Monday Musings

-  Do you realize that we've officially hit the month (October) which is the same month the NBA starts (October)?  I didn't either, but a co-worker mentioned to me the NBA actually starts at the end of this month (October) and sure enough, he's right.  Crazy.  I know I don't write a ton of NBA stuff because I only casually follow it during the season because college hoops is so much better, but every season I get excited for the start of the season before watching one game and remembering everything that bores me about it until the playoffs.  I actually started this post as an early NBA preview but then I got bored.  I'm sure TRE or I will have something up as we get closer to the season.  Two predictions:  T-Wolves make the playoffs as a 7 seed and the Sixers take the 2 seed in the East.  Also hopefully everyone on the Lakers dies.

-  Ok a little bit more on the Wolves, who I am optimistic about despite not knowing exactly when Rubio will be back.  Kevin Love is an absolute superstar, even if it's sometimes hard to think of him as such when you keep remembering the chubby unathletic kid from UCLA who you were convinced would be an NBA bust, but finishing 4th in the league in scoring and 2nd in rebounding while knocking down a ton of 3s (led the team and 21st in the league) is pretty clearly superstar type numbers (not to mention finishing 6th in MVP voting on a non-playoff team).  Not to mention how many amazing nights did he have when your jaw would just drop?  The double-double streak.  The 20-rebound games.  The 40 (and 50) point nights.  The four game stretch where he averaged 37 & 16.  The buzzer beater against LAC?  Obviously I love this guy, and having him guarantees the Wolves will at least be competitive for a spot in the playoffs this year.

And the complementary pieces just work.  Pekovic will be back and oh my he is just a beast and you know he's killed at least three people with his bare hands back in Mother Russia.  We might as well call him Zangeif.  He's the perfect guy to put down next to Love because if anybody starts shit with Love Zangeif will just rip their head off and make them eat it somehow.

In mother Russia, ball rebounds you!

Then Ridnour/Barea are just fine to fill in until Rubio comes back, and that's not even taking into account Alexey Shved who has a chance to be a little bit of a Rubio Lite.  Adding Andre Kirilenko gives you a defensive stopper (and a few too many commies, if you ask me) even if he's a bit long in the tooth.  The biggest weakness last year was on the wing, but with Roy (if his knees hold up), Derrick Williams (who apparently lost weight to play more on the wing), Chase Budinger, and Kirilenko two of them should work out well enough.  Back up big men are a little shaky with Lou Amundsen and Greg Stiemsma, but if everything goes according to plan you just need them to get in the way on defense and please god don't shoot on offense and shouldn't that be enough to get into the playoffs?  I say yes.  Plus, and I know everybody has made these jokes already a million times, but have you ever seen so many white guys on one team?  Crazy.  Not Camila and her sweet rack from Road Rules/Real World Challenge crazy, but crazy.

A little crazy can be a good thing.

Seriously I hate being so optimistic.  Between the Wolves and the Gophers my basketball boner for this season is off the charts.  If I had to rank my confidence that they'd each have a good season (playoffs for the Wolves, top-4 conference finish and NCAA win for the Gophers) on a scale of 1-10 I'd be at a combined 18, much higher than the old record of 6.

- I suppose I should say something about the Gopher footballers poor performance against Iowa on Saturday.  Unfortunately by the time I realized the game was on and turned it to ESPN2 it was already 17-0 and then Shortell kept throwing interceptions so eventually Wonderbaby and I played Super Mario Brothers on the Wii instead.  We won!

-  If Tony Romo doesn't start throwing the ball to Dez Bryant I swear to god I'm going to kill someone.  With a pitchfork or something else really stabby.  God Romo just sucks.

-  Pretty epic choke job at the Ryder Cup, which is much less sexy than it sounds.  Sadly I missed most of it watching football because like most of the free world I assumed there was no possible way the U.S. could lose and also because I was at my parents' house with Bear and they have Red Zone Channel and I was like whoa.  As such, I missed seeing Furyk and Mickelson pee down their legs, but thanks to a well-timed text from Snacks I was able to flip over in time to see Stricker wrap his putter around his neck.   I know people who don't watch golf don't quite get it (like Bear was talking about how the Ryder Cup is stupid on Sunday before I distracted him by talking about men in bike shorts), but this is devastating.  It seems hard to believe when you're talking about something that only happens every two years between groups of people who never play as a team, but if you watch it and watch it every two years you know what I'm talking about.  Europe has been destroying the U.S. almost every time out, and for the Americans to jump out to what would usually be an insurmountable lead, on their home soil, only to give it away by letting Europe win nearly every match when it came down to man vs. man?  Luckily everyone can go back to being an individual instead of a team for the next 2 years and try to forget (yeah I know they have the President's Cup or whatever but let's not pretend anybody gives a crap), and hopefully in two years everyone will be done thinking/talking/obsessing over this.  Ha ha just kidding.  In two years just wait to see how much this is talked about.  Prepare to throw up all over yourself like Stricker on 17. 

-  As for my thoughts on the upcoming presidential election, I'm just kidding.  God bless you whackos.

-  And I forgot to mention the Vikings.  They still suck, but now they're winning while they suck which is pretty much better than losing while sucking and actually worked for that Trent Dilfer team who sucked all year long until they won the Super Bowl.  So am I saying the Vikings are going to win the Super Bowl?  Yes, yes I am.

-  Seriously Tony Romo is absolutely fucking terrible.   You know how bad Fat Stafford looked this Sunday against the Vikings?  That's like Tony Romo 14 games a year.  Being a Dez fan is hard enough watching this, I can't believe there are Cowboy fans who haven't killed themselves yet.  God this must be brutal for 16 weeks a year.

-  Pretty fired up for the baseball playoffs.  Do you realize the Orioles are going to be in the playoffs despite not having won 70+ games since 2006, 80+ games since 1997, and their preseason OVER/UNDER on season wins was 69.5?  That shit is nuts.  And there's a good chance the A's are there as well, and they've won 80+ just once since 2007.  Not to mention that the probably best team (Nationals) shut down their best pitcher for the playoffs for some misguided, though well intentioned, reasons and the two best starting staffs amongst the contenders (Angels and Rays) likely won't make the playoffs.  Crazy.  I'm guessing TRE and I will have some sort of preview up, so until then........