D Fisher. The guy can hit a shot w/ .4 seconds left. The guy left a great gig in Utah, for his daughter’s illness. You feel for him, he’s one of the great clutch point guards that’ll probably help the Lake Snore, I mean show, get another ring. Yet I don’t care if you are Kobe, Lebron or even the over-passionate, yet always entertaining KG, you call the call the refs missed tonight! That’s the series. Spurs down 3-1 and have to play 2 of those on the road if they want to get back to the finals.
I told myself after the Nash incident last year and the mafia pocketed ref i wouldn’t blame losses on refs but how can I not? This was such an obvious call, that leaves me scratching my head pondering maybe I should give up my love for the NBA and switch to NCAA, where everything is more consistent. You have 2 seconds and change on the clock, Brent Barry shots a game tying shot, only to have an elbow to the head, with totally obvious contact and yet no whistle. The dude is a 36-year old veteran and he didn’t get the call. Lets reverse this. If it was Kobe shooting that shot, would there be a foul called? If Ginobli shot it, and acted with his European flopping skills, would there be a call? My Magic 8 ball is telling me, all signs point to yes for both scenarios. This is ridiculous. I hate blaming the refs but how can we ‘love this game,’ when the NBA would rather show us ‘NBA CARES’ videos than correct the ref problems that are inherent in every single playoff game so far in the post season?
-Aaron ‘Frustrated NBA Fan’ Goldstein out
This is just bad basketball and something that reminds me of the dirty years of the NBA, back when Bill Laimbeer wrestled w/ Charles Barkley in ‘90. Normally, you are suppose to root for the team that knocks your team out of the playoffs, yet after the cheap Steve Nash shot last year and the current move he did to David West’s back in tonight’s game, I just can’t do it.
Check out that link at about the 20 second remaining mark. All the players on the court know that David West has a hurt back in this game, just like Kobe has a hurt pinky/back right now. Yet, Robert Horry is the only one that blatantly pushes his elbows into it on a blind-sided pick. Such a cheap shot for a player that really is one of the most clutch to ever play the game and will more than likely end up in the hall of fame.
Luckily, the Hornets fans have 3 days rest for West’s back, but why is this legal? If this is legal in the sport and you don’t get a foul called, why hasn’t anyone on the Jazz taken out Kobe’s back or better yet jam his pinky worse than it already is?
The NFL owners met this past week to discuss possible rule changes. One of the proposals was to re-seed the playoffs. The idea was to seed the teams based on their record, and not whether or not they won their respective division. This rule would reward the good teams that finished with an outstanding record, but didn’t win their highly competitive division. It would also give teams a reason to play in the final week of the season.
I think that rule is worth discussing, but isn’t necessarily the answer. If a division leader that already clinched their division was 9-6 going into the final week, and a wild card team was 11-4, neither team would have anything to play for in this scenario as the wild card team would have already earned the better seed.
The league really wants to implement a rule that will give the teams something to play for in the final week. In my opinion, if they would reward the teams that win on the last week of the year with a compensatory draft pick the next season, I believe that would give them a reason to want to win that game. Perhaps, that would be enough to entice coaches to play their key players, which in turn rewards the fans for paying the price of admission to see a quality game.
Does anyone else have any ideas that might work besides re-seeding the playoffs and offering money rewards for merely trying to win a scheduled game?
The Boston Red Sox have no shortage of players who can carry this team at any given time, but I’ll give you just a few that could shine in 2008.There isn’t a better player to start with than ace Josh Beckett. Beckett is coming off a career year, winning 20 of his 30 starts in 2007, going 20-7 with a 3.27 ERA, yet still lost out to C.C. Sabathia for the AL Cy Young Award. He’s one of the few guys you can say is a genuine major league ace. If he puts up anywhere near the numbers be put up in 2007, he’s will run away with the Cy Young in 2008 and maybe, just maybe, another World Series ring.With Curt Schilling possibly on the shelf until the All-Star break, young pitchers Clay Buchholz and Jon Lester will have to fill the void in the back end of the Boston rotation. Buchholz has already shown that he can dominate, throwing a no-hitter against the Baltimore Orioles last season.Lester, in just 11 starts for the Red Sox, finished the 2007 season with a 4-0 record and a 4.57 ERA. Buchholz impressed even more, he finished 3-1 with a 1.59 ERA in 22.1 IP. These two youngsters will need to show that they are ready to make an impact if the Red Sox are going to be just as dominant as they were in 2007.
My surprise pick for 2008 is young centerfielder Jacoby Ellsbury. In 116 AB’s in 2007, the youngster hit .353 with 3 HR’s and 18 RBI’s. Fans and media alike expect Ellsbury to win the centerfield job outright from Coco Crisp, so much so that Crisp already sees the writing on the wall and has asked the team to trade him.
The one guy that really surprised a lot of people was 3rd baseman Mike Lowell. For a guy at 33 years of age in 2007, he hit .324 with 21 HR’s and drove in 120. Not the type of numbers that Boston thought he would put up, but you won’t find any of them complaining. If he has that kind of year again for the Red Sox, he adds another dimension to an already strong offense.
Loading ...