My younger brother started playing football in the 4th grade. Back then, when the boys were first learning the game, it wasn't especially serious. I remember the day it became serious. In 6th grade, my brother was an average height and weight for boys his age, which meant he was slightly smaller than most of the other football players. He was stick thin and weighed roughly 90 lbs. On offense, he played quarterback. On defense, he was a linebacker, not because he was a particularly good tackler but because he was fast. One day that fall, while on defense, the opposing team's 220 lb left tackle caught him from behind. His helmet dug in my brother's lower right back, somewhere around where his right kidney would be found. He fell to the ground in pain and the game stopped. "I can't feel my legs," he moaned, and for several minutes nobody moved him. Eventually, his immediate shock wore off and he crawled off the field, where he lay for another 15-20 minutes, icing his back, before finally standing up and walking off the remainder of the pain and the fear. I most clearly remember those first few minutes, when he lay unmoving on the ground, as the first time I seriously worried about my brother's safety playing sports.
Next fall, my brother will likely play for his freshmen football team. In the last two years, he's put on some weight, he's gotten faster, and he's found out that he's much better suited for a wide receiver than a quarterback and for a cornerback than a linebacker, which is fine by me. Every time I see a quarterback get tackled, I thank God that my brother catches the ball and runs. And when I hear about Junior Seau's suicide, I'm grateful that Jacob, my brother, is no longer a linebacker.
Junior Seau was a linebacker for the USC Trojans and a first round draft pick in 1990 for the San Diego Chargers, who he played with for 12 seasons before spending two years with the Miami Dolphins and three years with the New England Patriots. He was a 12x Pro-Bowler, the 1992 Defensive Player of the Year for the NFL and the AFC, the AFC Player of the Year in 1994, and a member of the San Diego Chargers Hall of Fame. He owned a successful restaurant in San Diego and his Junior Seau Foundation helps youth through child abuse prevention, drug and alcohol awareness, and multiple educational programs as well as anti-juvinile delinquency programs. After three years of retirement from the NFL, Junior Seau shot himself in the chest and died on May 2, 2012 at age 43.
The last eight days have left the sports world numb and questioning the role of football in Seau's life. This, and 68 lawsuits from over 1,800 retired NFL players, claiming that the league failed to offer them proper medical treatments for concussions or failed to inform them as to the extent of dangers that concussions pose, have people questioning football in general. They're mourning Seau as a tragic victim to a game that he loved. They're concerned that football players are slowly killing themselves, either with shots to the chest (Seau being the 3rd retired player within 15 months to choose this method of suicide, along with former safeties Dave Duerson and Ray Easterling) or by constantly subjecting their bodies to brutal beatdowns on the field. They're worried about their sons and their futures in the sport. I'm looking at the situation in a slightly different way.
I'll take this on one concern at a time. Junior Seau's death is tragic, but not in the way that some people are treating it. It's sad because someone died; it's sad because three children lost a father; it's sad because many people lost a friend and many more people lost a role model. But Junior Seau didn't die a hero, the way some people are treating him. He didn't die after a courageous and hard fought battle with an overpowering disease. He killed himself. He chose to die. He decided to leave all these people behind. It's sad that he felt he had no other choice, but it was a choice. And when I see a video of his mother or a picture of his father, I can't help but think that he caused it. He ended his suffering only to begin the suffering for the people that loved him. And that's selfish. After Seau severely pulled his right hamstring in 2000, one of many injuries throughout his career, he refused to sit out the remainder of the game or any games following it. He played through the pain. When asked about that decision later, he said, "You know what this game's about? Respect. The respect you can earn only between those white lines. The game is still about hitting. It's still about blocking. It's still about courage." Courage. That's what Junior Seau played for and that's what he lost on May 2. So, yes, his death is sad. But it's not a courageous death. It's selfish.
This leads to the next concern mentioned above. What happened to Seau that could transform him so completely? I'm not here to speculate as to what caused Junior Seau to pull the trigger, but it's hard to deny that football played some part in that. Nobody who knew Seau saw it coming. He was always happy; he was beloved in San Diego; he had plans for the following weekend. It's also possible that he had CTE: chronic traumatic encephalopathy, "the buildup of protein in the brain that has been associated with dementia in football players" (That definition was provided by David Epstien from Sports Illustrated.) It damages the part of the brain that causes impulse control as well, which may be one explanation as to why Seau acted so impulsively. Scientists don't know to what extent football harms the brain, but they know that it does. Yet players continue to play knowing they're endangering themselves. And that's why our concerning ourselves over the health of these players is pointless. I don't mean to sound crass; the brain damage football can cause is obviously a serious problem. But these players know that and they continue to play. Some people in the sports media have been speculating as to whether we should support them as they self-descruct and the answer is yes because the players know the risk. The play because they love the game and if they are willing to put themselves in the front line then we, as fans, should have no qualms watching them do so. It's our choice, just like it's theirs. Just like it was Seau's.
Which leads me to the point: what's going to happen to football? As scientists gain more understanding about the dangers of football, could we find ourselves in a football-less world? I don't know. I don't know if the dangers from football will ever exceed the joy it bring the players, the joy it brings the fans, and the revenue it brings to the sports world. Has a sport ever just disappeared? I don't know. But I've seen, on a very small scale, the effect Seau's death is having on the parent's of boys in football and I can say this much: it's not good. And I'm glad my brother prefers basketball to football.
Rod Carew wore the #29 for both the Minnesota Twins and the California Angels (now Los Angeles Angels) from 1967 to 1985 as a first and second baseman. He was inducted to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1991, his first year of eligibility. He was born on a train in the Panama Canal zone, so he is officially known as a "Zonian" and is named after the doctor on the train who helped deliver him. He immigrated to the United States when he was 14.
Don't be a stranger, now.
The Sports Nerd
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Saturday, April 28, 2012
Harrison Smith
It's been 26 days since the end of the 2012 college basketball season, although it's been 28 days since I stopped caring about it. Since then, I've been a little lost. I pick up a basketball every now and again and toss it hopelessly at the hoop, trying to fill the emptiness in my stomach. I scan the headlines briefly each morning before moving on to read far more intellectual articles. I've found myself aimlessly flipping through sports channels, only to get to the end and repeat the process, searching for something I won't find for roughly 6 months. When I reach ESPN, I hear a snippet of conversation between the announcers, which includes "point guard". I flip back quickly, my hopes impossibly restored for a moment before I realize that I'd rather go watch "Storage Wars" with my brother than what they're suggesting: the NBA.
Perhaps I'm one of the few who feels this way, but nothing the NBA does can convince me to watch any of the games. Jeremy Lin? I'll catch the highlights. Michael Jordan's Charlotte Bobcats? Who'd want to watch them? Lebron James? I see enough of that drama on Sportscenter. Ron Artest/Metta World Peace? That's so November 19, 2004. So 26 days after the college basketball playoffs ended, the NBA playoffs have begun. In fact, as I'm writing this, the Indiana Pacers-Orlando Magic game is playing on the screen next to me....on mute....unnoticed. What is it about college basketball that makes it so much more appealing than the pros?
I'll tell you what it is for me. I'll start at the bottom: the length of the season. In college basketball, I have time to watch my favorite teams play. My time is invested in my favorite team and a few others that I watch on a fairly regular basis. I know all the wins, all the losses, which games are considered "big", and which games I can predict the outcomes for without checking the score. And I have time for that because there are only so many games during the season. I can't keep up with the NBA. They play too often for too long. I can remember the outcomes of the last two or three games for one or two teams but that's it. The significance of each game is downplayed for me because I don't know what's at stake. But, really, there's not much at stake. With 82, teams can lose 11 of 14 games and still make the playoffs (Hello, New York Knicks, I'm looking at you).
Reason number 2: the drama. And the NBA has more drama than a soap opera. I'm not saying there aren't divas in college basketball - but those divas aren't paid (right?). Grown men who make millions playing a game for a living do not earn my sympathy when they miss the playoffs due to a back injury when they've spent the entire season demanding to be traded to another team. The sense of entitlement that comes with these 'superstars' in the NBA makes them impossible to root for. I recently read "The Punch" by John Feinstein. In his book, he tells of an exchange between Kermit Washington and his agent shortly after Washington was drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers in 1973. During the exchange, the agent explained to Washington what was meant by a "guaranteed contract" - that he would received four hundred thousand dollars over the next four years regardless of whether or not he played. Washington refused. He said, "No, I don't want to do that. I don't want to be paid for not working. If I'm not good enough, they shouldn't have to pay me." Legally, Washington had to accept the 'guaranteed' part of his contract, but Washington wasn't entitled. He was good and he wanted to prove he was good and if he wasn't, he didn't want to be treated any differently. Can anyone imagine an NBA player today, mere months after a disagreement about salaries between players and owners caused a lockout and a 66 game season, saying such a thing? Turning down money because they wanted to prove themselves? Playing only because they were passionate and talented? Today, the Lakers pay Kobe Bryant $25,244,000 a year. Kermit Washington hesitated to take $400,000. Times have changed.
Which brings me to my final reason: I missed the great age of the NBA and I'm resentful of that. The NBA had great players and the players today can never live up to those standards. They'll never have the same passion, the same drive, the same love of the game that players like Magic Johnson and Larry Bird had. Bird and Magic made the NBA. They made people care. And they didn't do it for attention or for money - they did it for respect, they did it for the sport, and they did it because they hated losing. Everyone loves to win, but what players and teams today lack, I think, is that hatred to lose. That willingness to do anything to avoid losing, even if it means not being the star. Bird and Magic didn't have that complacency - Knicks executive Donnie Walsh said the difference between those two and everyone else was that "Everyone says, "I don't want to lose." Magic and Larry said, "I'll kill you if I lose". Players today are complacent - they make their money even if they don't play, their teams make the playoffs, if not, there's always next year. College players don't have that privilege or the complacency that comes with it. They have 4 unpaid years of playing with passion to accomplish their goals....before they get sucked into the NBA.
With the 29th pick in the NFL draft, the Minnesota Vikings select......Harrison Smith from Notre Dame University. Therefore Harrison Smith is my 29th blog honoree. Smith is 6'1 7/8", 213 lb, has an arm length of 32.5", and a hand size of 10.2". In his college career, he forced 2 fumbles and recorded 85 tackles. His new team, the Vikings, acquired Smith by trading their second round pick (35th) and fourth round selection (98th) to the Baltimore Ravens. They still came away from the draft with 10 new players on their roster, including another safety from Notre Dame, Robert Blanton.
cyal8er
The Sports Nerd
Perhaps I'm one of the few who feels this way, but nothing the NBA does can convince me to watch any of the games. Jeremy Lin? I'll catch the highlights. Michael Jordan's Charlotte Bobcats? Who'd want to watch them? Lebron James? I see enough of that drama on Sportscenter. Ron Artest/Metta World Peace? That's so November 19, 2004. So 26 days after the college basketball playoffs ended, the NBA playoffs have begun. In fact, as I'm writing this, the Indiana Pacers-Orlando Magic game is playing on the screen next to me....on mute....unnoticed. What is it about college basketball that makes it so much more appealing than the pros?
I'll tell you what it is for me. I'll start at the bottom: the length of the season. In college basketball, I have time to watch my favorite teams play. My time is invested in my favorite team and a few others that I watch on a fairly regular basis. I know all the wins, all the losses, which games are considered "big", and which games I can predict the outcomes for without checking the score. And I have time for that because there are only so many games during the season. I can't keep up with the NBA. They play too often for too long. I can remember the outcomes of the last two or three games for one or two teams but that's it. The significance of each game is downplayed for me because I don't know what's at stake. But, really, there's not much at stake. With 82, teams can lose 11 of 14 games and still make the playoffs (Hello, New York Knicks, I'm looking at you).
Reason number 2: the drama. And the NBA has more drama than a soap opera. I'm not saying there aren't divas in college basketball - but those divas aren't paid (right?). Grown men who make millions playing a game for a living do not earn my sympathy when they miss the playoffs due to a back injury when they've spent the entire season demanding to be traded to another team. The sense of entitlement that comes with these 'superstars' in the NBA makes them impossible to root for. I recently read "The Punch" by John Feinstein. In his book, he tells of an exchange between Kermit Washington and his agent shortly after Washington was drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers in 1973. During the exchange, the agent explained to Washington what was meant by a "guaranteed contract" - that he would received four hundred thousand dollars over the next four years regardless of whether or not he played. Washington refused. He said, "No, I don't want to do that. I don't want to be paid for not working. If I'm not good enough, they shouldn't have to pay me." Legally, Washington had to accept the 'guaranteed' part of his contract, but Washington wasn't entitled. He was good and he wanted to prove he was good and if he wasn't, he didn't want to be treated any differently. Can anyone imagine an NBA player today, mere months after a disagreement about salaries between players and owners caused a lockout and a 66 game season, saying such a thing? Turning down money because they wanted to prove themselves? Playing only because they were passionate and talented? Today, the Lakers pay Kobe Bryant $25,244,000 a year. Kermit Washington hesitated to take $400,000. Times have changed.
Which brings me to my final reason: I missed the great age of the NBA and I'm resentful of that. The NBA had great players and the players today can never live up to those standards. They'll never have the same passion, the same drive, the same love of the game that players like Magic Johnson and Larry Bird had. Bird and Magic made the NBA. They made people care. And they didn't do it for attention or for money - they did it for respect, they did it for the sport, and they did it because they hated losing. Everyone loves to win, but what players and teams today lack, I think, is that hatred to lose. That willingness to do anything to avoid losing, even if it means not being the star. Bird and Magic didn't have that complacency - Knicks executive Donnie Walsh said the difference between those two and everyone else was that "Everyone says, "I don't want to lose." Magic and Larry said, "I'll kill you if I lose". Players today are complacent - they make their money even if they don't play, their teams make the playoffs, if not, there's always next year. College players don't have that privilege or the complacency that comes with it. They have 4 unpaid years of playing with passion to accomplish their goals....before they get sucked into the NBA.
With the 29th pick in the NFL draft, the Minnesota Vikings select......Harrison Smith from Notre Dame University. Therefore Harrison Smith is my 29th blog honoree. Smith is 6'1 7/8", 213 lb, has an arm length of 32.5", and a hand size of 10.2". In his college career, he forced 2 fumbles and recorded 85 tackles. His new team, the Vikings, acquired Smith by trading their second round pick (35th) and fourth round selection (98th) to the Baltimore Ravens. They still came away from the draft with 10 new players on their roster, including another safety from Notre Dame, Robert Blanton.
cyal8er
The Sports Nerd
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Brian Rafalski
It's been nearly twenty years since Christian Laettner's game-winning buzzer beater in the semi-finals of the NCAA Tournament against Kentucky shocked the nation. No doubt that shot will be shown countless times in the next month to the point of extreme annoyance. But it wasn't just that shot that made the Duke-Kentucky game so incredible; the 64 minutes and 57.9 seconds leading up to helped make it one of the greatest games in college basketball. In the end, though, what 98% of people remember is Christian Laettner's shot sending the Duke Blue Devils to the Final Four. Not Kentucky fans, though. Those fans remember it for something, or, to be more precise, a few someones, entirely different.
Richie Farmer. Deron Feldhaus. John Pelphrey. Sean Woods. The four seniors on that Kentucky team had been through a lot. After their freshmen season, their head coach, Eddie Sutton, was forced to resign following an NCAA investigation of several violations, including alleged cheating of a former player on his college admission exams and cash payments to the father of another player. The investigation was carried out throughout their freshmen season (1988-1989) which, due to several key losses, was Kentucky's first losing season since 1927. A ban was placed on the school that prevented them from playing any televised games during the next season or from any post-season play during the next two. Most of the Kentucky team of 1989 left when Sutton did. Those four didn't. The four soon-to-be-sophomores stayed with Kentucky and entered uncharted territory - no coach, no team, and, it appeared, no future. In the only NCAA Tournament they were able to shine in, they led the Wildcats in a remarkable run to one of the greatest games of all time. Following the game, the university retired their jerseys while they were still in school. They were the Unforgettables.
Flash forward to 2012. Kentucky has six freshmen, three sophomores, two juniors, and two seniors. Last year they had seven freshmen - four left to play professional basketball. At the bare minimum this year, one freshmen (Anthony Davis) is expected to leave this year as well. But it's ok - Head Coach John Calipari already has two five star, top 20 recruits ready to replace him.
Kentucky has entirely transformed itself in the last twenty years. They've always been a national powerhouse, but under John Calipari they are doing something that's never been done before in college basketball - they've become a "One-and-Done" factory. Five-star recruits come in for their mandatory one year of college basketball, play for Calipari, leave for the NBA, and are replaced. Lather, rinse, repeat. And who can blame Calipari? His team has lost one game this season, they're ranked #1 in the country, they'll get the #1 overall seed on the NCAA Tournament, and most analysts predict they'll win the NCAA Tournament (not that that really matters - last year, a grand total of two analysts predicted that eventual champs UCONN even would reach the Final Four). Calipari is taking good advantage of a broken system.
In 2006, the NBA increased the age limit of the draft from 18 to 19 and required U.S. players to be one year removed from high school before playing in the NBA. This means that stars like Derrick Rose, Kyrie Erving, and John Wall are forced to miss a year of basketball or, more likely, take their talents to a school for one year before moving onto the NBA. This rule benefits no one and harms everyone. There are numerous arguments that could be made against the rule:
1) It makes the term "student-athlete" a complete joke. One-and-done players come into college knowing they'll be leaving at the end of the year. That requires them to make good grades until the end of basketball season. They don't need to challenge themselves. They don't have to take their education seriously. A valuable privilege that should be graciously accepted and taken advantage of becomes an obligation, a chore, a mere stepping stone on the way to the NBA.
2) It puts the athlete in an unfortunate situation. Student athletes will tell you that, while the prospect of going to the NBA for the love the game is appealing, the idea of getting paid makes it even better. For some that's a bonus; for some it's a necessity. A lot of student athletes don't come from upper class families; going to the NBA is a way to provide their families with the kind of financial support that that they've never had before. At the same time, an extra year of playing basketball is an extra year of risking injury and preventing that NBA dream from ever coming true. Take Kyrie Irving: he was a one-and-done for Duke in 2011. While playing at Duke, he broke his toe. Fortunately for him, the toe healed and he was still drafted #1 overall by the Cleveland Cavaliers but he is an excellent example of why the age limit is dangerous for players: if Kyrie Irving had broken more than his toe, his entire career would have been on the line or maybe even over before it started so he could...play basketball at college for his mandatory year off before going pro?
3) It puts coaches in an unfortunate situation. As if recruiting wasn't difficult enough, the age rule adds an extra factor to the equation. Coaches now have to figure how long they'll have a player for and how they can recruit around that position and that player.
4) Why is the rule even there? Some of the best players in NBA history - Lebron James, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Dwight Howard - came straight from high school.
5) It harms the university and this is where we come back to Kentucky. The Unforgettables of 1992 were something special. They stayed with Kentucky because they loved Kentucky. They could have transferred; they likely would have been successful wherever they went. And, to be honest, they weren't high priority recruits for Kentucky; they were kind of the runts of the litter. But they loved that school and they couldn't imagine playing anywhere else. They stuck with Kentucky not because it was great (and it wasn't great, at that moment) but because they wanted to make it great again. The one-and-done rule makes the university a stepping stone, an obstacle to overcome before the real work begins. There's no undying loyalty to the school, to the fans, to the history of the program. It's disrespectful and diminishes the work that past players and coaches have done.
1989. Four Kentucky freshmen remain with their team despite the uncertainty of the program's future because they love the Wildcats. 1992. They're honored as the Unforgettables, the heart and soul that brought the Wildcats back to national relevance.
April 2011. The Kentucky Wildcats lose in the Final Four to UCONN. June 2011. Four Kentucky freshmen are drafted in the first round. November 2011. Six new freshmen enter Kentucky. Begin again.
2012. A lot can change in twenty years. And a lot can be changed going forward. Here's what I think should be done. It goes without saying that the age rule should be abolished. Players should be able to chose whether to go pro straight out of high school or to go to college. If they chose to go to college, though, make it a three year commitment, minimum. This ensures that players who actually want to be student athletes have that opportunity and those who don't are forced to go to school; only the athletes who care would come and isn't that the kind of students colleges want? Coaches wouldn't have to plan every recruiting class around guess work of how long a player will stay. Players might put more thought into the school they're going to because they'd be there longer. The players that want/need to go to the NBA can do so without being penalized with an extra year of waiting and warding off injury. And the NBA gets great players a year sooner than they normally would. Everyone wins.
Brian Rafalski is an American hockey defensive player with jersey #28. He played college hockey for the University of Wisconsin but was not immediately sought after by the NHL. Instead, he traveled overseas and played in Sweden and Finland, and became the first non-Finnish player to be voted best player by his peers. In 1999, he was declared by Sporting News to be the best hockey player not playing in the NHL. That same year, he was signed by the New Jersey Devils as a free agent. He played with the Devils until 2007 when he was signed by the Detroit Red Wings. In 2011, he retired due to knee and back injuries. During his 11 NHL seasons, he qualified for the post season every year. He played in five Stanley Cups and won three.
Thank you for your time.
The Sports Nerd
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Brandon Jacobs
#1: The Syracuse Orange
I'm going to go out on a limb here: come March, Syracuse will not make the Sweet Sixteen. Of the current number 1 seeds projected by Lunardi 2 days ago, (Missouri, Ohio State, and Kentucky being the other three), Syracuse is by far the weakest, despite being the overall #1 seed. I'm not a big fan of Ken Pomeroy's basketball rankings (#1 reason why: Michigan State, 18-5, strength of schedule: 11, is ranked one below Wisconsin, 18-6, SOS: 31, whom the Spartans defeated earlier this season. I have other reasons, but that one best exemplifies my opinion) but I'm going to be citing him a lot in this entry because his rankings are easy to compare. Syracuse is ranked #6 by Pomeroy (below both MSU and Wisconsin); they have a strength of schedule of 55 and here's why: they have played 3 ranked teams this entire season. Ohio State, ranked below Syracuse in the AP poll but above them in Pomeroy, has played 7. Michigan State has played 7. Wisconsin has played 6. Northwestern, who I've argued before would make the NCAA tournament if they were in a different conference, has played 5. They have a higher strength of schedule at this point in the season than the #2 team in the nation. It's easy to 24-1 when you play below the best of your abilities.
Syracuse's games against ranked opponents so far this season have been against Florida, Marquette, and Georgetown and they've won them all. Against unranked opponents, they've won by an average of 19.5 points; against ranked opponents, they've won by an average of 4.6. When they've played against formidable opponents, Syracuse has struggled. This is part of the reason that I think they'll struggle in March. Everyone will be good. Syracuse has two games remaining against ranked opponents, both of which are against Louisville. It's a shame that Marquette won't get the chance to play Syracuse in Milwaukee this season; if they did, I think they would win. With any luck, they'll get that opportunity during the Big East Tournament instead.
#2: The Officials
I'm not the only person who, after watching a game end with an outcome different from what I want, would be happy to blame the officiating. Most of the time, that's a coping mechanism: it's reassuring to blame your team's poor performance on that guy on the sidelines with the ridiculous facial expressions and over-the-top gestures that the cameras show as much as the players. Sometimes it's accurate. And when it's accurate, we're left with this question: to what extent can we place blame on the referees?
On January 28, with 26.3 seconds to go at home against West Virginia, the Orange (Oranges?) found themselves up by two with the ball in the hands of the Mountaineers. After an airball, Deniz Kilicli of West Virginia grabbed the rebound and put the ball back up with 11 seconds left only to have it blocked by Syracuse's Baye Kieta and, after a Syracuse miss and a failed desperation three by the Mountaineers, Syracuse won. Here's the thing: it wasn't a block. It was goaltending.
This brings us back to the question of how much blame can be placed on the officials or, to phrase it differently, how much responsibility should the officials take for blown calls? We have no idea what would have happened in the remaining 11 seconds of that game. Perhaps the shot would have gone in and Syracuse would have hit a buzzer beater at the end to win it anyway. The blame can't be placed squarely on the officials. West Virginia could have done more to guarantee that the game didn't come down to the final possession: they could have shot more than 40.7%; they could have held Syracuse below 46%; they could have made one of the 12 threes they missed, Kilicli could have gone more than 1-5 from the free throw line.
At the same time, maybe the game would have gone to overtime and West Virginia would have gone on a 13-4 run to win. As coach Bob Huggins said afterwards in reference to the goaltending call, "Do I think it was? No. I know it was. I saw the replay. It's hard. You've got 30 seconds and you're trying to get the refocused and they're all thinking about other things."Once a chance like that is taken away, through no fault of your own, it's hard to concentrate on anything but how unfair that is. Sure, they had a chance after the game but that was the momentum changer, the moment where they could say, "Even when I do the right thing, it goes against me." At the very least, this should have been acknowledged. Someone should have come forward and apologized. It's been done before after blown calls and this was undoubtedly a situation where one would be applicable. No such apology was given.
After mistakes like these, defenders will rush to the sides of the referees and say, "No one's perfect" or "That's a tough call" and they're right. But making those tough calls, and making them correctly, are their jobs. If the officials can't make the right call at the end of a close game, why are they still officials?
#3: The Iowa State Cyclones
And now for something completely different! I'm kidding; there is a connection between all of this, I swear. The Cyclones are currently 17-7, 7-4 in the Big 12. They made national news recently after defeating #5 Kansas, but I've been watching them for reasons entirely unrelated for some time now.
42% of Iowa State's playing roster are transfer players. That's 5 of their 12. What's more, 3 of those 5 are from the Big Ten - Chris Allen from Michigan State, Chris Babb from Penn State, and Royce White from Minnesota - and they have at least one more Michigan State transfer (Korie Lucious) redshirting to play for them next season. Head Coach Fred Coiberg has one of the most unique recruiting strategies in the country - take a hodge-podge of talented players who didn't quite fit in with their past schools and put them together in the hopes of making a talented basketball team. It's working.
Individually, the players are flourishing. A rough freshmen year at Minnesota, which involved clashes with head coach Tubby Smith as well as legal problems, led to White leaving the team before the season started. Kentucky coach John Calipari offered White a spot on the squad - not surprising, as White was Mr. Minnesota and one of 20 players chosen to play in the 2009 Jordan Brand Classic - and White was prepared to accept until he thought about the plane ride it would take to get there. White's fear of flying, coupled with an anxiety disorder that began at age 10 after watching his best friend nearly die of a heart condition, caused him to cancel his flight and end his opportunity to play with the Wildcats. He ended up in the middle of a cornfield in Iowa, where he's the team's leader in scoring, rebounding, and assists per game. His anxiety problems still wake him 4-5 times a night and leave him questioning simple decisions for hours, but he's gaining control - with under 2 minutes left in the Kansas game, following a night that involved waking from a nightmare about missing a free throw and running to the gym in the early hours of the morning for practice, White hit 2 critical free throws to give the Cyclones a 5 point lead.
White's is just one of the transfers success stories. Following an unexplained dismissal from the Spartans, Chris Allen trails only White in points and assists per game. The 3rd highest scorer is Scott Christopherson, a transfer from Marquette and the 4th is Chris Babb from Penn State. 4 of the 5 starters from Iowa State are transfers.
Iowa State is 17-7, 7-4 in the Big 12. They've played 4 ranked teams thus far (more than Syracuse) and beaten one (Kansas); they still have 3 more left to play. They're ranked 37 by Pomeroy with a SOS of 38 (compared to Syracuse's 55). They haven't lost by more than 10 points this season (vs Iowa and Michigan) and their worst loss of the season, at Drake, came by 9 in the first weekend of the season. They've split games this season with Texas and Oklahoma St and defeated Kansas St in their first matchup; these are the other 3 Big 12 bubble teams.
Here's my other prediction for March: Iowa State will make the Sweet Sixteen. Here's why: 1) they don't do anything great, but they do everything well. They shoot 45% from the field and they rank in the top hundred for assists, points, and rebounds per game. 2) They've played a challenging schedule. Not only do they face ranked teams in their conference, but they willingly challenged themselves in the non-conference schedule as well. They haven't won many of these games, but they've been competitive in all of them. They're prepared for anyone. 3) For whatever reason, this team has chemistry. Maybe it's because they live in the middle of no where and have nothing else to do besides spend time together or maybe it's because many of them have been redshirted for a year before they started playing so they had time to prepare or maybe it's because they appreciate the importance of second chances and are trying to make the most of theirs; whatever it is, it's working. The team plays well, the play competitively, and they play together and that's what they need to go on a run in March.
#4: The Grand Conclusion
Syracuse and Iowa State are about as opposite as they can be. Syracuse is overrated, Iowa State is underrated. Syracuse is ranked nationally despite only playing 3 ranked teams while Iowa State is just beginning to receive national recognition for defeating one of the 4 ranked teams they've played so far. Syracuse is better, but Iowa State is better prepared. At this moment, Joe Lunardi currently has Syracuse as the #1 seed and Iowa State the #9 seed in the east - meaning that, right now, they are projected to meet up in the second round to determine who goes to the Sweet Sixteen. My prediction stands. Iowa State goes to the Sweet Sixteen. Syracuse doesn't. Unless the officials have something to say about it.
#27
Brandon Jacobs wears jersey #27 for the New York Giants, Super Bowl XLVI Champs. He's a 6-4 running back from Southern Illinois University. He played in 14 games this season and started 6, but the Super Bowl was not one of these 14. That didn't stop him from getting some attention from the media, though. After Tom Brady's wife, Giselle Bundchen, said, "My husband cannot ... throw the ball and catch the ball at the same time. I can't believe they dropped the ball so many times", Jacobs jumped to the defense of his opposition and told Bundchen "to be cute and shut up". He apologized for the latter part of the comment...unnecessarily, in my opinion.
Bon voyage!
The Sports Nerd
I'm going to go out on a limb here: come March, Syracuse will not make the Sweet Sixteen. Of the current number 1 seeds projected by Lunardi 2 days ago, (Missouri, Ohio State, and Kentucky being the other three), Syracuse is by far the weakest, despite being the overall #1 seed. I'm not a big fan of Ken Pomeroy's basketball rankings (#1 reason why: Michigan State, 18-5, strength of schedule: 11, is ranked one below Wisconsin, 18-6, SOS: 31, whom the Spartans defeated earlier this season. I have other reasons, but that one best exemplifies my opinion) but I'm going to be citing him a lot in this entry because his rankings are easy to compare. Syracuse is ranked #6 by Pomeroy (below both MSU and Wisconsin); they have a strength of schedule of 55 and here's why: they have played 3 ranked teams this entire season. Ohio State, ranked below Syracuse in the AP poll but above them in Pomeroy, has played 7. Michigan State has played 7. Wisconsin has played 6. Northwestern, who I've argued before would make the NCAA tournament if they were in a different conference, has played 5. They have a higher strength of schedule at this point in the season than the #2 team in the nation. It's easy to 24-1 when you play below the best of your abilities.
Syracuse's games against ranked opponents so far this season have been against Florida, Marquette, and Georgetown and they've won them all. Against unranked opponents, they've won by an average of 19.5 points; against ranked opponents, they've won by an average of 4.6. When they've played against formidable opponents, Syracuse has struggled. This is part of the reason that I think they'll struggle in March. Everyone will be good. Syracuse has two games remaining against ranked opponents, both of which are against Louisville. It's a shame that Marquette won't get the chance to play Syracuse in Milwaukee this season; if they did, I think they would win. With any luck, they'll get that opportunity during the Big East Tournament instead.
#2: The Officials
I'm not the only person who, after watching a game end with an outcome different from what I want, would be happy to blame the officiating. Most of the time, that's a coping mechanism: it's reassuring to blame your team's poor performance on that guy on the sidelines with the ridiculous facial expressions and over-the-top gestures that the cameras show as much as the players. Sometimes it's accurate. And when it's accurate, we're left with this question: to what extent can we place blame on the referees?
On January 28, with 26.3 seconds to go at home against West Virginia, the Orange (Oranges?) found themselves up by two with the ball in the hands of the Mountaineers. After an airball, Deniz Kilicli of West Virginia grabbed the rebound and put the ball back up with 11 seconds left only to have it blocked by Syracuse's Baye Kieta and, after a Syracuse miss and a failed desperation three by the Mountaineers, Syracuse won. Here's the thing: it wasn't a block. It was goaltending.
This brings us back to the question of how much blame can be placed on the officials or, to phrase it differently, how much responsibility should the officials take for blown calls? We have no idea what would have happened in the remaining 11 seconds of that game. Perhaps the shot would have gone in and Syracuse would have hit a buzzer beater at the end to win it anyway. The blame can't be placed squarely on the officials. West Virginia could have done more to guarantee that the game didn't come down to the final possession: they could have shot more than 40.7%; they could have held Syracuse below 46%; they could have made one of the 12 threes they missed, Kilicli could have gone more than 1-5 from the free throw line.
At the same time, maybe the game would have gone to overtime and West Virginia would have gone on a 13-4 run to win. As coach Bob Huggins said afterwards in reference to the goaltending call, "Do I think it was? No. I know it was. I saw the replay. It's hard. You've got 30 seconds and you're trying to get the refocused and they're all thinking about other things."Once a chance like that is taken away, through no fault of your own, it's hard to concentrate on anything but how unfair that is. Sure, they had a chance after the game but that was the momentum changer, the moment where they could say, "Even when I do the right thing, it goes against me." At the very least, this should have been acknowledged. Someone should have come forward and apologized. It's been done before after blown calls and this was undoubtedly a situation where one would be applicable. No such apology was given.
After mistakes like these, defenders will rush to the sides of the referees and say, "No one's perfect" or "That's a tough call" and they're right. But making those tough calls, and making them correctly, are their jobs. If the officials can't make the right call at the end of a close game, why are they still officials?
#3: The Iowa State Cyclones
And now for something completely different! I'm kidding; there is a connection between all of this, I swear. The Cyclones are currently 17-7, 7-4 in the Big 12. They made national news recently after defeating #5 Kansas, but I've been watching them for reasons entirely unrelated for some time now.
42% of Iowa State's playing roster are transfer players. That's 5 of their 12. What's more, 3 of those 5 are from the Big Ten - Chris Allen from Michigan State, Chris Babb from Penn State, and Royce White from Minnesota - and they have at least one more Michigan State transfer (Korie Lucious) redshirting to play for them next season. Head Coach Fred Coiberg has one of the most unique recruiting strategies in the country - take a hodge-podge of talented players who didn't quite fit in with their past schools and put them together in the hopes of making a talented basketball team. It's working.
Individually, the players are flourishing. A rough freshmen year at Minnesota, which involved clashes with head coach Tubby Smith as well as legal problems, led to White leaving the team before the season started. Kentucky coach John Calipari offered White a spot on the squad - not surprising, as White was Mr. Minnesota and one of 20 players chosen to play in the 2009 Jordan Brand Classic - and White was prepared to accept until he thought about the plane ride it would take to get there. White's fear of flying, coupled with an anxiety disorder that began at age 10 after watching his best friend nearly die of a heart condition, caused him to cancel his flight and end his opportunity to play with the Wildcats. He ended up in the middle of a cornfield in Iowa, where he's the team's leader in scoring, rebounding, and assists per game. His anxiety problems still wake him 4-5 times a night and leave him questioning simple decisions for hours, but he's gaining control - with under 2 minutes left in the Kansas game, following a night that involved waking from a nightmare about missing a free throw and running to the gym in the early hours of the morning for practice, White hit 2 critical free throws to give the Cyclones a 5 point lead.
White's is just one of the transfers success stories. Following an unexplained dismissal from the Spartans, Chris Allen trails only White in points and assists per game. The 3rd highest scorer is Scott Christopherson, a transfer from Marquette and the 4th is Chris Babb from Penn State. 4 of the 5 starters from Iowa State are transfers.
Iowa State is 17-7, 7-4 in the Big 12. They've played 4 ranked teams thus far (more than Syracuse) and beaten one (Kansas); they still have 3 more left to play. They're ranked 37 by Pomeroy with a SOS of 38 (compared to Syracuse's 55). They haven't lost by more than 10 points this season (vs Iowa and Michigan) and their worst loss of the season, at Drake, came by 9 in the first weekend of the season. They've split games this season with Texas and Oklahoma St and defeated Kansas St in their first matchup; these are the other 3 Big 12 bubble teams.
Here's my other prediction for March: Iowa State will make the Sweet Sixteen. Here's why: 1) they don't do anything great, but they do everything well. They shoot 45% from the field and they rank in the top hundred for assists, points, and rebounds per game. 2) They've played a challenging schedule. Not only do they face ranked teams in their conference, but they willingly challenged themselves in the non-conference schedule as well. They haven't won many of these games, but they've been competitive in all of them. They're prepared for anyone. 3) For whatever reason, this team has chemistry. Maybe it's because they live in the middle of no where and have nothing else to do besides spend time together or maybe it's because many of them have been redshirted for a year before they started playing so they had time to prepare or maybe it's because they appreciate the importance of second chances and are trying to make the most of theirs; whatever it is, it's working. The team plays well, the play competitively, and they play together and that's what they need to go on a run in March.
#4: The Grand Conclusion
Syracuse and Iowa State are about as opposite as they can be. Syracuse is overrated, Iowa State is underrated. Syracuse is ranked nationally despite only playing 3 ranked teams while Iowa State is just beginning to receive national recognition for defeating one of the 4 ranked teams they've played so far. Syracuse is better, but Iowa State is better prepared. At this moment, Joe Lunardi currently has Syracuse as the #1 seed and Iowa State the #9 seed in the east - meaning that, right now, they are projected to meet up in the second round to determine who goes to the Sweet Sixteen. My prediction stands. Iowa State goes to the Sweet Sixteen. Syracuse doesn't. Unless the officials have something to say about it.
#27
Brandon Jacobs wears jersey #27 for the New York Giants, Super Bowl XLVI Champs. He's a 6-4 running back from Southern Illinois University. He played in 14 games this season and started 6, but the Super Bowl was not one of these 14. That didn't stop him from getting some attention from the media, though. After Tom Brady's wife, Giselle Bundchen, said, "My husband cannot ... throw the ball and catch the ball at the same time. I can't believe they dropped the ball so many times", Jacobs jumped to the defense of his opposition and told Bundchen "to be cute and shut up". He apologized for the latter part of the comment...unnecessarily, in my opinion.
Bon voyage!
The Sports Nerd
Monday, January 23, 2012
Joe Paterno
If you're anything like me, the announcement of legendary Penn State coach Joe Paterno's death was met with mixed emotions when you turned on Sportscenter on January 22, 2012. First, I was a bit stunned (though I would have been more stunned had CBS not inaccurately reported his death the night beforehand). Yes, Joe Paterno was old and sick, but Joe Paterno has been around for forever. There were times when, following a press conference, I would find myself thinking, "How is this man still standing, let alone coaching?". That's not meant to be funny or rude; it's just the truth. Joe Paterno was old, but he was omnipresent in college football, especially in the Big Ten. Everything changed on November 5, 2011, when sexual abuse charges were first brought up against Paterno's former assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky. The number of people involved in the scandal eventually increased to encompass Paterno himself, leading to his firing on November 9, just four days after the scandal was revealed. Less than three months later, and before his testimony could be used against Sandusky, he was dead, leaving the sports world reeling over how to remember one of the greatest college football coaches of all time, and also one of the most disappointing.
The Kubler-Ross model was first proposed by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in her 1969 book, On Death and Dying. She based her model off research and the experience of over 500 dying patients that she interviewed. The model she proposed is better known as The Five Stages of Grief.
Stage 1: Denial
Nobody wants to think ill of the dead. It would be easy to concentrate solely on Joe Paterno's accomplishments because there are so many of them. The 2011 season was Paterno's 62nd year with Penn State, his 43rd as head coach, making him the longest lasting head coach at a single school in history. He ended his career with 409 victories and 24 bowl victories (the most of any coach in history) out of 37 bowl appearances, and also as the only coach to win each of the four major bowls - Rose, Orange, Fiesta, and Sugar - as well as the Cotton Bowl Classic. Under Paterno, Penn State won at least 3 bowl games each decade since 1970. He had 2 national championships (1982 and 1986), 5 undefeated seasons, and won the Big Ten championship 3 times since Penn State joined in 1993.
But his accomplishments are more than just on the field. Paterno announced his plans to conduct a "Grand Experiment" immediately following his hiring in 1966, in which he planned to make academics just as high a priority for student athletes as athletics. Penn State students have all finished above average academically in comparison to other D1 schools and the 78% graduation rate is higher than the 67% average for D1 athletes, second only to Northwestern in the Big Ten.
Paterno donated over $4 million to Penn State since his hiring and, in honor of the $13.5 million he helped raise for the expansion of the library in 1997, the expansion was named Paterno Library.
A statue outside Beaver Stadium exemplifies the important impact that Joe Paterno had on Penn State. This is also demonstrated by the rallies held by students on Paterno's lawn the night of his firing as well as the ongoing candlelight vigils being held after his death. Amongst the student body, he was a person to be honored and respected. Amongst his players and former players, he was family. Former player Matt Millen said, "I am numb...Forget the football aspect. We just lost a great contributor to our society. He was more than a football coach...He was a teacher who affected thousands with life-long lessons." Forget football? Ok, that brings us to....
Stage 2: Anger
Paterno's role in the Sandusky sex scandal cannot, should not, and will never be overlooked. Here's what happened: Jerry Sandusky was the assistant coach under Joe Paterno from 1969-1999, 23 years of which he also spent as the team's defensive coordinator. In 1977, Sandusky founded "The Second Mile", a charity to help troubled young boys. In 1998, he was investigated by multiple sources for sexual abuse but no charges were filed. He retried in 1999 but remained at Penn State in an office position for the football team.
In 2008, the mother of a high school freshman boy (Victim 1) reported that her son had been continuously sexually abused by Sandusky since 2005/2006, during which time the boy was involved in The Second Mile and Sandusky was an assistant coach of his school football team.
In December 2010, assistant coach Mike McQueary appeared before the Grand Jury investigating Victim 1's case and stated that, in 2002, he had witnessed Sandusky abusing a different boy, Victim 2, in Penn State's showers. He reported this incident to Joe Paterno. Paterno, in turn, informed athletic director Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, who was overseeing Penn State's police at the time. The two men, along with the school President, Graham Spanier, told Sandusky not to bring children into Penn State facilities. That was the end of the matter for McQueary, Schultz, Curley, Spanier...and Paterno, but not the end for at least 20 boys who would find themselves victims to Sandusky.
Paterno, along with the men he informed, insist that the details McQueary gave to the Grand Jury were not the same information he gave them. It didn't matter to the courts, though. The Grand Jury charged Schultz and Curley with failure to report suspected child abuse. Not facing any legal charges, Paterno announced that he would retire at the end of the 2011 season. The Board of Trustees, though, voted to terminate Paterno's job immediately and unceremoniously fired him in a phone call late one night five days into the scandal.
Stage 3: Bargaining
Two months after he was fired, Paterno attempted to explain the position he found himself in: "I didn't know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was...so I backed away and turned it over to some other people, people I thought would have a little more expertise than I did." Paterno didn't face any legal obligations, but he did face some moral ones.
Joe Paterno went to Brown University; he won more games than any other college football coach; he was a smart man. When he says that he didn't know how to handle the situation, I don't believe him. That's an insult to his intelligence and to everyone who heard that statement. When you see someone having a heart attack, you call an ambulance. When you see a bank robbery, you call the police. When you see sexual abuse, you call anyone in any position of power to fix the situation. You could say that he did that by contacting the higher-ups in the school. When they didn't take action, he should have been smart enough to tell someone who would.
Another reason I don't believe Paterno's statement: Sandusky coached beneath Paterno for 31 years. In 1999, when he retired at age 55, he received the Assistant Coach of the Year Award. Why would he retire so young when he was obviously doing such a phenomenal job? Because in 1998, he was accused of sexual assault but no charges were filed. He remained at the school, just not in as an assistant coach. I think they all knew more than they let on, that Sandusky was forced to retire quietly in exchange for the school keeping quiet themselves. Maybe I'm a conspiracy theorist, but it's not the most far-fetched aspect about this whole situation.
Matt Millen said that Paterno was a teacher. A teacher generally guides the younger generation by example and through his wisdom and experience. By this definition, Joe Paterno taught the his students to take the least amount of necessary action as needed to clear your name of any legal obligations. It might be irrelevant, though, because the children that Paterno was supposed to be teaching and guiding were the same children that he allowed Sandusky to abuse. Millen said there is more than football and he was right. Maybe he should have told Joe Paterno that.
Stage 4: Depression
Yesterday on the radio, someone proposed that Joe Paterno died of a broken heart. He died of lung cancer, but the idea is still the same. Paterno had been at Penn State for 62 years. Nittany Lion football was his life and the students and players that he'd met during that time were his family and when he was cruelly (?) but justifiably (?) fired over the phone on the evening of November 9, the Board of Trustees did, in a way, take his life from him. He was sick, his reputation was ruined, his career was over - what else did he have to fight for?
He left behind a wife, five children, seventeen grandchildren, and countless numbers of players and students who loved him as their own family and they are all truly mourning right now. Paterno made inexcusably poor decisions during his lifetime, but dead is dead. His actions don't change the fact that a man died yesterday.
Stage 5: Acceptance
I remember when I first found out that Paterno was involved in the scandal. I've never been a Penn State fan nor a Joe Paterno fan; as I said before, I usually watched his press conference or him with a broken hip on the sidelines and just wondered how he could still do it. But I was stunned and I was sad because, with all the poor role models who are placed in the limelight, it's refreshing to have a person like Joe Paterno, who appears to be the exact opposite and, when the truth came out, it was hard to watch him fall. You can't look at Joe Paterno's accomplishments without looking at his failures, but the opposite can be said as well. Paterno was in imperfect human being whose faults were magnified because he was placed on such a high pedestal by so many for such a long time. He wasn't morally strong, he made bad decisions, he let a lot of bad things happen. He changed a lot of lives, he was loved by a lot of people, and he taught sportsmanship and leadership on the football field. He was human and now he's gone. Joe Paterno was born on December 21, 1926. This is my 26th blog and it is dedicated him. RIP.
Respectfully,
The Sports Nerd
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The Kubler-Ross model was first proposed by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in her 1969 book, On Death and Dying. She based her model off research and the experience of over 500 dying patients that she interviewed. The model she proposed is better known as The Five Stages of Grief.
Stage 1: Denial
Nobody wants to think ill of the dead. It would be easy to concentrate solely on Joe Paterno's accomplishments because there are so many of them. The 2011 season was Paterno's 62nd year with Penn State, his 43rd as head coach, making him the longest lasting head coach at a single school in history. He ended his career with 409 victories and 24 bowl victories (the most of any coach in history) out of 37 bowl appearances, and also as the only coach to win each of the four major bowls - Rose, Orange, Fiesta, and Sugar - as well as the Cotton Bowl Classic. Under Paterno, Penn State won at least 3 bowl games each decade since 1970. He had 2 national championships (1982 and 1986), 5 undefeated seasons, and won the Big Ten championship 3 times since Penn State joined in 1993.
But his accomplishments are more than just on the field. Paterno announced his plans to conduct a "Grand Experiment" immediately following his hiring in 1966, in which he planned to make academics just as high a priority for student athletes as athletics. Penn State students have all finished above average academically in comparison to other D1 schools and the 78% graduation rate is higher than the 67% average for D1 athletes, second only to Northwestern in the Big Ten.
Paterno donated over $4 million to Penn State since his hiring and, in honor of the $13.5 million he helped raise for the expansion of the library in 1997, the expansion was named Paterno Library.
A statue outside Beaver Stadium exemplifies the important impact that Joe Paterno had on Penn State. This is also demonstrated by the rallies held by students on Paterno's lawn the night of his firing as well as the ongoing candlelight vigils being held after his death. Amongst the student body, he was a person to be honored and respected. Amongst his players and former players, he was family. Former player Matt Millen said, "I am numb...Forget the football aspect. We just lost a great contributor to our society. He was more than a football coach...He was a teacher who affected thousands with life-long lessons." Forget football? Ok, that brings us to....
Stage 2: Anger
Paterno's role in the Sandusky sex scandal cannot, should not, and will never be overlooked. Here's what happened: Jerry Sandusky was the assistant coach under Joe Paterno from 1969-1999, 23 years of which he also spent as the team's defensive coordinator. In 1977, Sandusky founded "The Second Mile", a charity to help troubled young boys. In 1998, he was investigated by multiple sources for sexual abuse but no charges were filed. He retried in 1999 but remained at Penn State in an office position for the football team.
In 2008, the mother of a high school freshman boy (Victim 1) reported that her son had been continuously sexually abused by Sandusky since 2005/2006, during which time the boy was involved in The Second Mile and Sandusky was an assistant coach of his school football team.
In December 2010, assistant coach Mike McQueary appeared before the Grand Jury investigating Victim 1's case and stated that, in 2002, he had witnessed Sandusky abusing a different boy, Victim 2, in Penn State's showers. He reported this incident to Joe Paterno. Paterno, in turn, informed athletic director Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, who was overseeing Penn State's police at the time. The two men, along with the school President, Graham Spanier, told Sandusky not to bring children into Penn State facilities. That was the end of the matter for McQueary, Schultz, Curley, Spanier...and Paterno, but not the end for at least 20 boys who would find themselves victims to Sandusky.
Paterno, along with the men he informed, insist that the details McQueary gave to the Grand Jury were not the same information he gave them. It didn't matter to the courts, though. The Grand Jury charged Schultz and Curley with failure to report suspected child abuse. Not facing any legal charges, Paterno announced that he would retire at the end of the 2011 season. The Board of Trustees, though, voted to terminate Paterno's job immediately and unceremoniously fired him in a phone call late one night five days into the scandal.
Stage 3: Bargaining
Two months after he was fired, Paterno attempted to explain the position he found himself in: "I didn't know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was...so I backed away and turned it over to some other people, people I thought would have a little more expertise than I did." Paterno didn't face any legal obligations, but he did face some moral ones.
Joe Paterno went to Brown University; he won more games than any other college football coach; he was a smart man. When he says that he didn't know how to handle the situation, I don't believe him. That's an insult to his intelligence and to everyone who heard that statement. When you see someone having a heart attack, you call an ambulance. When you see a bank robbery, you call the police. When you see sexual abuse, you call anyone in any position of power to fix the situation. You could say that he did that by contacting the higher-ups in the school. When they didn't take action, he should have been smart enough to tell someone who would.
Another reason I don't believe Paterno's statement: Sandusky coached beneath Paterno for 31 years. In 1999, when he retired at age 55, he received the Assistant Coach of the Year Award. Why would he retire so young when he was obviously doing such a phenomenal job? Because in 1998, he was accused of sexual assault but no charges were filed. He remained at the school, just not in as an assistant coach. I think they all knew more than they let on, that Sandusky was forced to retire quietly in exchange for the school keeping quiet themselves. Maybe I'm a conspiracy theorist, but it's not the most far-fetched aspect about this whole situation.
Matt Millen said that Paterno was a teacher. A teacher generally guides the younger generation by example and through his wisdom and experience. By this definition, Joe Paterno taught the his students to take the least amount of necessary action as needed to clear your name of any legal obligations. It might be irrelevant, though, because the children that Paterno was supposed to be teaching and guiding were the same children that he allowed Sandusky to abuse. Millen said there is more than football and he was right. Maybe he should have told Joe Paterno that.
Stage 4: Depression
Yesterday on the radio, someone proposed that Joe Paterno died of a broken heart. He died of lung cancer, but the idea is still the same. Paterno had been at Penn State for 62 years. Nittany Lion football was his life and the students and players that he'd met during that time were his family and when he was cruelly (?) but justifiably (?) fired over the phone on the evening of November 9, the Board of Trustees did, in a way, take his life from him. He was sick, his reputation was ruined, his career was over - what else did he have to fight for?
He left behind a wife, five children, seventeen grandchildren, and countless numbers of players and students who loved him as their own family and they are all truly mourning right now. Paterno made inexcusably poor decisions during his lifetime, but dead is dead. His actions don't change the fact that a man died yesterday.
Stage 5: Acceptance
I remember when I first found out that Paterno was involved in the scandal. I've never been a Penn State fan nor a Joe Paterno fan; as I said before, I usually watched his press conference or him with a broken hip on the sidelines and just wondered how he could still do it. But I was stunned and I was sad because, with all the poor role models who are placed in the limelight, it's refreshing to have a person like Joe Paterno, who appears to be the exact opposite and, when the truth came out, it was hard to watch him fall. You can't look at Joe Paterno's accomplishments without looking at his failures, but the opposite can be said as well. Paterno was in imperfect human being whose faults were magnified because he was placed on such a high pedestal by so many for such a long time. He wasn't morally strong, he made bad decisions, he let a lot of bad things happen. He changed a lot of lives, he was loved by a lot of people, and he taught sportsmanship and leadership on the football field. He was human and now he's gone. Joe Paterno was born on December 21, 1926. This is my 26th blog and it is dedicated him. RIP.
Respectfully,
The Sports Nerd
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Darrelle Revis
The Northwestern Wildcats basketball program has existed since 1901. In 1931 and 1939, they were the regular conference champions. According to the Helms Foundation (which, starting in 1939, was a panel of voters who declared one team a national champion each year based on their record as far back as 1901), they were they were the National Champions in 1931. The NCAA Tournament began in 1939. Since its existence, the Wildcats are the only major conference team to have never appeared in a single tournament game. The Northwestern Wildcats consistently rank among the bottom half of the Big Ten. They've had a total of two finishes above fourth place since World War II and none since 1968. They've played in the NIT six times, including 2009-2011. Last January, Drew Crawford stated that a fan came up to him and said, "You've gotta make the tournament this year." Crawford's response: "Yeah, haven't heard that before."
The strangest thing about Northwestern is that I can never remember them having a really bad team. Let's take a look at their last three seasons, the seasons when they went to the NIT. They've ended each season with winning records and yet still placed 9th, 7th, or 8th, respectively, in the Big Ten. All three years they unexpectedly knocked off at least one top team in the Big Ten (#7 Michigan State, #6 Purdue, and unranked-but-tournament-bound Michigan and Illinois). They have good players: seven players on their current roster are shooting higher than 40%, senior John Shurna, averaging 19.4 ppg and 6.0 rpg, is one of 50 seniors selected John R. Wooden Award and is currently a possibility for the Naismith College Player of the Year Award. The Big Ten has named him one of the top 10 players on the conference. Fellow senior Luka Mirkovic is a 6'11'' center averaging 8.3 ppg and junior Drew Crawford, the team's second highest scorer with 18.1 ppg and 5.0 rpg, scored 34 points in Northwestern's loss to Creighton earlier this week. If star forward Kevin Coble had remained on the team for his senior season last year, Northwestern more-than-likely would have made the NCAA Tournament last year. But, as has often been the case for the Wildcats, fate intervened and it was simply not meant to be. Their non-conference schedule is always challenging and they perform well enough to leave the season with a winning record overall. So far this season, they're ranked 8th in apg, 89th in ppg, and 93rd field goal percentage. So why doesn't Northwestern make the tournament? Because they're a member of the Big Ten Conference.
The truth of the matter is, if Northwestern played in a different conference, they would have a much greater possibility of making the tournament. The Big Ten is consistently good, sending at least four teams to the tournament a year. Last year, six of the eleven schools (55%) made it. Take a look at the Tennessee Volunteers of the 2010-2011 season. They're members of the SEC, which sent five of their twelve teams (41%) to the tournament last season, and finished conference play 8-8, 19-14 before the tournament started, a .58 winning percentage and in 7th place. They entered the tournament as a #9 seed and lost to Michigan, who Northwestern beat earlier that year. Northwestern, on the other hand, finished conference play 7-11, 18-13 overall before entering the NIT, with a total winning percentage of .58. They placed 8th out of 12. The real difference between the two teams is conference play and it wasn't even that much of a difference. Because of the way the SEC is set up, Northwestern plays more games and therefore has more opportunities to lose and they're playing more teams that will eventually go to the NCAA Tournament themselves. In another conference, a team with Northwestern's record can and does go on to play in March. In the Big Ten, that's harder to do. Northwestern isn't a bad team; they're just always in a bad situation.
If Northwestern wants to make the tournament this year, they can't play average; their 'average' is what it would take for many teams to make the tournament, but not the Wildcats. They're playing in a league that currently has five ranked teams. If they want to make the tournament, the Wildcats can't just pull of one upset this season; they need to finish with a .500 or above record in the conference (to go along with their 10-2 non-conference record) and they need some wins over some ranked teams. The way for them to accomplish that is to finish games; Northwestern has always been an entertaining team to watch because, during the first half of every game they play against a ranked opponent, they stay close and make you think they can win. Then, in the second half, they either fail to make the appropriate adjustments or they run out of energy (or both) and lose. If they can play the second half like they play the first half, they can win. They can start that tonight by pulling an upset at #2 Ohio State.
Earlier this week, the selections for the Pro Bowl were announcers. The Pro Bowl is the all-star game of the NFL, pitting the best of the NFC against the best of the AFC. #24 Darrelle Revis was one of those selected for the AFC defensive team. He plays cornerback for the New York Jets and has made 51 tackles and 4 interceptions this season.
Unhello,
The Sports Nerd
The strangest thing about Northwestern is that I can never remember them having a really bad team. Let's take a look at their last three seasons, the seasons when they went to the NIT. They've ended each season with winning records and yet still placed 9th, 7th, or 8th, respectively, in the Big Ten. All three years they unexpectedly knocked off at least one top team in the Big Ten (#7 Michigan State, #6 Purdue, and unranked-but-tournament-bound Michigan and Illinois). They have good players: seven players on their current roster are shooting higher than 40%, senior John Shurna, averaging 19.4 ppg and 6.0 rpg, is one of 50 seniors selected John R. Wooden Award and is currently a possibility for the Naismith College Player of the Year Award. The Big Ten has named him one of the top 10 players on the conference. Fellow senior Luka Mirkovic is a 6'11'' center averaging 8.3 ppg and junior Drew Crawford, the team's second highest scorer with 18.1 ppg and 5.0 rpg, scored 34 points in Northwestern's loss to Creighton earlier this week. If star forward Kevin Coble had remained on the team for his senior season last year, Northwestern more-than-likely would have made the NCAA Tournament last year. But, as has often been the case for the Wildcats, fate intervened and it was simply not meant to be. Their non-conference schedule is always challenging and they perform well enough to leave the season with a winning record overall. So far this season, they're ranked 8th in apg, 89th in ppg, and 93rd field goal percentage. So why doesn't Northwestern make the tournament? Because they're a member of the Big Ten Conference.
The truth of the matter is, if Northwestern played in a different conference, they would have a much greater possibility of making the tournament. The Big Ten is consistently good, sending at least four teams to the tournament a year. Last year, six of the eleven schools (55%) made it. Take a look at the Tennessee Volunteers of the 2010-2011 season. They're members of the SEC, which sent five of their twelve teams (41%) to the tournament last season, and finished conference play 8-8, 19-14 before the tournament started, a .58 winning percentage and in 7th place. They entered the tournament as a #9 seed and lost to Michigan, who Northwestern beat earlier that year. Northwestern, on the other hand, finished conference play 7-11, 18-13 overall before entering the NIT, with a total winning percentage of .58. They placed 8th out of 12. The real difference between the two teams is conference play and it wasn't even that much of a difference. Because of the way the SEC is set up, Northwestern plays more games and therefore has more opportunities to lose and they're playing more teams that will eventually go to the NCAA Tournament themselves. In another conference, a team with Northwestern's record can and does go on to play in March. In the Big Ten, that's harder to do. Northwestern isn't a bad team; they're just always in a bad situation.
If Northwestern wants to make the tournament this year, they can't play average; their 'average' is what it would take for many teams to make the tournament, but not the Wildcats. They're playing in a league that currently has five ranked teams. If they want to make the tournament, the Wildcats can't just pull of one upset this season; they need to finish with a .500 or above record in the conference (to go along with their 10-2 non-conference record) and they need some wins over some ranked teams. The way for them to accomplish that is to finish games; Northwestern has always been an entertaining team to watch because, during the first half of every game they play against a ranked opponent, they stay close and make you think they can win. Then, in the second half, they either fail to make the appropriate adjustments or they run out of energy (or both) and lose. If they can play the second half like they play the first half, they can win. They can start that tonight by pulling an upset at #2 Ohio State.
Earlier this week, the selections for the Pro Bowl were announcers. The Pro Bowl is the all-star game of the NFL, pitting the best of the NFC against the best of the AFC. #24 Darrelle Revis was one of those selected for the AFC defensive team. He plays cornerback for the New York Jets and has made 51 tackles and 4 interceptions this season.
Unhello,
The Sports Nerd
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
Roy Finch
In the 2004-2005 season, the Siena Saints finished 6-24. Fran McCaffery took over the Siena Saints in their 2005-2006 season, a year when they were projected to finish dead last in the MAAC. They also came up with major victories against cross-town rivalry, Albany, and against Niagara on Senior Day. That season their record was 15-13. Then 20-12. In 2009-2010, they set a school record 17 MAAC wins during their 27-7 season. Then McCaffery left and came to coach the Iowa Hawkeyes.
He's only been at Iowa for one season, but it already seems that he might be doing the same thing he did for the Saints to the Hawkeyes. Under Todd Lickliter, the 2009-2010 Hawkeyes finished 10-22, 4-14 in the Big Ten. Last season, they ended 11-20, 4-14 in the Big Ten, 10th place once again. But they also came up with two huge victories during the season - one was a twenty point victory win over Michigan State (which, in retrospect, wasn't as impressive as it might have appeared to be at the time) and a two point home upset over Purdue on Senior Day. These two victories strangely parallel Siena's two most significant victories during McCaffery's first season.
The Hawkeyes have started this season 8-5. They open up Big Ten Conference play Wednesday night at home against Purdue. According to ESPN.com, Iowa ranks higher than Purdue in rebounding, scoring, field goal percentage, and assists per game (all based on their games and opponents so far this season). The last time these two teams met, when Purdue was, in my opinion, a much stronger team, Iowa won. Iowa is stronger this season and Purdue is weaker; this should be a good game and I think Iowa has a good shot at winning. If McCaffery's second season at Iowa imitates his second season at Siena like his first season did, Iowa will improve this year. Admittedly, it's not hard to improve on an 11-20 season and I'm not suggesting that Iowa will be in the running for the Big Ten, but, under McCaffery, that could be a possibility within the next few years. The Saints were projected to finished dead last in the MAAC when McCaffery took over in 2005. By the time he left in 2010, they were coming off their third straight conference championship. Iowa was in a better starting position when McCaffery got them - 2nd to dead last - so who's to say McCaffery won't do the same for them?
Blog #22 is named after Roy Finch, the #22 sophomore running back for the Oklahoma Sooners football team, who has played in all but one game this season. On December 30, the Iowa Hawkeyes football team will play the #14 Oklahoma Sooners in the Insight Bowl. Oklahoma started their season 6-0 before dropping 3 of their last 6 games. They rank in the top 50 for passing yards, rushing yards, points scored, and points allowed (meaning they don't allow a lot). Iowa ranks in the top 50 for points allowed. Iowa is returning to the Insight Bowl for the second straight year and hoping to extend their Bowl winning streak to three against the pre-season #1 team.
I have to go,
The Sports Nerd
He's only been at Iowa for one season, but it already seems that he might be doing the same thing he did for the Saints to the Hawkeyes. Under Todd Lickliter, the 2009-2010 Hawkeyes finished 10-22, 4-14 in the Big Ten. Last season, they ended 11-20, 4-14 in the Big Ten, 10th place once again. But they also came up with two huge victories during the season - one was a twenty point victory win over Michigan State (which, in retrospect, wasn't as impressive as it might have appeared to be at the time) and a two point home upset over Purdue on Senior Day. These two victories strangely parallel Siena's two most significant victories during McCaffery's first season.
The Hawkeyes have started this season 8-5. They open up Big Ten Conference play Wednesday night at home against Purdue. According to ESPN.com, Iowa ranks higher than Purdue in rebounding, scoring, field goal percentage, and assists per game (all based on their games and opponents so far this season). The last time these two teams met, when Purdue was, in my opinion, a much stronger team, Iowa won. Iowa is stronger this season and Purdue is weaker; this should be a good game and I think Iowa has a good shot at winning. If McCaffery's second season at Iowa imitates his second season at Siena like his first season did, Iowa will improve this year. Admittedly, it's not hard to improve on an 11-20 season and I'm not suggesting that Iowa will be in the running for the Big Ten, but, under McCaffery, that could be a possibility within the next few years. The Saints were projected to finished dead last in the MAAC when McCaffery took over in 2005. By the time he left in 2010, they were coming off their third straight conference championship. Iowa was in a better starting position when McCaffery got them - 2nd to dead last - so who's to say McCaffery won't do the same for them?
Blog #22 is named after Roy Finch, the #22 sophomore running back for the Oklahoma Sooners football team, who has played in all but one game this season. On December 30, the Iowa Hawkeyes football team will play the #14 Oklahoma Sooners in the Insight Bowl. Oklahoma started their season 6-0 before dropping 3 of their last 6 games. They rank in the top 50 for passing yards, rushing yards, points scored, and points allowed (meaning they don't allow a lot). Iowa ranks in the top 50 for points allowed. Iowa is returning to the Insight Bowl for the second straight year and hoping to extend their Bowl winning streak to three against the pre-season #1 team.
I have to go,
The Sports Nerd
Miles Asafo-Adjei
Illinois entered the season unranked, worked their way into the rankings with nine straight wins, and worked their way back out after losing two of their last three games. Their 1-1 against ranked teams (defeating #18 Gonzaga and being defeated by #8 Missouri), and, though they are not ranked in the top 100 nationally for points, field goal percentage, rebounds, or assists according to ESPN.com, Ken Pomeroy has them making the NCAA tournament. Part of the reason they are projected to make the tournament is Sam Maniscalco.
Maniscalco played point guard for the Braves of Bradley University for three years and six games of his senior season, before a persistent ankle injury forced him to have surgery and miss the remainder of his final season at Bradley. After Bradley head coach Jim Les was fired, Maniscalco asked to be released to play elsewhere. Despite interest in both Iowa State and Indiana as well, Maniscalco decided to play as a graduate student for Illinois. The timing could not have been better for the Fighting Illini.
Illinois lost seniors Dimitri McCamey, Mike Tisdale, and Mike Davis, which meant losing 31.7 points out of the average 71.8 the Illini scored a game. The seniors were the leading scorers; the highest returning scorer was then-sophomore Brandon Paul, who averaged 9.2 ppg (which he has increased to 11.3 ppg so far this season). Before gaining Maniscalco, the Illini would have had one senior on the roster, walk-on Jean Selus, who, after joining the team in the 2010-2011 season, had played a grand total of five minutes. What's more, with the graduation of McCamey, the Illini lost their starting point guard. Their other option was true-freshman Tracy Abrams, who is playing 15.2 mpg and scoring 2.4 ppg. While Abrams is a 4-star recruit who's expected to lead the Illini in the future, for the time being he's a freshman who, like any other player, will benefit from playing time and some upperclassmen guidance. At the start of this season, Illinois desperately needed some senior leadership and an experience scorer on the team.
They found this player in Sam Maniscalco. At first glance, Sam Maniscalco appears to be a steady player on the Illinois Fighting Illini basketball team: he's 6'0'' and generously listed as 230 lbs, averages 10.6 ppg, 2.9 apg, and 27.8 minutes a game, and is an 89% free throw shooter. Steady, but not spectacular. But sometimes statistics don't tell the entire story. Maniscalco is the "glue-guy" that the Illini needed. He's not the leading scorer or rebounder, he doesn't play 39 minutes a game, but he fits in with fellow starters D.J. Richardson, Meyers Leonard, and Brandon Paul to create a balanced, well-rounder group of leaders for the Illini and provides the experience and guidance that this team, especially freshman point guard Tracy Abrams, will benefit and learn from.
#22 Miles Asafo-Adjei is a junior guard for the Cornell Big Red. He's averaging a career high 17.9 minutes this season as well as 3.8 ppg. He's from Antioch, TN, and is enrolled in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Cornell is 4-6, but ranked in the top 50 for assists per game. They played both Illinois and Penn State this season and lost to both, by 4 and 7 respectively.
You can go now.
The Sports Nerd
Maniscalco played point guard for the Braves of Bradley University for three years and six games of his senior season, before a persistent ankle injury forced him to have surgery and miss the remainder of his final season at Bradley. After Bradley head coach Jim Les was fired, Maniscalco asked to be released to play elsewhere. Despite interest in both Iowa State and Indiana as well, Maniscalco decided to play as a graduate student for Illinois. The timing could not have been better for the Fighting Illini.
Illinois lost seniors Dimitri McCamey, Mike Tisdale, and Mike Davis, which meant losing 31.7 points out of the average 71.8 the Illini scored a game. The seniors were the leading scorers; the highest returning scorer was then-sophomore Brandon Paul, who averaged 9.2 ppg (which he has increased to 11.3 ppg so far this season). Before gaining Maniscalco, the Illini would have had one senior on the roster, walk-on Jean Selus, who, after joining the team in the 2010-2011 season, had played a grand total of five minutes. What's more, with the graduation of McCamey, the Illini lost their starting point guard. Their other option was true-freshman Tracy Abrams, who is playing 15.2 mpg and scoring 2.4 ppg. While Abrams is a 4-star recruit who's expected to lead the Illini in the future, for the time being he's a freshman who, like any other player, will benefit from playing time and some upperclassmen guidance. At the start of this season, Illinois desperately needed some senior leadership and an experience scorer on the team.
They found this player in Sam Maniscalco. At first glance, Sam Maniscalco appears to be a steady player on the Illinois Fighting Illini basketball team: he's 6'0'' and generously listed as 230 lbs, averages 10.6 ppg, 2.9 apg, and 27.8 minutes a game, and is an 89% free throw shooter. Steady, but not spectacular. But sometimes statistics don't tell the entire story. Maniscalco is the "glue-guy" that the Illini needed. He's not the leading scorer or rebounder, he doesn't play 39 minutes a game, but he fits in with fellow starters D.J. Richardson, Meyers Leonard, and Brandon Paul to create a balanced, well-rounder group of leaders for the Illini and provides the experience and guidance that this team, especially freshman point guard Tracy Abrams, will benefit and learn from.
#22 Miles Asafo-Adjei is a junior guard for the Cornell Big Red. He's averaging a career high 17.9 minutes this season as well as 3.8 ppg. He's from Antioch, TN, and is enrolled in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Cornell is 4-6, but ranked in the top 50 for assists per game. They played both Illinois and Penn State this season and lost to both, by 4 and 7 respectively.
You can go now.
The Sports Nerd
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Jorge Brian Diaz
The Big Ten Conference is the oldest Division I college athletic conference. It was originally called the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representatives and consisted of seven schools: Illinois, Northwestern, Chicago, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Purdue. It became informally known as the Big Nine with the additions of Iowa and Indiana in 1899. Then Ohio State joined in 1912, Chicago left in 1946, and Michigan State joined in 1950. The Conference formally adopted the title the Big Ten in 1987. Penn State was the 11th school in the Big Ten in 1990 and, as of 2011, the Big Ten gained a 12th addition: the Nebraska Cornhuskers.
The Big Ten announced their decision to expand in December 2009. Though no number was set, many analysts speculated that the Big Ten was hoping to expand to 14 or 16 teams in order to increase the influence of the Big Ten Network and to establish a championship game in football (which they did...with disastrous results). Nebraska first petitioned to join the Big Ten in 1900 and then again in 1911 but was denied access both times. On June 11, 2010, they asked, again, for entry and this time they were accepted.
The Cornhuskers were previously members of the Big 12 Conference (ironically, their entrance to Big 10 brought the membership to twelve while their exit from the Big 12 was one of many changes that brought their membership to ten) and, before that, the Big 8 (which gained four new members to become the Big 12). The Big 10 wanted Nebraska for their football program - 5 national titles, 3 Heisman winners, .702 winning record all time - the basketball program just came with them.
Nebraska hasn't won a conference title since sharing the title with Kansas and Kansas State in 1950. They haven't won an outright title is 1916. They've appeared in the NCAA Tournament seven times in school history and are one of three BCS programs to have never won a single NCAA Tournament game (the others being Northwestern and South Florida). Their last March Madness appearance came in 1998, two years after their one and only NIT championship. They've played in the NIT five of the last ten years.
They've started this season 8-3, with losses to Oregon, Wake Forest, and #22 Creighton. According to ESPN.com, they are not in the top 125 nationally for rebounds, points, field goal percentage, or assists per game. According to Ken Pomeroy, they won't be make the NCAA Tournament this year either. Like football, they're first game will be against Wisconsin. Welcome to the Big Ten, Nebraska.
Since most fans of the Big Ten know little to nothing about Nebraska, this blog is titled after #21 on the Nebraska Cornhuskers, Jorge Brian Diaz. Diaz is a junior 6'11'' center from Puerto Rico. He's the teams second leading rebounder (4.9 rpg), scorer (10.9 ppg), and blocker (2.6); coming into this season, he is 10th on the Cornhusker's all time shot blocker list. Last season, the Cornhuskers were 14.3 when he scored in double figures.
Ta ta,
The Sports Nerd
The Big Ten announced their decision to expand in December 2009. Though no number was set, many analysts speculated that the Big Ten was hoping to expand to 14 or 16 teams in order to increase the influence of the Big Ten Network and to establish a championship game in football (which they did...with disastrous results). Nebraska first petitioned to join the Big Ten in 1900 and then again in 1911 but was denied access both times. On June 11, 2010, they asked, again, for entry and this time they were accepted.
The Cornhuskers were previously members of the Big 12 Conference (ironically, their entrance to Big 10 brought the membership to twelve while their exit from the Big 12 was one of many changes that brought their membership to ten) and, before that, the Big 8 (which gained four new members to become the Big 12). The Big 10 wanted Nebraska for their football program - 5 national titles, 3 Heisman winners, .702 winning record all time - the basketball program just came with them.
Nebraska hasn't won a conference title since sharing the title with Kansas and Kansas State in 1950. They haven't won an outright title is 1916. They've appeared in the NCAA Tournament seven times in school history and are one of three BCS programs to have never won a single NCAA Tournament game (the others being Northwestern and South Florida). Their last March Madness appearance came in 1998, two years after their one and only NIT championship. They've played in the NIT five of the last ten years.
They've started this season 8-3, with losses to Oregon, Wake Forest, and #22 Creighton. According to ESPN.com, they are not in the top 125 nationally for rebounds, points, field goal percentage, or assists per game. According to Ken Pomeroy, they won't be make the NCAA Tournament this year either. Like football, they're first game will be against Wisconsin. Welcome to the Big Ten, Nebraska.
Since most fans of the Big Ten know little to nothing about Nebraska, this blog is titled after #21 on the Nebraska Cornhuskers, Jorge Brian Diaz. Diaz is a junior 6'11'' center from Puerto Rico. He's the teams second leading rebounder (4.9 rpg), scorer (10.9 ppg), and blocker (2.6); coming into this season, he is 10th on the Cornhusker's all time shot blocker list. Last season, the Cornhuskers were 14.3 when he scored in double figures.
Ta ta,
The Sports Nerd
Mike Bibby
Some times the non-conference schedule reveals a lot about a team. Sometimes it doesn't. The Purdue Boilermakers seem to fall into the latter category. They're 10-3 and they could easily be 15-4 (with wins against Iowa, Minnesota, Penn State, and Illinois and a loss to Wisconsin) in mid-January (though this means that the end of their Big Ten schedule will be tough). There's nothing remarkably impressive about their victories thus far. Half have come over teams with losing records, but also had two nice wins over Temple and Iona, both of whom have a chance at winning their leagues and making the tournament come March. They've played two ranked teams (#15 Alabama and #11 Xavier) and lost to both, as well as 6-7 Butler. They've played one game away from Mackey Arena (at Xavier). According to ESPN.com, they are not in the top 50 nationally for points, rebounds, assists, or field goal percentage, but ESPN doesn't have any way to rank defense and Purdue has always been a defense-oriented team. They're unranked in the polls, but Ken Pomeroy has them at 21. There's nothing about Purdue so far that indicates that they will pose their usual threat to the Big Ten this season. There's nothing that says they won't.
The big story so far this season for Purdue has been the return of Robbie Hummel. Hummel joined Purdue as a true freshman in the 2007-2008 season, during which he was the 2nd leading scorer and the leading rebounder on the team and was a first team All-Big Ten selection. Next season, he was made a co-captain of the team and led in rebounding again during a season when he missed five games due to back spasms and a broken vertebrae. During his junior season, Hummel once again led the team in rebounds and was 2nd in scoring when, on February 24, at Minnesota, he suffered an ACL tear near his right knee. He was once again named a first team All-Big Ten selection, but was forced to miss the NCAA tournament after having a season ending surgery, recuperation for which was supposed to be 4-6 months. Hummel expected to return with fellow teammates Et'Twaun Moore and JaJuan Johnson at the start of their senior season. The first practice of the season, Hummel tore the same ACL and took a medical redshirt.
He returned as a redshirted senior for the 2011-2012 season. Some analysts wondered how he would play after over a year without practice, coming off two knee surgeries. Now they know: very well. Hummel once again leads the team in rebounding (5.9 rpg) and also, for the first time in his career, in scoring (17.5 ppg). He's averaging 31 minutes a game and has the best assist:turnover ratio of his career right now. After almost three injury-plagued seasons, Robbie Hummel has returned for his senior season as a man with a mission: stay healthy and win. Other than a moment at the end of the Xavier game when he collapsed due to dehydration, he has done just that.
I've said the Purdue's fate this season is still uncertain. Robbie Hummel and his health is a huge X-factor in their conference play, but he might not be the only one. Unfortunately, Purdue's schedule thus far hasn't given me a lot to go on as to determining what those other factors could be. Purdue is typically a very dangerous team; this is the first time in four years they came into the season unranked. Their past non-conference schedules are very similar to their schedule this season with similar results. Chances are, Purdue will once again be a competitive team.
Today is the start of the NBA season and the first game today is the New York Knicks vs the Boston Celtics. #20 Mike Bibby is a point guard for the Knicks, who lost 4 out of 5 pre-season games to the Dallas Mavericks. Bibby played college basketball at the University of Arizona and was drafted as the 2nd overall pick in 1998 by the Vancouver Grizzlies. He's since played for Sacramento, Atlanta, Washington, and Miami before joining New York for the 2010-2011 season, where he averaged 28.6 minutes and 8.7 points per game.
So long,
The Sports Nerd
He returned as a redshirted senior for the 2011-2012 season. Some analysts wondered how he would play after over a year without practice, coming off two knee surgeries. Now they know: very well. Hummel once again leads the team in rebounding (5.9 rpg) and also, for the first time in his career, in scoring (17.5 ppg). He's averaging 31 minutes a game and has the best assist:turnover ratio of his career right now. After almost three injury-plagued seasons, Robbie Hummel has returned for his senior season as a man with a mission: stay healthy and win. Other than a moment at the end of the Xavier game when he collapsed due to dehydration, he has done just that.
I've said the Purdue's fate this season is still uncertain. Robbie Hummel and his health is a huge X-factor in their conference play, but he might not be the only one. Unfortunately, Purdue's schedule thus far hasn't given me a lot to go on as to determining what those other factors could be. Purdue is typically a very dangerous team; this is the first time in four years they came into the season unranked. Their past non-conference schedules are very similar to their schedule this season with similar results. Chances are, Purdue will once again be a competitive team.
Today is the start of the NBA season and the first game today is the New York Knicks vs the Boston Celtics. #20 Mike Bibby is a point guard for the Knicks, who lost 4 out of 5 pre-season games to the Dallas Mavericks. Bibby played college basketball at the University of Arizona and was drafted as the 2nd overall pick in 1998 by the Vancouver Grizzlies. He's since played for Sacramento, Atlanta, Washington, and Miami before joining New York for the 2010-2011 season, where he averaged 28.6 minutes and 8.7 points per game.
So long,
The Sports Nerd
Saturday, December 24, 2011
John Jett
A tale of two teams. A slight alteration of Charles Dickens' famous novel sufficiently describes the difference between this season's Michigan State Spartans and that of last seasons. After back-to-back Big Ten championships and Final Four runs, the 2010-2011 Spartans finished the Big Ten 9-9, tied for 4th, and desperately searching for a win to make it to it's 14th straight NCAA tournament, which they found over Purdue in the Big Ten tournament, before losing in the first round to UCLA, ending one of the most disappointing basketball seasons in recent school memory. That does not appear to be the case with the 2011-2012 Michigan State basketball team.
After losing their first two games to then #1 North Carolina and #6 Duke, the Spartans have won their last eleven games, including an impressive win at #22 Gonzaga, who have a 92-7 record on their home court, during which senior forward Draymond Green scored a career high 34 points. The Spartans are ranked 6th nationally in rebounding, 12th in assists, 44th in points per game, and 51st in field goal percentage. After starting the season unranked, the Spartans are currently #20 in the country.
So what's the difference between the '10-'11 Spartans team and the '11-'12 one? There were the fundamental problems, of course. A typical MSU basketball team is defense-oriented with a strong post presence, which didn't happen. They're aggressive in rebounding and in loose balls, but that effort wasn't there either. But the fundamental problems stemmed from some larger issues. The first problem with last season's team began before they even set foot on the court: off-court distractions. The summer after their second straight Final Four run, Tom Izzo was heavily pursued by the Cleveland Cavaliers after head coach Mike Brown was fired. The weeklong drama included numerous visits to Cleveland and, finally, a late-night press conference announcing his refusal. The situation, though, planted some seeds of discomfort amongst the team in early July. The drama continued rolling in that summer when would-be senior Chris Allen was dismissed from the team for unspecified reasons and transferred to Iowa State. He would be joined in February by dismissed junior Korie Lucious. Meanwhile, senior captain and point guard Kalin Lucas, after deciding to return for his senior season, continued to struggle and recover from a torn achilles tendon suffered during the Final Four run, junior Delvon Roe fought through chronic knee pain, and redshirted freshman Russell Byrd had yet another foot surgery. As the Spartans were anything but stable off-the-court, they struggled to find stability on the court as well.
Another major problem that factored into the team's struggles was the lack of leadership. Tom Izzo takes pride in having a player-coached team and, under Izzo, the Spartans have had many great leaders: Antonio Smith, Mateen Cleaves, Alan Anderson, Drew Neitzel, Travis Walton. Generally, team leadership (for any team) comes from people who are natural born leaders, talented, and experienced. Last year, the Spartans star senior, point guard Kalin Lucas, was not a leader. Izzo wanted him to be, but it wasn't in his personality to lead. Senior Durrell Summers also didn't have the gumption to lead nor did he have the kind of playing season that would inspire his teammates. The person who did have the natural ability to lead was junior Draymond Green. So last year's team faced another dilemma: to follow the leadership of a senior point guard who didn't want/know how to lead, or to follow the guy who wanted to lead, but was forced to take a backseat to the seniors. Ultimately, no decision was made.
Last year's team wasn't a team. Players, seniors in particular, focused on playing for the names on the back of their jerseys rather than the name on the front. There was no chemistry, too many distractions, and a sense of entitlement coming into the season, ranked #2 in the country after back-to-back Final Four runs. It's not secret that I'm a huge Spartan fan. My father is a bigger Spartan fan. We turned the games off. We couldn't watch.
Last year's team wasn't a team. Players, seniors in particular, focused on playing for the names on the back of their jerseys rather than the name on the front. There was no chemistry, too many distractions, and a sense of entitlement coming into the season, ranked #2 in the country after back-to-back Final Four runs. It's not secret that I'm a huge Spartan fan. My father is a bigger Spartan fan. We turned the games off. We couldn't watch.
That's not the case with this year's team. No dismissals. No NBA flirtations. No injured players. The players aren't selfish (17.5 apg, 12th nationally). Draymond Green is the undisputed leader of the team. They hustle, they rebound, they play in the post. They started the season under the radar and have had to prove themselves to get ranked. The difference between the two Spartans' teams shows how important leadership, effort, and team chemistry is to the game. The skill level of teams isn't dependent on the amount of talent in each individual player; it's what happens when they all play together.
This entry is in honor of John Jett, #19 punter on the 1999 Detroit Lions football team. He played college football at East Carolina University, spent 1993-1996 with the Dallas Cowboys, winning two Superbowls, and was with the Lions from 1997-2003. This was the Lions last team to make the playoffs. Until tonight. With their 38-10 victory over the San Diego Chargers, the Lions have clinched their first playoff berth in 13 years.
Sincerely,
The Sports Nerd
This entry is in honor of John Jett, #19 punter on the 1999 Detroit Lions football team. He played college football at East Carolina University, spent 1993-1996 with the Dallas Cowboys, winning two Superbowls, and was with the Lions from 1997-2003. This was the Lions last team to make the playoffs. Until tonight. With their 38-10 victory over the San Diego Chargers, the Lions have clinched their first playoff berth in 13 years.
Sincerely,
The Sports Nerd
Friday, December 23, 2011
Peyton Manning
Last year, I predicted that the Penn State Nittany Lions would make the NCAA tournament (and I was right). I won't be making that prediction this year. The Nittany Lions are currently unranked with an 8-5 record, but don't let their victories fool you. PSU has played five above .500 teams; they've lost to four of them. Their wins have come against 0-11 Hartford, 1-10 Mount St. Mary's, 3-8 Bradford, and 4-6, Cornell, to name a few. In the Big Ten, Penn State ranks dead last in field goal percentage (39%), points per game (64.0), and assists per game (11.9). Their poor performance this season hasn't been entirely under their control, however. They've had a lot of distractions.
The first of these distractions came May 23, 2011, when Head Coach Ed DeChellis announced he would be leaving his alma mater and taking the head coaching job at Navy. DeChellis started at PSU in 2003. During his eight seasons there, DeChellis won the NIT championship (2009), was named Big Ten Coach of the Year in 2009, and gained an NCAA tournament bid last season for the first time in ten years. Despite this, the school denied DeChellis' plea to provide one of DeChellis' assistants (the lowest paid in the Big Ten) a salary increase as well as his request for a contract extension. Feeling unwanted and unsure of his standing at the school, DeChellis took a $200,000 pay cut and left for Navy. He was replaced by Pat Chambers, who is in his 3rd year of coaching after a successful season at Boston University, during which time his Terriers won their conference tournament, thereby earning a spot in the NCAA tournament.
Along with DeChellis, PSU's leading scorer and their all-around-do-everything man, Taylor Battle, graduated. Battle averaged 20.2 points during his typical 38.1 minutes per game, but statistics don't describe the role that Taylor Battle played for Penn State. Battle was PSU's Jared Sullinger/Draymond Green/Jordan Taylor, except he didn't have anyone else on his team to help him out. With his departure, PSU returned one starter, Tim Frazier, who, prior to this season, averaged 6.3 ppg; he's increased that to 17.2 points so far his junior season. The point of this is that, with the loss of head coach Ed DeChellis and the team's heart and soul, Taylor Battle, Penn State lost their identity after they were eliminated from the first round of the 2011 tournament.
Which brings me to another distraction for Penn State this season. PSU has always been a football school first, and, to be honest, a women's volleyball school second. Basketball ranked somewhere further down the line for the sports administration department. Even after the best season in ten years, Ed DeChellis couldn't find respect for himself and his program, which is why he left. As the team continues to falter this season, they lose more and more interest from the students and the administration, leading to a further downward cycle.
And really, the school could use some morale boosting from their basketball team right now. The final distraction for Penn State is probably the most obvious: the sex abuse scandal. I find it hard to believe that anyone doesn't know what this is about so I won't go into detail explaining it. I will say, though, that the loss of head football coach Joe Paterno after 46 years, the bad publicity, and the general horror of the events have put a lot of pressure and added stress on this basketball team.
To sum up, the Penn State Nittany Lions, with the exception of Tim Frazier, are not having a good season and it probably won't get any better this year. Pat Chambers, though, brought the Boston Terriers to their first NCAA tournament appearance in 9 years, only the 7th in school history, in his second season both at Boston University and as a coach. Tim Frazier is a junior and still has another year to go. Much like Indiana, chances are Penn State will be competitive again very soon.
I try to avoid using big names for the titles (with the exception of Ryan Braun, which shows how much I know about baseball), but Peyton Manning is #18 for the Indianapolis Colts. For anyone who doesn't know, the Colts are having a horrendous season. After finishing as ACF South division champions and playing in their 9th straight playoffs, the Colts are currently 2-13 and are expected to have the first pick in the upcoming draft. A big discussion topic right now amongst ESPN analysts is whether the Colts will keep 34 year old Peyton Manning (11x Pro Bowl team member, 5x First-Team All Pro Team, Super Bowl 2005 MVP, Colts all time career leader in career wins/passing touchdowns/pass attempts/pass completions/passing yards) as quarterback or select Standford's Andrew Luck with the first pick.
Sayonara!
The Sports Nerd
The first of these distractions came May 23, 2011, when Head Coach Ed DeChellis announced he would be leaving his alma mater and taking the head coaching job at Navy. DeChellis started at PSU in 2003. During his eight seasons there, DeChellis won the NIT championship (2009), was named Big Ten Coach of the Year in 2009, and gained an NCAA tournament bid last season for the first time in ten years. Despite this, the school denied DeChellis' plea to provide one of DeChellis' assistants (the lowest paid in the Big Ten) a salary increase as well as his request for a contract extension. Feeling unwanted and unsure of his standing at the school, DeChellis took a $200,000 pay cut and left for Navy. He was replaced by Pat Chambers, who is in his 3rd year of coaching after a successful season at Boston University, during which time his Terriers won their conference tournament, thereby earning a spot in the NCAA tournament.
Along with DeChellis, PSU's leading scorer and their all-around-do-everything man, Taylor Battle, graduated. Battle averaged 20.2 points during his typical 38.1 minutes per game, but statistics don't describe the role that Taylor Battle played for Penn State. Battle was PSU's Jared Sullinger/Draymond Green/Jordan Taylor, except he didn't have anyone else on his team to help him out. With his departure, PSU returned one starter, Tim Frazier, who, prior to this season, averaged 6.3 ppg; he's increased that to 17.2 points so far his junior season. The point of this is that, with the loss of head coach Ed DeChellis and the team's heart and soul, Taylor Battle, Penn State lost their identity after they were eliminated from the first round of the 2011 tournament.
Which brings me to another distraction for Penn State this season. PSU has always been a football school first, and, to be honest, a women's volleyball school second. Basketball ranked somewhere further down the line for the sports administration department. Even after the best season in ten years, Ed DeChellis couldn't find respect for himself and his program, which is why he left. As the team continues to falter this season, they lose more and more interest from the students and the administration, leading to a further downward cycle.
And really, the school could use some morale boosting from their basketball team right now. The final distraction for Penn State is probably the most obvious: the sex abuse scandal. I find it hard to believe that anyone doesn't know what this is about so I won't go into detail explaining it. I will say, though, that the loss of head football coach Joe Paterno after 46 years, the bad publicity, and the general horror of the events have put a lot of pressure and added stress on this basketball team.
To sum up, the Penn State Nittany Lions, with the exception of Tim Frazier, are not having a good season and it probably won't get any better this year. Pat Chambers, though, brought the Boston Terriers to their first NCAA tournament appearance in 9 years, only the 7th in school history, in his second season both at Boston University and as a coach. Tim Frazier is a junior and still has another year to go. Much like Indiana, chances are Penn State will be competitive again very soon.
I try to avoid using big names for the titles (with the exception of Ryan Braun, which shows how much I know about baseball), but Peyton Manning is #18 for the Indianapolis Colts. For anyone who doesn't know, the Colts are having a horrendous season. After finishing as ACF South division champions and playing in their 9th straight playoffs, the Colts are currently 2-13 and are expected to have the first pick in the upcoming draft. A big discussion topic right now amongst ESPN analysts is whether the Colts will keep 34 year old Peyton Manning (11x Pro Bowl team member, 5x First-Team All Pro Team, Super Bowl 2005 MVP, Colts all time career leader in career wins/passing touchdowns/pass attempts/pass completions/passing yards) as quarterback or select Standford's Andrew Luck with the first pick.
Sayonara!
The Sports Nerd
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Drew Neitzel
Shane Ryan stole my idea. Earlier this month, Ryan posted an article entitled "Wisconsin: The Most Boring Team in America." I wouldn't have used those exact words (the sole purpose of which were to grab attention, which they did here, in Wisconsin) but the general concept is the same. Since I was planning to write this anyway and you might not feel like reading Ryan's whole article, I'm going to continue my plan and write this blog about the Wisconsin Badgers. Under Bo Ryan, Wisconsin plays a slow, defense oriented style of basketball. It works.
According to ESPN.com, Wisconsin isn't a top 100 team for average points, rebounds, assists, or field goal percentage per game. Their leading scorer is averaging a mere 12.3 points per game. They average 60.2 possessions a game, the 3rd lowest in the country, and rank 345 out of 345 for adjusted tempo, per Ken Pomeroy. They're also ranked number 1 in the country, per Ken Pomeroy.
Don't ask me to try and explain Pomeroy's reasoning behind this, because I can't do it. What I can tell you, though, is that the style of basketball that Wisconsin plays, every statistic mentioned above, is deliberate. Prior to the 2012 recruiting class, Ryan hadn't recruited a 5-star player since Joe Krabbenhoft in 2005. Wisconsin doesn't play for flash and pizazz; they play for efficiency and that's exactly what they end up with. They go back to basics: they cause fouls; they make free throws; and they run the shot clock down. They force the opponents to play good, solid defense and then they play tough defense at the other end of the court. Wisconsin intends to be ranked dead last for adjusted tempo; that's their strategy. It's far easier to slow a game down than to speed it up and when Wisconsin forces other teams to play at their speed, they frustrate their opponent.
Their game plan works. In their 3-point loss to North Carolina, they held the 4th highest scoring team in the nation, averaging 86.1 ppg, to 60 points. This is why Wisconsin has been so effective under Bo Ryan during conference play, acquiring 3 regular season championships, 2 conference tournament championships, and appearing in 13 straight NCAA tournaments (10 under Ryan). They're currently ranked 13 (or 14, depending on the poll) in the nation and will be a definite threat to the Big Ten this season. As always.
Today's blog is named after former Michigan State point guard, Drew Neitzel. Neitzel was the 2004 Mr. Basketball for the state of Michigan. He's ambidextrous, winning a two-handed dribbling competition at age 12. He played for the Spartans from the 04-05 season to 07-08, becoming the school's all-time leader in career free-throw shooting at 87%. Proving that the Wisconsin method of basketball is not always effective, Neitzel's best collegiate game came against Wisconsin, one day after their first (and last) #1 ranking in school history was announced, during which he scored 28 points. After spending 3 years in Europe, Neitzel was put on the 2011-2012 Dallas Mavericks roster with jersey #17.
Be back soon,
The Sports Nerd
According to ESPN.com, Wisconsin isn't a top 100 team for average points, rebounds, assists, or field goal percentage per game. Their leading scorer is averaging a mere 12.3 points per game. They average 60.2 possessions a game, the 3rd lowest in the country, and rank 345 out of 345 for adjusted tempo, per Ken Pomeroy. They're also ranked number 1 in the country, per Ken Pomeroy.
Don't ask me to try and explain Pomeroy's reasoning behind this, because I can't do it. What I can tell you, though, is that the style of basketball that Wisconsin plays, every statistic mentioned above, is deliberate. Prior to the 2012 recruiting class, Ryan hadn't recruited a 5-star player since Joe Krabbenhoft in 2005. Wisconsin doesn't play for flash and pizazz; they play for efficiency and that's exactly what they end up with. They go back to basics: they cause fouls; they make free throws; and they run the shot clock down. They force the opponents to play good, solid defense and then they play tough defense at the other end of the court. Wisconsin intends to be ranked dead last for adjusted tempo; that's their strategy. It's far easier to slow a game down than to speed it up and when Wisconsin forces other teams to play at their speed, they frustrate their opponent.
Their game plan works. In their 3-point loss to North Carolina, they held the 4th highest scoring team in the nation, averaging 86.1 ppg, to 60 points. This is why Wisconsin has been so effective under Bo Ryan during conference play, acquiring 3 regular season championships, 2 conference tournament championships, and appearing in 13 straight NCAA tournaments (10 under Ryan). They're currently ranked 13 (or 14, depending on the poll) in the nation and will be a definite threat to the Big Ten this season. As always.
Today's blog is named after former Michigan State point guard, Drew Neitzel. Neitzel was the 2004 Mr. Basketball for the state of Michigan. He's ambidextrous, winning a two-handed dribbling competition at age 12. He played for the Spartans from the 04-05 season to 07-08, becoming the school's all-time leader in career free-throw shooting at 87%. Proving that the Wisconsin method of basketball is not always effective, Neitzel's best collegiate game came against Wisconsin, one day after their first (and last) #1 ranking in school history was announced, during which he scored 28 points. After spending 3 years in Europe, Neitzel was put on the 2011-2012 Dallas Mavericks roster with jersey #17.
Be back soon,
The Sports Nerd
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Bob Lanier
The Minnesota Golden Gophers are currently 11-1, ranked 14th in field goal percentage (50%), and scoring an average of 71.1 points per game despite the fact that their leading scorer, and the apparent heart and soul of the Gopher team, is finished for the season (and likely finished at Minnesota) because of a torn ACL, but more on that later. Minnesota has won the last 6 games since their star was injured and, as is the case with Minnesota seemingly every season, appears to be in an excellent position to enter conference play. They're unranked.
I've said before that most teams from the major conferences work up to conference play with easier opponents, during which time they establish team chemistry, settle on rotations, and develop some confidence. Most teams will also schedule several games against traditionally challenging opponents as well, though, in order to compare themselves to more talented teams, challenge themselves, and prepare themselves for the type of play they will face in their conference and when/if they play in March. Minnesota is one of two Big Ten teams to play no ranked opponents prior to the Big Ten season, which is why they are still unranked.
This isn't unusual for Minnesota. Since Tubby Smith took over as head coach in 2007, there's been a distinctive pattern and relationship between their pre-conference and conference play. Take a look at their non-conference results, the results for their first 12 conference games, and their yearlong results:
2007-2008 Non-Conference: 11-1 Conference: 5-7 Final Results: 20-14 Tournament: No
2008-2009 Non-Conference: 12-0 Conference: 7-5 Final Results: 22-11Tournament: Yes
2009-2010 Non-Conference: 9-3 Conference: 5-7 Final Results: 21-14 Tournament: Yes
2010-2011 Non-Conference: 11-1 Conference: 5-7 Final Results: 17-14 Tournament: No
2011-2012 Non-Conference: 11-1
Minnesota has a history of scheduling easy non-conference games only to falter when conference play begins. They have yet to win a game in the NCAA tournament under Tubby Smith. Unfortunately for Minnesota, history tends to repeat itself and seems to be on track to do so again this year.
Adding to Minnesota's woes is the injury of Trevor Mbakwe. Mbakwe averaged 15.3 points and 8.7 rebounds last season, making 2nd team all Big Ten. This year, he was averaging 28.7 minutes, a team high 14.0 ppg, and a team high 9.1 rpg before he tore his right ACL in the Gophers' one loss to Dayton. He's set to undergo ACL surgery, which will keep him out for the remainder to the season and, as a 5th year senior academically, effectively end his college basketball career. The Gophers have not spiraled down since the loss of Mbakwe, as many analysts expected, but, for the Gophers, the worst (ie, most difficult competition) is yet to come. If they continue on the path they are currently on and find someone to replace Mbakwe, Minnesota could be a threat to the Big Ten this season. If they follow their usual pattern, they'll be fighting to simply make it to March.
Bob Lanier is a Hall of Fame NBA player for both the Milwaukee Bucks and the Detroit Pistons, the two teams that I consistently root for (my allegiance for other teams depends on whose playing for them. At the moment, in addition to those two, I support the Mavericks, the Suns, and anyone who plays the Heat. In case you were at all interested). Lanier played college basketball at St. Bonaventure University in New York, was drafted by the Pistons in 1970, and traded to the Bucks in 1980, where he remained until he retired in 1984. He's an 8x NBA All-Star, the NBA All-Star game MVP in 1974, and the winner of the J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award, an award for outstanding service to the community, in 1970. His #16 jersey is retired by both teams he played with.
Have a good one!
The Sports Nerd
I've said before that most teams from the major conferences work up to conference play with easier opponents, during which time they establish team chemistry, settle on rotations, and develop some confidence. Most teams will also schedule several games against traditionally challenging opponents as well, though, in order to compare themselves to more talented teams, challenge themselves, and prepare themselves for the type of play they will face in their conference and when/if they play in March. Minnesota is one of two Big Ten teams to play no ranked opponents prior to the Big Ten season, which is why they are still unranked.
This isn't unusual for Minnesota. Since Tubby Smith took over as head coach in 2007, there's been a distinctive pattern and relationship between their pre-conference and conference play. Take a look at their non-conference results, the results for their first 12 conference games, and their yearlong results:
2007-2008 Non-Conference: 11-1 Conference: 5-7 Final Results: 20-14 Tournament: No
2008-2009 Non-Conference: 12-0 Conference: 7-5 Final Results: 22-11Tournament: Yes
2009-2010 Non-Conference: 9-3 Conference: 5-7 Final Results: 21-14 Tournament: Yes
2010-2011 Non-Conference: 11-1 Conference: 5-7 Final Results: 17-14 Tournament: No
2011-2012 Non-Conference: 11-1
Minnesota has a history of scheduling easy non-conference games only to falter when conference play begins. They have yet to win a game in the NCAA tournament under Tubby Smith. Unfortunately for Minnesota, history tends to repeat itself and seems to be on track to do so again this year.
Adding to Minnesota's woes is the injury of Trevor Mbakwe. Mbakwe averaged 15.3 points and 8.7 rebounds last season, making 2nd team all Big Ten. This year, he was averaging 28.7 minutes, a team high 14.0 ppg, and a team high 9.1 rpg before he tore his right ACL in the Gophers' one loss to Dayton. He's set to undergo ACL surgery, which will keep him out for the remainder to the season and, as a 5th year senior academically, effectively end his college basketball career. The Gophers have not spiraled down since the loss of Mbakwe, as many analysts expected, but, for the Gophers, the worst (ie, most difficult competition) is yet to come. If they continue on the path they are currently on and find someone to replace Mbakwe, Minnesota could be a threat to the Big Ten this season. If they follow their usual pattern, they'll be fighting to simply make it to March.
Bob Lanier is a Hall of Fame NBA player for both the Milwaukee Bucks and the Detroit Pistons, the two teams that I consistently root for (my allegiance for other teams depends on whose playing for them. At the moment, in addition to those two, I support the Mavericks, the Suns, and anyone who plays the Heat. In case you were at all interested). Lanier played college basketball at St. Bonaventure University in New York, was drafted by the Pistons in 1970, and traded to the Bucks in 1980, where he remained until he retired in 1984. He's an 8x NBA All-Star, the NBA All-Star game MVP in 1974, and the winner of the J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award, an award for outstanding service to the community, in 1970. His #16 jersey is retired by both teams he played with.
Have a good one!
The Sports Nerd
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Kelley Washington
While Indiana has the best record of any team in the Big Ten so far this season, the undisputed leader of the Big Ten is predicted to be the Ohio State Buckeyes. After winning the Big Ten conference championship and the Big Ten tournament, the Buckeyes entered the NCAA tournament last year as a number 1 seed, the favorite to win, and lost in the sweet sixteen. This year, they've returned with a chip on their shoulders and a sense of determination to redeem themselves.
They're doing a pretty good job so far. Ranked #2 in the nation, the Buckeyes are 10-1, shooting 50%, and averaging 18.3 assists per game, the 9th best assist average in the country. They're winning their games by an average of 26.3 points. Like Indiana, many of their victories have come against small mid-major teams. On the other hand, they beat #4 Duke by 22 and #8 Florida by 7. They lost to #13 Kansas by 13. Their one loss came without Jared Sullinger, whose presence provides the identity of the Ohio State team.
Don't get me wrong: OSU has a roster full of talented players. Sophomore forward Deshawn Thomas has more than doubled his 7.5 ppg from last season and is contributing 15.9 this season, sophomore guard Aaron Craft leads the teams in assists with 5.3 per game, and the team is led by captain and senior William Buford. But sophomore forward Jared Sullinger is this team. He leads in both points per game (16.6) and rebounds per game (9.3) and is loaded with talented; the mock NBA draft 2012 has him as the 5th overall selection, going to the Sacramento Kings. To emphasize just how important Sullinger is to this team, take a look at their games with and without him.
Sullinger played the first seven games of the season, scoring anywhere between 14 and 27 points in seven victories. After their victory over Duke on November 29, Sullinger began suffering from back spasms, practicing only periodically over the next two weeks and missing two games - one to Texas-Pan American, which the Buckeyes won by 29, and one to Kansas, which they lost by 11. He returned on December 14 to play against USC Upstate, which the Buckeyes won handily despite only having only 12 points from Sullinger, and started against South Carolina, only to go down after 6 minutes and 3 points with an injured tendon. OSU won that game as well, but only 8 and only in the last 2 minutes of the game. OSU won their first seven games by an average of 29.2 points. Since Sullinger's back spasms began, the Buckeyes have been winning by an average of 12.5 ppg.
I am by no means trying to take anything away from OSU's basketball team. They're really, really good. They're also much better when Jared Sullinger is healthy. Sullinger hasn't had the best start to the season, health-wise. I hope, for his sake, that the back spasms go away and the tendon problem is nothing serious because, even though it'd be easier for the rest of the teams in the Big Ten to beat OSU without Sullinger, it'd be a lot more satisfying to beat them with him. And he's a blast to watch - he's really, really good too. As I write this, OSU is playing Lamar (who?) and winning by 14. Sullinger is currently 1-4, with 4 points and 5 rebounds.
Today's post is entitled after Kelley Washington (whose real first name is James, middle name is Kelley), number 15 on the 2007 New England Patriots. He played college football at the University of Tennessee before being drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in the 3rd round of the 2003 draft. He played wide receiver for the Bengals from 2003-2006, for the Patriots from 2007-2008, for the Ravens in 2009, and currently plays for the San Diego Chargers. His 2007 Patriots team was the last team to have an undefeated conference season in the NFL and will remain so for at least another year.
Ciao!
The Sports Nerd
They're doing a pretty good job so far. Ranked #2 in the nation, the Buckeyes are 10-1, shooting 50%, and averaging 18.3 assists per game, the 9th best assist average in the country. They're winning their games by an average of 26.3 points. Like Indiana, many of their victories have come against small mid-major teams. On the other hand, they beat #4 Duke by 22 and #8 Florida by 7. They lost to #13 Kansas by 13. Their one loss came without Jared Sullinger, whose presence provides the identity of the Ohio State team.
Don't get me wrong: OSU has a roster full of talented players. Sophomore forward Deshawn Thomas has more than doubled his 7.5 ppg from last season and is contributing 15.9 this season, sophomore guard Aaron Craft leads the teams in assists with 5.3 per game, and the team is led by captain and senior William Buford. But sophomore forward Jared Sullinger is this team. He leads in both points per game (16.6) and rebounds per game (9.3) and is loaded with talented; the mock NBA draft 2012 has him as the 5th overall selection, going to the Sacramento Kings. To emphasize just how important Sullinger is to this team, take a look at their games with and without him.
Sullinger played the first seven games of the season, scoring anywhere between 14 and 27 points in seven victories. After their victory over Duke on November 29, Sullinger began suffering from back spasms, practicing only periodically over the next two weeks and missing two games - one to Texas-Pan American, which the Buckeyes won by 29, and one to Kansas, which they lost by 11. He returned on December 14 to play against USC Upstate, which the Buckeyes won handily despite only having only 12 points from Sullinger, and started against South Carolina, only to go down after 6 minutes and 3 points with an injured tendon. OSU won that game as well, but only 8 and only in the last 2 minutes of the game. OSU won their first seven games by an average of 29.2 points. Since Sullinger's back spasms began, the Buckeyes have been winning by an average of 12.5 ppg.
I am by no means trying to take anything away from OSU's basketball team. They're really, really good. They're also much better when Jared Sullinger is healthy. Sullinger hasn't had the best start to the season, health-wise. I hope, for his sake, that the back spasms go away and the tendon problem is nothing serious because, even though it'd be easier for the rest of the teams in the Big Ten to beat OSU without Sullinger, it'd be a lot more satisfying to beat them with him. And he's a blast to watch - he's really, really good too. As I write this, OSU is playing Lamar (who?) and winning by 14. Sullinger is currently 1-4, with 4 points and 5 rebounds.
Today's post is entitled after Kelley Washington (whose real first name is James, middle name is Kelley), number 15 on the 2007 New England Patriots. He played college football at the University of Tennessee before being drafted by the Cincinnati Bengals in the 3rd round of the 2003 draft. He played wide receiver for the Bengals from 2003-2006, for the Patriots from 2007-2008, for the Ravens in 2009, and currently plays for the San Diego Chargers. His 2007 Patriots team was the last team to have an undefeated conference season in the NFL and will remain so for at least another year.
Ciao!
The Sports Nerd
Jalen Courtney
I'd like to be able to say that I have enough knowledge to somewhat intelligently talk about most teams in college basketball right now. That would be a lie. I simply don't have enough time (or enough TV channels) to catch all the games during the week. As a consequence, I admit that, nationally, I only know the big sports stories around the country. On the other hand, anyone who has read this blog before knows that I'm a Michigan State fan and follow Big Ten sports quite passionately. While I can't provide much insight for basketball teams from the SEC or ACC, I pride myself on being pretty knowledgable on the happenings in the Big Ten. As a result, I'm going to do something I've never done before and, in the days leading up to the start of conference play, I'm going to write a blog for each Big Ten team, focusing on their 'big' story of the season thus far and taking a look at how their season has been going. Big Ten men's basketball conference play begins on December 27. That gives me approximately 7 1/2 days to come up with 12 blogs. Let's go.
I'll start with the only undefeated team left in the Big Ten - the Indiana Hoosiers. Yesterday, I caught the tail end of their game against Howard University. The point differential was 57. A score such as this hasn't been unusual for Indiana in the last few years; they haven't had a winning season since 07-08 and their last three seasons they've finished 6-25, 10-21, and 12-20 and, rest assured, there were some hardy blowouts in there. What made this game so astonishing wasn't so much the final score, but the fact that it was Indiana who won by 57.
As I mentioned, the last few years have been quite tumultuous for the Hoosiers, but their problems started before the 2008 season. To understand the significance of this win (and others this season), you should probably go back to 1971, the year Bobby Knight first began coaching at Indiana. Under Knight, the Hoosiers were Big Ten Conference champions 11 times, reached the Final Four 5 times, and won 4 national championships. They were undefeated in conference play from 1974-1976 and lost only one game outside of conference during that time as well; the 1976 Hoosiers basketball team is the last NCAA team to finish with an undefeated season. Under Knight, Indiana became a basketball powerhouse.
At the same time, however, Knight was one of the most controversial coaches in NCAA history. During his time as Indiana's coach, he famously threw a chair onto the court during a game, to give one example (out of many) of his out of control temper. In May 2000, the school adopted a "zero tolerance" policy for Knight after a video of him choking a former player was aired on CNN. By September that same year, numerous complaints were filed against Knight for breaking the zero-tolerance policy and, after Knight refused to resign, he was fired.
Indiana has not yet regained their former glory. Since 2000, they've gone through 4 coaches and reached the NCAA tournament only 6 times, winning one game or less in 5 of those years. Tom Crean became the head coach in 2008 after Kelvin Sampson was fired for recruiting violations. That season was the worst in school history. Crean made due with 2 returning players, one on scholarship. They finished dead last in the Big Ten. The following year, adding 4 top 100 recruits to the roster, Indiana finished tied for 10th. Last year, Crean's Indiana defeated their first ranked opponent (Illinois) and followed with an encore six days later (Minnesota) only to finish last in the Big Ten again.
This season, Crean added 3 five star players to his roster. Yesterday, they defeated Howard University by 57. On December 10, in a game that was not nearly as close as the final score shows, they upset #1 Kentucky on a buzzer beating 3 point shot from Christian Wafford, their first victory over a number 1 team since 2001. They're 11-0; last time they started a season this well, they won the national championship.
That's not to say that I expect Indiana to win the national championship; if they do, I promise to put on a gorilla costume (and my family has one) and run around the neighborhood handing out candy. Don't get your hopes up. They're undefeated but, like most teams in the nation, their pre-conference games haven't been the most challenging, Kentucky game aside. They've beaten Notre Dame (which sounds great but the 8-5 team isn't the same as it has been in past years), Butler (who has a similar story to Notre Dame, though did just beat Purdue), North Carolina State during the Big Ten-ACC challenge, and a number of unknown mid-major programs (does anyone know where Howard University is?). The Big Ten schedule is going to be much harder than their out-of-conference schedule. Up until this year, though, Indiana was losing these out-of-conference games to these nobody colleges. And not just losing - they were getting pulverized. Most teams set up easy out-of-conference games, with one or two exceptions, in order to beef up their resume and establish some team chemistry. You're supposed to win most of them. Indiana is finally doing that.
The good news for Indiana is, despite some easy non-conference games, they are a good team, as the Kentucky game demonstrated. They're also underrated. They're shooting 52%, 4th best in the nation, and averaging 85 ppg, 7th best in the nation. They're one of six remaining undefeated teams and yet they're ranked 18, behind several 1 and 2 loss teams, with substantially better wins than most of them. They should be ranked higher, but sometimes it's better to fly under the radar a little bit. Voters in the coaches poll are hesitant to rank them higher because of their miserable past 3 seasons but my prediction is that soon Indiana will be a definite threat. Eventually, coaches and spectators will have to acknowledge that Tom Crean is bringing Indiana basketball back and, with the incoming recruiting class of 2012 ranked 8th in the nation, it appears that he's bringing them back to stay.
I haven't done one of these in a while, but here is something for you to watch. The State Street Singer's performed an NFL-inspired version of the "12 Days of Christmas"in Central Park, complete with cartoon drawings. It'll get you all set for the holidays.
Jalen Courtney is the player today's blog is named after. He's the #14 sophomore forward for the LSU tigers basketball team. I wonder, after football season, does anyone down at LSU have the energy to care about their 8-3 basketball team? But that's beside the point. Courtney is averaging 6.4 minutes per game this season, an improvement from the 4.8 last season. He's a 43% 3-point shooter but averages only 2.1 points per game. He did not play in LSU's victory over Marquette, dropping Marquette down from the ranks of the undefeated.
Over and out.
The Sports Nerd
I'll start with the only undefeated team left in the Big Ten - the Indiana Hoosiers. Yesterday, I caught the tail end of their game against Howard University. The point differential was 57. A score such as this hasn't been unusual for Indiana in the last few years; they haven't had a winning season since 07-08 and their last three seasons they've finished 6-25, 10-21, and 12-20 and, rest assured, there were some hardy blowouts in there. What made this game so astonishing wasn't so much the final score, but the fact that it was Indiana who won by 57.
As I mentioned, the last few years have been quite tumultuous for the Hoosiers, but their problems started before the 2008 season. To understand the significance of this win (and others this season), you should probably go back to 1971, the year Bobby Knight first began coaching at Indiana. Under Knight, the Hoosiers were Big Ten Conference champions 11 times, reached the Final Four 5 times, and won 4 national championships. They were undefeated in conference play from 1974-1976 and lost only one game outside of conference during that time as well; the 1976 Hoosiers basketball team is the last NCAA team to finish with an undefeated season. Under Knight, Indiana became a basketball powerhouse.
At the same time, however, Knight was one of the most controversial coaches in NCAA history. During his time as Indiana's coach, he famously threw a chair onto the court during a game, to give one example (out of many) of his out of control temper. In May 2000, the school adopted a "zero tolerance" policy for Knight after a video of him choking a former player was aired on CNN. By September that same year, numerous complaints were filed against Knight for breaking the zero-tolerance policy and, after Knight refused to resign, he was fired.
Indiana has not yet regained their former glory. Since 2000, they've gone through 4 coaches and reached the NCAA tournament only 6 times, winning one game or less in 5 of those years. Tom Crean became the head coach in 2008 after Kelvin Sampson was fired for recruiting violations. That season was the worst in school history. Crean made due with 2 returning players, one on scholarship. They finished dead last in the Big Ten. The following year, adding 4 top 100 recruits to the roster, Indiana finished tied for 10th. Last year, Crean's Indiana defeated their first ranked opponent (Illinois) and followed with an encore six days later (Minnesota) only to finish last in the Big Ten again.
This season, Crean added 3 five star players to his roster. Yesterday, they defeated Howard University by 57. On December 10, in a game that was not nearly as close as the final score shows, they upset #1 Kentucky on a buzzer beating 3 point shot from Christian Wafford, their first victory over a number 1 team since 2001. They're 11-0; last time they started a season this well, they won the national championship.
That's not to say that I expect Indiana to win the national championship; if they do, I promise to put on a gorilla costume (and my family has one) and run around the neighborhood handing out candy. Don't get your hopes up. They're undefeated but, like most teams in the nation, their pre-conference games haven't been the most challenging, Kentucky game aside. They've beaten Notre Dame (which sounds great but the 8-5 team isn't the same as it has been in past years), Butler (who has a similar story to Notre Dame, though did just beat Purdue), North Carolina State during the Big Ten-ACC challenge, and a number of unknown mid-major programs (does anyone know where Howard University is?). The Big Ten schedule is going to be much harder than their out-of-conference schedule. Up until this year, though, Indiana was losing these out-of-conference games to these nobody colleges. And not just losing - they were getting pulverized. Most teams set up easy out-of-conference games, with one or two exceptions, in order to beef up their resume and establish some team chemistry. You're supposed to win most of them. Indiana is finally doing that.
The good news for Indiana is, despite some easy non-conference games, they are a good team, as the Kentucky game demonstrated. They're also underrated. They're shooting 52%, 4th best in the nation, and averaging 85 ppg, 7th best in the nation. They're one of six remaining undefeated teams and yet they're ranked 18, behind several 1 and 2 loss teams, with substantially better wins than most of them. They should be ranked higher, but sometimes it's better to fly under the radar a little bit. Voters in the coaches poll are hesitant to rank them higher because of their miserable past 3 seasons but my prediction is that soon Indiana will be a definite threat. Eventually, coaches and spectators will have to acknowledge that Tom Crean is bringing Indiana basketball back and, with the incoming recruiting class of 2012 ranked 8th in the nation, it appears that he's bringing them back to stay.
I haven't done one of these in a while, but here is something for you to watch. The State Street Singer's performed an NFL-inspired version of the "12 Days of Christmas"in Central Park, complete with cartoon drawings. It'll get you all set for the holidays.
Jalen Courtney is the player today's blog is named after. He's the #14 sophomore forward for the LSU tigers basketball team. I wonder, after football season, does anyone down at LSU have the energy to care about their 8-3 basketball team? But that's beside the point. Courtney is averaging 6.4 minutes per game this season, an improvement from the 4.8 last season. He's a 43% 3-point shooter but averages only 2.1 points per game. He did not play in LSU's victory over Marquette, dropping Marquette down from the ranks of the undefeated.
Over and out.
The Sports Nerd
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Austin Etherington
"The Heisman Memorial Trophy annually recognizes the outstanding college football player whose performance best exhibits the pursuit of excellence with integrity. Winners epitomize great ability combined with diligence, perseverance, and hard work. The Heisman Trophy Trust ensures the continuation and integrity of this award." This mission statement was taken from the official Heisman Trophy website. Today was the day when one of five finalists - Montee Ball (Wisconsin), Robert Griffin Junior III (Baylor), Andrew Luck (Stanford), Tyrann Mathieu (LSU), and Trent Richardson Junior (Alabama) - would be awarded the trophy, joining a group of 75 other outstanding football players who exhibited the same qualities (this is the 77th award, but the 2005 winner, Reggie Bush, forfeited and returned his in 2010 due to an investigation revealing broken NCAA policies). Robert Griffin Junior III won, the first player from Baylor ever to do so, and congratulations to him. Today might have been a very ironic day for this award to be given, though, considering all of the other events that happened. While one player was honored for excellence, dignity, integrity, and perseverance, two college basketball teams showed everything but dignity and integrity on the court, while one scandal has the potential to ruin the reputation of a baseball player who most people believed to have all of the qualities of a Heisman winner.
Most people outside the state of Ohio don't realize the passion beneath the Cincinnati-Xavier rivalry but two schools within 10 minutes of one another are bound to develop some animosity and two upsets pulled by Xavier over No. 1 Cincinnati in 1996 and 2000 and Cincinnati's most recent win by 20 points have added fuel to the fire for both sides. Today, tensions burst. With 9.4 seconds remaining, last years Atlantic 10 player of the year, Xavier's Tu Holloway, and Cincinnati's Ge'Lawn Guyn appeared to have a heated conversation in front of Cincinnati's bench, at which point Xavier freshman Dezmine Wells, apparently backing up his teammate, shoved Guyn. Then all hell broke loose. Both benches joined in the scuffle. Cincinnati's Yancy Gates punched Xavier's Kenny Frease in the jaw and after he fell to the ground it appears that Cheikh Mbodj stomps on his face. The fight began long before the 9 second mark, though.
Leading up to today's game, Cincinnati's Sean Kilpatrick said in an interview that Xavier's Tu Holloway - the Atlantic 10 player of the year in 2011 - wouldn't start for Cincinnati. Trash talking began during the National Anthem. Xavier guard Mark Lyons made some comments to the Cincinnati players on his way to the locker room at halftime with a 9 point lead. And it didn't stop when the referees were forced to call the game with 9.4 seconds remaining, allowing Xavier to leave with a 76-53 victory. In the post game press conference, Holloway called himself and his teammates gangsters - not thugs, but tough guys (if anyone can provide me with the distinction between thugs and gangsters I would be very appreciative). He added, "You don't let people disrespect you. That's what I'm about. I don't regret anything that happened." Cincinnati's Coach Mick Cronin addressed the issue head on in his post game conference, calling it "embarrassing", saying that some players need to "grow up", and that he was "going to decide who is on this team going forward." Here's my question, though: with all the tension leading up to the game, how did this escalate to the point where Kenny Frease had to crawl out of a mob of basketball players clutching his bloody face to avoid being trampled? The signs were there; why didn't one of the coaches or assistants or even one of the officials say, "Cool it" during the 39:50.6 minutes prior to this?
My question isn't really the point of all this, though. What matters is what comes next: suspensions and a lot of hard work at restoring the national respect that both these programs lost because a few dumb players lost their tempers and humiliated themselves, their schools, and their sport for a petty rivalry (because, again, who outside of Ohio really cares about the Cincinnati-Xavier game?).
Which leads me to my second topic. This is breaking news, so I don't have a whole lot to go on at this point (and hopefully it'll all be false anyway so this paragraph will be completely irrelevant). Today Ryan Braun, the face of the Milwaukee Brewers franchise and the National League MVP tested positive for performance enhancing drugs and faces a 50-game suspension in 2012. A urine sample in October revealed elevated levels of testosterone and a later test revealed the testosterone to be synthetic. Braun plans to appeal the suspension, something that no suspended player has successfully overturned as of yet, claiming it to be B.S. And I hope it is. One of the best things about sports is the role models that it provides. Up until now, Ryan Braun has not only been a tremendously gifted athlete, but also a stand out person, a combination that seems to be much too rare amongst professional sports. For baseball in particular, Braun seemed like the start of the post-steroids generation, a fresh slate for the sport. I'd like to think, and I know I'm not the only one, that's it's possible to be an MVP without taking performance enhancing drugs, that people can accomplish great things on talent alone. It gives people hope.
Someone recently asked me what the significance of sports was. Ironically, it was right after I wrote my previous blog, where I praised Tim Tebow as a person and a role model. I love sports, but I realize that it's not a matter of life-or-death. No football game is ever going to lead to a cancer cure, no war will be resolved by a basketball score. In the end, it's not the scores that matter, but what happens off the court and how people react to those situations. I think the importance of sports comes from days and dilemmas like the ones many athletes and coaches are facing today. Sports brings out the best in people - people like Tim Tebow and Robert Griffin III. It shows the value of hard work, how to win and lose with dignity and class, how to be a team player, and it brings people together as a community with a common goal and a common interest. It can also bring out the worst in some people and when that happens, people are challenged to find ways to handle situations, move on, and learn from them. But isn't that how everything in life is? In politics, for every Ronald Reagan there is a Rod Blagojevich. For every Jonas Salk in science we get a Josef Mengele. In sports, for every Tim Tebow there is a Ben Roethlisberger. Nothing's perfect. An ugly street brawl erupts on the court, an MVP tests positive for drugs, and five players are honored for excellence and integrity. Take the good and the bad, because you can learn something either way.
Today's blog features Indiana's Austin Etherington, a freshman forward for the men's basketball team. He did not play in Indiana's buzzer beating victory over No. 1 ranked Kentucky today, the 6th victory in team history over a No. 1 ranked team, the first since 2002, and the 8th straight victory for Tom Crean's undefeated Hoosiers. He did get 5 minutes and 2 rebounds in their victory over Stetson, though.
I'm leaving now.
The Sports Nerd
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