 guys for the Heat (Bosh only gets half points) against the opposing five every night. James had to be basically everything on every night; a playmaker, scorer, lockdown defender, and rebounder, or else the Heat weren’t winning. On the other hand if you replace Rose with Chris Paul, Deron Williams, or Russell Westbrook I’m not sure if the Bulls would be any different. Rose is a great scorer and does bring his A game in the clutch but I don’t think he’s even close to as valuable to the Bulls as LeBron is to the Heat.
Most Improved Player- LaMarcus Aldridge
Yes this is a biased pick but the difference between Aldridge this season and the past few seasons is stunning. With the announcement that Brandon Roy was going to be missing significant time due to his knees being incurably screwed up many including myself wrote the Blazers off as contenders. Instead Aldridge put the Blazers on his back highlighted by averaging 27 points and 9 rebounds during the month of February. Everyone knew that he was the Blazers only scoring option but that didn’t stop him and on a nightly basis he threw up 20 plus points against defenses geared to stop him. This ones easy in my book, no one improved more than he did, he went from a nice complimentary player to a bona fide number one option.
Most Disappointing Team- Milwaukee Bucks
They were viewed as a certain playoff team preseason after making the playoffs last season and adding Corey Maggette and Drew Gooden to their roster in the offseason, instead they will be watching the playoffs from home. Even though they endured a terrible streak of injuries there is no way that this team should be missing the playoffs in the Eastern Conference.
Team That Played on National Television the Least- Toronto Raptors
I’m not sure but by my unofficial calculations they were the only team that didn’t log a single national television appearance. Then again a roster headlined by Andrea Bargnani doesn’t exactly scream must watch TV so really we should be thanking television executives for not putting us through a Raptors game. For those that are wondering the winner of this award in the other two major sports leagues would be the Pittsburgh Pirates (never seen a Pirate game on TV) for the MLB and the Buffalo Bills of the NFL.
Rookie of the Year- Blake Griffin
No explanation needed here.
Coach of the Year and Executive of the Year- Tom Thibodeau and Gar Forman of the Bulls
This is a joint effort as Forman (general manager of the Bulls) and Thibodeau have both done a great job making the Bulls legitimate contenders for the championship. The Bulls brought in eight new rotation players in the offseason and Thibodeau was able to mold this new roster into a powerhouse defensive team that looks like it will claim the number one playoff seed in the East. Not bad for a team that was supposed to be a year away from truly contending.
Worst Player in the NBA- Sean Marks
Even though he is now unemployed Sean Marks time on the Blazers ensured that he would be the runaway winner of this award. He seems like a nice enough guy but there is no way that he should be playing in the NBA. I don’t think that he has one skill that could even be described as below average he is truly awful at everything. The best part of the Gerald Wallace trade from at least in my eyes was actually sending him to Charlotte.
Player That Ruined My Fantasy Basketball Team- Darren Collison
This was actually the award that was the hardest for me to determine but Collison came away with it in the end of Gerald Wallace. Wallace made the list because I had a friend draft my first round for me and instead of taking Amare Stoudamire sixth overall he drafted Wallace who might even be a stretch in the second round. As for Collison he came in with way too much hype and of course I fell for it and he proceeded to sleepwalk through the season. This award also doubles as my time to vent for my fantasy failures.
Strangest Moment of the Year- Drew Gooden registering a triple double
Of all the players to register a triple double I’m 100% sure that Gooden is the one name on the list that doesn’t belong, I’m pretty sure that the glamour of a triple/double has all but disappeared after Gooden got one this past week. Gooden has always been a good scorer and rebounder but his career average of 1.1 assist per game says it all. I’m interested in watching the tape of this game just to see what the hell the other defense was doing that night, seriously a Gooden triple/double makes zero sense. Upon further review the opposing team was the Cleveland Cavaliers; it all makes sense now.
MLB- Were only in week two of the regular season, unfortunately this means that Mariners have eliminated themselves from the playoffs. After winning their first two games the Mariners have lost their past seven including most recently getting swept in their first home series to the mighty Cleveland Indians. I actually had the Mariners lasting less than a week until they were eliminated from playoff contention so they surpassed my expectations. Bad news for the Mariners is that they might have some contention for worst team in the American League as the Tampa Bay Rays have opened up with a superior 1 win and 8 loss record, don’t worry I still give the Mariners the edge to be the worst team in the American League. My roommate summing up how bad the Mariners are, “It’s that bad that the Cy Young winner (King Felix) isn’t even guaranteed getting the Mariners a win.” Of course this isn’t any of his doing but just how truly awful the Mariner offense is. I’m not a huge Mariner fan by any measure but after watching him pitch I’m always left wondering what his stats would be if he pitched for a contender. He won the Cy Young last year with a record of 13 wins and 12 losses with an ERA of 2.27 and 232 strikeouts. The Mariners only getting him 13 wins last year was an utter embarrassment and just shows how futile their offense was. Of course over the off-season the Mariners decided to do nothing about their offense, makes sense right? Bold prediction the Mariners will get no-hit or perfect gamed this year, guarantee it. I understand the Mariners can’t trade him because they could never get full value for him and Felix and Ichiro are the only reason that people still go to Mariner games but I kind of wish that they would trade him so he gets the press and wins he deserves. Its kind of like Zach Grienke when he won the Cy Young on the Royals, what an accomplishment that nobody watched because the Royals were so awful and weren’t ever on TV. In related news the Texas Rangers will stroll to the AL West crown, they’re too good offensively to not win this division by 10+ games. Its only week 2 but its pretty funny to see the Cleveland Indians and Kansas City Royals as the leading teams in the AL Central, neither of these teams is very good but I think the Royals can at least contend for a .500 record this year. I might have just pulled something from writing too much this early in the MLB season, you have to remember it’s all about pacing.
Brick Throwing Competition- UCONN 53 Butler 41
First and foremost this was an ugly game, there is no debating this. Butler shot a tad over 18 percent, which is quite remarkable considering that they were shooting at 15 percent with three minutes left in the game, quite the improvement if you ask me. Then there’s the matter of Butler only scoring one basket in the paint, UCONN may be a good defensive team but there’s no way there this good. The worst statistic for Butler was the fact that they had 2 more field goals (12) than UCONN blocks (10), you can’t make these statistics up this shouldn’t happen. It’s not even like Kemba Walker beat them, Butler just couldn’t score to save their life. Not trying to brag but I’m pretty sure that the Wet Bandits could have surpassed 41 points (I’m dead serious) but we definitely would have given up more than 53. There’s really not much else to say here, not the best way to end an otherwise phenomenal NCAA tournament. Side note how many sports fans can relate to Butler fans? As an Oregon fan I can tell you that it sucked (duh) losing the national title game and I can’t imagine losing twice in a row. The only fans off the top of my head that can relate to this are fans of the Buffalo Bills in the early 90’s when they lost three straight title games.
The Week Moving Forward
Owners vs. Players- As I write this there is a little less than 18 days left until the NFL Draft, which is hard to get excited about considering there might not be a season next year. My only thoughts on this are that the Panthers should take a QB, either Cam Newton or Blaine Gabbert, with the first pick, Jimmy Clausen isn’t the answer at QB. Plus if they don’t take a QB I’m pretty sure star wide receiver Steve Smith might kill someone, this should be incentive enough. I think this should be pretty straightforward logic, if you are returning a QB from the worst team in the league you need to change something. The one exception to this rule is the Texans in 2006 but they don’t even really count because they traded for a QB, Matt Schuab, instead of drafting one. You could even argue that they should have taken a QB because they haven’t made the playoffs since they drafted defensive end Mario Williams with the first overall pick in 2006. As for the rest of the draft I really don’t care but it would be nice to see the Seahawks grab a QB with their first round pick.
NBA- The last week of the regular season carries some serious playoff seeding ramifications but the real spotlight will be on the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Minnesota Timberwolves as they duel it out for the worst team in the NBA. I have often referred to the Cavaliers as a D-League team, which now seems a little unfair since they are actually tied for the worst team in the league. I hope the Cavaliers end up with the number one pick because I don’t want the Timberwolves to take another PG in the first round. Side note I find it a little unreal that an NBA All-Star (Kevin Love) could play for the worst team in the NBA. Does an All-Star really lead his team to the worst record in the NBA? I’m thinking the answer should be no but in his defense Love’s supporting cast is pretty bad.
MLB- I think I threw my arm out writing too much in the MLB recap column so unfortunately I have nothing to provide here.
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