Gophers 66, Indiana 60

I wouldn't call this a great win, but it's a good one and one they absolutely had to have to keep the NCAA dream alive.  As with most wins, there was plenty of good to come out of it.  Here are the 10 things I liked and didn't like about the game:


1.  It may be time to mostly scrap the zone.  I know it's Pitino's preferred defensive style, but it simply isn't working.  Indiana is a team that struggles against zone defenses most of the time, but they were able to shred the Gophers in the first half.  To Pitino's credit he went man-to-man for the second half, and the Gophers played great defense which basically won them the game.  This team has the athletes to play killer man-to-man against anybody, and big enough centers to handle anyone in the Big 10 one-on-one, or at least not get killed.  However in a zone the guards are too short, they don't really have a true rim protector, and power forward is a basically an empty space when it comes to rebounding.  Hopefully we'll see man-to-man going forward, with a mix of zone thrown in here and there simply to change up looks and hopefully throw the opponent's offense out of whack.  This kind of sounds like a negative I guess, but what I'm trying to say is that this team has played some awesome man-to-man a few times this year, and they can do it against anybody.  I'm hopeful we see more of it.

2.  DeAndre Matheiu's jump stop/euro step/slide through and body control are simply amazing.  I don't know exactly what you'd call it because it's not a true euro step, but you know what I'm talking about.  It's that thing where he drives, does a jump stop and then kind of slithers to the rim with his two steps, and that combined with his ability to create space between him and the help defense by initiating just enough contact and then make lay-ups from bizarre angles is nothing short of magnificent.  Yeah, I said magnificent.  There have been a lot of Gopher players I've loved throughout all my years of watching (and plenty I've hated as well) but I'm having an awfully hard time thinking of anybody as flat out enjoyable as the Honey Gopher.  Rodney Williams had his highlight dunks and Blake Hoffarber was fun as hell when he was hot, and I was always a fan of guys who could play inside and outside like Sam Jacobson and Michael Bauer.  The all-timers like Bobby Jackson and Willie Burton were pretty consistently great, and it's fun seeing guys who get so much better from year to year like Eric Harris and Damian Johnson, but I really, really enjoy watching Mathieu right now. 

3.  It is absolutely criminal how Tom Crean does nothing to get Noah Vonleh the ball.  I mean this guy is an absolute beast.  As my buddy $nake said at the game, he already looks like Antonio McDyess.  Add in a nice shooting touch, some good handles (that little shake and bake he did in the second half was like whoa), and some decent creativity around the rim and he should be getting the ball on the block almost every possession for that team.  Instead all the offense he gets he has to create himself because Crean's idea of coaching seems to be "Hey Yogi go run around and then either shoot or throw it to somebody at random but mostly shoot."  One of the biggest possessions of the game for Indiana at the end and his team clearly had zero idea what to do yet he waits until 7 seconds left on the shot clock to finally call a timeout?  Then he diagrams up.......nothing.  Seriously, the guy is absolutely terrible.

4. For all the bitching and kvetching about the new rules, I've barely noticed the change.  Teams pretty much adapted quickly, and for the most part everything is hunky dory.  What really made me remember there are new rules however, is the lack of enforcement of the new rules in this game.  I can't remember seeing a game this physical with little to nothing called all season, and I didn't mind it.  Just 28 fouls called in the entire game between the two teams, and without bothering to look it up I'm going to guess that's the fewest in any Gopher game this season.  There could have been a lot more called, but what's his face, the bald guy, and the other one decided to let the boys play.  I really don't care if a game is called tightly or loosely (though I prefer loosely) as long as it's called evenly on both ends of the court, and this one was.  Good times, ref guys.

5.  I have nothing left to say about Mo Walker.  Nothing.  His transformation into a legitimate Big Ten big man with possible all-Big 10 potential next season is nothing short of remarkable.  Another big game (14 points, 8 rebs) against a quality opposing big man.  He showed some flashes of skill when he was a freshman but was saddled with all that extra weight, and then shortly after that he had basically no mobility recovering from that knee injury.  Now, with the pounds gone and a healthy knee he looks downright unstoppable at times.  If he takes the time in the offseason and makes that jumper we saw against Purdue a reliable weapon and develops one or two go to moves in the post he could be a legitimate destructive forced next season.  Of course, all this has come at the expense of Eliason, who has started to look tentative out there and is a shell of what he was to open the season.  Would be pretty stellar to get both of these guys running hot at the same time.

6.  For the second straight game Pitino dropped the ball on calling a timeout down the stretch.  Last game, against Purdue, I thought a timeout should have been taken to set up a play when it was clear the Matheiu pick and rolls weren't working.  This game, they really needed a timeout taken when Dre Hollins was trapped along his own baseline by 3 guys, one of which was the aforementioned gigantic athletic Noah Vonleh, considering there were 40 seconds left and they were only up 4.  Hollins had no help (I think 3 Gophers were on the wrong side of the floor), he had already picked up his dribble, and he was trapped between the baseline and three Hoosiers - basically the absolute worst possible situation.  It's bad enough that Hollins didn't call a timeout, but the fact that Pitino didn't call one - remember, the coach can call one at any time when his team has the ball - is just terrible.  I don't know if you chalk this one up to coach's inexperience or what, but predictably Vonleh got the steal and the bucket, and it could have cost the Gophers the game.  In most phases Coach Pitino has impressed me, but his late game management needs work.

7.  Joey King is impressing me a little tiny bit on offense.  I still cringe a little bit when he posts up and still say "Joey no!" more often that I'd like, but I can't deny he's getting better.  I'm not really sure about his footwork in the post, and he only seems to have the one move where he fakes a turnaround and then tries to go up and under a little bit, but that's more moves than he had at the start of the season.  My biggest concern with King was everything I had heard about him was he was basically going to be nothing but a perimeter guy, so the fact that he's playing in the post and appears to be working on that facet of his game is a great sign.  His defense is still going to give me a stroke, and one of Indiana's first baskets came when they were coming down in a three on two situation and instead of getting in proper defensive position King peeled off to pick up his man leading to an open lay up for the Hoosiers, but I am far more of a King fan now than I was before. 

8.  The Gopher guards showed some good patience.  Indiana was really aggressive after a pick in some cases, basically turning a hard hedge into a full on trap of the Gopher with the ball.  The guards generally kept their heads and were able to move the ball to a safer location, which led to Indiana scrambling and resulted in some open shots.  Twice I recall whoever had the ball not only avoiding getting trapped, but keeping the ball and passing lanes open long enough for the roller to get into the lane and then hitting said roller for a wide open dunk.  It was great patience and vision by the guards, and of course absolutely shitty defense by Indiana as nobody rotated to pick up the roller which is defense 101, but just because Crean is a dumpster fire of a coach is no reason to not be impressed by how the Gophers handled pressure.

9.  There was a guy there in a custom made Hosea Crittendon jersey.  I have so many questions.  Did he buy this back in 1995 and is still wearing it nearly 20 years later?  How much does it cost to get a custom made Gopher jersey?  How much back in '95?  Why a white one instead of the more classic gold?  Does he own more custom made jerseys of semi-obscure Gophers like Antoine Broxsie, Wade Hokenson, or Sunshine Esselink?  Does he wear it like, to the grocery store or on casual Friday at work?  Do other people recognize it and high five him at the gas station?  I need answers.

10.  Big road trip coming up next.   The Gophers head to Wisconsin and Northwestern now, and both of these games are important.  The Gophers, in my estimation, need to get to 9 wins in conference play in order to feel safe about an NCAA bid going into the Big Ten Tournament.  I consider there to be three absolute must wins: @Northwestern, vs. Illinois, and vs. Penn State.  That gets them to 8, which means they need to steal another game, and beating Wisconsin in Madison might actually be the easiest one to steal.  If the road trip ends up 0-2, well, we can go ahead and stop stressing out about this season, because she's over.

Words on the NCAA Basketball Season

With little to no action on the recruiting front (although our new best friend Nate Mason was on campus this weekend) and nothing worth talking Twins about, I haven't posted in a while.  But here I am, watching both baseball and football, and I was missing you guys so I should write some words.

-  Ok so spoiler alert, I'm pretty lazy busy now a days and don't get to post as much.  Therefore, I likely won't be doing that thing where I preview a whole bunch of college basketball teams this year because that takes a shit ton of time and I don't think anybody reads them anyway.  But I feel I must call your attention to a team that is not getting the respect they deserve, a team I have ranked as the 3rd best in the country behind Michigan State and Louisville - The Oklahoma State Cowboys.

Most prediction things I've looked at have them somewhere in the 20s, and that is just way way way wrong.   Did we all forget just how far one great player can take a team in college basketball?  Carmelo Anthony?  Danny Manning?  Hell, Kemba Walker?  Marcus Smart is one that level.  But lest you think this is a one person team, Markel Brown and LeBryan Nash are here too.  The only thing missing is a good big man, but they have a ton of options so if they can cobble together forty minutes of competent big man play each game (they only need one "big guy" because Nash is big enough to play the 4 unless they need to go big) this team is going to be a serious, serious contender.  Currently 25-1 or 40-1 to win the whole thing at some books.  Get in there now.

-  Speaking of, here are your contenders this year:  Oklahoma State, Michigan State, Louisville, Kentucky, Duke, Arizona, Kansas, Syracuse, VCU and Wisconsin (gross, but true.  I'm high on Dekker).  That's it.  I think UCONN could be a bit of a sleeper too, seems like everybody has forgotten about them but they have a pretty nice squad coming back.  On the opposite end, I think Indiana falls off a cliff.  I know Noah Vonleh is supposed to be a stud, but when the rest of your offense is going to reliant on Yogi Ferrell and Will Sheehey you're in trouble.  The only exception is if Evan Gordon (transfer from Arizona State) ends up being a stud, but he's on his third team of his career for a reason.  Then again, he's already 22 (and a half) so maybe he'll have some of that Mbakwe stuff going on, although I don't know how much that'll help a guard.  Plus, I hate Indiana a lot, so there's that too.

-  If you want another team that could surprise, but in more of a rising from projected bubble team to a top 5 seed, you should consider Stanford.  Nobody really is predicting them to do much, but it's basically the third year with the same core group but they added Chasson Randle last year.  Two years ago they won the NIT, then had a really disappointing season landing back in the NIT last year.  They just couldn't get over the hump, losing something like six games by five points or fewer, and I think with another year, particularly for Randle, they'll win more of those games and contend for the Pac-12 title.  And then probably make Reid Travis fall more in love with them.  Great.  We're doomed.

-  Speaking of doomed, I just want to mention the loony bin that is the Gopher Hole, where apparently if Rashad Vaughn ends up at either Iowa State or UNLV those programs are clearly crooked.  Honest to god, the prestige rankings over there are something like:
1. Michigan State
2.  Ohio State
3. Indiana
4. Michigan
5.  Duke
6.  North Carolina
7.  Louisville (shot up the rankings this year)
8.  Kansas
9.  Minnesota

Seriously.  Then there's a huge gap and everyone else is in the 100s with Iowa State at the very bottom.  That place has gotten damn near unreadable due to all the Minnesota high school talent for 2014.  Did you know that any Minnesota kid, or any kid considering Minnesota, who ends up going to a different school was clearly enticed by some sort of illegal or shady benefit?  It's true.

-  Should I elaborate on my Wisconsin thoughts a bit?  Yeah, probably since I'm saying they're going to be really good but I hate them.  Assuming Josh Gasser is fully back, he and Ben Brust give the Badgers one of the best back courts in the country.  Wait let me clarify.  I don't mean one of the best back courts in the country in terms of talent or ability or anything like that, I mean best back courts as in best fits for their team's system.  Their boring, boring system.  I don't remember the last time they had two guards who fit this well, but this is like if Jordan Taylor and Trevon Hughes played together and were white.

Then you bring in Sam Dekker, who I think is going to be an absolute monster, and this is a crazy, crazy talented team for a Wisconsin club.  The only real concern is in the front court, except that's never a concern for Wisconsin because there's always some giant hulking shlub who can go from nothing to 10 & 8 in no time flat because Bo Ryan has some sort of grinchy magical powers when it comes to 6-8 frumps.  I don't know if it'll be an old guy (Frank Kaminsky/Zach Bohanon/Evan Anderson) or a new guy (Nigel Hayes) but the last thing you ever need to worry about when it comes to Wisconsin is them getting front court production.  Add in their best 3-man back court I can remember and their boring, boring system of boring their opponent to death and the Badgers are sneaky dangerous this year.  And that sucks.

-  Overall the Big 10 is going to be tough this year, but I see four pretty distinct tiers:
TIER 1:  Michigan State
TIER 2:  Michigan, Ohio State, Wisconsin, Iowa
TIER 3:  Illinois, Indiana, Purdue, Minnesota
TIER 4:  Northwestern, Nebraska, Penn State

There's some chance for movement between these of course - Michigan State, Ohio State, or Wisconsin could end up as good as Michigan State.  Iowa or Illinois could drop.  Northwestern could jump up, but pretty much this is how I see it so I guess I'm saying the Gophers could finish anywhere from 6th to 10th, and because their schedule is so weak this year it's going to be an uphill battle to get to the NCAA Tournament again.  Obviously not impossible or anything, but keep an eye on the Maui tournament - the results there could end up being huge for the Gophers' RPI.





-  Your most likely high profile coach to get canned this year is Rick Barnes at Texas which makes sense because he's a terrible game coach.  He was always a hell of a recruiter and rode those abilities to a stretch of five Sweet 16s in eight years, but the Longhorns missed the NCAA Tournament last year (for the first time since 1998, but still it was pretty bad) with a losing season and they're poised to have an even worse year this season.  Myck Kabongo left for the NBA (or wherever, considering he didn't get drafted) and Julien Lewis and Shelden McClellan transferred, Ioannis Papapetrou signed to play pro ball overseas, and Javan Felix is injured and out for an indefinite amount of time.  With a not very strong recruiting class coming in this is going to be an ugly year.  Maybe his past success combined with the current rough circumstances will buy him some more time, but Texas is not a very patient school and also Rick Barnes is almost worse than Bruce Weber.

-  As far as Kentucky goes this year, I know a lot of people are ready to hand them the title since they have the best recruiting class of all-time coming in and some established talent already in place and frankly it's not a bad call.  It really is the greatest collection of talent I can remember in college basketball in the early entry era, at least on paper.  Calipari showed how this kind of plan can work two years ago when he won the national title, but he's had the same basic play every since he came to Kentucky and still only has the one title in four years, while missing the tournament altogether last season.

I'm not saying they shouldn't be the favorite, but there is some truth to the old saying, "not enough basketballs to go around."  That Kentucky team that won the National Championship was supremely talented, but that talent came mainly in the form of players who could impact the game without needing the ball.  Anthony Davis was a defensive force, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist was an all-around stud, Marquis Teague was happy to let others take the shots, and even Doron Lamb and Terrence Jones had no problem taking a back seat when necessary for the good of the team.  That was the problem with the John Wall team (a team that, granted, made the Elite 8) - Wall, Eric Bledsoe, Patrick Patterson, and DeMarcus Cousins were all ball dominating players.  I'm interested to see where this new group falls, because the talent level really is insane, and like nothing we've ever seen before.


-   One of the unintended consequences of all this conference realignment stuff going on is the complete weakening of the mid-majors as the bigger conference get stronger by pilfering the top programs from all over the country.  The only mid-majors worth a damn (WCC, A-10, Missouri Valley, and Mountain West if you consider them a mid-major) were either strengthened or completely untouched by realignment.  Look at once strong conferences like Conference USA, the Colonial, and the Horizon have been gutted. 

C-USA has become 16 crappy teams, everyone has fled the Colonial to the point where the team that just joined up, College of Charleston, is probably the most historically successful program in the conference, and the Horizon is now looking at Wright State and Cleveland State as it's shining stars.  Perhaps the worst is the WAC, which was never you know, awesome or anything, but it has been completely gutted.  The #1 team is now New Mexico State, but even worse the #2 squad is Idaho or Cal State Bakersfield.  Bakersfield!  I'm not even sure if any of these teams here outside of NMSU have ever been to the NCAA Tournament.  I mean they probably have or something, but I'll be damned if I remember.  Sure, this all makes for better games in the major conferences, but I'm a little sad about how crappy all the mid-majors are now.  Well, I'm over it now.

-   There is now a team in D-I basketball called the University of the Incarnate Word Cardinals (of course they're the Cardinals).  They're ineligible for the NCAA Tournament this year as they make the transition to D-I, but they're joining the Southland along with Abilene Christian and Houston Baptist.  Soon it seems the Southland will be called the Holy Conference.  Or something more clever than that.  Shut up I'm tired.

-  Lastly, here's my shot at your projected NCAA Tournament teams by conference.  We'll see how I do:
ACC (5):  Duke, Syracuse, UNC, Virginia, Notre Dame
AAC (4):  Louisville, Memphis, UCONN, Cincinnati
A-10 (3):  VCU, LaSalle, St. Louis
America East (1):  Stony Brook
Atlantic Sun (1):  Florida Gulf Coast
Big East (5):  Georgetown, Marquette, Villanova, Creighton
Big 10 (5):  Michigan State, Michigan, Ohio State, Wisconsin, Iowa, Indiana
Big 12 (5):  Kansas, Oklahoma State, Oklahoma, Baylor, Iowa State
Big Sky (1):  Weber State
Big South (1):  High Point
Big West (1):  Long Beach
C-USA (1):  Louisiana Tech
Colonial (1):  Drexel
Horizon (1):  Wright State
Ivy (1):  Harvard
Mountain West (4):  New Mexico, UNLV, Utah State, Boise State
Missouri Valley (2):  Wichita State, Indiana State
MAC (1):  Akron
MAAC (1):  Manhattan
MEAC (1):  Morgan State
NEC (1):  Bryant
Ohio Valley (1):  Belmont
Pac-12 (5):  Arizona, Oregon, UCLA, Colorado, Stanford
Patriot (1):  Lafayette
SEC (6):  Kentucky, Florida, Tennessee, Alabama, LSU, Missouri
SoCon (1):  Elon
Southland (1):  Houston State
Summit (1):  Denver
Sun Belt (1):  Western Kentucky
SWAC (1):  Texas Southern
WAC (1):  New Mexico State
WCC (2):  Gonzaga, BYU
 
You know what's crazy?  When I did this without worrying about counting how many bids I was giving out on my first pass I came out with 67 teams.  Just had to add one to round it out.   I ended up making it Indiana which was perfect because I didn't feel good about just five teams coming out of the Big 10, but I have no idea who the sixth one will be.  Indiana, like I said, has a million question marks, I hate Illinois, and I don't think Purdue or Minnesota have the pieces.  Whatever.  I'm pretty dumb anyway so say la vee.

Thoughts before Canada

I leave for the big Canada trip Thursday morning with Bogart, Dawger, and Bear so I won't get a chance to talk at you for quite a while.  I'll leave a few parting thoughts here and then hopefully TRE can put up a couple of posts while I'm gone.

-  At one point it seemed like the Gophers had a strong shot at landing Memphis transfer Tarik Black, but once again when the big boys come calling the Gophers have little shot as Black has decided to enroll at Kansas, who also just signed the #1 player in the class of 2013 in Andrew Wiggins, called the best pro prospect since LeBron, and have gone from lots of question marks to a pretty loaded squad.  There are still a handful of interesting big man options out there (Juco and/or transfers) with the most likely to become a Gopher still Rakeem Buckles (no clue what exactly the hold up on this one seems to be) and man somebody better be coming.  Not that anybody is a difference maker at this point, but of the four big guys (yes, only four) the only one you can relatively sure you can rely on is Eliason.  I personally think Oto will have a big year and a definite Buggs fan, but so many question marks.  Might as well make the lane at Williams look like the Riddler's suit at this point.

-  Sometimes I'm wrong about things.  Not often, but sometimes.  Roy Hibbert is one of those times.  You know how completely worthless Hasheem Thabeet has been, even getting bounced down to the D-League?  I figured Hibbert would be right there with him. I should have known better with him coming out of Georgetown who, outside of Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje, never miss on centers, but I thought he was doomed to failure.  This year he nearly averaged a double-double while finishing fourth in blocked shots (also Tim Duncan finished third.  Guy's immortal.  Immortally boring, but immortal).  So Roy, and Georgetown, I'm sorry for doubting.  And now that I've apologized and admitted my error, it's clear I am the better man here.

-  Sam Deduno is back.  Again.  After an outstanding World Baseball Classic (3 starts, 0.69 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, 17 K vs. 5 BB, team won the whole thing) some Deduno related buzz was generated that maybe he had figured things out.  Unfortunately fans would have to wait as Deduno didn't make his minor league debut until early May thanks to an injury suffered at the WBC.  So who is Deduno this year?  The 28 year old rookie of last year with the 57/55 K-to-Walk ratio?  Or the WBC hero?

It's really tough to tell so far with just 3 minor league starts under his belt.  Deduno has made the K/BB ratio a bit more manageable at 17/10 with his last start the best going 6 innings and striking out 8 while walking just two.  Of course, he also gave four earned runs in that one compared to just one earned in his prior to starts which encompassed eleven innings, when, of course, he struck out 9 while walking 8.  He's almost impossible to figure out.  I think it boils down to a guy who has decent stuff but little command.  He'll have games where he'll shut teams down like he did last year, and he'll have games where he doesn't get out of the third inning like he did last year.  Is he worth more of a shot than P.J. Walters or Cole DeVries in this spot?  I don't know, but the correct answer is Kyle Gibson, who, in case you missed it, has thrown complete game shutouts with 8 Ks and 2 walks in two of his last three outings for the Rochester Red Wings.  He's coming.  I don't know when the arbitration clock kicks on or kicks off or whatever it is, but he better be up the day after it happens.

-  Lastly, for those knocking the Pitino hire because he's only had one year of head coaching experience and is now in a major conference:

• Billy Donovan:  previous head coaching experience before Florida - 2 years at Marshall
• Jim Boeheim: previous head coaching experience before Syracuse - NONE
• Roy Williams: previous head coaching experience before Kansas - NONE
• Tom Izzo: previous head coaching experience before Michigan State - NONE
• Brad Stevens: previous head coaching experience before Butler - NONE

That's a pretty good list.  People are morons.

-  And with that, I'm out for a while.  Wish me luck - mostly that I catch a lot of big fish, but also that I don't die in the wilderness.

Pat Reusse is an Asshole

Seriously.  Look at this "article" Reusse wrote about the Gophers hiring of Rich Pitino to take over the Gopher hoops program.  It's full of misinformation, gross hyperbole, and just smacks of a cranky old man who is pissed off that either Tubby got fired, Flip didn't get hired, or both.  Let's look, FJM style.

Billy Heywood finally has made it to Minnesota. He’s traded in his manager’s uniform for a basketball coach’s whistle, but there isn’t much difference between the fictional Billy and the real-life version brought to town under the name Richie Pitino.

There isn't?  Tell me more.  Also, going with "Richie" over "Richard" or "Rich" is probably the biggest dickhead move you could make.  Good work, "professional writer."

Billy was the 12-year-old hero of “Little Big League.’’ He inherits the Twins from his grandfather, fires a manager deemed too hard on the players, takes over and leads the team to a Game 163 showdown.

Oh, ok.  So other than the sport, their ages, Pro vs. Amateur, Pitino not firing anybody, and essentially everything else about the two they're the same?  I suppose they both are set in Minnesota so I guess there's that.  Also, using this absolutely tortured analogy sets up Reusse to refer to Pitino as "Richie" through the article, which is a classy move.

Richie is the 30-year-old hero of “Norwood’s Amusing Quest.’’ He inherits a basketball reputation from his father, beats Louisiana-Monroe twice, waits for a half-dozen people to turn down a chance to coach at Minnesota, and gets Gopher Nation dreaming of future showdowns with Northwestern.

He's been an assistant at two of the most successful programs in the country and took a crappy program to within one basket of the NCAA Tournament last season, but yes, they did beat Louisiana-Monroe twice.  Why you'd point that out rather than how, at the end of the year in the Sun Belt Tournament when you're supposed to have your team peaking (Tubby hi!) they beat Middle Tennessee, a juggernaut who had run through the Sun Belt all season, is beyond me.  Also why would anybody dream of a showdown with Northwestern when the Gophers are already guaranteed to play them 1-3 times per year?  There's no way Reusse didn't slap this together in under 12 minutes.

I don’t want to be too negative on this. 

No, clearly not.

Clearly, once the search gets to a point where the replacement for Tubby Smith comes down to Richie Pitino or Pam Borton, it’s easy to embrace athletic director Norwood Teague’s decision.

It's actually now getting physically difficult to comment on this.  What an asshole thing to say.  I can't even decide who this is most insulting to, but I'll go with the literate.

We all have been assured that Teague and associate AD Mike Ellis are as well connected as any people in college basketball through the Villa 7 weekend seminars for assistant coaches that were conducted at Virginia Commonwealth.

And, after this whiz-bang search by Teague and Ellis, it’s obvious that the name Villa 7 carries at least as much magic in college basketball as does a Tom Petters hedge fund in the financial world.

This may very well be the stupidest thing in this article and trust me, it's pretty difficult to narrow it down.  Because Teague and Ellis hired someone who Reusse doesn't like invalidates all the success of Villa 7 over the years?  The guy Reusse would be slobbering over (Smart) was a Villa 7 guy and I'm guessing if the Gophers had hired Buzz Williams (another one) Reusse would have been slobbering over him too.  You know who recommended Pitino to Teague?  Billy Donovan.  You know who recommended Shaka Smart to Teague at VCU?  Billy Donovan.  You think you're going to find that factoid in here?  Nope, too busy shaking his fist at the kids on his lawn and lamenting about how things used to be, when you just hired retread coach after retread coach because "they were good ole boys" and "we dinn't need no 'lectric typewriters."  I'm actually somewhat shocked this wasn't written by Sid.

The Teague-Ellis tandem was so proud to be the first basketball brainiacs to fire Tubby Smith that it appears the information was leaked to buddies in the national media before it was leaked to the guy being fired.

This sentence doesn't really fit the flow (as it is) of this article but it isn't hard to figure out it was put in here as another shot at Teague-Ellis for not coming to Reusse and company first with their "leaks" about the news.  Also Tubby Smith was fired by Kentucky too, so they aren't the first.  Really, this article reads like a letter written by a scorned lover.  We could get Alanis Morissette to set it to music and have a top 40 hit on our hands.

There were two reasons for the local sporting public and media to embrace Smith’s departure: One, Tubby’s mediocre performance over six seasons at Minnesota; and two, the belief that Teague’s background at VCU and Ellis’ with Villa 7 would put them in position to make a blockbuster hire.

I can't argue with this.  I would, however, argue that a blockbuster hire doesn't necessarily mean it's someone who knocks you on your ass when you hear the name.  The Gophers already tried that with Tubby Smith and, well, here we are.  Is there some law against giving someone time to prove themselves?  Oh wait, yeah.  The law of time since Reusse's fat ass will probably choke to death on a cheeseburger in a year or two.

“You always have a short list,’’ Teague said on the day he fired Smith. “You always have people that you have in mind. Some are realistic, some are unrealistic, but I have a list in mind. We’ll work that and we’ll get a terrific coach.’’

It was easy to accept VCU’s Shaka Smart and Butler’s Brad Stevens, the two hottest young coaches in the country, as unrealistic for the Gophers. That was especially true when they turned out to be unrealistic for UCLA.

And, any interest expressed by Fred Hoiberg’s agent was easy to detect as a play for a new deal at Iowa State. “The Mayor’’ of Ames wound up getting 10 years out that rumor being floated, so hooray for him.



Wow that's like, two paragraphs in a row I kind of agree with.  But wait, what's all this talk about a big-time hire then if Reusse can agree that Smart, Stevens, and Hoiberg were pretty much unrealistic?

Later, we started hearing Mick Cronin at Cincinnati, which would have allowed him to get out of the mess that remains of the former Big East … soon to be a league with the Bearcats, UConn and Memphis as the only schools of basketball prestige.

Teague-Ellis couldn’t even a land a guy whose conference is leaving him to take this job in what today stands as the best basketball league in the country.

Cronin couldn't possibly be a considered a big-time hire, could he?  Plus, I never heard of him being a serious candidate, just that his name had hit the rumor mill.  Although I should probably trust that Reusse knows what he's talking about, considering he has inside sour.......wait, no.  That's right, he doesn't and that's half of the reason he wrote this column because he's pissed off he couldn't get any inside info from Teague's office.  So basically he's just throwing shit against the wall in order to try to get another slam in at Teague and co.  What a grown up he is. I wonder what his motivation could be to act like a spoiled child who wants another cookie?

All this while, Flip Saunders — maroon-and-gold through and through, a longtime NBA coach, immensely popular with boosters — was available to be hired.

And there it is.

We loved to bad-mouth Joel Maturi, Teague’s predecessor, for his coaching searches. And it’s doubtful that Maturi would have mustered the audacity to fire Smith, the big-name coach who had landed in his lap in April 2007.

But we know this for sure:

Maturi wouldn’t have messed around with Saunders. The man we loved to ridicule would’ve had Flip hired within 48 hours of a Smith departure.

You know, I was in favor of Flip.  I was.  I thought he was the biggest home run they could have hit, but I was also aware of all the possible things that could have gone wrong, particularly considering he's never run a college program before.  If Teague wanted more control over his assistants and Flip didn't want to budge, well, agree to disagree and move on.  I fail to see how this is some colossal mistake on Teague's part.  And do we really want to insult him by saying he's not enough like Joel Maturi?  Really?  Is this fucking bizarro-world?

Tell me a week ago that the choice was Flip Saunders, a passionate ex-Gopher with an outstanding résumé, or a 30-year-old former student manager with little more than a famous surname to validate his candidacy, and I would have been standing in front of Williams Arena, acting as goofy as Larry Spooner at a Vikings stadium hearing, holding a sign and shouting, “Flip, Flip, Flip.’’

I don't know who Larry Spooner is because I'm not some stupid provincial idiot, but I can only assume he's someone well grounded who cares about sports not too much at all.  And seriously, referring to Pitino as a "former student manager"?  Yeah, it's true but guess what?  GOD DAMNED NEAR EVERY SINGLE COACH SPENDS TIME AS A STUDENT MANAGER.  You know who was never a student manager?  Flip Saunders.  Because he's NEVER BEEN A GOD DAMN COLLEGE COACH (at least not at anywhere that counted).  You know who has more experience as a D-I college coach?  Pitino.  You know who has run a program at the collegiate level?  Pitino.  You know who's a "name" who "old people" in this "town" love because he's "connected" to the "program" and is a good ole boy?  Flip.  I like Flip, but writing this entire meandering article (which both bashes and praises Villa 7 at times) to bash a new coach, who you don't know dick about, because the new guys in town didn't hire your friend?  Seriously it baffles me that people actually pay Reusse to write this crap.

Teague and Ellis started this search as the two smartest guys in any basketball room. They return with a coach much more suspect than what poor old Northwestern managed in Chris Collins, an assistant but fully trained,

Can anyone tell me what the hell "fully trained" means?  Collins was an assistant coach for 15 years at Seton Hall and Duke.  Pitino was an assistant for seven years, then an associate head coach, and then, oh yeah, AN ACTUAL FUCKING HEAD COACH.  I can see arguing the merits of the two with someone because I can actually see either side of the debate on who is more qualified to run a Big 10 program, but to call Pitino "much more suspect" than Collins is clearly yet another reach in order to throw another shot at Teague and Ellis simply because your buddy didn't get the job.  Not to mention there isn't a chance in hell Reusse knows what the duties of either were as an assistant because that could make a world of difference.  I don't either, but at least I'll admit it.  By the way, you know how many years Rick Pitino was an assistant before he got a head job?  Four.  He seems to be doing ok.  

rather than the nonfiction version of Billy Heywood.

Jesus, what a twat.

Gophers vs. Illinois L ive Blog

-11 minutes - So why not drink some booze and live blog, am I right?  Watching the Iowa State vs. Kansas game right now.  Great game. 

-9 minutes - On a scale of 1-think the Big Bang Theory isn't nerdy enough, how nerdy is it that I just watched this:


-7 minutes - So real quick since we have some time let me just mention how ridiculous the Hall of Fame voting crap was this year with nobody getting in.  Are you guys kidding me?  The worst part is you know they think they're taking some kind of stand or making a statement, when in reality they're just being a bunch of pussies.  The worst part?  As pointed out by Loretta8 from Sippin' on Purple - Bonds and Clemens finished with a different amount of votes.  One is the all-time home run leader, the other won 7 Cy Young Awards.  They're both no-brainer first ballot inductees - unless you are against voting in steroid guys (aka completely ignoring the 90s) in which case they both are at the same level of guilt and should both stay out.  One way or the other.  This means somebody voted for one, but not the other guy. Makes zero sense.  They need to revamp the whole system, and I hate saying that because I really don't know how to make it better.  To start, how about kicking out all the idiots. 

-4 minutes - Seriously, even if you don't want to vote in anybody you remotely suspect of steriods (and, by the way, I've never heard Piazza linked to roids) how do you not elect Craig Biggio?  The stats are there and I'm pretty sure nobody suspects him of steroid use.  Or elect Tim Raines for christ's sake.  He's the second best leadoff hitter of all-time.  At some point I may have to do a post on Raines - or at least link to one - because the guy absolutely has the numbers to be in Cooperstown.  And you know he wasn't on steroids because he was too busy being high on cocaine.

-2 minutes - This Iowa State game needs to end before the Gopher game starts.  Hurry up already.

20:00 - A banked in three for Kansas?  You gotta be joshing me.  Welp, on to the Gopher game.

20:00 - Being good kind of sucks.  It was much easier watching these games when I knew they were going to lose. 

20:00 - What's Egwu doing in there, he doesn't even shoot threes?

19:48 - Paul with a very tough three point attempt (and missed).  You can have that all game, guys.

19:04 - Another bad three early in the shot clock.  Please keep doing this, Illini.

17:41 - Illinois doing a good job keeping the Gophers off the offensive glass, which we can tell already because they've missed like, a billion shots already.

16:53 - Announcer guy FYI - D.J. Richardson is not a "sharp shooter."  Gopher offense is so bad right now I'm afraid Tubby might go with the line change offense.

16:18 - Brandon Paul called for the charge after dunking over Mbakwe - announcers don't seem to realize that is, indeed, an offensive foul so who cares about the dunk part.  I feel like these guys might be the death of me.  Gophers down 4-3, but there have been as many shots already as there were in the entire first half of the Northwestern game.

15:44 - Wait a minute.  How can a basket count on a made dunk with a charge called?  By definition the ball was still in Paul's hand, which by definition means the basket doesn't count.  Jesus this is like re-writing the rules of math.  It's not like you can just change PI to be equal to 3.14158.  My god people.

14:29 - Gopher defense has been good, forcing Illinois into tough shots, other than the two dunks that is, and doing a good job on the boards.  Gophers just not converting opportunities except for just now with Coleman on a dunk in transition.  More transition please.

13:25 - Rodney for 3?  I guess if they aren't going to challenge it he's going to have to prove he can hit it.  Big shot as far as rest of the game implications go.

12:12 - Dre hits a three to answer a Richardson three.  Richardson's came early in the shot clock with a hand in his face, Dre's came mid-shot clock and was wide open.  Gophers are going to win this game, you guys.

11:29 - Complete second unit in for the Gophers.  Great.  And Elliason travels 35 feet from the bucket.  I know why he does this, so he can play the good players the entire second half, but I still don't like it.  Gophers down 13-11 right now, let's hope it stays close to that number while these clowns run down the shot clock again and again.

10:18 - Gopher turnover, Illinois three, Gopher turnover.

9:52 - Welch guarding Paul.  God save us all.

9:32 - Offensive foul on Elliason.  That's three straight turnovers by him.  Effing brilliant.

9:00 - Is there anything more terrifying than Maverick in transition?  For Gopher fans, I mean.

7:56 - TV timeout coming with Illinois up 16-15.  Good job by the second unit.  And by good job, I mean good job on defense (for real) with absolutely brutal offense until Mbakwe came in for Elliason, with Trevor scoring all four points.

7:42 - Wow.  Mbakwe with the drive from the top of the key, makes a lefty layup and is fouled.  That was an NBA second round draft pick play right there.  Free throw to tie?  Good.

6:45 - Coleman goes for a monster dunk and gets fouled but it's not called, good job attacking the rim though.  Pretty sure Dan just pulls up for a 16 footer there.

5:47 - Great defensive rotations forcing the Illini into bad shots, leading to transition opportunities leading to back-to-back dunks by Coleman and Mbakwe.  Gophers up four.

4:53 - More bad shots, more transition opportunities, more Gopher dunks.

4:17 - Good one-on-one move by Bertand to hit a jumper, answered by a three-pointer by Austin Hollins off a good pass by Andre in transition.

3:57 - D.J. Richardson has got to be one of the more disappointing big 10 players I can remember.  Tons of fan fare and hype and in four years he's become nothing more than a jump shooter.  Of course, it's tough when you have to play for the worst couch in the world.

2:08 - Illinois getting (and hitting) a shit ton of free throws, keeping this close at 31-27 Gophers.  Illinois just terrible from three right now, but a lot of it is the Gopher defense.  In general the Illini aren't missing open shots, but contested ones.

1:25 - Hollins (Austin) for three, followed by an Illini miss, followed by Andre Ingram throwing a pass into the 8th row.  I really think Andre Ingram is very promising for a sophomore.

0:47 - Paul actually gets an open look and drains it.  Then Ingram travels.  We're going to have to go Iron Five.

0:00 - 34-30 Gophers at the half.  Excellent job.  Gopher defense is playing awesome, and as long as they keep that up and keep getting transition opportunities they're going to win this game.

0:00 - Holy crap the Lakers are a mess.  Spurs up 101-85 with seven minutes left.

19:13 - Illinois still taking dumb shots as Paul goes for the contested running floater (and misses).

18:33 - Paul swatted by Rodney on a contested turnaround jumper, which leads to a wide open three for Austin Hollins (who misses) which leads to an offensive rebound which leads to a lay-up (and foul) for Mbakwe.  Free throw good.  That sequence was a microcosm of this game.

17:53 - Richardson step back 18 footer early in the shot clock.  So dumb.

16:54 - Gopher ball up 39-30.  Looking for a dagger.  Looking at you, Austin.

16:17 - How about a 40 footer with teh shot clock at two that banks in for Dre who I'm not even sure looked at the hoop?  How about that?

14:52 - Illinois with a couple buckets in the paint to cut it to 44-36 Gophers.  I hope they haven't figured out this "get good shots" thing.

14:11 - Another lay-up for Illinois, time-out Gophers.  Gotta keep 'em out of the paint and keep making them take those contested jumpers they love so much.

12:33 - Illini cut it to 2 with like their fourth straight basket in the paint.  I liked it better when they were stupid.  Also Mo Walker in the game is killing everything. 

11:54 - Austin Hollins steal leads to a dunk for Coleman, and then a Dre Hollins steal leads to an intentional foul by Illinois.  Also, I'm having a heart attack.

11:54 - I think I'm supposed to try to be funny but I'm just way too into the game.  If you want to laugh just listen to Nickelback or Coldplay or something.

11:41 - Dre hits both free throws and then nails a three.  Thank god for Dre.  Like Eminem said, you can't forget about Dre.  *streetcred*

11:09 - Shit, Paul into the lane, fouled and hits the shot.  STOP PLAYING SMART ILLINOIS.

10:50 - "Ahanmisi getting ready to check-in."  Cry.

10:28 - Another Illinois lay-up, defense has gone to shit. 

9:38 - Coleman for three?  Great play by Rodney to find him.  And again Illinois gets to the lane and draws a foul.  This needs to stop.

9:12 - Time for Welch to shine here with four fouls on Andre Hollins already.  I'm fine with him on offense, but very scared on defense.

8:38 - Gophers switch to a zone leading to an absolutely terrible three point miss by Paul, leading to a dunk by Rodney and a 58-47 Gopher lead.  I love dumb teams.

7:09 - Paul into the lane and misses when he could have kicked it out to a teammate for an open three, leads to a transition lay-up for Coleman and a 60-49 lead.  I feel like I'm typing the same thing over and over again.  Also fearing this is a pretty worthless live blog for the reader, but what do you care it's saving you from having to think about actually doing work.

6:42 - Bertand goes one-on-one for about 10 dribbles then misses a contested turnaround.  I know I keep pointing it out but I can't get over how dumb this team is. 

5:43 - Could have done without the easy dunk.  On Coleman, naturally.

5:24 - He pays it back by blowing by his defender for a lay-up.  Incredible game for Coleman.

4:45 - Coleman with ANOTHER three.  And Dre Hollins just checked in and picked up his fourth foul, which means earlier when I thought he had four he only had three which means I have no idea why he was ever taken out of the game.

3:33 - Gophers up 13 (another Coleman dunk) and I can still barely breathe.

3:04 - Sloppy turnover.  Oh yeah, that's why.

2:52 - Richardson airballs a three (contested, of course) which reminds me why I probably CAN breathe.

2:30 - I know the game isn't over yet (Gophers up 72-59) but man is this team good.  Their defense is incredible.  Watching their rotations on defense was the most impressive part of the game, and that's a game when Coleman scored 25 (as of now).  Those who didn't watch or didn't pay attention may call this a fluky bad shooting night by the Illini, but the Gophers had everything to do with that.  Then look at the offense where they have five guys who could put up 20 on any given night?  This team is for real, kids. 

1:48 - I can't believe Illinois missed another contested three-pointer, you guys.

1:16 - Brandon Paul lay-up.  Basically uncontested since the Gophers are up by 12 (after that).

0:30 - Coleman playing some serious suckhole, now up to 29 points after a couple easy dunks.

0:09 - Dre with a three as the shot clock winds down becasue why not.  84-67 Final.  Crazy, dudes.  I'll maybe have more on this game tomorrow if I don't get lazy

Wednesday Wonderings

I was going to do a statistic-laced post about the candidates for the Twins' rotation next year, but my computer kept shutting itself down due to depression so instead I'll just do that thing where I type whatever I think about.  I'll eventually get to the Twins' rotation because I've already put in too much time to just let it die, but man, looking at Cole Devries and P.J. Walters in the same night is a nightmare not even Poe could have come up with.

-  So Stephen Strasburg is officially shut-down now after 159 innings because he had a rough last outing, which really hurts the Nationals chances in the playoffs and is just, weird.  I understand the thinking behind the move, I just don't think it's the right plan.  Simply getting to the playoffs is damn hard, so when you have a chance at a special year I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense to jeopardize that when you don't even know if there's any actual benefit to doing so.

In the playoffs everybody will bump up one spot, which means the extra starts - assuming four starters - will go to Ross Detwiler instead of Strasburg.  Detwiler's a nice little pitcher - 3.23 ERA, 1.19 WHIP - nice.  But he strikes out half as many batters as Stras while walking the same amount, he's gotten a little bit lucky this year while Strasburg has gotten a tiny bit unlucky (BABIP-wise), and Detwiler throws three average pitches while Strasburg has three above average ones.  I suppose when you end up replacing your ace with your #4 you could a lot worse than Detwiler, but man, Strasburg.  Strasburg, man, Strasburg.

Honestly, is this the worst possible way they could have handled this?  If you're firmly committed to that 160-180 innings limit, however misguided, why wouldn't you at least make an attempt to maximize your value out of it?  Don't just keep running him out there every fifth day because you know come early September you've just run out of your best bullets (armor piercing, exploding, acid tipped, whatever).  Why not skip a few starts?  Why not go with a six-man rotation?  You could even go with a four man rotation and then slot him in just when you need another arm.  Or hell, spot start him part of the time and then use him in relief here and there.  Manage him so you have innings left for him in the playoffs, even if they're just bullpen innings.  Game 7, World Series:  would you rather start Strasburg or Detwiler?  Or how about Game 7, leading 3-2, 8th inning and your opponent has a man on second with zero outs - Strasburg or Craig Stammen?  Ugh.  I'd be so frustrated if I were a Nats fan, but then again I heard from some dude on the radio today that everybody in Washington is buying into this crap, so I guess they deserve what they get.  I hope Detwiler gets completely rocked.

-  I'm not generally one to make excuses for the University of Minnesota because it's more fun to just rip on stuff, but I had a conversation with some co-workers today that kind of made me think a little bit.  Think about all the cities that have all four major sports, like we do:  Boston, Chicago, Denver, Dallas, Detroit, Miami, New York, Philly, Phoenix, San Fran, and D.C.  And look at the most successful college sports program in that same city:  Boston College, Northwestern, U of Denver, Southern Methodist, Detroit-Mercy, U of Miami, St. John's, Villanova/Temple, Arizona State, Cal-Berkeley, Georgetown.  Now looking at that list, and considering success in ALL college sports, who'd you rather be than the University of Minnesota?  Miami and Cal, right?  Maybe B.C.?  Obviously St. John's and Georgetown are better in hoops, but they don't even have football teams I don't think.

So maybe, just maybe, I'm a little too hard on the teams.  After all, most college powers are located in some butthole town in the middle of nowhere so the population has really no choice but to spend all it's money and fan points on the college.  It's also how mini-cults like State College and the like happen, so I'm not saying that's a good thing, but it certainly gives you an idea of why the Gophers struggle at times.  Oh god, I don't even know who I am anymore.  Look away, I'm hideous.

This is me.

-  I'm watching this show Suburgatory for the first time and there's this chick on there named Jane Levy who is an absolute dead-ringer for Emma Stone, both appearance and line delivery-wise, which is totally awesome because I'm madly in love with Emma Stone and now there are two of her which doubles my odds.  Actually, two of her makes that pairing a contender for my dream threesome.  It's either those two, Natalie Portman and Keira Knightley, or Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake.

It's like a slice of heaven.  Red-headed, smart, sarcastic, sexy heaven

-  I'm sure I had lots of important stuff to say but then I got distracted by Real World and booze and so here we are.

Manager of the Year

As sad and pathetic as it is there are actually psychopaths out there who truly believe Ron Gardenhire is a great manager.  Well to those of you who are out there I am sorry to tell you that a great big giant fist just ripped its way through the anus of your argument today, because Gardy started Ben Revere in right field tonight against the Red Sox.

Assuming you have heard of baseball you are no doubt aware that one of the main prerequisites for a right fielder is a good arm, owing to the fact that at times you'll have to make the throw from right field to third base - basically the longest throw in the game.  In fact I'd say the only prerequisite to playing right field is having a decent arm given the list of nearly immobile stiffs who've patrolled right in baseball history.  Instead tonight Gardy put Ben Revere out there, the player with one of the worst outfield arms in history and the guy who throws the ball in a way generally reserved for women, children, invalids, and Shannon Stewart.

And who was in left field, typically the outfield position given to the player with the worst arm?  Delmon Young.  Now, Delmon's arm will never be confused with Roberto Clemente or Carlos Gomez or that kid from that movie, but just watching the games you know his arm is far, far better than Revere's.  We can even go into nerd stats a bit to prove this, although full disclaimer:  I don't know how good these fielding stats are, but they're better than nothing.

According the the Arm Runs Above Average stat Delmon's arm has been that of a completely average outfielder this year, at 0.1 runs better than the average, and over his career his arm has actually been very good, mostly due to a couple of great throwing years in Tampa, including 2007 where he threw out an impressive 16 runners on the bases, all of which coming as a DUH DUH DUH right fielder. 

Revere's arm on the other hand has been 2 runs worse than average, meaning his arm alone has given teams 2 more runs than an average arm would so far this year, so you're looking that an arm that costs the team about 4 runs in a full season, and that's as a CF/LF (note:  he more than makes up for that with his range, but that's not what we're talking about).

So we have clear evidence, both quantitative as well as qualitative, that Revere has a terrible arm and much worse than Delmon Young.  So why would Revere play in right and Young in left?  I can think of two reasons, and neither is flattering for your favorite manager.

The first possibility is that Delmon Young said "I'm not comfortable playing Right Field" which doesn't make any sense because that was his main position when he was with Tampa.  It also doesn't make sense because when a player says "I don't want to do this" when it's something that clearly would help the team a good manager would say "Tough, do it or sit or be traded."  Since we've seen Gardy roll over like a frenchman in the past when it comes to letting the players run the team this is, unfortunately, a distinct possibility.

The other reason I can come up with is that Gardenhire is a moron.  You know how a lot of times in the past (and present) whenever he'd do the lineup if somebody was filling in for a regular he'd just put them in the same spot in the batting order?  So like, last year if Casilla was playing for Hudson he'd hit Casilla second even though it greatly weakened the lineup or Mike Redmond batted third a bunch of times when Mauer would sit?  I'm betting there is a good chance this is the same stupid crap.  Kubel would normally play RF but with a tough lefty on the mound he's sitting for Revere (who, by the way, is also left-handed and is hitting 73 points worse vs. lefties than Kubel this year).  So rather than do the smart, logical thing and shift Delmon to right and play Revere in left, he just plugs Revere into Kubel's outfield spot because apparently not only is shuffling a lineup similar to solving Fermat's Theorem, but changing around the outfield is akin to figuring out the alchemical fucking formula to turn lead into gold.

Honest to god.  So the two options are either the manager is incompetent and lazy, or spineless and stupid.  Manager of the Year though, and they can't take that away from him.  I looked it up.

- As long as I'm here I might as well tell you guys about the latest Danny Dan Gladdenism I heard on the radio, and no I have no idea why I've heard so much Twins radio this year, it's not like I'm a long haul trucker.  So about a week ago whoever the new announcer guy is brings up the Moneyball movie that's coming out.  Gladden says, and I'm paraphrasing here but the the same points remain, "Yeah I know about Moneyball, that book by Billy Beane.  I just don't think that kind of stuff works.  I'm not going to see that movie.  I didn't read the book and I'm not going to see the movie."

The book isn't by Beane, it's just about him, and he doesn't think "that kind of stuff" works but he never read the book and thus can't possibly know what it talks about other than "stats" which is not really the point of the book anyway.  Just a beautiful way to sum up Dan Gladden, and all of the staunchly "old school" guys who hate the idea that there are newer, more advanced stats that can help understand some parts of the game at a different level.  God I miss Fire Joe Morgan.

-  Lastly, take a look at these two rotations and tell me which you'd rather have.

Pitcher 1:   3.21 ERA, 1.19 WHIP, 3.75 K/BB
Pitcher 2:   4.71 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, 2.10 K/BB
Pitcher 3:   5.00 ERA, 1.48 WHIP, 1.47 K/BB
Pitcher 4:   4.58 ERA, 1.56 WHIP, 1.54 K/BB
Pitcher 5:   4.56 ERA, 1.44 WHIP, 2.23 K/BB

OR

Pitcher 1:   3.45 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 2.40 K/BB
Pitcher 2:   3.56 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, 2.50 K/BB
Pitcher 3:   3.81 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 2.88 K/BB
Pitcher 4:   3.72 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, 2.44 K/BB
Pitcher 5:   4.41 ERA, 1.42 WHIP, 2.34 K/BB

The first group is the current Twin rotation, the second group is Kyle Lohse, Matt Garza, Phil Humber, R.A. Dickey, and Livan Hernandez.  Isn't that the most saddest depressing thing you've ever heard?  Seriously if it wasn't for the tens of dollars I'm making from advertising on this site I'd burn it to the ground.  Through the computer or something.  I heard if you put a match in the USB port cool shit happens.

-  Lastly, and this time I mean lastly, I just want to mention that there is a already a sequel filming for the world's most awesome movie, and everything about it looks awesome.  From the name (Piranha 3dd) to the new additions to the cast (David Hasslehoff, the guy who plays Todd Packer on the office, and the incomparably insane Gary Busey) everything looks just right.  Usually sequels have a low % chance to be good, but the first one was so good as hitting everything you want in a creature/horror movie (hot chicks, boobs, gratuitous nudity, making the bad guy the true star, lots of killing, and creative deaths - second only to the Friday the 13ths here) that I totally trust them here and can't wait to see this.  Between this and Shark Night it's a banner year for killer fish movies.

Six Very Important Things from Last Night

 I was going to do a typical week in review post last night, but as I sat and stared at my computer screen I realized I got nothin'.  The Twins have sucked the life out of me and I just couldn't bring myself to type anything.  I started and deleted at least three times, and then was going to watch a shark movie and just didn't have the energy.  Thanks Twins!

They've killed my brain so much I can't even cook right anymore.  For last night's meal I looked around at what we had in the fridge and pantry and decided to make a Cuban chili.  I screwed it up every way imaginable.  Actually the first step, browning the ground beef with onions, red peppers, and garlic, went well, but from there it was right down hill.  I used way too much liquid in the base (beef broth + mexican beer) and made it way watery.  Then, after the first 45 minutes or so in the crock pot it seemed bland and rather than slowly adding spices to give it the flavor it needs I just threw a bunch of stuff in all at once and it ended up way too spicy.  Luckily I have Mrs. W around, who just scooped 90% of the broth out to make it more chili-y and also cut back on the spice.  I added some garlic salt and onion powder and WA-LA it ended up pretty good.  But it turns out I'm not quite the brilliant chef I like to think I am.  Well usually I am but not this time.  Except for when I helped fix it.  Anyway the Twins are stupid.
 


1. I quit watching after the third inning because it was 9-0.  It's now 18-1 in the fifth.  Eighteen.  To.  Fucking.  One.  Feels like the perfect end to a perfect season  This team sucks, Nick Blackburn throws the ball too easy to hit to even be a batting practice pitcher, and I'm never writing about the Twins again.  EVER.  Unless they start trading dudes, then I'll write about the sweet sweet prospects they pick up.  God I hate this so much.  This is just like that time I cut my own finger off.  [EDIT:  Final was 20-6.  L.  O.  L.]

2.  It looks like we'll have an NFL this year after all.  Football players and owners apparently realized that they all stand to make billions of dollars as long as there is a season and came to an agreement to go ahead and play some american football this year.  This sort of bums me out.

Not that I don't like football, because I really do, but because there is just so much about the NFL season that bugs me.  Particularly the fans.  And can you imagine that group of fans - the kind of guys who watch every minute of every preseason game, are convinced they're smarter than every coach, bitch and complain the one week there's no Sunday night football because of the World Series, and who ignore their family for 12 hours every Sunday so they can watch the six different TVs they have the overpriced Sunday Ticket hooked up to in a room they inevitably call their "man cave" (and seriously, can we stop putting man in front of words to make up new words?  It's not a man-cave, it's a den.  It's not a mancation, it's a vacation.  It's not man-scaping, it's shaving.  And so on).

You know the kind of guy I'm talking about.  And you can you imagine this guy without football?  It would be hilarious.  I imagine these guys would just start wandering around their neighborhood muttering to themselves and yelling at inanimate objects about getting into a cover 2 and rolling the safety over or start staging fake games in their yard using lawn gnomes.  But now that dream is over, just like the dream of getting to watch scab players this year.  Oh what could have been.  Where have you gone, Brian Cupito?

3.  Plenty of other things flying around the NFL rumor mill as well, including Terrell Pryor and Brett Favre rumors.   The Favre rumor is that he may sign with the Eagles to be insurance behind Michael Vick, which supposedly makes sense because he's had a long-time relationship with Andy Reid.  I would guess we can just ignore this because I really don't see him coming back after that pounding he took last year and I really don't see him volunteering for back-up duty.  Then again, since he has a need for attention that would rival any 3-year old you know we're not going to hear a definitive answer from him, so this is going to drag out.  Again.  And dominate the news to the point where you want to stab your ears out with a spoon.  Again.  Pete Rose II just needs to die or something so he'll actually go away.

As far as Pryor, the big cheating cheater, it turns out that due to a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo that I neither understand nor have actually read, he might not get to enter the NFL supplemental draft this year.  In that case I'd assume his options would be to play in the Arena League, CFL, XFL (if it still exists), or sling crack rock.  Which is good for him because then maybe he can make some money because once he hits the NFL he's going to absolutely suck.  Spergon Wynn style.  Seriously, the guy could hit the broad side of Sarah Rue (before she sadly got all skinny) with a pass if she was standing still and he's supposed to be an NFL QB?  Sure he can run, but that's all he can do.  All you need to know is that he is Ohio State's all-time leading rusher as a QB and it's well known that there has never been an all-time leading rushing QB from a school who has succeeded in the NFL.  Sorry Terrelle, you're doomed.  And you suck and are a cheater and a bad person. 

4.  This T-Wolves coaching search is rather perplexing.  I can't quite figure out what they're going for.  The latest is that they interviewed Larry Brown, who is 71 years old and I can't possibly figure out what the upside is, other than possible insurance money from when he dies (whether of a heart attack or Michael Beasley snapping and beating him with a dreadlock makes no difference).  The other guys, warts and all, at least have something that I get.  Don Nelson is super old but likes to play uptempo which is what Kahn wants and plays to Ricky Rubio's strength.  Bernie Bickerstaff is a total retread but, in theory, would have brought JB into play as the coach of the future (too late for this now).  Terry Porter would be an inexperienced, but young (for a coach) up and comer.  Rick Adelman is just a good coach.  I've never head of Mike Woodson.

But Larry Brown doesn't make sense for the Wolves and the job doesn't make sense for him either.  At 71, he'll be 75 by the time this is a possible playoff team, and Brown is notoriously difficult on young players and point guards.  Seeing as how the Wolves are exclusively young players and have basically hitched the hopes of the entire franchise on a rookie point guard this match makes me nervous.  Yeah, he's famous for turning losers into 8 seeds, but he's also a thousand years old and will probably end up shooting Beasley and/or Kahn by the all-star break.  But I guess they wouldn't be the Wolves if they did something that made sense.

5.  Ray Rice is going to destroy you.  Since NFL teams can do shit now the Ravens released a bunch of fairly notable players:  Derrick Mason, Todd Heap, and Willis McGahee.  Mason is 100 and Heap has sucked for two years but the McGahee release is important because it means whoever the coach of the Ravens is won't have to keep him happy by giving him the goalline carries.  The Bear once said Rice was overrated because he'd never be "a monster" but now McGahee is gone, he runs for a billion yards and catches enough balls to be the next generation of Thurman Thomas, and now he's going to get the goal line carries.  Can Ray Rice be a monster?  We're about to find out.  And I think this is going to go down just like he's Kobe Bryant and the league is that poor girl from that hotel.


6.  I was hoping to ignore the Twins for the rest of this post, but then there's this:  The Nationals are after Denard Span and the Twins are listening.  Frankly, this makes no sense.  I agree the Twins should start looking to move some dudes because they suck and this season is dead, and I also think it makes sense to move an outfielder/DH because that's what they have an abundance of.  But not Span.

First, he's under a reasonable contract.  He's signed through 2014 with a team option for '15 at a good cost ($3m next year, $4.75m the next, $6.5m in '14, $9m on the option) so you don't need to move him soon.  Unlike Kubel (free-agent to be) and Cuddyer (free-agent to be), or Jim Thome (1 more year but clearly not part of rebuilding).

Second, his skill set is something the Twins don't have anywhere else:  an actual lead-off hitter.  I love Ben Revere, I really do, but unless he starts walking more and finds a way to hit the ball farther than the average girl in a co-ed softball league once in a while (and yes that's AND, not OR) he's a nine hitter with a little excitement due to his speed.  I mean really, Kubel, Cuddy, and Delmon are such similar players if you move one you're not fundamentally changing your team's make-up, but Span is the only real lead-off hitter, maybe in the system.  If you still had Gomez and he was progressing (which, by the way, he still isn't) then trading Span is palatable, even though it still doesn't make sense.

Lastly, the Nationals are not a playoff team.  They aren't making trades for a playoff push, they're making trades to try to get better for the long run.  So why would a non-playoff team who needs to build for the future trade a guy to a different non-playoff team who needs to build for the future?  Because the Twins want Ian freaking Desmond to be their future shortstop?  The guy is absolutely terrible. Might as well have just kept Jason Bartlett for christ's sake.

Look, I get the Ramos trade for Capps.  It was stupid and I said so at the time, but I at least understand what they were doing, however misguided.  But trading Span, unless you are getting back Stephen Strasburg or Bryce Harper or Wilson Ramos, doesn't make sense financially, logically, chemistry-y, physically, lineup-y, racially, or sexually.  Leave it to the Twins and that rapey dickmitten Bill Smith.  Have fun watching Ian Desmond flail about like the next Nick Punto for the next four years.

Fuck this.  I'm moving.

MLB 2011 Mid-Year Check-In, Part 2

Part 1 was yesterday (scroll down, genius) where I talked about the good things so far this year in MLB.  Now here are the bad:



1.  Joe Mauer.  I just recently let lose with a little Mauer diatribe, so instead of simply rehashing what I already said you can read it by clicking here.  Of note:  since I wrote that he's gone 6-17 and raised his average 20 points and, if you can believe this, even hit a double.  That's two bases with one swing.  I couldn't believe it either.

2.  Derek Jeter.  Apparently being "too tired" to play when you're "star" is getting to be an epidemic because Derek Jeter, arguably the biggest "star" in baseball depending on how you want to define that, begged out of tonight's all-star game due to "exhaustion."  I personally don't really care who plays and who doesn't because the whole thing is really kind of stupid, but the most idiotic thing I've heard in a long time came from a caller on the radio today who tried to explain, "You people did nothing but complain that he didn't deserve to be voted into the game, and now, because he's such a class act, he decides not to play so Asdrubel Cabrera can start, and you rip him for that." 

Seriously, dumbass?  I'm sorry and I know you love him, but captain intangiibles isn't a shining greek god of virtue and I don't care how many barbecues he invites his teammates too or how often he has Robinson Cano sleep over at his house and they tag-team Minka Kelly.  Look, I get it - he's a decent looking, non-threatening dude who plays the game well, isn't overly cocky, doesn't show up opponents, and bangs lots of chicks.  But there's a guy like him on every team except the fucking evil White Sox, and nobody knows what he (they) are like off the field.  Jeter could very well be a serial killer rapist arsonist litterbug for all we know, but because that shit I wrote earlier plus he plays in the biggest market for the most famous team and people can't stop making love to excuses for anything he does.

It's like that dude who caught Jeter's 3,000th hit and gave it away for some autographed shit and box seats.  Noble?  Moral?  How the hell is that noble or moral when the guy has over $100k in debt?  You owe it to yourself to get your life in order (and yes I know it's student loans not credit card bills, which kind of makes this more depressing) with your once in a lifetime lottery winning baseball and you toss it away to make an empty gesture to a guy who will make more this year than you'll make in ten lifetimes, will bring in nearly $300 million total by the time his career his over in just salary (not counting endorsements) and likely wouldn't cross the street to piss on your face if it was about to be run over by a car?  Guess what?  He's already forgotten about you.  And that $100k you owe?  That's what he makes in a day.

You know how they say that the lottery is really just a tax on stupidity?  Well, it's now being reported that this guy might have to pay something like $14k in taxes on the "gifts" he got from the Yankees.  Now that's really a tax on stupidity. 

3.  Florida Marlins.  The Marlins were looking like they were going to be a very nice story this year.  Smallest payroll on the team at $35 million, a team that had to trade Dan freaking Uggla because he was too expensive, and suddenly they ripped out of the box with a 30-20 start, and behind Josh Johnson were looking like a nice NL East sleeper team.  Then Johnson got hurt, they couldn't sustain their early momentum, they lost 19 out of 20, Hanley Ramirez proved he's more lazy than leader, they fired their manager, and are now 43-48 and 14 games out of first (and it's only that good thanks to a 5-game winning streak going into the break).  Now all they're good for is laughing at any highlights of their home games because there are about 16 people there.

4.  The entire Twins' bullpen.  Honest to god, is it really that hard to have one guy who you can trust to get three outs?  Perkins is the only full-time reliever with an ERA under 4.40 and if you trust him you're dumber that got into my van the other night.  Cappsie's WHIP looks respectable, but unfortunately it's accompanied by one of the worst HR allowed rates on the team and he seems to be on a rapidly accelerating slide from mediocre to pathetic.  Nathan can be excused, at least mostly, but there's no real reason for Jose Mijares to be putting up career worst numbers (he has more walks than strikeouts for christ's sake) and Phil Dumatrait and Alex Burnett may as well just put the ball on a tee.  And if anybody does pitch well (Chuck James and Anthony Slama have thrown 7 combined innings of 1-hit ball) they're immediately shipped out.  I mean is it time to make Anthony Swarzak your #1 set-up guy now?  Has it really come to this? 

5.  Adam Dunn.  Another guy I've talked about here before, but it's impossible to ignore how bad he's been.  Dunn has always done three things:  strike out like crazy, walk constantly, and hit a ton of home runs.  Well this year he's striking out at an all-time high rate, walking far less than normal (second lowest of his career), and is well on pace to hit the fewest homers he's ever had in a season.  Even the hits he always got accidentally aren't falling this year, and he's also hitting nearly 100 points below his career mark at just .160.  He's on pace for just 15 homers with 204 strikeouts, which would be the fewest home runs (by 9) by a batter with 180 or more Ks.  His .160 would be the worst batting average by a player with over 180 Ks by 38 points, and his (on pace for) 59 RBI would be the lowest ever by 11.  We are talking a truly, epically, pathetically putrid season, and the Sox just signed him for four years and $56 million.  Awesome.  

6.  Royals starting pitching.  Kansas City seems to be going the right way on the offensive side of the ball - Hosmer looks good, Butler is solid, Gordon seems to be figuring it out, and they got all those other prospects on the way.  On the hill, however, they have some of the worst arms in history, and that's why they couldn't sustain their semi-hot start.  Three of the five worst WHIPs among starting pitchers with at least 50 innings belong to Royals:  Kyle Davies (1.92), Sean O'Sullivan (1.78), and Danny Duffy (1.64).  Duffy, at least, is clearly part of their future (assuming he develops) but if that's the strategy then retreads who suck like Jeff Francis and Bruce Chen don't make much sense either.   

7.  Twins' injuries.  You guys ever wonder what's going on with the Twins and how many games they miss due to injury?  Doesn't it seem pretty ridiculous, like something must be wrong?  Morneau missed the entire second half of last year with a concussion and Denard Span is chasing his games missed record.  Meanwhile 1-2 weeks seems pretty standard.  Mauer has missed 2-months this year with some bizarre, mysterious injuries and it's not the first time he's done that.  Then you have Kubel, who has now missed a month and a half with an injured foot, and is expected to miss another 1-2 weeks post all-streak, and I'm pretty sure Delmon Young has missed a couple weeks on two separate occasions this year - once due to being cold and once due to being tired.  I just don't get it, man.  Either this team has the worst trainers in the world or is the biggest collection of babies outside of a lactation convention.

8.  Ubaldo Jimenez.  It's always kind of tough to trust one-year wonders, especially starting pitchers, and Ubaldo is showing you why.  After maybe one of the most impressive first halves of a season in recent baseball history he started to fade late last year and has continued that slide right into a mediocre, irrelevant, mid-rotation pitcher.  His numbers this year (4.14 ERA/1.30 WHIP) are nearly identical to Carl Pavano's (albeit with far more Ks and BBs).  This from the same dude who finished 3rd last year NL Cy Young voting, so consider if Johan Santana was here in his prime and suddenly turned into Carl Pavano.  You know, like Scott Erickson.

9.  Jim Riggleman.  I dig this because it's one of the most awesome examples of someone not nearly understanding how much value and leverage (or lack thereof) they actually have.  He's always been a terrible manager (career:  662-824) with just two winning seasons and one playoff appearance out of 10 tries.  He was signed as the Nationals manager, and appropriate match of awful to awful, and in this, the third year of his contract, he managed to get them to win 11 of 12 games and was pushing for management to sign off on his extension for next year (despite their overall record of 27-36 before that streak).  Management, wisely, chose not to do so at that point and so Riggleman resigned.  Full on jackassery, all the way around. 

10.  Clay Buchholz.  If you're sitting there still waiting for Buchholz to put it all together and become the stud he's seemed destined to become, get in line.  I swear I've drafted this hippie every year in fantasy baseball, and every year he turns out to be as brittle as Ralph Sampson's confidence.  Last year he looked like he might finally have done it, making 28 starts and registering a 2.33 ERA (2nd in the league), but after a rough start this year where he was allowing homers at a Matt Cappsian rate he's once again out with a back injury.  He's supposed to be ready soon after the break, but for those of us who have followed his career way too closely we know that's a dirty lie.


Finally, this is where I'd tell you to expect Grandslam to come in with his British Open preview at some point this week but I just asked him if he was going to do one and he said, "No, the Open is stupid played on stupid courses and you can't predict anything."

Nice expert.  As such, I'll at least try to get up some thoughts on this Wednesday night, but I have a pretty big work function that's expected to go from 6-10pm (at the earliest) so the odds aren't great.  I promise I'll try.  Unlike most of the Twins.

Monday's Musings

I promise that I plan to get back to doing the week in review type posts every Monday, but Easter weekend was hectic as all hell and by the time I finally got to sit down on a stupid computer it was late Sunday and I just didn't have the energy or care enough to slap together something.  Plus, that wouldn't live up to the fine tradition I've started here of high quality postings every single time.  I couldn't possibly betray you that way, gentle reader, so I just didn't type up anything.  Instead I'll just put together my thoughts into this evening's post.  Just like this:

-  Tip o' the ole cap to our buddy Grandslam for bringing this to my attention, but guess how much money Kyle Lohse is going to make this year.  Go ahead, guess.  You're way low.  It's $12 million.  Nope, not in his career, but this year alone Lohse will make $12 mother-effing million dollars.  And in 2009 and 2010 combined he made about $16 million to deliver right around a combined 200 below-average innings to the Cardinals.  This, my friends, would be why you don't suddenly throw a 4-year, $41 million extension at a pitcher with a history of mediocrity simply because he has one slighly above average season, especially when advanced metrics can tell you, if you take the time to put down the binoculars and game worn miniature scorebook pencil, that he was a little bit lucky and you can fully expect him to regress back to the same mediocre pitcher.

Now Lohse is off to a 3-1 start and coming off a gem of a 2-hit shutout against Washington (WASHINGTON!!), and has a low ERA and WHIP, but honestly you don't need advanced metrics to tell you he's not that good (note:  he's been very, very lucky so far).  He's an average pitcher at best who has just enough of a live arm that he's going to jump up and give you a good start or two here or there - he did it for the Twins, he did it for the Phillies, and he's done it before for these very same Cardinals.  But guess what?  There's not a chance in hell he's worth $12 million.


Want to know the best part?  When they extended him they also gave him a full no-trade clause.  L-O-freaking-L.  Who's running this team, McHale?  I'm expecting another extension any day.

-  And since we are on the subject of former Twins' pitcher who define mediocrity (or worse) guess who currently has a no-hitter through five innings against the Yankees?  Phil freaking Humber.  I know there's no way this can last more than another batter or two, but could there possibly be a bigger kick in the nuts?  Player acquired for former superstar who the team couldn't afford to keep who washes out pitches a no-hitter for a hated division rival against the old team's arch nemisis that's bounced them from the playoffs the last three times they've been there?  Honestly, the only way you could possibly make this worse is to have it be a playoff game.  But yeah, this will do.  Ouch.

- Greivis Vasquez plays a meaningful role for the Grizzlies?  I had no idea (but I guess why would I when it pertains to the Memphis NBA team).  I've been watching this game for about four game minutes and he's hit two buckets as well as a three-pointer.  I think he might be MVP.

-   Humber now through six.  Still hitless.  If he can get through the seventh (Granderson, Texeira, A-Rod) he'll have a chance.  Of course, that still lives Cano.  Wait.  I got it.  He's going get all the way to the last out, which will be Jeter.  Jeter will break it up. All announcers/journalists everywhere will collectively mess their shorts to race to their typewriters to write up an article about how tough he is and his intangibles.  One journalist will out-crazy them all by writing about how he believes "some part of Jeter really didn't want to break that up, because he knew what a great story it was, but he's such a competitor that the though of lying down never crossed his mind."  Book it.

-  I just realized A.J. Burnett is on the other side of this, and he's only allowed 2 hits and one run.  This is like bizarro-world.  There must be a five-hundred mile per hour wind blowing in, the infield grass must be three times longer than normal, and whoever is umping home plate obviously is calling everything a strike tonight.  That has to be it, no?

-  Moment of silence of Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, who died nine years ago today.  You may remember her as the crazy as shit broad from TLC who burned down Andre Rison's house, but what you might not remember is that Andre Rison died exactly four years ago today.  Creepy, right?  But I should mention that I actually have no idea if Andre Rison is dead or alive, and if he is dead he probably didn't die on this date.  But he could have, and that's creepy.

-  I just read that a judge or something lifted the NFL lockout.  I'm not going to lie to you.  I have no idea what this means.  All I know is I want scab players in at least one NFL game.  Come on.  Tell me you don't want to see Adam Weber throw a TD pass to some 33-year old slob who was selling cars or schlepping concrete last year.  How much fun would it be to go through the rosters and see guys you remember as the third WR on Michigan in 2002 and be all like, "Ronald Bellamy!  I remember that guy!  He's a fag!"  Seriously, it would be like Christmas.

-  A-Rod breaks up the no-hitter with one down in the 7th.  I feel both relieved and saddened at the same time.

-  That Joe Mauer/Troy Polamolu commercial creeps me out.

-  I know what you're wondering.  You're wondering what's going on with the NBDL right now.  Well I'll tell you.  They've reached the finals (which is a best of three affair) and the Iowa Energy are up on the Rio Grande Valley Vipers after taking game one by a score of 123-109.  Iowa was led by Curtis "The Curt Man" Stinson who notched a triple-double (29-10-10).  Also apparently Stinson was MVP of the D-League.  How proud of that would you be?  I'd say it's kind of like getting into Harvard and getting a communications degree.  I mean, it's better than slinging crack or living off welfare, but even so you gotta feel like you didn't quite get everything out of life that you maybe should have.

-  I don't know how anybody could root for the San Antonio Spurs.  You have the world's most boring superstar surrounded by a bunch of commies and some ooh la la frenchman who probably smells like Drakkar.  Gross.

-  Speaking of Drakkar, Memphis is about to be up 3-1 on the Spurs tonight and I can't help but a feel a bit of a pang of jealousy.  I know this would be their first playoff series win ever, and they picked up their first playoff win ever earlier, and I also know the Wolves did have that nice run the conference finals, but Memphis being successful when the Wolves are in the pooper makes me, and baby jesus, cry.  How can Zach Randolph become a leader?  How can a backcourt of O.J. Mayo, Mike Conley, and Tony Allen do, well, anything?  And the Wolves are not just worse, but significantly worse.  That feels like a place to end.  Plus I have to go stab myself in the temple with a crossbow quarrel, but before I go I want to leave with this piece of wisdom...."The eyes are the groin of the head."

-  Wait, I just realized I didn't even put a picture in here. So here's a pic of Alison Brie. Top 10, easy.  Should also drive some traffic because cash money ya'll.

6 Very Important Things from Last Night - 04.19.2011

1.  The Twins got rolled 11-0 by the hapless Orioles.  I only watched half of this one because it was apparent very early that the Twins had no shot, but from what I saw Pavano was all over the place.  That's bad for anybody unless you're a guy like Carlos Marmol who throws 99mph and has no idea where it's going but nobody can hit it anyway, but for Pavano to miss his spots means it's going to be a rough night.  Not only by falling behind in counts and walking guys (3 walks and just 60% strikes) but because when he misses by a little bit his 89mph fastball goes from a well placed tough to hit pitch to an easy to drive pitch, and Pavano was run after four and two-thirds after allowing 8 hits and 7 runs.  Naturally, the Twins were unable to score, a consistent problem not helped by the absence of Mauer, Morneau, and Delmoney from the lineup.

Maybe the most discouraging part of last night's festivities, however, was Joe Nathan getting rocked again, giving up a couple of hits and a 3-run home run to Vlad Guerrero in his inning of work, which means he's now given up 7 runs in his last three times out, with at least two runs coming in each game.  It's pretty clear he's not all the way back from injury, and his fastball is clocked consistently 2-3 miles per hour slower than it was in his prime, making him essentially Nick Blackburn but who doesn't know how to pitch like he has a noodle arm.  I don't know what you do with him - could he do a minor league assignment? - but he's not good right now, and he just needs more time.  I guess we'll have to rely on Cappsy.  Get ready for some brutal emotional swings, fans.

2.  Carmelo Anthony could almost do it himself but Jared Jeffries and Bill Walker fucked it all up.  Chauncey Billups is out with an injury and Amare Stoudamire was only able to play a half before getting knocked out due to back spasms, and the Knicks opponent was the Celtics one of the best defensive teams in the league.  The stage was set for Melo to channel Bernard King and elevate the Knicks to victory and he damn near pulled it off, scoring 42 points and grabbing 17 rebounds (and dishing 6 assists).  Unfortunately Bill Walker couldn't hit a shot all game, going 0-11 from the floor, and eventually Boston realized Carmelo had no help and they started double-teaming him before he even had the ball.  Remarkable.  This defensive strategy resulted in Jared Jeffries having to make a play on the two biggest possessions of the game for the Knicks, and you can imagine how that went.  If you're imagining it was like watching Gardy try to figure out a Rubik's Cube, you're not far off. 


3.  Sticking with the NBA, I thought ESPN said Atlanta had the guys to stop Dwight Howard?  In fact, I know they did because in my preview on here I said Atlanta couldn't deal with Howard and Snacks emailed me to say that ESPN said that the Hawks' Jason Collins and Zaza Pachulia would be able to handle him.  Wrong, idiots.  33 points and 19 rebounds last night in the Magic's Game 2 win following up his 46-19 in game 1 - a Magic loss.  It's actually interesting because it's become clear that Atlanta is simply going to single cover Howard - and let him destroy them - and concentrate all their defensive efforts on shutting down Orlando's jumpshooters, which is basically the entire rest of the team. 

That strategy worked brilliantly in Game 1, the Hawks big win, with Jameer Nelson the only non-Howard player to have a good shooting game with Gilbert Arenas, Hedo Turkoglu, JJ Redick, Ryan Anderson, and Jason Richardson shooting a combined 2-14 from three.  In Game 2 it almost worked again with Orlando shooting 5-23 from three as a team but this time the Magic played good enough defense to get the win.  What seemed to be a boring series in the beginning has suddenly become interesting based on the Hawks' strategy.  Or at least as interesting as any series involving the boring as hell Hawks could ever be.

4.  Josh Johnson is unhittable.  Maybe it's because he's in the NL, or maybe it's because he's on a small market team, or maybe it's simply because nobody cares about the Marlins, but Josh Johnson is one of the best pitchers in baseball and I'm not sure how many people know it.  Last night he tossed seven scoreless innings against Pittsburgh, allowing just two hits and striking out nine, and the only notable thing about it was how un-notable it really was - this is the norm for this nerd.  His season stats are now at 3-0 with a 1.00 ERA, a WHIP of 0.59, and a strikeout per inning.  Looking at his career arc it reads like a big-time pitcher - good rookie year (5th in ROY), two injury plagued seasons, then a comeback year where he was an all-star, followed last year by his 2.30 ERA and fifth place finish in the Cy Young balloting.  The guy may look like a slightly less nerdy Davis Love III, but he's an absolute super star.  I wonder if he'll end up on the Yankees or the Red Sox.

5.  Penn State is going to be even worse than you thought.  Not that there was a whole lot of optimistic feelings towards Penn State's 2011-2012 basketball season with Talor Battle, Jeff Brooks, Andrew Jones, and David Jackson all graduating (that's four of their top five scorers and top four rebounders), but one of the few rays of hope has now been crushed with the news that Taran Buie is transferring/has been kicked out.  It's not a surprise given that Buie was suspended from the team twice for various violations, but it's still a kick in the junk since he was one of the highest rated recruits in many, many years at Penn State.  Not to mention this leaves them with Tim Frazier and a bunch of guys who never played, and it's not like either Jones or Jackson should have been hard to beat out for playing time since they are severely flawed players, so those guys coming back are probably even worse than Colton Iverson (for reals).  Should be fun to watch a team whose only good player's #1 skill is distributing the basketball play with a bunch of teammates who couldn't score on a date with your sister.

6.  The Vikings schedule (if there's a season) was announced last night.  But let's be honest, if you get excited about this you are a retard, and you're probably a big fan of mayo sandwiches, think Nickelback and Hinder "fuckin' rock", consider Borat to be quality cinema, and name Olive Garden as your favorite "fancy" restaurant.