Bruce Jenkins is not a fan of using statistics to judge players. He prefers to use dust, sweat, tears and hustle to judge a baseball player. Bruce has a history of needlessly bashing Sabermetricians and telling statistics-loving baseball fans to,
"Strip down to those fourth-day undies...,"
and
head downstairs (to "your mother's basement and your mother's computer,"
These insults are both not only creative, but also incredibly accurate. Those people who love using statistics to evaluate baseball players rarely take showers and don't even have enough money to purchase their own computer. Though I have always wondered why an insult like this always refers to a person going to "his mother's basement" or some variation of this insult. Are we to assume this person's blind devotion to statistics not only caused his parents to split (I don't read as many references to "your parent's basement"), but also forced his/her mother to move the computer away from a general area of convenience in the house into the basement? More importantly, why would a person take their clothes off to head to their mother's basement? I'm not sure that makes sense due to some basements not being heated. You know what, better not to answer that question.
So Bruce sees the San Francisco Giants' second World Series title in three years as a major victory for scouting players based on the eye test, rather than by using statistics. This is because Brian Sabean and the Giants don't employ those stupid stat-collectors who live in their mom's basement and don't rely on those assholes for what "the stats say." Bruce Jenkins says the Giants are a purely eyeball-based team when it comes to scouting, thank you.
This is a nice narrative for Bruce Jenkins to spin if it were true. One look at the Giants front office reveals a guy named "Yeshayah Goldfarb" his job description is defined as (according to his bio on the Giants team site),
He helps run the minor league operations on a day-to-day basis
and provides analytical and statistical analysis for, but not limited to,
player acquisition and development.
His job title is "Director, Minor League Operations/Quantitative Analysis," which in the opinion of Bruce Jenkins is just a fancy way of saying he lives with his mother, has never kissed a girl, and wears "Star Trek" shirts everyday of the week (or whenever his mom does his laundry). In fact, the Giants credited Goldfarb with helping them to win the 2010 World Series, which is a little fact that Bruce Jenkins either intentionally or conveniently forgot. Either way, this championship is a huge victory for the anti-stats crowd because Bruce Jenkins chooses to view it that way, even if the Giants do employ a person whose job is to look at those dreaded statistics and provide input into acquisitions or roster moves. Let's read about Bruce Jenkins wallowing in this incredibly (not) important (non-)victory.
In a scene from the film "Moneyball," a half-dozen A's
scouts sit around a table, tossing out opinions. With their haggard
faces and old-school lingo, they are made to look like fools, a bunch of
washed-up alcoholics whose time has passed.
Having seen the movie, I don't recall the whole "alcoholic" part represented in this movies as it relates to these scouts. Knowing Bruce Jenkins is writing this article based on an alternate reality where the Giants don't employ a numbers-cruncher, so maybe he has an alternate reality "Moneyball" where the grizzled scouts miss on seeing a prospect because they were all too drunk at a bar. This is as opposed to the stats geek who did not miss on the prospect because this stats geek (like all stats geeks) lives in his mom's basement and can't drink alcohol like a real man does due to his overly-sensitive stomach which can only handle milk and that really diluted tea his mom has ready for him every morning as he wakes at 9:30am. Perhaps that is the world in which Bruce Jenkins lives and viewed this alternate-reality "Moneyball" film.
The Giants' world championship is a victory for John Barr, Dick Tidrow, Bobby Evans, a cadre of sharp-eyed scouts and especially general manager Brian Sabean, who learned his trade in the Yankees' system and surrounds himself with people who don't merely know baseball, but feel it, deep inside.
These people feel baseball, deep inside, much like how someone feels indigestion in their stomach or vomit rising deep inside their throat.
They all played the game, somewhere along the line, and if you throw a
binder full of numbers on their desk, they don't quite get the point.
Since it is physically impossible to throw a binder full of numbers on a desk, seeing as how numbers aren't tangible objects, many people wouldn't quite get the point. Now if there were binder that had paper in it with numbers written on them, that would make more sense, as well as be more understandable.
All stupid joking aside, every scout has his way of evaluating a player, but if a GM throws a book of numbers on a table and the scout says, "I don't get the point of looking at these numbers" then that scout needs to be fired. At some point, the scout needs to realize he doesn't have to love the numbers or use them, but understand their point.
The beauty of baseball is that it can be dissected in a thousand ways, each an engaging enterprise in its own way.
Baseball can be dissected in a thousand ways, but Bruce Jenkins knows there is only one certain way it can be dissected and scouted correctly. He's open-minded about how to dissect the game as long as you do it his way.
The stat-crazed sabermetricians, as they are called, invent specific
methods of evaluation without needing to witness the action in person. Numbers, they believe, tell the entire story -
This is repeated constantly by the anti-stats crowd, yet I would like to see them present one quote from a Sabermetrician where he/she says any variation of, "I don't need to see the game, I only need my statistics." I have a feeling such a quote doesn't exist but it doesn't stop guys like Bruce Jenkins who choose to invent this position of the stats crowd in order to help prove their point.
The modern-day general manager bears no significant resemblance to
Sabean, rather an especially sharp accountant who can draw up contracts,
analyze a salary structure and study esoteric numbers with the best of
them.
And this approach by modern-day general managers never works, which is why the San Francisco Giants have won the last 10 World Series titles.
It's a new breed of geeks, in essence.
Versus the old brand of closed-minded geezers who always oppose change, new knowledge or doing anything that is slightly uncomfortable for them. It's always a fun battle.
Privately, they scoff at the likes of Sabean - although, as far as we can tell, the Giants take home the rings.
So not only does Bruce Jenkins create fictional points of view that stat geeks have, but he also knows the internal thought process of stat geeks. He certainly doesn't sound like he is straight making shit up, does he?
I'm not sure a lot of people are scoffing at Brian Sabean at this point. Since Sabean bears no significant resemblance to the modern-day general manager that other MLB clubs employ, those 10 straight World Series titles by the Giants certainly speak well for Sabean.
The San Francisco model is based on visual evidence, not statistics, and it clearly works
The model isn't based on statistics, as long as you don't want to include the guy in the Giants front office whose very job with the team is to sort through statistics and give his opinion based on that. The same guy who is credited with helping the Giants win the 2010 World Series. Maybe part of the visual evidence model that Jenkins supports is to look at pertinent facts when making an argument and ignore those facts which don't support your argument.
Those people wouldn't understand what the Giants saw in Gregor Blanco, a longtime disappointment, as he tore up the Venezuelan winter league.
Perhaps they saw, and I am just taking a guess here, that Blanco was tearing up the Venezuelan winter league? Blanco also hit .244/.333/.344 with 103 strikeouts in 453 plate appearances in the majors, so he was a good acquisition who actually played below his career averages for the Giants, except in the "home runs" category.
They wouldn't necessarily spot the massive heart inside Sergio Romo,
I don't know. A massive heart inside Sergio Romo sounds like a concerning health problem.
The Giants drafted Romo in the 28th round in 2005 and he is one of those late round selections who have worked out really well. I'm sure he was drafted solely based on a grizzled scout seeing his massive heart and not based on his collegiate performance.
or what Hunter Pence's relentless energy brings to a contending team.
Those people who love statistics wouldn't know about Hunter Pence's relentless energy and what it brings to a contender, but would know about he has a career line of .285/.339/.475 and is a two-time All-Star. It is interesting to see Bruce Jenkins acting as if the Giants traded for Pence this year based on his relentless energy and this was an attribute only the most grizzled scout could have noticed and Pence's statistics don't reflect he is a quality baseball player. It doesn't take just eyes and ears to see Hunter Pence is a good baseball player. A binder full of statistics could tell a scout that as well. Good try to make it seem like Pence is a diamond in the rough though.
The Giants look at the face, the demeanor, the background, the ability to play one's best under suffocating pressure -
And given Pence's career line of .210/.244/.272 in the playoffs I can see why they immediately acquired him. This line doesn't tell what Pence's energy and heart have done in the playoffs under suffocating pressure though, it only tells a statistics-based story that he hasn't been very good in the playoffs. Pence's performance in the playoffs means nothing, it is his heart and relentless energy while not getting on-base in the playoffs is what brings him value.
all the components "Moneyball" lamely holds up to ridicule.
Again, if you don't understand an opposing point of view then it is best not to ridicule this point of view. "Moneyball" doesn't hold these components up to ridicule. They hold the insistence you can quantify these components in any meaningful way to determine how a player will perform as ridiculous...because it is ridiculous. I've been through this quite a few times, but much of the anti-statistics crowd doesn't even completely understand what they are arguing against. They fail to understand "Moneyball" (which is a generic term really) doesn't hold evaluating a player's background or demeanor as lame, but when evaluating a player (as PART, not ALL) to discuss a player's background and quantify it into any meaningful metric to evaluate that player is very difficult to do.
If you try calling Sabean a genius, he'll laugh in your face. Baseball
is an enterprise of failure, both on and off the field, and it's a game
of humility. He doesn't pretend to know everything, he'll gladly recount
his misfired decisions over the years,
How humble...unlike those completely unhumble drooling cellar-dwelling numbers freaks. You know, those generic works of fiction that anti-statistics writers create in their mind to not only show they don't understand this Sabermetrics point of view, but are willing to act like bullies to discredit this point of view.
But he won't stop trusting his eyes.
Or the guy he pays to be on his staff who is responsible for quantitative analysis. Ignore this man's existence though when it disproves your main point. "Ignore all evidence that may lead someone to a different conclusion than you have reached." Is that a pillar of journalism I just haven't heard about because I have been too busy sitting in my mom's attic in my underwear looking at binders full of numbers?
He'll finance the plane flights, rental cars, motel rooms and other staples of a scout's lonely existence.
Mostly because that is his job as the General Manager to finance the scout's lonely existence.
Also, this "lonely existence" crap...this is 2012 where you can talk to nearly anyone at any time or even see someone face-to-face at any time. There aren't many lonely existences left unless a person chooses this path. So I don't see scouts sitting sadly in hotel rooms unable to talk or hear from their loved ones.
The Giants trade the numbers for humanity, as the howls of skepticism tone down to a whisper.
It's the end of the statistical revolution as we know it. The rebellion has been squashed. Let them eat their favorite kind of cyber-cake!
Before I stop writing, Murray Chass has chimed in on the MVP race in the American League. Not shockingly, he wouldn't vote for Mike Trout.
Proponents of WAR, which means “wins above replacement,” insist that the
Angels’ terrific rookie Mike Trout should obviously win the award.
Those of us who use common sense, not common statistics, say the winner
should be the Tigers’ Miguel Cabrera.
As usual, smart people agree with Murray Chass and if you have a differing opinion from Murray then that means you simply don't use common sense. It's clear Murray is an old-media type and never had to deal with people telling him his point of view was wrong in the past. He's used to writing a column and then sitting back smiling happily at what an intelligent and well-thought out point of view he has. He's like a child who has never been told "no," so it isn't his fault he believes his point of view is the only smart point of view.
The Trout supporters would vote for him because he had the top WAR
rating among all players. That thinking only reinforces my view that to
satisfy stats zealots a list of statistics should be used to determine
award winners and Hall of Famers.
Framing those who use Sabermetrics as zealots...nice. Has anyone else noticed the amount of bullying that old-media columnists use to oppose the Sabermetric crowd? It's very unbecoming. They often use junior high-type insults in criticizing statheads for living in their mom's basement and not having a life outside of their interaction with a computer. Here Murray calls statheads "zealots" and other old-media types will use similar words to describe the opposing point of view. It's essentially journalistic bullying, which apparently these writers find acceptable.
The reason the stats zealots would like this system is it would eliminate members of the Baseball Writers Association as voters.
IT'S ALL A CONSPIRACY! STOCK UP ON CANNED GOODS AND GET THE BOMB SHELTER READY!
Not that Murray's opposition to the use of Sabermetrics is based on fear of losing his place in baseball's writing hierarchy or anything like that. His distaste for Sabermetrics doesn't result from fear. Not at all.
That’s right, the stats zealots are envious of the baseball writers
because they get to vote for these things and the zealots don’t.
Yes, it is envy that causes a person to have an opposing point of view from Murray. Pure envy. We all want to be Murray Chass. The delusions never end, do they?
That is not to say that new-age statistics haven’t started creeping into
the award decisions of some of the BBWAA voters, presumably the
younger, less experienced ones.
This is only the natural reason that new-age statistics have crept into award decisions. It couldn't be because there are open-minded voters who don't mind using new techniques to evaluate players.
This is part of what I find absolutely astonishing about old school writers who refuse to adopt any statistical methods, or even accept these alternative methods of evaluating players exist, is that in any other profession this could be a cause for being fired or forced to adopt the new methods. If I refused to adopt new methods in my job then I would be forced to adopt these new methods whether I liked it or not. I realize Murray isn't currently employed by a newspaper, but somehow in sports journalism the inability to accept change is not seen as a negative.
Arguments can be made about the relative value of players to their
teams, but if one candidate leads his team to the playoffs and another
candidate doesn’t, the latter player’s value comes into question.
The Angels won more games in the regular season than the Tigers did. This argument that Cabrera's team made the playoffs is probably the worst way of arguing on his behalf. Again, it's clear Murray rarely has had to defend his point of view, because he is very bad at it.
As good as Trout was this year, what did he do for the Angels? They were
only on the fringe of the American League West race, and they began
dropping back in the A.L. wild-card race in mid-August and getting back
in it when it was too late.
Well, they certainly had a much better record when Trout was playing for them from late April until the end of the season. I ain't no expert, but I would say that means something.
To me, the beauty of the BBWAA’s m.v.p. voting is it challenges voters
to study and think about the contributions players made to the success
of their teams.
But ignore any statistics-based argument. The beauty of the BBWAA's MVP voting is the ability to stay willfully ignorant to any information they don't believe supports their chosen player's candidacy for the award and only study and think about the information they choose to focus on.
Should Trout, for example, be penalized in m.v.p. consideration because
the Angels weren’t good enough to take advantage of what he did for
them?
No, he should not. Should Trout be penalized that his team won more games than the Tigers, yet didn't make the playoffs because the Angels play in a division with the Rangers and A's?
What fans and new-age nerds should understand, if they don’t already, is
most valuable players is not the same as player of the year.
"Nerds." Another attempt at journalistic bullying.
Also, what the fuck is "player of the year," other than an award Murray Chass simply just made up? Is Murray trying to make a point by comparing the MVP to a fictional award that Murray simply made up?
But he is not the most valuable player, no matter what WAR says. WAR, you see, does not have a vote in this election.
And WAR is very jealous of this fact. Guard tight to your old ways, Murray. Ignore any new information. That and your attempts to bully those who you disagree with says enough about you that I'm not sure I would want you to agree with me.
Showing posts with label one sentence pithy replies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label one sentence pithy replies. Show all posts
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Friday, March 30, 2012
5 comments No, College Football Postseason Is Not Better Than College Basketball's Postseason
Leave it to a Bleacher Report columnist to believe the NCAA college football postseason is better than the NCAA college basketball postseason. I would bet even the most diehard college football fan would agree the NCAA Tournament is more exciting than the BCS bowl. I don't believe this to be true at all. Leave it to a Bleacher Report writer to get together 50 reasons why college football's bowls (there is no real postseason) are better than college basketball's NCAA Tournament. I don't even see how there is a debate on this issue.
The reasons given by the author are incomprehensibly bad and also noted by me in bold italics.
Let's start the slideshow!
I love both college basketball and football to death, but something about the BCS and all of the bowl games gets me more excited.
I love both college basketball and football to death, but NOTHING about the BCS and all of the bowl games gets me more excited.
There. It's fixed.
but here are my 50 reasons as to why March Madness does not hold a candle to college football's postseason.
I warn you, they are terrible. Maybe college football is better than college basketball during the regular season, but the college football bowl system is the biggest letdown and disappointment among all sports in terms of how the postseason is run. We wait almost a month and a half for two teams to battle for the BCS Championship and along the way there are bowl games, only half of which are even somewhat interesting to me. No offense to the 10 bowl games that featured teams who won 6 games or less prior to making a bowl game (meaning these teams were just above .500 or below .500 like UCLA before the bowl game), but I prefer the competition of the NCAA Tournament where one team at or under .500 in the field is the exception.
Cash Money
You can't argue with someone who considers cash money received by the schools and networks to be a reason one postseason is better than the other.
From 2009 through 2011, an average of 28.3 million people watched the BCS Championship. During that same span, an average of only 20.4 million watched the NCAA Tournament's title game.
I never knew people are considered monetary amounts. I'm going to go purchase a hamburger and pay Burger King with 1.5 people and see how that works. What he means to talk about is ad revenue. In reality, the ad revenue of the NCAA Tournament is third behind the Final Four and the World Series at $170 million. Where did I get this information? From the exact same article this idiot just selectively chose his information from.
For one, there's a lot more money at stake in college football than there is in basketball. The Final Four pulled in nearly $170 in ad revenue last year, behind only the Super Bowl ($228 million) and World Series ($269 million).
So while more people watch the BCS championship game and the networks have larger contracts for the BCS games, the Final Four pulls in more money for advertisers.
Officials
Officiating in college basketball does suck. I'll give everyone that.
If you paid any attention to the tournament, many of these games are being decided in the final minute with a questionable call (or so it seems).
I love the way your over-generalized statement proves your point.
We don’t see that in football and we never see a fluke game reversed in football unless it is for the better and correct call (it is called review).
The reasons given by the author are incomprehensibly bad and also noted by me in bold italics.
Let's start the slideshow!
I love both college basketball and football to death, but something about the BCS and all of the bowl games gets me more excited.
I love both college basketball and football to death, but NOTHING about the BCS and all of the bowl games gets me more excited.
There. It's fixed.
but here are my 50 reasons as to why March Madness does not hold a candle to college football's postseason.
I warn you, they are terrible. Maybe college football is better than college basketball during the regular season, but the college football bowl system is the biggest letdown and disappointment among all sports in terms of how the postseason is run. We wait almost a month and a half for two teams to battle for the BCS Championship and along the way there are bowl games, only half of which are even somewhat interesting to me. No offense to the 10 bowl games that featured teams who won 6 games or less prior to making a bowl game (meaning these teams were just above .500 or below .500 like UCLA before the bowl game), but I prefer the competition of the NCAA Tournament where one team at or under .500 in the field is the exception.
Cash Money
You can't argue with someone who considers cash money received by the schools and networks to be a reason one postseason is better than the other.
From 2009 through 2011, an average of 28.3 million people watched the BCS Championship. During that same span, an average of only 20.4 million watched the NCAA Tournament's title game.
I never knew people are considered monetary amounts. I'm going to go purchase a hamburger and pay Burger King with 1.5 people and see how that works. What he means to talk about is ad revenue. In reality, the ad revenue of the NCAA Tournament is third behind the Final Four and the World Series at $170 million. Where did I get this information? From the exact same article this idiot just selectively chose his information from.
For one, there's a lot more money at stake in college football than there is in basketball. The Final Four pulled in nearly $170 in ad revenue last year, behind only the Super Bowl ($228 million) and World Series ($269 million).
So while more people watch the BCS championship game and the networks have larger contracts for the BCS games, the Final Four pulls in more money for advertisers.
Officials
Officiating in college basketball does suck. I'll give everyone that.
If you paid any attention to the tournament, many of these games are being decided in the final minute with a questionable call (or so it seems).
I love the way your over-generalized statement proves your point.
We don’t see that in football and we never see a fluke game reversed in football unless it is for the better and correct call (it is called review).
Some of it actually is where the officials do not make the right call, but that is never the issue in college football (especially in bowl games).
Really? The 2002 BCS Championship Game argues differently. Also, in college basketball the officials are required to make more judgment calls without the benefit of instant replay. There are fewer judgment calls to be made in college football (other than where to spot the ball) during a game. I wouldn't say bad calls are NEVER an issue though.
Timeouts
There is nothing more annoying than having longer and extended timeouts in the NCAA Tournament. It allows the underdog to stay in the game longer and gives them more hope to believe.
This has absolutely no meaning in the real world. This author really, really, really likes to generalize. What's wrong with the underdog having more hope to believe? How do timeouts give the underdog more hope again?
There is nothing wrong with that, but college football keeps it at a level playing field.
I fail to see how timeouts cause an uneven playing field.
Maybe there is not an edge given in terms of how long the timeouts are,
"Maybe everything I've just said is all bullshit."
The bottom line is a college basketball game is two hours long and a college football is three hours long. Regardless of timeouts, it takes longer to play a college football game and the halftime of a BCS game is at least 30 minutes long. So there may be more timeouts in college basketball, but BCS games take longer overall.
Final Four in Football is Always Better
The top two bowl games (national title being one of them, obviously) every season are always memorable, period. I wish I could say the same for college basketball.
ANOTHER generalization. There have been memorable college basketball and college football games. We all remember Vince Young's drive that won the game for Texas in the 2005 National Championship Game, but we also remember Gordon Heyward's halfcourt shot that almost won the NCAA Tournament for Butler.
I'm not sure what anyone finds memorable about the BCS Championship Games over the last five years, other than who won of course. Even the "best" game in that time wasn't the most exciting championship game (2011 BCS Championship Game) and is mostly known for Oregon's inability to properly ensure Michael Dyer was down, allowing him to rush for more yardage on a running play. I feel like the BCS Championship Game is usually a letdown after a month and a half long wait. That's just my opinion though and I don't have any over-generalized statements to support my opinion.
College Basketball's Regular Season
I cannot say I have too many friends or family members who even bother watching any of the regular season games.
Perhaps you shouldn't use your friends and family as the sample size from which you chose to derive your conclusion.
Well, they are essentially meaningless due to the fact that you are not rewarded much by dominating in the regular season.
So what exactly was LSU rewarded for dominating the regular season this year in college football? A chance to play Alabama, a team they had already beaten during the regular season? That's some reward, the chance to beat Alabama, a they had already beaten at Alabama. At least college basketball has a tournament which allows the best teams to go head-to-head, which is something college football probably needs.
Outside of earning a one-seed, you might be matched up with a giant killing mid-major or perhaps one hell of a squad in the second (now called third round).
That's the breaks and what makes the college basketball postseason so much fun. You have to constantly prove you are one of the best teams in the country to advance. What makes college football's postseason so tedious is fans have to sit through 20+ irrelevant bowl games just to get to a bowl game that "matters" in that they don't really matter since the winner only gets pride, a trophy and a gift bag for participating.
College football's Regular Season
We are already stretching these reasons to get to 50.
It leads us to a tremendous postseason where we see the best of the best compete against one another.
No we don't. We see teams chosen for a bowl game based on predicted attendance for that game, ability for the bowl to turn the highest amount of profit, and conference affiliation.
And this news might shock you, but they reward teams for what they accomplished in the regular season!
Ask Boise State and Oklahoma State if they feel they were rewarded for what they accomplished during the regular season. The odds aren't they don't feel very rewarded. Houston lost their conference championship game and was rewarded by playing by going to the TicketCity Bowl, without a chance to play against other teams who only have one loss.
College football takes the two "best" teams and pits them against each other and all the other teams are shit out of luck.
Pageantry
In the first few rounds, some teams just get a feel for their competition. In bowl games, this is it.
Wasn't it just a few minutes ago the author said the college basketball postseason stunk because a team isn't rewarded for a strong regular season? Didn't the author say a team could run into "a giant-killing mid-major" or "one hell of a squad?" But now, teams are just feeling their way through games? You can't have it both ways. Either elite college basketball teams are challenged by a "giant-killing mid-major" or they can feel their way through games. You can't argue both ways and be persuasive.
Jump Balls
There is one jump ball per game. So jump balls are bad?
It is like a turnover, if your team does not have the possession arrow, then it just flat out stinks.
So the possession arrow stinks AND jump balls stink?
I do not agree with Dick Vitale on everything, but this rule must change (he has stated it many times). They need to jump it up like the NBA because this kills the tournament.
WHAT? So jump balls are bad, but college basketball should have more jump balls? I hate to ask this question, but if jump balls are so damn bad, then WHY DO YOU WANT MORE OF THEM?
This article reads like it was dictated to the author by a 5 year old.
Tiring
Bowl season allows you time to actually get some sleep and be able to come back ready to go for every game.
Unfortunately for the first two weeks of the bowl games are you rested and ready to watch irrelevant bowl games and by the time good bowl games come around they start at 8:45pm It's hard to watch the whole thing if you live on the East Coast.
Entertainment
The momentum never dies in college football’s postseason, and we are almost never let down in the main events (BCS bowls).
The momentum never dies in college football's postseason because there is never any momentum. Once the bowl games matchups are decided it takes a month for some of the matchups to even take place. There is no momentum for BCS bowls. All momentum is destroyed by the long wait for the BCS bowl games and the fact the games are played at 8:30pm on a weeknight. While the NCAA Tournament is an event, the BCS bowls are a welcome sign that bowl season is finally ending.
Getting Jobbed
Outside of getting jobbed by officials in the final minutes (Butler-Pitt, among hundreds of games),
This is among hundreds of games, not wait, thousands of games, no wait, millions of games where one team has gotten "jobbed" by the officials. In fact, there are so many games where a team has gotten "jobbed" by the officials the author doesn't even bother to list them. In fact, there are so many numerous games the author doesn't even have time to list a game from this very college basketball season where the officials "jobbed" a team. So he lists a Butler-Pitt NCAA Tournament game where the officials didn't screw up, but called two legitimate fouls, one on each team. So neither team got "jobbed" since Butler and Pitt had a ticky-tack foul called on them at the end of the game. What a poor example to prove another over-generalized reason.
Basketball is about a game of runs, but one poor shooting night and it all evaporates in front of you.
Timeouts
There is nothing more annoying than having longer and extended timeouts in the NCAA Tournament. It allows the underdog to stay in the game longer and gives them more hope to believe.
This has absolutely no meaning in the real world. This author really, really, really likes to generalize. What's wrong with the underdog having more hope to believe? How do timeouts give the underdog more hope again?
There is nothing wrong with that, but college football keeps it at a level playing field.
I fail to see how timeouts cause an uneven playing field.
Maybe there is not an edge given in terms of how long the timeouts are,
"Maybe everything I've just said is all bullshit."
The bottom line is a college basketball game is two hours long and a college football is three hours long. Regardless of timeouts, it takes longer to play a college football game and the halftime of a BCS game is at least 30 minutes long. So there may be more timeouts in college basketball, but BCS games take longer overall.
Final Four in Football is Always Better
The top two bowl games (national title being one of them, obviously) every season are always memorable, period. I wish I could say the same for college basketball.
ANOTHER generalization. There have been memorable college basketball and college football games. We all remember Vince Young's drive that won the game for Texas in the 2005 National Championship Game, but we also remember Gordon Heyward's halfcourt shot that almost won the NCAA Tournament for Butler.
I'm not sure what anyone finds memorable about the BCS Championship Games over the last five years, other than who won of course. Even the "best" game in that time wasn't the most exciting championship game (2011 BCS Championship Game) and is mostly known for Oregon's inability to properly ensure Michael Dyer was down, allowing him to rush for more yardage on a running play. I feel like the BCS Championship Game is usually a letdown after a month and a half long wait. That's just my opinion though and I don't have any over-generalized statements to support my opinion.
College Basketball's Regular Season
I cannot say I have too many friends or family members who even bother watching any of the regular season games.
Perhaps you shouldn't use your friends and family as the sample size from which you chose to derive your conclusion.
Well, they are essentially meaningless due to the fact that you are not rewarded much by dominating in the regular season.
So what exactly was LSU rewarded for dominating the regular season this year in college football? A chance to play Alabama, a team they had already beaten during the regular season? That's some reward, the chance to beat Alabama, a they had already beaten at Alabama. At least college basketball has a tournament which allows the best teams to go head-to-head, which is something college football probably needs.
Outside of earning a one-seed, you might be matched up with a giant killing mid-major or perhaps one hell of a squad in the second (now called third round).
That's the breaks and what makes the college basketball postseason so much fun. You have to constantly prove you are one of the best teams in the country to advance. What makes college football's postseason so tedious is fans have to sit through 20+ irrelevant bowl games just to get to a bowl game that "matters" in that they don't really matter since the winner only gets pride, a trophy and a gift bag for participating.
College football's Regular Season
We are already stretching these reasons to get to 50.
It leads us to a tremendous postseason where we see the best of the best compete against one another.
No we don't. We see teams chosen for a bowl game based on predicted attendance for that game, ability for the bowl to turn the highest amount of profit, and conference affiliation.
And this news might shock you, but they reward teams for what they accomplished in the regular season!
Ask Boise State and Oklahoma State if they feel they were rewarded for what they accomplished during the regular season. The odds aren't they don't feel very rewarded. Houston lost their conference championship game and was rewarded by playing by going to the TicketCity Bowl, without a chance to play against other teams who only have one loss.
College football takes the two "best" teams and pits them against each other and all the other teams are shit out of luck.
Pageantry
In the first few rounds, some teams just get a feel for their competition. In bowl games, this is it.
Wasn't it just a few minutes ago the author said the college basketball postseason stunk because a team isn't rewarded for a strong regular season? Didn't the author say a team could run into "a giant-killing mid-major" or "one hell of a squad?" But now, teams are just feeling their way through games? You can't have it both ways. Either elite college basketball teams are challenged by a "giant-killing mid-major" or they can feel their way through games. You can't argue both ways and be persuasive.
Jump Balls
There is one jump ball per game. So jump balls are bad?
It is like a turnover, if your team does not have the possession arrow, then it just flat out stinks.
So the possession arrow stinks AND jump balls stink?
I do not agree with Dick Vitale on everything, but this rule must change (he has stated it many times). They need to jump it up like the NBA because this kills the tournament.
WHAT? So jump balls are bad, but college basketball should have more jump balls? I hate to ask this question, but if jump balls are so damn bad, then WHY DO YOU WANT MORE OF THEM?
This article reads like it was dictated to the author by a 5 year old.
Tiring
Bowl season allows you time to actually get some sleep and be able to come back ready to go for every game.
Unfortunately for the first two weeks of the bowl games are you rested and ready to watch irrelevant bowl games and by the time good bowl games come around they start at 8:45pm It's hard to watch the whole thing if you live on the East Coast.
Entertainment
The momentum never dies in college football’s postseason, and we are almost never let down in the main events (BCS bowls).
The momentum never dies in college football's postseason because there is never any momentum. Once the bowl games matchups are decided it takes a month for some of the matchups to even take place. There is no momentum for BCS bowls. All momentum is destroyed by the long wait for the BCS bowl games and the fact the games are played at 8:30pm on a weeknight. While the NCAA Tournament is an event, the BCS bowls are a welcome sign that bowl season is finally ending.
Getting Jobbed
Outside of getting jobbed by officials in the final minutes (Butler-Pitt, among hundreds of games),
This is among hundreds of games, not wait, thousands of games, no wait, millions of games where one team has gotten "jobbed" by the officials. In fact, there are so many games where a team has gotten "jobbed" by the officials the author doesn't even bother to list them. In fact, there are so many numerous games the author doesn't even have time to list a game from this very college basketball season where the officials "jobbed" a team. So he lists a Butler-Pitt NCAA Tournament game where the officials didn't screw up, but called two legitimate fouls, one on each team. So neither team got "jobbed" since Butler and Pitt had a ticky-tack foul called on them at the end of the game. What a poor example to prove another over-generalized reason.
Basketball is about a game of runs, but one poor shooting night and it all evaporates in front of you.
It is tough for a running team to get bottled up in a bowl game when they have two All-Americans paving the way.
So because the NCAA Tournament is more unpredictable, it isn't as exciting as the bowl games? Crazy me, I always thought excitement was good during sporting events.
Forget the major upsets in college football because the two juggernauts competing with one another are more than likely close in talent to begin with.
Who can forget the juggernaut West Virginia team playing the juggernaut Clemson team in a bowl game this year? The same game where West Virginia ran up 70 points on the juggernaut Clemson team. How about that National Championship game this year where the juggernaut LSU team couldn't get past mid-field?
No Jamar Samuels
Never in my lifetime have I ever heard of or even pondered such an awful thought. Jamar Samuel was Kansas State's second-leading scorer and leading rebounder who suspended approximately 20 minutes before tip-off this past weekend against Syracuse.
The timing was the abysmal part of this whole thing, and for that reason I must put the NCAA Tournament and college basketball in the timeout circle.
We all know college football would never have problems like this. Players would never get suspended for selling a game-worn jersey or selling memorabilia for tattoos. That stuff never happens in college football.
Sloppy Play
We hardly see sloppy play in the bowl games—and that is with a month off.
I thought Clemson did a great job of not tackling after being given a month off. They only gave up 70 points in a BCS bowl game. Who can forget LSU's precision offense that couldn't get a first down in the BCS Championship Game? It was memorable to watch Jordan Jefferson and the LSU offense make your local high school team look like the 2007 New England Patriots offense.
The preparation put in is remarkable to witness,
You are an idiot and you clearly don't watch the bowl games. Sometimes teams play like they don't even want to be there, which in many cases the teams don't. This is especially true if that team believes they deserved a better bowl bid which they didn't receive because a bowl choose a lesser-talented team which would bring the bowl more attendance and therefore more income. One more reason bowls suck. Bowls are about money and attendance, not putting the best matchups on the field.
The teams get a minimum of three days off (most teams get full week), but it is amazing to watch teams throw bricks up at the rim.
I want to be a sportswriter! I write for Bleacher Report! I write over-generalized statements! All teams throw up bricks in the NCAA Tournament! Fuck facts, I have my opinion! Every white player tries hard, most fat people are lazy and if you see a group of minorities together they are probably committing a crime! I write for Bleacher Report and refuse to write like a mentally competent human being would!
Outside of a few bowl games every season, every game is hard fought heading into the fourth quarter.
"Most" bowl games are fought hard? There is no proof of this given by the author, instead he just makes blanket and over-generalized statements in an effort to prove his point. This is embarrassing even for Bleacher Report and please remember Bleacher Report will sometimes print nearly anything that is written in English and the author is able to throw more than two sentences together to form a paragraph.
No Frustration
How many of your friends—and yourself included—just hate shredding that bracket up on the first day?
Forget the major upsets in college football because the two juggernauts competing with one another are more than likely close in talent to begin with.
Who can forget the juggernaut West Virginia team playing the juggernaut Clemson team in a bowl game this year? The same game where West Virginia ran up 70 points on the juggernaut Clemson team. How about that National Championship game this year where the juggernaut LSU team couldn't get past mid-field?
No Jamar Samuels
Never in my lifetime have I ever heard of or even pondered such an awful thought. Jamar Samuel was Kansas State's second-leading scorer and leading rebounder who suspended approximately 20 minutes before tip-off this past weekend against Syracuse.
The timing was the abysmal part of this whole thing, and for that reason I must put the NCAA Tournament and college basketball in the timeout circle.
We all know college football would never have problems like this. Players would never get suspended for selling a game-worn jersey or selling memorabilia for tattoos. That stuff never happens in college football.
Sloppy Play
We hardly see sloppy play in the bowl games—and that is with a month off.
I thought Clemson did a great job of not tackling after being given a month off. They only gave up 70 points in a BCS bowl game. Who can forget LSU's precision offense that couldn't get a first down in the BCS Championship Game? It was memorable to watch Jordan Jefferson and the LSU offense make your local high school team look like the 2007 New England Patriots offense.
The preparation put in is remarkable to witness,
You are an idiot and you clearly don't watch the bowl games. Sometimes teams play like they don't even want to be there, which in many cases the teams don't. This is especially true if that team believes they deserved a better bowl bid which they didn't receive because a bowl choose a lesser-talented team which would bring the bowl more attendance and therefore more income. One more reason bowls suck. Bowls are about money and attendance, not putting the best matchups on the field.
The teams get a minimum of three days off (most teams get full week), but it is amazing to watch teams throw bricks up at the rim.
I want to be a sportswriter! I write for Bleacher Report! I write over-generalized statements! All teams throw up bricks in the NCAA Tournament! Fuck facts, I have my opinion! Every white player tries hard, most fat people are lazy and if you see a group of minorities together they are probably committing a crime! I write for Bleacher Report and refuse to write like a mentally competent human being would!
Outside of a few bowl games every season, every game is hard fought heading into the fourth quarter.
"Most" bowl games are fought hard? There is no proof of this given by the author, instead he just makes blanket and over-generalized statements in an effort to prove his point. This is embarrassing even for Bleacher Report and please remember Bleacher Report will sometimes print nearly anything that is written in English and the author is able to throw more than two sentences together to form a paragraph.
No Frustration
How many of your friends—and yourself included—just hate shredding that bracket up on the first day?
Bowlmania does not do that to you, so that has to be a bit more enjoyable.
It isn't more enjoyable. Unpredictability is fun in sports.
No Need To Skip Work
However, the postseason in college football allows you to still be productive with your non-college football life.
This is simply an outright lie. Here are the bowl games that were played this year when people were at work (this doesn't include people who work on the weekend and remember the United States does have a West Coast, so games starting at 5pm take place when they are at work):
Gildan New Mexico
AdvoCare V100 Independence
Little Caesars Bowl
Military Bowl Presented By Northrop Grumman
Bridgepoint Education Holiday
Champs Sports
Bell Helicopter Armed Forces
New Era Pinstripe
Franklin American Mortgage Music City
TicketCity
Outback
Capital One
Taxslayer.com Gator Bowl
Rose
The NCAA Tournament can set you back if you get addicted by watching every single game (all 67 of them).
The Thursday and Friday of the first weekend of the tournament is the only time a person who gets off work at 5pm on either coast can't watch an entire game. Every other game is during the evening after 7pm or on a weekend. What a terrible point.
I'm going with one sentence pithy replies from here on out...
College Gameday
It feels like your team wins a dramatic game and then the next day the season is done with. That is the way it goes in college basketball, but that doesn’t mean it is cool or fair.
No, no, no, this is EXACTLY why bowl games suck, because after a bowl game the season is over the team that wins the bowl game never plays another team.
NIT is for the Weak
The NIT isn't considered the NCAA Tournament, but nice try.
Rivalries are Made
You could argue the NCAA Tournament gives us matchups we would never see in any other sport.
No Need To Skip Work
However, the postseason in college football allows you to still be productive with your non-college football life.
This is simply an outright lie. Here are the bowl games that were played this year when people were at work (this doesn't include people who work on the weekend and remember the United States does have a West Coast, so games starting at 5pm take place when they are at work):
Gildan New Mexico
AdvoCare V100 Independence
Little Caesars Bowl
Military Bowl Presented By Northrop Grumman
Bridgepoint Education Holiday
Champs Sports
Bell Helicopter Armed Forces
New Era Pinstripe
Franklin American Mortgage Music City
TicketCity
Outback
Capital One
Taxslayer.com Gator Bowl
Rose
The NCAA Tournament can set you back if you get addicted by watching every single game (all 67 of them).
The Thursday and Friday of the first weekend of the tournament is the only time a person who gets off work at 5pm on either coast can't watch an entire game. Every other game is during the evening after 7pm or on a weekend. What a terrible point.
I'm going with one sentence pithy replies from here on out...
College Gameday
It feels like your team wins a dramatic game and then the next day the season is done with. That is the way it goes in college basketball, but that doesn’t mean it is cool or fair.
No, no, no, this is EXACTLY why bowl games suck, because after a bowl game the season is over the team that wins the bowl game never plays another team.
NIT is for the Weak
The NIT isn't considered the NCAA Tournament, but nice try.
Rivalries are Made
You could argue the NCAA Tournament gives us matchups we would never see in any other sport.
The real point is seeing Goliath’s battle it out on the gridiron, which gets me more excited than seeing a Cinderella eventually break their slipper.
I've never heard the argument that because the NCAA Tournament is more competitive and features never-before-seen matchups, this makes it inferior to college football...a simply amazing line of thought.
Five Fouls
In a game that matters the most, we often see All-American players perform like scrubs.
"Often" see All-American players perform like scrubs, yet All-American Kemba Walker led UConn to the NCAA Championship last year, just like All-American Jon Scheyer did the year before, just like All-American Tyler Hansbrough did the year before that.
In a fluky one-game playoff, anything can occur.
Like anything could happen in the one-game playoff that is a bowl game?
Excitement
He's just looking in the dictionary and naming words he sees at this point. I would use the Will Ferrell "George W. Bush" voice to read what's written in bold if I were you. It makes it more exciting to read.
Many of the first-round games are extremely boring because we see these teams come out flat.
Completely untrue and we see the author's continuous use of "many," "most," "often," or "all" to compensate for a lack of research and a convincing argument.
Relaxation
I love the NCAA Tournament like nobody’s business, but the postseason for college football is more relaxing.
Exactly, the NCAA Tournament is more exciting and more unpredictable. It is better.
Lehigh
However, some argue that Lehigh never deserved that shot against Duke in the first place, right?
Wrong, I haven't heard anyone argue this point of view until I just read it in this slideshow.
The underdog hangs around and finds a way to pull off the shocking upset in a first-round game when a top notch shooting team cannot hit the backside of a barn. Many argue that is bad for the game, not good.
There is absolutely no way this is bad for college basketball.
Prove Yourself
A top-five team has to continue to win game after game despite doing so for the previous four months.
This is clearly less preferable to basing who plays in the BCS Championship game based on a poll.
I understand that is how the game works, but that is weak sauce
This is relevant modern terminology "the kids" use!
No Complaining
While you could throw the same at me for the BCS since there are haters (though I won’t complain), the NCAA Tournament often has way too much boring negativity.
(Bengoodfella is speechless) You realize the majority of people hate the entire bowl system, right? Like the entire format and everything about it?
Consistency
Strategery.
In the BCS we would never get a chance to see two mediocre teams plays for it all because college football is just better in terms of rewarding their best.
It's just tough for college football to figure out which teams are the "best."
Entertainment
He's now used "entertainment" twice as a reason.
The Best of the Best
Every season college football rewards you with the best two teams on the planet. In my eyes, no other sport in America can come close to giving you the same.
Then you need to go to an eye doctor if that's what your eyes tell you.
The Super Bowl has legit teams normally, but in a one-game playoff, anything can happen. That is not the case in college football.
The argument that unpredictability is bad, and this is why the NCAA Tournament is bad, just absolutely astounds me.
The Best
Not to be confused with "The Best of the Best" of course.
I want to watch the best at all times possible. I am the biggest underdog guy out there,
You are also confused and lack the ability to understand your own self since you just wrote this:
The Final Four isn't always must watch if VCU is playing Butler. George Mason and those Cinderella stories are amazing to follow, but it is really getting old right now.
Yeah, you are a big underdog guy, as long as the underdog isn't the underdog and instead is an elite team from a major conference.
One-Game Playoff
I do not honestly know what I would do if a random non-AQ team such as Nevada had an opportunity to play Ohio State with a chance to compete for the BCS title.
If they earned it by defeating other teams in a tournament, then what the hell is the problem?
That is what we see in college basketball, and when it happens, it really does stink to witness.
He's a big underdog guy you know.
Holidays
Maybe you get a spring vacation or break, but on New Year’s day college football is king.
There were zero games on New Year's Day this year...damn facts getting in the way of trying to prove a point!
No Wait
Really, "no wait" a reason for why the BCS is better than the NCAA Tournament coming from a guy who likes the system that waits over an entire month for two teams to play for the BCS title?
The weekends are great to watch the NCAA Tournament, but Monday-Wednesday is atrocious without anything going on.
You know, other than the four First Four games that take place on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Happy New Year!
Still, celebrating the New Year’s with the ones you love will always be better for me.
Five Fouls
In a game that matters the most, we often see All-American players perform like scrubs.
"Often" see All-American players perform like scrubs, yet All-American Kemba Walker led UConn to the NCAA Championship last year, just like All-American Jon Scheyer did the year before, just like All-American Tyler Hansbrough did the year before that.
In a fluky one-game playoff, anything can occur.
Like anything could happen in the one-game playoff that is a bowl game?
Excitement
He's just looking in the dictionary and naming words he sees at this point. I would use the Will Ferrell "George W. Bush" voice to read what's written in bold if I were you. It makes it more exciting to read.
Many of the first-round games are extremely boring because we see these teams come out flat.
Completely untrue and we see the author's continuous use of "many," "most," "often," or "all" to compensate for a lack of research and a convincing argument.
Relaxation
I love the NCAA Tournament like nobody’s business, but the postseason for college football is more relaxing.
Exactly, the NCAA Tournament is more exciting and more unpredictable. It is better.
Lehigh
However, some argue that Lehigh never deserved that shot against Duke in the first place, right?
Wrong, I haven't heard anyone argue this point of view until I just read it in this slideshow.
The underdog hangs around and finds a way to pull off the shocking upset in a first-round game when a top notch shooting team cannot hit the backside of a barn. Many argue that is bad for the game, not good.
There is absolutely no way this is bad for college basketball.
Prove Yourself
A top-five team has to continue to win game after game despite doing so for the previous four months.
This is clearly less preferable to basing who plays in the BCS Championship game based on a poll.
I understand that is how the game works, but that is weak sauce
This is relevant modern terminology "the kids" use!
No Complaining
While you could throw the same at me for the BCS since there are haters (though I won’t complain), the NCAA Tournament often has way too much boring negativity.
(Bengoodfella is speechless) You realize the majority of people hate the entire bowl system, right? Like the entire format and everything about it?
Consistency
Strategery.
In the BCS we would never get a chance to see two mediocre teams plays for it all because college football is just better in terms of rewarding their best.
It's just tough for college football to figure out which teams are the "best."
Entertainment
He's now used "entertainment" twice as a reason.
The Best of the Best
Every season college football rewards you with the best two teams on the planet. In my eyes, no other sport in America can come close to giving you the same.
Then you need to go to an eye doctor if that's what your eyes tell you.
The Super Bowl has legit teams normally, but in a one-game playoff, anything can happen. That is not the case in college football.
The argument that unpredictability is bad, and this is why the NCAA Tournament is bad, just absolutely astounds me.
The Best
Not to be confused with "The Best of the Best" of course.
I want to watch the best at all times possible. I am the biggest underdog guy out there,
You are also confused and lack the ability to understand your own self since you just wrote this:
The Final Four isn't always must watch if VCU is playing Butler. George Mason and those Cinderella stories are amazing to follow, but it is really getting old right now.
Yeah, you are a big underdog guy, as long as the underdog isn't the underdog and instead is an elite team from a major conference.
One-Game Playoff
I do not honestly know what I would do if a random non-AQ team such as Nevada had an opportunity to play Ohio State with a chance to compete for the BCS title.
If they earned it by defeating other teams in a tournament, then what the hell is the problem?
That is what we see in college basketball, and when it happens, it really does stink to witness.
He's a big underdog guy you know.
Holidays
Maybe you get a spring vacation or break, but on New Year’s day college football is king.
There were zero games on New Year's Day this year...damn facts getting in the way of trying to prove a point!
No Wait
Really, "no wait" a reason for why the BCS is better than the NCAA Tournament coming from a guy who likes the system that waits over an entire month for two teams to play for the BCS title?
The weekends are great to watch the NCAA Tournament, but Monday-Wednesday is atrocious without anything going on.
You know, other than the four First Four games that take place on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Happy New Year!
Still, celebrating the New Year’s with the ones you love will always be better for me.
Waking up on New Year's Day is probably more exciting than Christmas was as a child nowadays.
Wait, does this have to do with the NCAA Tournament???????????
The Best of the Bunch
Again, not to be confused with "The Best" or "The Best of the Best."
BCS Matchups
In college football we always see dream matchups every January.
As long as you aren't a fan of Boise State or any other team that doesn't get a chance to play in the BCS games because they weren't chosen high enough in the polls.
Every Single Game Matters Leading Into Postseason
Except for the Alabama-LSU game played in November of this year, which apparently didn't count since the game was played again for the BCS Championship.
Every weekend during the regular season of college football, there are thrilling games filled with more pageantry than any other sport.
Then it ends with a huge thud when the bowl pairings are announced because the momentum slows down and the college football postseason competes directly against the end of the NFL season.
If you truly are the best team on the planet, then losing a game should never happen.
Which explains why since 1998 we have only had eight teams win the BCS Championship Game as an undefeated team. So nearly half the time, the BCS Champion has lost a game...but this should never happen of course. So explain how an undefeated team can still not get a chance to play in the BCS Championship Game? The system works! Maybe if we keep saying it then it will eventually come true for every single season!
The best two teams have played each other nearly every single season. In college basketball, that rarely happens.
This is true unless you think Oklahoma State (or Stanford) deserved a shot at the BCS Championship Game.
There is no way the BCS bowls are better than the NCAA Tournament. No over-generalized and poorly executed slideshow can convince me differently.
The Best of the Bunch
Again, not to be confused with "The Best" or "The Best of the Best."
BCS Matchups
In college football we always see dream matchups every January.
As long as you aren't a fan of Boise State or any other team that doesn't get a chance to play in the BCS games because they weren't chosen high enough in the polls.
Every Single Game Matters Leading Into Postseason
Except for the Alabama-LSU game played in November of this year, which apparently didn't count since the game was played again for the BCS Championship.
Every weekend during the regular season of college football, there are thrilling games filled with more pageantry than any other sport.
Then it ends with a huge thud when the bowl pairings are announced because the momentum slows down and the college football postseason competes directly against the end of the NFL season.
If you truly are the best team on the planet, then losing a game should never happen.
Which explains why since 1998 we have only had eight teams win the BCS Championship Game as an undefeated team. So nearly half the time, the BCS Champion has lost a game...but this should never happen of course. So explain how an undefeated team can still not get a chance to play in the BCS Championship Game? The system works! Maybe if we keep saying it then it will eventually come true for every single season!
The best two teams have played each other nearly every single season. In college basketball, that rarely happens.
This is true unless you think Oklahoma State (or Stanford) deserved a shot at the BCS Championship Game.
There is no way the BCS bowls are better than the NCAA Tournament. No over-generalized and poorly executed slideshow can convince me differently.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
2 comments Jemele Hill Tries to Get Me To Talk About Race and I Call Her a Communist
I need closure with Jemele Hill.
I can't ignore Jemele when she talks about O.J. Simpson, I just can't do it. I was originally going to put a different heading to this post with the words David Duke in it, but since "Hiel Hitler" (thanks to Jemele Hill) is a search term that brings up our blog, I decided not to chance it. So now the word "Communist" will bring up our blog. Perfect! Let's go with one sentence pithy (which means lots of run on sentences) replies today since I am too tired to give Jemele Hill all my energy.
I'm supposed to believe the O.J. Simpson guilty verdict is a purging.
No one I have heard has ever said that but maybe I need to listen better.
It supposedly represents America collectively issuing a makeup call for 1995 by rendering a judgment that could send the 61-year-old Simpson to prison for much of the rest of his life.
O.J. Simpson is a punchline and I could truly care less whether he ever goes to jail again or not, I really don't care, just don't accuse all of America of trying to get back at him for being acquitted 13 years ago.
But I don't believe any of that was accomplished last week in Las Vegas.
Jemele Hill loves to start her columns off with an incredibly wrong premise she believes is true, and then just build and build upon it, then prove it wrong, so it is kind of like if I said, "Most of America thinks that Tony Romo looks retarded but I think it just shows how intolerant we are as a society."
(In Sports Illustrated last week it said Tony Romo was Latino...what????????)
All this verdict does is prove that race, wealth and celebrity are just as relevant in 2008 as they were in 1995, when Simpson was acquitted of murdering his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.
This is false, because only one person in this case had wealth and celebrity, which means O.J. Simpson would have been acquitted again.
In response to the guilty verdict, David Cook, the attorney who represents Goldman's father Fred, said: "Is this closure for Fred Goldman? No. Is this closure for America? Yes."
Jemele Hill thinks Fred Goldman's attorney speaks for the entire United States.
With all due respect to Cook, it's not closure for me, because I accepted O.J.'s acquittal 13 years ago.
What a shock, she creates a false premise and then disagrees with the false premise she created.
"I think it's closure for traditional white America," said Dr. Carl Taylor, a sociologist at Michigan State. "[For African-Americas], this won't be a closure.
What is traditional white America and why do I get the feeling Dr. Carl Taylor does not know who this is either?
It will be an opening. It will be ripping the wound open."
Jemele Hill is proud to try and rip open the wound even further and I have gotten a feeling that African Americans that aren't looking for an article to write don't care, but I may be wrong.
Given the reaction to the verdict, the case is clouded by a strong odor of payback and revenge.
Absolutely, Las Vegas police and attorneys were just waiting for O.J. to barge into someone's hotel/casino and steal memorabilia items at gunpoint.
Maybe you're fine with that, but I'm not.
I am fine with him being arrested for allegedly committing a crime, being prosecuted for said crime, and being tried in front of a jury of his peers...alas, the legal system, so yes, I am fine with this.
O.J.'s imprisonment wasn't Al Capone being nabbed for tax evasion, because that took thought, planning, precision and the FBI collecting a litany of evidence.
I was also fine with O.J. getting off at the original trial, but just because this crime did not require a lot of planning did not make it non-serious.
The caper that undid O.J. was engineered by a bunch of buffoons and amateur criminals, who were given a high degree of credibility in a court of law.
If it were engineered by actual engineers who graduated college and had committed several professional crimes, then Jemele would have no problem with it, but unfortunately many criminals that get caught are not that bright, so this can't be the case all the time.
There are also serious questions about whether the jury was unbiased. According to an Associated Press report, five of the 12 jurors -- all of whom were white -- wrote in their questionnaires they disagreed with the 1995 verdict, and several others didn't even answer the question.
Jemele Hill, though well versed in bullshit, is not aware of the term "peremptory challenge," which means the defense could have potentially not had these jurors on the jury to begin with, so that is his defense team's fault, besides aren't the questionnaires supposed to be confidential?
The "experts" now predict O.J. will spend the rest of his life in jail, which is an interesting leap when you consider that Simpson will come to his December sentencing with a clean criminal record.
The same "experts" she is mocking are the same "experts" who are saying that this is payback for traditional white America and things like that, but please ignore that.
But life in prison for sports memorabilia? Life, when many witnesses who testified in the trial had rap sheets that could carpet a 2,000-square-foot home? Bobby Brown has been arrested eight times -- including once for sexual battery and another time for getting into a violent altercation with ex-wife Whitney Houston -- and he has never even done more than a month in jail.
Life is not fair Jemele and the quicker you learn this the better your shitty writing is going to be and besides, what the hell is O.J. doing hanging out with these people if he is trying to not go afoul of the law?
Maybe O.J. wouldn't be in this mess if, instead of stealing cable and having bouts of road rage, he had moved to Paraguay and become a soybean exporter.
He would also not be in this mess if he took his $22,000/month pension and played golf all day, avoided the public and tried like hell to just become a normal citizen, but he did not do that.
Still, the reaction to Simpson's guilty verdict is just more of the same irrational, often racist, hatred that has dogged him for years.
I have watched CNN and other news networks for days now and have no idea what you are talking about, but I very well could be missing the hatred you speak of.
You wouldn't know it now, but O.J. was once considered one of the greatest running backs to ever play. Some think O.J., who won the Heisman Trophy at USC and later became the first NFL player to rush for more than 2,000 yards with the Buffalo Bills, was better than Jim Brown.
I do know it, have known it and do remember it, but this has nothing to do with what you are talking about.
It always was considered appropriate to refer to O.J. as a murderer, even though the law says otherwise. Yet no one would dare still call William Kennedy Smith a rapist. And Smith also settled a civil suit after being accused by another woman of sexual assault.
Why in the fucking hell are you saying no one calls William Kennedy Smith a rapist, I think he is a rapist, so please do more research other than ask one guy at Michigan State before you start mouthing out what you think everyone's opinion is.
Last year, O.J. was asked to leave a restaurant in Louisville, Ky., the night before the Kentucky Derby because his presence was supposedly unnerving the customers. Meanwhile, Phil Spector and Robert Blake apparently dine unbothered.
I think they are both murderers, I am not the only one, and I am sure at some point they have been asked to leave a restaurant.
Here is a reaction to the Robert Blake result by a WHITE prosecutor:
Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley, commenting on this ruling, called Blake a "miserable human being" and the jurors "incredibly stupid."
Notice he was not hugging his friends and white America was not celebrating this trial.
Phil Spector was also not even found guilty or innocent, there was a mistrial, so he is going to possibly be convicted when he is tried again.
In early December 2007, it was announced that San Francisco lawyer Doron Weinberg had agreed to serve as Spector's attorney and had proposed that the retrial begin in September 2008. The only remaining member of Spector's defense team is Christopher Plourd, who Weinberg told Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler will not be available to resume the case until the autumn of 2008.
"The public reacted more angrily to the acquittal in this case than the public would ever react to the execution of an innocent person," Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz told PBS' "Frontline" during a special retrospective on O.J.'s murder case a couple years ago.
People also reacted much more favorably and excited to the verdict than you would a normal acquittal, which is why this was such a highly emotional case, but still has very little to do with the new conviction of Simpson.
Dershowitz was a member of Simpson's defense team in 1995. "This was taken personally by whites in America in a way that no other case ever affected them. This was somehow a legitimation of the pent-up racism that I think Americans have had to hold back since the 1950s."
He is clearly a neutral observer on this issue and you would think that Jemele would not want to get a quote from a man who defended the Phil Spector and Robert Blake of the 90's, Claus von Bulow, and got him acquitted for a crime that many think he actually committed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claus_von_B%C3%BClow
This conviction seems to have stirred up plenty of feelings. None of which is closure.
You are stirring up feelings, everyone else in the world is over this, including the prosecutor, judge, and jury that convicted O.J. for his most recent crime, and it is not revenge or payback simply because that is how you want it to be. God, I hate talking race.
I can't ignore Jemele when she talks about O.J. Simpson, I just can't do it. I was originally going to put a different heading to this post with the words David Duke in it, but since "Hiel Hitler" (thanks to Jemele Hill) is a search term that brings up our blog, I decided not to chance it. So now the word "Communist" will bring up our blog. Perfect! Let's go with one sentence pithy (which means lots of run on sentences) replies today since I am too tired to give Jemele Hill all my energy.
I'm supposed to believe the O.J. Simpson guilty verdict is a purging.
No one I have heard has ever said that but maybe I need to listen better.
It supposedly represents America collectively issuing a makeup call for 1995 by rendering a judgment that could send the 61-year-old Simpson to prison for much of the rest of his life.
O.J. Simpson is a punchline and I could truly care less whether he ever goes to jail again or not, I really don't care, just don't accuse all of America of trying to get back at him for being acquitted 13 years ago.
But I don't believe any of that was accomplished last week in Las Vegas.
Jemele Hill loves to start her columns off with an incredibly wrong premise she believes is true, and then just build and build upon it, then prove it wrong, so it is kind of like if I said, "Most of America thinks that Tony Romo looks retarded but I think it just shows how intolerant we are as a society."
(In Sports Illustrated last week it said Tony Romo was Latino...what????????)
All this verdict does is prove that race, wealth and celebrity are just as relevant in 2008 as they were in 1995, when Simpson was acquitted of murdering his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.
This is false, because only one person in this case had wealth and celebrity, which means O.J. Simpson would have been acquitted again.
In response to the guilty verdict, David Cook, the attorney who represents Goldman's father Fred, said: "Is this closure for Fred Goldman? No. Is this closure for America? Yes."
Jemele Hill thinks Fred Goldman's attorney speaks for the entire United States.
With all due respect to Cook, it's not closure for me, because I accepted O.J.'s acquittal 13 years ago.
What a shock, she creates a false premise and then disagrees with the false premise she created.
"I think it's closure for traditional white America," said Dr. Carl Taylor, a sociologist at Michigan State. "[For African-Americas], this won't be a closure.
What is traditional white America and why do I get the feeling Dr. Carl Taylor does not know who this is either?
It will be an opening. It will be ripping the wound open."
Jemele Hill is proud to try and rip open the wound even further and I have gotten a feeling that African Americans that aren't looking for an article to write don't care, but I may be wrong.
Given the reaction to the verdict, the case is clouded by a strong odor of payback and revenge.
Absolutely, Las Vegas police and attorneys were just waiting for O.J. to barge into someone's hotel/casino and steal memorabilia items at gunpoint.
Maybe you're fine with that, but I'm not.
I am fine with him being arrested for allegedly committing a crime, being prosecuted for said crime, and being tried in front of a jury of his peers...alas, the legal system, so yes, I am fine with this.
O.J.'s imprisonment wasn't Al Capone being nabbed for tax evasion, because that took thought, planning, precision and the FBI collecting a litany of evidence.
I was also fine with O.J. getting off at the original trial, but just because this crime did not require a lot of planning did not make it non-serious.
The caper that undid O.J. was engineered by a bunch of buffoons and amateur criminals, who were given a high degree of credibility in a court of law.
If it were engineered by actual engineers who graduated college and had committed several professional crimes, then Jemele would have no problem with it, but unfortunately many criminals that get caught are not that bright, so this can't be the case all the time.
There are also serious questions about whether the jury was unbiased. According to an Associated Press report, five of the 12 jurors -- all of whom were white -- wrote in their questionnaires they disagreed with the 1995 verdict, and several others didn't even answer the question.
Jemele Hill, though well versed in bullshit, is not aware of the term "peremptory challenge," which means the defense could have potentially not had these jurors on the jury to begin with, so that is his defense team's fault, besides aren't the questionnaires supposed to be confidential?
The "experts" now predict O.J. will spend the rest of his life in jail, which is an interesting leap when you consider that Simpson will come to his December sentencing with a clean criminal record.
The same "experts" she is mocking are the same "experts" who are saying that this is payback for traditional white America and things like that, but please ignore that.
But life in prison for sports memorabilia? Life, when many witnesses who testified in the trial had rap sheets that could carpet a 2,000-square-foot home? Bobby Brown has been arrested eight times -- including once for sexual battery and another time for getting into a violent altercation with ex-wife Whitney Houston -- and he has never even done more than a month in jail.
Life is not fair Jemele and the quicker you learn this the better your shitty writing is going to be and besides, what the hell is O.J. doing hanging out with these people if he is trying to not go afoul of the law?
Maybe O.J. wouldn't be in this mess if, instead of stealing cable and having bouts of road rage, he had moved to Paraguay and become a soybean exporter.
He would also not be in this mess if he took his $22,000/month pension and played golf all day, avoided the public and tried like hell to just become a normal citizen, but he did not do that.
Still, the reaction to Simpson's guilty verdict is just more of the same irrational, often racist, hatred that has dogged him for years.
I have watched CNN and other news networks for days now and have no idea what you are talking about, but I very well could be missing the hatred you speak of.
You wouldn't know it now, but O.J. was once considered one of the greatest running backs to ever play. Some think O.J., who won the Heisman Trophy at USC and later became the first NFL player to rush for more than 2,000 yards with the Buffalo Bills, was better than Jim Brown.
I do know it, have known it and do remember it, but this has nothing to do with what you are talking about.
It always was considered appropriate to refer to O.J. as a murderer, even though the law says otherwise. Yet no one would dare still call William Kennedy Smith a rapist. And Smith also settled a civil suit after being accused by another woman of sexual assault.
Why in the fucking hell are you saying no one calls William Kennedy Smith a rapist, I think he is a rapist, so please do more research other than ask one guy at Michigan State before you start mouthing out what you think everyone's opinion is.
Last year, O.J. was asked to leave a restaurant in Louisville, Ky., the night before the Kentucky Derby because his presence was supposedly unnerving the customers. Meanwhile, Phil Spector and Robert Blake apparently dine unbothered.
I think they are both murderers, I am not the only one, and I am sure at some point they have been asked to leave a restaurant.
Here is a reaction to the Robert Blake result by a WHITE prosecutor:
Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley, commenting on this ruling, called Blake a "miserable human being" and the jurors "incredibly stupid."
Notice he was not hugging his friends and white America was not celebrating this trial.
Phil Spector was also not even found guilty or innocent, there was a mistrial, so he is going to possibly be convicted when he is tried again.
In early December 2007, it was announced that San Francisco lawyer Doron Weinberg had agreed to serve as Spector's attorney and had proposed that the retrial begin in September 2008. The only remaining member of Spector's defense team is Christopher Plourd, who Weinberg told Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler will not be available to resume the case until the autumn of 2008.
"The public reacted more angrily to the acquittal in this case than the public would ever react to the execution of an innocent person," Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz told PBS' "Frontline" during a special retrospective on O.J.'s murder case a couple years ago.
People also reacted much more favorably and excited to the verdict than you would a normal acquittal, which is why this was such a highly emotional case, but still has very little to do with the new conviction of Simpson.
Dershowitz was a member of Simpson's defense team in 1995. "This was taken personally by whites in America in a way that no other case ever affected them. This was somehow a legitimation of the pent-up racism that I think Americans have had to hold back since the 1950s."
He is clearly a neutral observer on this issue and you would think that Jemele would not want to get a quote from a man who defended the Phil Spector and Robert Blake of the 90's, Claus von Bulow, and got him acquitted for a crime that many think he actually committed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claus_von_B%C3%BClow
This conviction seems to have stirred up plenty of feelings. None of which is closure.
You are stirring up feelings, everyone else in the world is over this, including the prosecutor, judge, and jury that convicted O.J. for his most recent crime, and it is not revenge or payback simply because that is how you want it to be. God, I hate talking race.
Monday, July 28, 2008
0 comments I'm Really, Really Sorry
I am not going to talk about Brett Favre anymore...after this. I will be pithy, I promise, simply because I want to use the "one sentence pithy replies" tag. Also, Brett Favre is now holding out of training camp and demanding a trade, let's cut through the shit and just call it like it is.
http://www.profootballtalk.com/2008/07/27/favre-says-thompson-begged-him-not-to-return/
Chris Mortensen of ESPN reports that Packers quarterback Brett Favre has signed a letter requesting reinstatement, but that Favre might not send it until Monday or Tuesday.
Per Mort, Favre says that G.M. Ted Thompson “pleaded” with Favre to give the team more time to figure out the situation.
Go away, for God's sake, go away.
I told him I’m not trying to get anybody fired. So Ted asked me to let the guys report and let’s try to resolve this over the next two or three days.
Of course not, you are just asking Thompson to choose between what is best for the football team in the long run that will cause some immediate pain and what is best for the team in the short run, which will cause the team pain later.
"Deanna, Bus, everyone here [in Mississippi] says, ‘You’re so stupid, letting [the Packers] play you like this,” Favre said.
Deanna is a bitch, Bus wants to get paid, and you are fucking clueless.
“I said, ‘Let me compete, you’ll know I’ll win this job’
That's not the issue Brett, the issue is that you lied and said you were retired and put everyone in this situation.
It’s pretty clear — and this is what I told the commissioner — that they want me to go away, stay retired.
It took him over a month to figure this out.
They would much rather see me in a Packers’ uniform, paying me $12 million to be a backup
No, they would rather you have kept your teary eyed word and stay fucking retired and pay you $0 to mow the grass at home.
— which you know they really don’t want — rather than see in another uniform, no matter what they say.
They don't want you to get pissed off and go to a division rival and beat them twice this year and once in the playoffs and this is understandable.
They’ll drag this out, asking a king’s ransom [in a trade], hoping it all goes away.”
They have the rights to you, they can ask for Al Davis' 15 year old great grandchild's virginity if they would like to, it's their right, you signed a contract.
Chris Mortensen of ESPN reports that Packers quarterback Brett Favre has signed a letter requesting reinstatement, but that Favre might not send it until Monday or Tuesday.
Doesn't this sound like he is trying to hold the franchise for ransom?
http://www.profootballtalk.com/2008/07/27/favre-says-thompson-begged-him-not-to-return/
Chris Mortensen of ESPN reports that Packers quarterback Brett Favre has signed a letter requesting reinstatement, but that Favre might not send it until Monday or Tuesday.
Per Mort, Favre says that G.M. Ted Thompson “pleaded” with Favre to give the team more time to figure out the situation.
Go away, for God's sake, go away.
I told him I’m not trying to get anybody fired. So Ted asked me to let the guys report and let’s try to resolve this over the next two or three days.
Of course not, you are just asking Thompson to choose between what is best for the football team in the long run that will cause some immediate pain and what is best for the team in the short run, which will cause the team pain later.
"Deanna, Bus, everyone here [in Mississippi] says, ‘You’re so stupid, letting [the Packers] play you like this,” Favre said.
Deanna is a bitch, Bus wants to get paid, and you are fucking clueless.
“I said, ‘Let me compete, you’ll know I’ll win this job’
That's not the issue Brett, the issue is that you lied and said you were retired and put everyone in this situation.
It’s pretty clear — and this is what I told the commissioner — that they want me to go away, stay retired.
It took him over a month to figure this out.
They would much rather see me in a Packers’ uniform, paying me $12 million to be a backup
No, they would rather you have kept your teary eyed word and stay fucking retired and pay you $0 to mow the grass at home.
— which you know they really don’t want — rather than see in another uniform, no matter what they say.
They don't want you to get pissed off and go to a division rival and beat them twice this year and once in the playoffs and this is understandable.
They’ll drag this out, asking a king’s ransom [in a trade], hoping it all goes away.”
They have the rights to you, they can ask for Al Davis' 15 year old great grandchild's virginity if they would like to, it's their right, you signed a contract.
Chris Mortensen of ESPN reports that Packers quarterback Brett Favre has signed a letter requesting reinstatement, but that Favre might not send it until Monday or Tuesday.
Doesn't this sound like he is trying to hold the franchise for ransom?
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
0 comments Low Hanging Fruit Loves Me
I tried in vain to find something else to write about. I searched the Internet up and down and tried to get pissed at even the slightest stance a columnist took. I went to Goodhousekeeping.com for any articles I may disagree with and still came up empty. Finally I went to the Bill Simmons column which is pretty much crack for my soul, I seriously need an intervention. Due to the fact he pisses me off and I can write for hours about his latest column, I will only comment in short, one sentence pithy comebacks. That's the hook, but can I do it?
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/080609
For all intent and purpose, the Celtics played a perfect Game 2. They shot 53 percent from the field and made nine of 14 3-pointers.
Perfect would be 100% from the field and 14 of 14 3-pointers, so here is the definition to help you. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/perfect
So you can understand our confusion. Within something like 15 seconds, Boston's 24-point lead was whittled down to … (clearing my throat) … (slapping myself in the face a couple of times) … (peeing a little bit in my pants) … two
No matter what Adam Sandler says, peeing in your pants is not cool and this does not sound like the definition of perfect so please read it again. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/perfect
I wish I could explain what happened, but L.A.'s comeback defied explanation.
He is an idiot so I bet he will explain and defy the odds!
The Celtics relaxed, the Lakers made a couple 3s, the Celtics missed a couple shots, Kobe shifted into 17th gear, the Lakers made a couple more 3s, and somewhere during this stretch,
He did.
my buddy Hench texted me, "Will this be the worst loss in Boston sports history?"
Worse than Game 6 of the 1986 World Series?
(Yes, actually. And NBA history.
Worse than this I found randomly searching on the Internet? Milwaukee authored the biggest comeback in NBA history on November 25, 1977, vs. the Hawks. Down 29 with 8:43 remaining, the Bucks finished the game with a 35-4 run and a 117-115 win.
And sports history.)
Excessive Hyperbole Bill Simmons would have been his Western gun slinger name and he would carry a reference encyclopedia for all the claims makes, but he would never look at it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Comeback_(American_football)
and my frozen father was only missing a coffin and a touch-up makeup job from a mortician.
So if he is dead does that mean we don't get to hear about him ever again, because if we don't please tell me where I can send flowers/donations to.
That's when Paul Pierce (28 points, eight assists) saved us, barreling to the basket with one of his patented old-school, herky-jerky, zig-zag drives, drawing a foul and nailing both free throws with 22 seconds left.I was more relieved than anyone. Why?
Because you are self centered, egotistic douchebag that thinks the entire world revolves around you and have no concept there are other individuals in the world that could be feeling the same emotions and possibly in greater amounts that you do because you are too focused on how awesome you and everything you experience is?
Because the two Lakers fans sitting to my left apparently had this conversation in California on Friday night.
Fan No. 1: "Dude, I got us tickets for Round 2. Wanna fly to Boston with me?"
Fan No. 2: "Dude, I'm in!"
Fan No. 1: "Let's wear Kobe jerseys, get drunk during the game, argue with people in our section and see if somebody will take a swing at us."
Fan No. 2: "Dude, I said I'm in. You bringing your designer man-purse?"
Fan No. 1: "Absolutely! Are you going to trim your beard so you look like Crockett during the first season of 'Miami Vice'?"
Fan No. 2: "You betcha!"
Is this stupidier than wearing a Red Sox jersey to Tropicana Field, writing an article about it, mocking the fans, and then taking a picture of your crotch with food on it?
Look, every fan base has a worst-case scenario stereotype -- for Boston fans, it's someone with a shortened Irish name (Murph, Sully or Fitzy) who looks like a 295-pound Mike O'Malley, only with a shaved head, a comically ridiculous Baaaaa-stan accent, a T-shirt that's two sizes too small and a blood-alcohol level of 0.27 at all times.
Being so self centered, I wish you would realize you are my worst-case scenario stereotype.
(Here's an idea before Game 6, should it happen: The Celtics send out a news release that, if they see anyone sitting in a season-ticket seat for Games 6 or 7 wearing a Lakers jersey, a Lakers T-shirt or a Lakers hat, then the person who owns those season tickets will lose them next season. Period. End of story.)
I guess Boston Celtics fans are such die hard fans they sell their season tickets to the NBA Finals against their hated rivals!
This was a different crowd from Game 1 -- almost entirely Boston diehards, all of them wearing green or white -- which pushed the atmosphere to old-school Garden heights and unquestionably affected the officiating.
Boston diehards, who sell their season tickets to the NBA Finals against their hated rivals, can even affect (effect? Bill?) officiating.
There were also an unfathomable number of current Boston stars and former stars spread throughout the building, including Bill Russell, Doug Flutie, Curt Schilling, John Havlicek, David Ortiz, Kevin Millar, Mike Lowell, Josh Beckett, Wes Welker, Vince Wilfork, Adalius Thomas, Richard Seymour, Ty Warren, Coco Crisp, Antoine Walker, Cedric Maxwell, Jon Lester, the Red Sox owners (John Henry, Tom Werner and Larry Lucchino), Tim Wakefield, Jacoby Ellsbury, Tedy Bruschi, Jo-Jo White, Ty Law, M.L. Carr, Tommy Heinsohn and many more.
If Boston diehards had a special superpower it would be, "the ability to bring together athletes in one city for a major sporting event," and every other super hero would have it.
For God's sake, look at that list again. It's like the Ghosts of Boston Sports Past and Present.
For God's sake...is your father really dead?
That's a phenomenon unique to this particular city -- an unusually high level of fraternizing between the Red Sox, Celtics and Patriots that started a few years ago and eventually reached the point that players show up to support the other teams. Basically, the Boston sports scene has turned into a giant college campus.
Excessive Hyperbole Bill Simmons stared into the face of Wrongness, ignoring it's disapproving scowl, threw his encyclopediac reference book down and wrote this sentence, but because Excessive Hyperbole Bill Simmons does not allow comments Wrongness can not hit Simmons back with the weakness he has, the Truth.
Now the three relevant Boston franchises seem like mirror images of each other.
Not quite yet, there has been no proof the Red Sox have cheated to win games.
Digging a little deeper, the revival of the Celtics, Red Sox and Patriots mirrors something that's happening to Boston as a whole. Quite simply, the city that I left behind in 2002 doesn't exist anymore.
I wish you did not exist anymore.
On Friday night, I went to pick up my friend Willy at his place on Commonwealth Avenue; across the street, something was happening but I couldn't figure out what.
"That's where they're filming the new Bruce Willis movie," Willy said matter-of-factly.
Oh.
They filmed a prominent movie with George Clooney and John Krasinski right near me, so look for my 1500 word essay on it when I reached the point of patheticism you are currently at.
During the first quarter, there was one sequence when Kobe threw a bullet pass through Gasol's hands for a turnover, then shot Gasol one of his patented Michael Corleone, "You disappointed me, don't be surprised if I have you killed later" glares, only Gasol fired right back and told Kobe that he should have thrown a bounce pass, followed by Kobe staring at Gasol intently and trying to make Gasol's head actually explode on the court.
He forgot the part where Gasol dunked on Garnett the next time down the court.
But it symbolized what happened with the Lakers in these first two games; they looked rattled,
They looked rattled when they almost came back from 24 points?
they couldn't get calls
That was because of those Boston die hard fans, who sell their season tickets to the NBA Finals against their hated rivals.
they couldn't protect the rim,
Gasol did not need to protect the rim when he dunked on Garnett.
and on defense they seemed one step behind except for the fourth quarter in both games.
The Lakers outscored the Celtics 41-25 in the fourth quarter of Game 2.
At one point, my dad pointed to referee Bob Delaney, who was practically wearing a Celtics jersey and joked, "I like that guy. I want him for every game!"
So he is still alive AND not funny?
Yeah, the calls were one-sided, but you can't expect to get calls when you're reaching in from behind, trying to strip guys after they beat you and trying to block shots after your guy already grabbed an offensive rebound and he's standing between you and the basket.
I prefer the Celtics and find this indefensible, so please don't try.
When they started playing with desperation in the fourth quarter, pressured the ball full-court and bombed 3s in a wild small-ball attack, you could see the lightbulb flickering over their heads. Hmmmmm, maybe that's how we should have played this whole series.
Apparently if you change your style of play the referees will be entertained and give you more calls.
flying around the court like Lawrence Taylor after an 8-ball
Bill had to make one negative drug reference to a minority, so his quota is met now.
I'm starting to wonder if they simply got rusty after they clinched home court, lost their way a little bit, battled some severe confidence issues in the Atlanta and Cleveland series and ultimately found their way again.
They were clearly the best team, they just had no confidence, yeah, that's the ticket.
These things can happen with an inexperienced team, even a team with this many veterans.
You know, they say 60% of the time, it works every time.
When you think about it, none of their key characters could be considered "playoff experienced" except for Pierce (and even that's dubious), and they have a coach who has been learning as he goes along.
I wish horseshit excuses were not covered by his ESPN healthcare plan.
For all the grief that Doc Rivers has taken (and yes, I'm one of the grief-givers),
You are THE grief giver and got called out by Bob Ryan over it.
As I've written in the past, I'm a big believer in "getting reps" in life, whether it's speaking in public, driving a race car, performing in a porn movie, coaching a basketball team or whatever. Maybe Doc just needed to get some playoff reps in. I keep telling myself this.
I am Simmonsologist and have never heard you say that, but think you may be a bigger believer in making shit up to make you look smart.
But even Kobe can't stop the sun from shining in Boston today.
Probably because despite being a great basketball player, Kobe is not a solar eclipse, a cloud, nor a massive explosion that obliterates the sun.
There is nowhere I would rather be.
I have $100 that says he will be in Los Angeles for Game 3.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/080609
For all intent and purpose, the Celtics played a perfect Game 2. They shot 53 percent from the field and made nine of 14 3-pointers.
Perfect would be 100% from the field and 14 of 14 3-pointers, so here is the definition to help you. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/perfect
So you can understand our confusion. Within something like 15 seconds, Boston's 24-point lead was whittled down to … (clearing my throat) … (slapping myself in the face a couple of times) … (peeing a little bit in my pants) … two
No matter what Adam Sandler says, peeing in your pants is not cool and this does not sound like the definition of perfect so please read it again. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/perfect
I wish I could explain what happened, but L.A.'s comeback defied explanation.
He is an idiot so I bet he will explain and defy the odds!
The Celtics relaxed, the Lakers made a couple 3s, the Celtics missed a couple shots, Kobe shifted into 17th gear, the Lakers made a couple more 3s, and somewhere during this stretch,
He did.
my buddy Hench texted me, "Will this be the worst loss in Boston sports history?"
Worse than Game 6 of the 1986 World Series?
(Yes, actually. And NBA history.
Worse than this I found randomly searching on the Internet? Milwaukee authored the biggest comeback in NBA history on November 25, 1977, vs. the Hawks. Down 29 with 8:43 remaining, the Bucks finished the game with a 35-4 run and a 117-115 win.
And sports history.)
Excessive Hyperbole Bill Simmons would have been his Western gun slinger name and he would carry a reference encyclopedia for all the claims makes, but he would never look at it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Comeback_(American_football)
and my frozen father was only missing a coffin and a touch-up makeup job from a mortician.
So if he is dead does that mean we don't get to hear about him ever again, because if we don't please tell me where I can send flowers/donations to.
That's when Paul Pierce (28 points, eight assists) saved us, barreling to the basket with one of his patented old-school, herky-jerky, zig-zag drives, drawing a foul and nailing both free throws with 22 seconds left.I was more relieved than anyone. Why?
Because you are self centered, egotistic douchebag that thinks the entire world revolves around you and have no concept there are other individuals in the world that could be feeling the same emotions and possibly in greater amounts that you do because you are too focused on how awesome you and everything you experience is?
Because the two Lakers fans sitting to my left apparently had this conversation in California on Friday night.
Fan No. 1: "Dude, I got us tickets for Round 2. Wanna fly to Boston with me?"
Fan No. 2: "Dude, I'm in!"
Fan No. 1: "Let's wear Kobe jerseys, get drunk during the game, argue with people in our section and see if somebody will take a swing at us."
Fan No. 2: "Dude, I said I'm in. You bringing your designer man-purse?"
Fan No. 1: "Absolutely! Are you going to trim your beard so you look like Crockett during the first season of 'Miami Vice'?"
Fan No. 2: "You betcha!"
Is this stupidier than wearing a Red Sox jersey to Tropicana Field, writing an article about it, mocking the fans, and then taking a picture of your crotch with food on it?
Look, every fan base has a worst-case scenario stereotype -- for Boston fans, it's someone with a shortened Irish name (Murph, Sully or Fitzy) who looks like a 295-pound Mike O'Malley, only with a shaved head, a comically ridiculous Baaaaa-stan accent, a T-shirt that's two sizes too small and a blood-alcohol level of 0.27 at all times.
Being so self centered, I wish you would realize you are my worst-case scenario stereotype.
(Here's an idea before Game 6, should it happen: The Celtics send out a news release that, if they see anyone sitting in a season-ticket seat for Games 6 or 7 wearing a Lakers jersey, a Lakers T-shirt or a Lakers hat, then the person who owns those season tickets will lose them next season. Period. End of story.)
I guess Boston Celtics fans are such die hard fans they sell their season tickets to the NBA Finals against their hated rivals!
This was a different crowd from Game 1 -- almost entirely Boston diehards, all of them wearing green or white -- which pushed the atmosphere to old-school Garden heights and unquestionably affected the officiating.
Boston diehards, who sell their season tickets to the NBA Finals against their hated rivals, can even affect (effect? Bill?) officiating.
There were also an unfathomable number of current Boston stars and former stars spread throughout the building, including Bill Russell, Doug Flutie, Curt Schilling, John Havlicek, David Ortiz, Kevin Millar, Mike Lowell, Josh Beckett, Wes Welker, Vince Wilfork, Adalius Thomas, Richard Seymour, Ty Warren, Coco Crisp, Antoine Walker, Cedric Maxwell, Jon Lester, the Red Sox owners (John Henry, Tom Werner and Larry Lucchino), Tim Wakefield, Jacoby Ellsbury, Tedy Bruschi, Jo-Jo White, Ty Law, M.L. Carr, Tommy Heinsohn and many more.
If Boston diehards had a special superpower it would be, "the ability to bring together athletes in one city for a major sporting event," and every other super hero would have it.
For God's sake, look at that list again. It's like the Ghosts of Boston Sports Past and Present.
For God's sake...is your father really dead?
That's a phenomenon unique to this particular city -- an unusually high level of fraternizing between the Red Sox, Celtics and Patriots that started a few years ago and eventually reached the point that players show up to support the other teams. Basically, the Boston sports scene has turned into a giant college campus.
Excessive Hyperbole Bill Simmons stared into the face of Wrongness, ignoring it's disapproving scowl, threw his encyclopediac reference book down and wrote this sentence, but because Excessive Hyperbole Bill Simmons does not allow comments Wrongness can not hit Simmons back with the weakness he has, the Truth.
Now the three relevant Boston franchises seem like mirror images of each other.
Not quite yet, there has been no proof the Red Sox have cheated to win games.
Digging a little deeper, the revival of the Celtics, Red Sox and Patriots mirrors something that's happening to Boston as a whole. Quite simply, the city that I left behind in 2002 doesn't exist anymore.
I wish you did not exist anymore.
On Friday night, I went to pick up my friend Willy at his place on Commonwealth Avenue; across the street, something was happening but I couldn't figure out what.
"That's where they're filming the new Bruce Willis movie," Willy said matter-of-factly.
Oh.
They filmed a prominent movie with George Clooney and John Krasinski right near me, so look for my 1500 word essay on it when I reached the point of patheticism you are currently at.
During the first quarter, there was one sequence when Kobe threw a bullet pass through Gasol's hands for a turnover, then shot Gasol one of his patented Michael Corleone, "You disappointed me, don't be surprised if I have you killed later" glares, only Gasol fired right back and told Kobe that he should have thrown a bounce pass, followed by Kobe staring at Gasol intently and trying to make Gasol's head actually explode on the court.
He forgot the part where Gasol dunked on Garnett the next time down the court.
But it symbolized what happened with the Lakers in these first two games; they looked rattled,
They looked rattled when they almost came back from 24 points?
they couldn't get calls
That was because of those Boston die hard fans, who sell their season tickets to the NBA Finals against their hated rivals.
they couldn't protect the rim,
Gasol did not need to protect the rim when he dunked on Garnett.
and on defense they seemed one step behind except for the fourth quarter in both games.
The Lakers outscored the Celtics 41-25 in the fourth quarter of Game 2.
At one point, my dad pointed to referee Bob Delaney, who was practically wearing a Celtics jersey and joked, "I like that guy. I want him for every game!"
So he is still alive AND not funny?
Yeah, the calls were one-sided, but you can't expect to get calls when you're reaching in from behind, trying to strip guys after they beat you and trying to block shots after your guy already grabbed an offensive rebound and he's standing between you and the basket.
I prefer the Celtics and find this indefensible, so please don't try.
When they started playing with desperation in the fourth quarter, pressured the ball full-court and bombed 3s in a wild small-ball attack, you could see the lightbulb flickering over their heads. Hmmmmm, maybe that's how we should have played this whole series.
Apparently if you change your style of play the referees will be entertained and give you more calls.
flying around the court like Lawrence Taylor after an 8-ball
Bill had to make one negative drug reference to a minority, so his quota is met now.
I'm starting to wonder if they simply got rusty after they clinched home court, lost their way a little bit, battled some severe confidence issues in the Atlanta and Cleveland series and ultimately found their way again.
They were clearly the best team, they just had no confidence, yeah, that's the ticket.
These things can happen with an inexperienced team, even a team with this many veterans.
You know, they say 60% of the time, it works every time.
When you think about it, none of their key characters could be considered "playoff experienced" except for Pierce (and even that's dubious), and they have a coach who has been learning as he goes along.
I wish horseshit excuses were not covered by his ESPN healthcare plan.
For all the grief that Doc Rivers has taken (and yes, I'm one of the grief-givers),
You are THE grief giver and got called out by Bob Ryan over it.
As I've written in the past, I'm a big believer in "getting reps" in life, whether it's speaking in public, driving a race car, performing in a porn movie, coaching a basketball team or whatever. Maybe Doc just needed to get some playoff reps in. I keep telling myself this.
I am Simmonsologist and have never heard you say that, but think you may be a bigger believer in making shit up to make you look smart.
But even Kobe can't stop the sun from shining in Boston today.
Probably because despite being a great basketball player, Kobe is not a solar eclipse, a cloud, nor a massive explosion that obliterates the sun.
There is nowhere I would rather be.
I have $100 that says he will be in Los Angeles for Game 3.
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