Archive for January, 2010


Who On The Jazz Is Overrated?

Filed Under: Comparing Players / Teams, NBA, Talking About Hoops by Tweener — Comments Off
01/28/2010

No, I’m not asking whether anyone on the Jazz is overrated. I’m asking who on the Jazz is overrated. Specifically, I want to know this: between Deron Williams, Carlos Boozer, and Jerry Sloan, who is overrated? And don’t tell me that none of them is overrated.

I’ll get into the discussion in a bit, but first a bit of a digression… I hate the Jazz. They’re my least favorite team in the league. Frankly, I’m not even sure why that is. I think it has a lot to do with their name: Utah Jazz is one of the stupidest names I can imagine for a team. There ain’t no Jazz in Utah. There was Jazz in New Orleans, where the team used to play. The name made sense for a team from New Orleans. It’s a stupid name for a team from Utah. It’s like calling a team the Bronx Cornhuskers. Or the Miami Polar Bears. It’s just dumb, and, worse, because the name comes from New Orleans, hearing the words “Utah Jazz” reminds me that sports teams should have a connection to their hometown, and reminds of how much I dislike it when a team picks up and moves without acknowledging that it loses some of its character in the process.

But, to be fair, that can’t be the entire reason I hate the Jazz. I mean, “Lakers” made sense for a team from Minneapolis, but, when the team moved to Los Angeles, keeping the name “Lakers” hardly made sense. That’s the same thing I just complained about the Jazz doing, and, yet, I don’t hate the Lakers.

So, there must be some other reason. I don’t know what it is. Maybe I’m just jealous that most Jazz fans get to practice polygamy and I don’t. I don’t know. Whatever the reason, I don’t like the Jazz. Or their fans. At all.

Ok, digression over…

The Jazz have been on my mind recently, more than they usually are. I think it’s because I listen to the NBA Today podcast, and, within the last 10 days:
- Rick Bucher came on with a list of his top 10 players in the league, and included Deron Williams, and
- A segment was devoted to talking about where Carlos Boozer will end up next year, as if he’s some kind of star and it really matters for the league what team he winds up in.

Another reason the Jazz are on my mind is that they have been winning recently. They are, at the moment, the #4 seed in the West. Not bad. But, they’re only 2 games ahead of the #9 seed, so they aren’t exactly setting the league on fire, either. Yet, if Williams, Boozer, and Sloan were all living up to their reputations, this would be a top 2 or 3 team in the whole league.

Think about it: Williams and Boozer were both on the 2008 Olympic team. Thus, important people in important places think they’re very good players. The Jazz are the only team in the NBA with two guys from that Olympic team on it. I look at it this way: if those guys were really worthy of being Olympians, then you’d have to think that the Jazz would be a top 2 or 3 NBA team unless they had either (i) a monkey for a coach, or (ii) a roster filled with crippled dudes.

Not only is Jerry Sloan not a monkey, but he’s a HALL OF FAMER. Yup. His reputation is so sterling that he got elected to the Hall of Fame. Watch a Jazz game and listen to the commentators; they’ll go on and on about what an amazing coach he is. It’s like he broke into Brett Favre’s suitcase, and stole some of the Broadcaster Pixie Dust.

I’m not saying the guy can’t coach, but the Hall of Fame? Seriously? A Hall of Fame coach leading a team with 2 guys from the Olympic team, and they’re only 2 games ahead of the #9 seed? I’m sorry. One of those 3 dudes is overrated. Maybe 2. Or all 3.

As I said, maybe we could make sense of this if they were surrounded by a roster of crippled dudes. But they aren’t. There are 4 other guys on the roster who average double-figure points-per-game. There are 3 other guys on the roster who average more than 4 boards per game (including 2 who average more than 6). Kirilenko is consistently one of the league leaders in both steals and rebounds.

To be sure, this supporting cast is no All-Star team. But the supporting cast shouldn’t have to be a bunch of All-Stars for the Jazz to be successful, BECAUSE THE GUYS THAT THE SUPPORTING CAST ARE SUPPORTING INCLUDE TWO OLYMPIANS AND A HALL OF FAME COACH.

Yet, they’re only 2 games ahead of the #9 seed. So at least one of those 3 dudes must be overrated. Which one is it?

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College Hoops Fascinates Me

Filed Under: NCAA by Tweener — Comments Off
01/19/2010

Recently, I blogged about my inability to figure out fundamental things about college hoops. Judging by the comments to my posting, people either didn’t read it, didn’t care, or didn’t think I said anything worth spending any time discussing; only one person commented, and he thought my posting was dumb — he told me I was “making it much more complicated than it really is.”

Well, my motto has always been: If at first you say something that people aren’t at all interested in, ELABORATE, and then ELABORATE SOME MORE. So, I’m back to tell you that, as the college hoops season unfolds, I continue to be amazed and confused by the sport.

To put my thoughts into context, consider two sets of Top 25 rankings. The first is from week 1 of the season. Here is a link. The second is from this week. Here is a link.

Two things jump out at me:
The essence of what makes a college basketball team good befuddles even the people who decide which teams are good for a living. To illustrate, Syracuse was not even ranked in the Top 25 during week 1. Now, the Orange are #5 in the country. (Also consider Kansas State, who is now a top-10 team, but was not ranked in week 1.) On the flip side, California was ranked #11 in week 1. Now, the Golden Bears are not ranked. (Also consider Michigan, who opened at #15 and now isn’t ranked.) Apparently, I’m not the only person who doesn’t understand how a college team becomes good; the people WHOSE JOB IT IS TO RANK THE TEAMS have lots of trouble figuring out who is good and who is not, even after spending months learning about all of the teams.

Look at some of the schools that are ranked, and some of the schools that are not. UCLA and Indiana, two traditional powerhouses, are nowhere to be seen. Northern Iowa, though, is climbing the charts. Yup, Northern Iowa. You know, the Panthers. (What, you didn’t know?)

The factors that are generally thought of as making teams good (tradition and coaching, among others) apparently aren’t helping UCLA or Indiana become better than Northern Iowa. Amazing.

The best explanation I can think of is that, because players only stay with their college teams for a maximum of 4 years, we should expect teams to go from good to bad and back again more frequently than professional teams do. That’s fair enough, except that there are almost as many exceptions to the rule as there are teams that prove it: Pittsburgh lost most of its talent, and the Panthers are now a top-10 team (for what it’s worth, they were not ranked in week 1). Syracuse, too — they lost Jonny Flynn, Paul Harris, and Eric Devendorf, and, again, were not picked to even be a top 25 team. Yet, at this point of the season, they seem to be better than last year’s team. How does this happen? (And please don’t tell me it’s the coaching, unless you’re ready to say that Rick Pitino and Ben Howland can’t coach.)

I’ve all but given up trying to figure out how a college team gets to be good. At this point, I’m happy to just accept that it’s the nature of the sport to be unpredictable, and enjoy it for what it is.

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Am I A Bad Person?

Filed Under: Uncategorized by Tweener — Comments Off
01/13/2010

These days, I’m wondering whether I’m a bad person. Don’t worry, this is not some weird musing about morality that has nothing to do with hoops.  You don’t come to this site for that.  It’s a hoops-related moral question.

Now that the Knicks are contending for a playoff spot, I am thinking about my NBA team loyalty. And when I think about it, the undeniable truth is that I’m not very loyal. I’m wondering whether this makes me a rational person that others should be like more often, or whether it makes me a disloyal scumbag.

The context for asking this question is that we live in a world where sports-team-loyalty is generally considered to be constant, and is sometimes treated like it’s a reflection on the fan’s character. People become fans of a team by the time they’re six or seven years old, and they remain fans of that team. If the team is bad, their fanship is a sign of loyalty; if the team is good, it’s considered a reward for the loyalty shown while the team was bad. If you become a fan of a team while it’s good, you’re a “fair-weather fan.” Even if you’re a fan of, say, the Celtics because you grew up near Boston, and you wind up moving to, say, Los Angeles as an adult, you remain a Celtics fan or you run the risk of being called a sellout, trader, or something worse. It’s basically your duty to find the bar in Santa Monica where Celtics fans gather, and root, root, root for the road team when the C’s play the Lakers. Just because you grew up near Boston.

But that’s not how I roll. I’ve abandoned my favorite team, and now I’m thinking about going back. Here’s my deal: I grew up in a suburb of New York, and can remember being a Knicks’ fan as early as I can remember being anything. One of my earliest memories is that, one night, after my parents put me to bed and went downstairs, I snuck into their room (the only TV in any of the upstairs rooms was in their room) to watch the Knicks’ game. The Knicks were awful; this was the team with Eddie Lee Wilkins, Louis Orr, Pat Cummings, Rory Sparrow, and Trent Tucker. (And those were the guys who PLAYED.) I remember watching the Knicks get destroyed, and then crying uncontrollably. I knew that my parents would hear me sobbing, and knew that, when they came upstairs to ask what was wrong, I’d either have to lie about what was wrong or admit that I snuck out of my room to watch the Knicks. I was too upset to worry about consequences — I told them that I snuck out to watch the Knicks, and was crying because it just wasn’t fair that they were as bad as they were.

Then, one day when I was a 2nd grader, the Knicks won the draft lottery and acquired the rights to draft Patrick Ewing. I was ecstatic. I had visions of championship banners, and visions of crying Celtics fans, whose parents got mad at THEM when they were crying after sneaking out of their rooms to watch a game. I remember jumping up and down in my den. I threw the couch pillows up in the air. I screamed. I shrieked. I might have even wet myself.

As we now know, Ewing never carried the Knicks to a championship. As I have blogged before, people generally don’t give him credit that other superstars get, and some people even refer to him as a disappointment.

Not me. I grew up during Patrick’s career, and enjoyed being a Knicks fan because he made it fun to be one during the prime home-team-fan-years of my life. I knew he wasn’t as good as Jordan or Olajuwon, but I didn’t begrudge him of anything. When I thought about why the Knicks never won a championship, the things that came to mind were not any shortcomings of Ewing’s, but, rather, images of Charles Smith getting multiple layups blocked against the Bulls, and of John Starks missing shot after shot against the Rockets. Whether that’s a fair assessment of Ewing or not, the point was that, as I watched him age, I felt an immense sense of gratitude. I was mindful of the pain that the Knicks caused me before they got him and of the excitement he created by making them a contender for so long. Sure, it was disappointing that the Knicks didn’t win a championship with Patrick, but he was no disappointment. Not to me.

Just as I started to acknowledge this gratitude, there started to be grumblings in the papers that the young guns on the Knicks — Camby, Sprewell, LJ, Houston — thought that they might be better without my man Patrick. They thought he clogged up the offense, or some such nonsense.

Well, I didn’t like this. Not at all. These fools who were new to my beloved franchise wanted to push my man Patrick out the door. And they wound up pushing him out (people can say what they want about Ewing requesting the trade, my memory is very clear that he only asked out after the guys on his team started talking openly about being better without him). And when they did, they pushed me away from my connection to the Knicks. The year he played in Seattle I was a Sonics fan, and the (somewhat sad) year he played in Orlando, I was a Magic fan. I have not only not rooted for the Knicks since then, but I have actively rooted against them. I’m one of the only New Yorkers who loved the Isiah Thomas era. The franchise that kicked my boy Patrick out the door deserved that, at least in my eyes.

Which brings me to the present moment, and starts to touch upon the question I raise at the top of this posting. Those clowns who pushed my man Patrick out are long gone. The franchise has suffered plenty for its decision to get rid of Ewing for Glen Rice’s horrible contract, a move that set them down a path of misery for many years. Now they’re a lousy but overachieving team with an exciting coach and some players that I don’t mind — as a group, they have many more neck tatoos than the groups of dudes I generally hang around with, but I can actually see myself rooting for this group of players if I decide that it’s ok to root for the Knicks after what the Knicks did to my man Patrick.

So, if I decide to root for these guys, am I a hypocrite? Am I already a disloyal person for hating on the Knicks as long as I have? If so, do I make it right by defending that decision and hating on them even longer? Or, has the wound healed, allowing me to go back to being a Knick fan?

If the answer is that I should have stayed “loyal” to the Knicks all along, what does that say about the essence of being the fan of a sports team? Was Jerry Seinfeld right when he joked that sports fans are just rooting for a certain type of laundry? Or is there more to it than that?

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Can We All Agree That The Cavs Are Good?

Filed Under: Comparing Players / Teams, Talking About Hoops by Tweener — Comments Off
01/10/2010

I think the Cavs are good. I know that isn’t a very controversial thing to say at the moment; they are 28-10 and are in first place in the Eastern Conference.

But, my take on the Cavs is slightly controversial, because I think that LeBron’s teammates are actually pretty good. In fact, I’m tired of people blaming his teammates when his team fails to win a championship, and continuing to treat LeBron like he’s the Second Coming. I’ve already blogged elsewhere that I think people give LeBron too much credit, in comparison to other superstars that people are generally harder on (here and here).
Look at Cleveland’s big men. I know that Shaq, Z, and Varejo each have their limitations. But, still, that’s got to be one of the best groups of 3 big men in the league. Ilgauskas is consistently underrated. As recently as Sunday, Varejo had the best “plus-minus” number in the ENTIRE LEAGUE. And the old, slow version of Shaq that they roll out on the court every night is still Shaq.

The Lakers have a better group of big men. So do the Spurs, and the Celtics. I’ll even give you the Hawks, the Magic, and the Mavs. But that’s probably it.

In terms of guards, Mo Williams was an All-Star last year, and continues to be one of the better scoring guards in the league. He’s averaging 17 points and 5 assists. Delonte West and Daniel Gibson are pretty solid as far as guards coming off the bench go.

I’m not saying that anyone would confuse the Cavs without LeBron for the Dream Team. I’m just saying that, as far as supporting casts for superstars go, that is a pretty solid one. Now that they’re 28-10, I hope we can all agree that it’s a solid team. If they don’t make some serious noise in the playoffs, I hope we can all agree not to continue making excuses for LeBron that we don’t make for other superstars. His teammates are good enough to go 28-10, and they’re good enough to win a championship. If LeBron doesn’t lead them to one, people shouldn’t make excuses for him.

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Week in Review

Filed Under: '09 - '10 Season, Week in Review by Tweener — Comments Off
01/04/2010

If you haven’t been paying attention to the basketball season yet, it’s about time to start. Things are getting good.

In college, two undefeated teams fell this week. The first was West Virginia, who lost to Purdue. Purdue really extended its defense, and the Mountaineers were having trouble getting anything going towards the basket. Look out for the Boilermakers. Then Syracuse fell to Pitt. As an Orange fan, that was a tough one to hear about. But some perspective is important: last year there was chatter about North Carolina possibly going undefeated. Then the Tar Heels lost to Boston College, but wound up winning the whole thing. Plus, this Syracuse team was not highly touted before the season, and probably needs time to reach its potential anyway. And Pitt is now 12-2.

Bottom line is that teams don’t go undefeated in college hoops, and a loss to a conference rival is nothing to panic about. What’s important is that you peak in March. (This year, if you aren’t Kansas, Texas, Kentucky, or Purdue, there might not be much you can do that matters anyway, because those teams are very strong.)

For those interested in the teams on the other end of the college basketball hierarchy, the Quakers are now 0-10.

Rankings here.

In the NBA, the Spurs continue to climb in the standings, going 8-2 in their last 10. They have been aided by plays like this one, one of the most amazing plays you’ll ever see. Portland continues to stay afloat despite a rash of injuries, and Houston continues to stay afloat despite a roster that, on paper, is not very good. I still expect the Hornets to make a run because, well, they have Chris Paul, and he can do stuff like this. Don’t forget about the Clippers, either, who have stayed within striking distance without Blake Griffin.

The East is simply a mess after the top 5 teams. Let’s just say that the Knicks might make the playoffs. The Wizards are falling apart and might just be ready to start killing each other. (Sorry, I had to.)

Power rankings: ESPN here, Sportsline here.

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Will A Champion Be Built Via Free Agency?

Filed Under: GM Consultant, NBA by Tweener — Comments Off
01/01/2010

Much is made of the potential of the free agent class of 2010. Some teams have designed their rosters to maximize their cap space this off-season, and some stars are expecting to cash in.

If you look only at the talent that will be on the market (LeBron, Wade, Bosh, Dirk, etc.), the hoopla is justified. (Get it? HOOPla.) But, if history is any guide, teams expecting to turn their fortunes around via free agency are setting themselves up for disappointment.

Championship teams are almost never built around a player who was acquired via free agency. Look at the champions of the past 20 years. The Bulls were led by Jordan and Pippen, the Spurs by Duncan and Robinson, the Bad Boy Pistons by Thomas and Dumars, and the Rockets by Olajuwon and Drexler. Each of those teams drafted or traded for each of those players.

The 05-06 Heat acquired Wade via draft and Shaq via trade (that’s why Odom is on the Lakers). The 07-08 Celtics acquired Garnett and Allen via trade (that’s why Al Jefferson is on the Wolves and Jeff Green is on the Thunder), and Pierce via draft. Last year’s Lakers were led by Kobe and Bynum, whom they drafted, and Gasol, whom they traded for. The 03-04 Pistons are kind of an anomoly, because they won without a superstar. Two of their main players – Billups and Wallace – blossomed into stars as Pistons after mediocre careers elsewhere. That team is not really a model that other teams can expect to replicate. (When the Pistons acquired Billups via free agency, he had never averaged more than 14 ppg or 6 apg at the time.)

That leaves only the three-peat Lakers of ’00, ’01, and ’02. They acquired Shaq via free agency.

So, if history is any guide, then, unless you’re signing someone as dominant as Shaq via free agency, and you already have a young Kobe Bryant on your roster, you ain’t transforming your team from mediocre to champion via free agency.

Why is this? I don’t know. Two initial thoughts come to mind: First, if your team has enough money to spend on a superstar free agent, then it’s probably a pretty lousy team, and one superstar free agent won’t be able to turn it around.

Second, the team that signs a particular free agent probably offered him more money than all of the other teams. Thus, there’s a good chance that the team that signs him has overrated him. Think about it; 1 team decides to offer the guy, say, $10 million per year. The 29 other teams in the league fall into one of two categories: either they don’t think the guy is worth more than $10 million (if they did they would have offered him more than that), or their present payroll prevents them from offering him that much. (These teams were probably already better than the team that wound up getting him, as noted in the paragraph above).

If the team that signed him is going to get significantly better, then the player has to prove himself worthy of such a high salary. There’s a chance that he does, but, remember, a bunch of teams did not think he was worth $10 million, so there’s a good chance that he doesn’t. Even if he turns out to be a star, he has to be so good that he makes the lousy team he signed with better than the teams that already had a bunch of guys making a bunch of money.

When we think of someone as talented as LeBron signing with a lousy team, it’s easy to start thinking of that team becoming an instant contender. I’m not saying it isn’t possible, I’m just saying that it’s not how teams historically improve themselves. When you hear talk about a team getting much better via free agency, be skeptical.

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