Friday, November 30, 2007

Thursday, November 29, 2007

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

The Heat Is Gone

After each Heat win this season, the local Miami papers run rampant with stories of this years team turning the corner or how the squad is finally gelling, but I am still not buying it. I watched last nights game, a game in which Riley finally made some lineup changes, with pride as the Heat ended up on the better side of a blowout for the first time all year, but lets be reminded that it was still against the Charlotte Bobcats. Yes, the Bobcats had beaten the Heat twice already this season, but both of those games were without Dwayne Wade, and we know that Dwayne by himself accounts for 20+ wins. Now this is not to say that there were not some major positives from this game to build on, but not enough to say that this ship has found its course.

POSITIVES: Bringing Ricky Davis and Jason Williams off of the bench really gives the second unit a burst of scoring and energy. If Williams plays the way he did last night continually, then we have by far the best backup point guard in the league. He was in control, while still pushing the tempo, and looked for his shot a lot more. With Davis as the main scoring option for the second unit, he gives Wade a needed rest. Davis can really score on anyone, and that is really what a sixth man is primarily looked at to do. He was 2nd in sixth man of the year voting a few years back, so he is comfortable in the position. Add in Alonzo Mourning and rookie Daquan Cook and the Heat have a really strong bench. Cook really showed me something last night, by hitting outside shots and taking it to the hoop strong. One of the announcers put it best; 'He reminds you of a young Byron Scott'. It looks like the Heat got a gem in the draft.

NEGATIVES: You can't have the positives without the negatives and nowhere is this clearer than this new starting lineup. So inserting Penny and Chris Quinn worked for one game, but lets look a bit closer. Quinn is 0-7 from the 3 point line on the year, so unless he starts getting comfortable and hitting shots where does he help us? He can handle the ball, but he is not a great defender, and does not appear to be a great shooter, so I can't see him staying in the game long. Good point guards will eat him alive night in and night out. The dearth at point guard is not a surprise though, as it has been mentioned all year. Heat fans better keep praying that a team like the Kings just want to unload Mike Bibby for some expiring contracts, so they can fast pace their youth movement. So while Quinn has struggled to make a jump shot, Penny has surprisingly been hitting his. He is shooting the best he ever has for his career, which is nice to see for a guy who has been fighting a battle with mother nature since the early 90's. As time took away his body, it could not take his mind, which is his biggest strength by far. He still knows when guys are open and how to get them the ball, and he has been good on defense up to this point. I don't think you can count on him to slow a guy like Lebron James, but that is when we go to Davis. There is always room for a savvy veteran on any team of mine, but to have him in the starting lineup each night is pushing it a bit, when that is all they have to rely on.

OVERALL: Pat Riley knows that this team is nowhere close to perfect so he is trying to tinker with the lineup and rotations in hope of catching lightning in a bottle, and I have to give him credit for that. After all this is a team that he put together so he has to find a way to make it work. I just don't think he can make it work unless he finds another point guard and small forward that can start. It is one thing to have a good bench to complement your starting lineup, but to have a good bench at the expense of your starting lineup is going to bite you in the rear at some point.

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

GOD Levels The Playing Field...



and the Dolphins still find a way to lose.

Friday, November 16, 2007

Hot Topics

Wow, I am not sure that the sports world has ever seen a day like it did on Thursday. A-Rod resigns, #2 Oregon losses, and Barry Bonds is indicted on federal perjury charges. Where does one start on a day like this?

-Oregon became the fifth team this year to be #2 in the College Football polls, and they are the fifth team to lose. USC, California, South Florida, Boston College are the other teams that climbed to #2, and USC is the only one that is still ranked in the top 10. I would say that their ranking, like all the #2 rankings this year, comes by default. With so much parity amongst programs this has been the toughest year to pick who is worthy of a top 10 spot. Oregon was a team that finally seemed worthy of the spot, but when Heisman hopeful Dennis Dixon was lost for the season, so went Oregon's hopes. Dixon had become the front runner for the Heisman Trophy, which like #2 is up in the air. I guess Kansas becomes #2, but with the toughest part of their schedule coming up, I predict we will see another #2 before the season ends.

-Alex Rodriguez agrees in principle to a 10 year 275 million dollar contract. This contract was negotiated without A-Rod's agent Scott Boras being involved. The Yankees saw Boras as a hindrance in making the deal, due to his history of long holdouts and playing teams against each other. The Yanks did not want to hear Boras try to over inflate Rodriguez's value, which seems to never hit the point that they had imagined it would be. While teams loved his production, there just are not many teams who have enough money to pay him. Therefore at the end of the day, the Yankees were the only true suitor.

-Barry Bonds was indicted on federal perjury charges, for lying about taking steroids. I think the biggest surprise is that it took them this long to make the case. Bonds is now the Home Run King, so baseball will have to figure out how to handle the situation come Hall of Fame time. I find it interesting that the Home Run King and the All Time Hits Leader, Pete Rose, both would be kept out of the Hall of Fame.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Photo Of The Day


MANNING SMELLING HIS OWN FART...I MEAN LOSS!

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Photo Of The Day

Has it really been 5 years since McNair was a Pro Bowler? With 2 touchdowns and 4 interceptions in 6 games this year, it is time for McNair to hang it up.

On my Christmas List

My family and I like the "no-guess" Christmas. We post our wish-list on Amazon and call it a day. After years and years of ill-fitting Care Bear underwear from our parents, we decided choosing our own presents is the wise route. And we have not been disappointed. When in doubt a gift-card, is our motto.

Too bad Amazon doesn't have a Wish-List for this beaut.


A Red Sox t-shirt for my fave relief pitcher, Jonathan "Papelboner" Papelbon. Now that celebrates Christ's birth!

Monday, November 12, 2007

Episode 10: Kiss My Asterisks



Listen HERE






The Idiots are hopped up on Halloween candy so get ready for a show! (Tim dressed up as a sexy cat, Jackie was Manny Ramirez, Producer Mark dressed up as our long-lost Episode 4.5 MP3 file.) We begin with the Hitlist: Giving birth then running a marathon, the unholy union of Michelle Tanner and Livestrong Douchie, the good times in Boston, and Jackie tries a new candy, the Hershey Dark with Almonds, Cranberries and Blueberries LIVE on air! (It sucks worse than ARod's post-season record.) Jackie is happy because there is so much to talk about with Boston sports. Even though Don Shula is getting his Viagra boner all bent out of shape about the Pats. Who cares about 1972? And Tim doesn't need Viagra to get a boner 'cause it's NBA time! He offers some predicitions and sheds a tear because Jackie watched an entired Celtics game. And Mazel Tov to Tim and his fiancee. I hope she likes basketball!

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

BIG TEN to quit sports

With the football teams struggling to get their footing this year (except for Ohio St), the Big Ten conference was looking forward to the basketball season. In the span of 10 days 2 top 10 teams went down in exhibition games to Division II schools. This is just unacceptable if you are a Big Ten official. Remember, the football season starting with the Michigan stunner, and now your two top basketball teams, Ohio St and Michigan St, can't handle their business at home against D-2 schools.
My first thought last night when I heard that Findlay beat Ohio St, was that it must have been Finland beating them. Now Finland is not a basketball powerhouse, but it is a country, therefore having a large selection of players to put on one team. However, this was not Finland, but University of Findlay, the #5 ranked team in the D-2 polls, taking down Ohio St 70-68. This is a low point for the Big Ten, when their dominance of their big sports comes into question.
Maybe athletes are getting better at all levels, so it was only a matter of time until parity played its way consistently into mainstream sports. Looking around at the landscape of college sports, and it is easy to see this trend taking place. No longer do we see the dynasty's coming into play. No longer are we assured of big name programs that dominate the preseason polls, being there at the end of the year. It wasn't long ago that South Florida was ranked #2 in the BCS polls, while Miami and Florida St were not even in the top 25. Welcome to a new world of college athletics, where parity is the name of the game. I for one welcome this, cause it means that kids are putting in the effort in High School, and no matter where they end up playing, they are going to give it their all.

Thursday, November 1, 2007

The Literary Criticism Of Bud Selig

Here is an excerpt of an interview with Bud Selig. This part of the interview was not included in the final article (The author's name, the publication are omitted to protect my anonymous source. But don't doubt it: its real). Here Selig weighs in on baseball and 20th century post-war American literature:



Q: Are you at all aware of Jack Kerouac's baseball connection?

Selig: No.

Q: Do you know who Jack Kerouac is?

Selig: No.

Q: I didn’t think so.

Selig: Do you?

Q: Of course. He was one of the great Beat writers of all time. He wrote a book called On The Road.

Selig: I know every beat writer in the land. Where was he a beat writer?

Q: Not a beat, Beat, like a Beat poet.

Selig: Oh. Oh, that’s a different story. One thing about (interviewer) that you can always count on, he is a purveyor of more useless information than any human being I’ve ever met.