The Texas Sports Guy

Well, work has been kicking my tail and I've spent all my free time on 2-3 music projects, so haven't had a chance to make many posts.

First, with the college football regular season all but over at this point, I'll update you on how my college football picks have gone for the season. I have picked 10 games every week for all 13 weeks of the season. In the 13 weeks, I have won my 5-7 person office pool FIVE times, including this week, when I went 7-3. For the season, I went 71-56-3, which is 56%, well below my goal of 65%. I still have the office bowl season pool, where we will pick all 32 bowl games. So all I need to do is go 32-0 in my bowl game picks against the spread and I will be up to 65% on the year.

Now for my thoughts on the season of the 9-3 Texas Longhorns. Obviously an extremely disappointing end to the season, with Texas playing themselves out of the Big 12 Title game with back to back losses to Kansas St and Texas A&M. The worst part about the loss to A&M was this old A&M lady fan who was a total {censored} who yelled the following phrase the entire game... "Let's go army!!" This speaks to the pure ignorance and delusion that aggy fans live under. Does she really think that her school is a real military institution? Anyway, I instructed her that if she wanted to be accurate she should refer to them as the kiddie corp or the fake army. The worst part of Texas losing was knowing that this fat old {censored} got the satisfaction of seeing her team win.

There are many reasons being debated right now trying to diagnose why Texas lost their last two games, but I have a different theory. The cardinal sin in sports is to assume victory before the clock reads 0:00. Before the Kansas St game, I received an email from the UT ticket office reminding me to purchase my Big 12 Championship game tickets. They should have never sent this email out before Texas actually qualified for the game. On top of that, my brother bought his title game ticket the week before the KState game, but he wasn't the only one. His friend Tommy not only bought a game ticket, but he also bought a plane ticket to Kansas City the week of the KState game. My co-worker also pre-emptively bought tickets to the game before Texas won the Big 12 south.

I forgive them, because it's only a game. Besides, the money they will lose by buying tickets early and the guilt they must feel for commiting the cardinal sin of sports is punishment enough. Hopefully they all learned their lesson and we won't have this problem in future years.

Now, I want to close this post with my thoughts on the UT coaching staff and the job they did this season. I give each coach a grade based on expectations, performance and player development. It isn't very pretty, but I think it's fair and accurate.

WR coach Bobby Kennedy: (A-) - There is not a single senior in the group, and this is the best our WR's have played at least since the Big 3 (Roy Williams, BJ Johnson, and Sloan Thomas), and an argument can be made that as a group, they outdid the Big 3 as a group in any season they played. Very few drops this year. The only negative is it's possible that better WR run blocking at times could have resulted in breaking long runs at some point this year. When looking for an answer why we broke no long runs, that could be a part. I think that's a stretch though, and it's tough to find anything bad to say about any of the WR's this year.

QB Coach/Offensive Coordinator Greg Davis (B+) - The bad is that the gameplans were highly ineffective in both the Ohio St and A&M games. The good is that we had a RS freshman 3-star recruit at QB who was a legitimate heisman finalist up until the moment he got hurt in the first quarter against Kansas St, and when he is hurt, the backup true FR QB comes in and puts 42 points on the board. From a QB development standpoint, how can Greg Davis not be thought of as the best in the country right now? You have more highly recruited QB's all over the country that are not playing even close to the level that McCoy played at this year.. among them are the following highly recruited QB's within one year of McCoy in classification are the following: Kyle Wright, Drew Weatherford, X. Lee, Ryan Perrilloux, Mark Sanchez, Matthew Stafford, Mitch Mustain, Tim Tebow, Bobby Reid, Rhett Bomar (compare his freshman year to McCoy's). Anything less than a B+ for Davis is a joke when you take a look around the country and see how all of McCoy's more highly regarded classmates are playing. The most disappointing part of the offense to me has been red zone efficiency, but I put that more on the OL play than the playcalling/QB play (see OL comments below).

TE coach Bruce Chambers: (B) - Not much to say here, other than RS FR JerMichael Finley had what you would have to call a very successful freshman campaign (23 rec, 326 yards 3 TD's). If Finley has 3 more years identical to his first, he will leave Texas ranked #2 all time in career receptions, yards, and TD's by a tight end in school history. There were some inconsistencies early in the year dropping balls, but I feel good about Finley going forward and his improvement from September to now is clear.

DE coach Oscar Giles: (B-) - The DE position seemed to take a step backwards at the moment when Brian Robison got hurt and was slowed the rest of the season, but Tim Crowder and Robison probably had their best seasons at Texas, with Brian Orakpo doing well in pass rush situations. The emergence of Soph Aaron Lewis this year was also a good mark in Giles' favor. The negative here is the lack of a good pass rush the 2nd half of the season and the poor job of defending the option against Texas A&M, where a large responsibility falls on the DE. If the DE is hitting the QB on the option every play, it frees up the outside LBer to take the pitch man, and the option gets contained.

DT coach Mike Tolleson: (C+) - The good here is the run defense as a whole throughout the season (A&M game removed), the play of Derek Lokey up until he got injured, which you can't blame on Tolleson, the short yardage stops against Texas Tech by the DT's saved us that game. The bad is clearly getting physically manhandled by A&M throughout the game and the lack of plays made in the backfield as a whole, but mostly from Frank Okam. You have to call Okam a disappointment to this point in his career.

It's hard to say much good about the guys that are left, so here goes..

OL coach Mac McWhorter (D+) - This begins with our problems all season long in short yardage and in the red zone. Our inability to run the ball effectively in the red zone led to numerous possessions in the red zone where we could not get the ball in the end zone. It all starts with the OL in the red zone, because you need to run the ball effectively to score in short yardage situations. The pass blocking was decent this year, and that's about the only thing that keeps this grade from being an F. Expectations are a little higher than other positions because we have 3 seniors on the line. The lack of big runs is a big problem that has a lot to do with the inability of the OL to ever get to the 2nd level this year. This stat pretty much sums it all up for me... we averaged less than 4.0 ypc in 4 of our last 5 games. When you have 3 OL who are pre-season all conference (one preseason AA), you should rank higher than 22nd in the nation in rushing offense, ESPECIALLY when you have a coach who would much rather run the ball than pass it. The secondary played poorly enough to save this group from being the most diappointing on the team.

After McWhorter is where I draw the line between coaches I have no problem with being in the program next year and coaches that I don't care one bit if they are somewhere else next year.

RB coach Ken Rucker: (D) - Fumbles fumbles fumbles. Fumbles are one thing, but a majority of our fumbles seem to be of the variety where it's more the result of poor ball security technique and carelessness than they are great defensive plays or big hits. Fumbles have been a consistently bothersome problem that appeared the moment Rucker arrived on campus and has not improved one bit since. The lack of big runs is the 2nd major problem here. The play of Melton is the 3rd major problem here. Why does a RB with the physical attributes of Henry Melton run like he has a vagina? Texas Rivals moderator Geoff Ketchum summed it up in his pre-A&M game chat when he labeled Melton as the biggest waste of talent on the UT roster.

DB coach Duane Akina (D-) The only thing keeping Akina from getting an F is that the secondary made their share of big game-saving and game-changing plays to go along with the countless coverage breakdowns and big plays given up at critical times. The lack of development of Brandon Foster, Ryan Palmer, and the backup safeties is a major cause for concern. Ranking in the 100's in pass defense with four 4th year players, three of whom will play on Sundays, is absolutely 100% inexcusable regardless of the scheme they are forced to play under or the number of injuries they sustain.

LB coach/Defensive Coordinator Gene Chizik: (F) - Most overrated coach in the country at this point if his name is up for any head coaching jobs right now. The LBers were completely non-existant the entire year. Linebackers are not the most disappointing position group because they weren't expected to be great, but they are still the worst position group on the team, and they pretty much have been both years Chizik has been the LB coach here. Chizik's stubbornness and complete ineptude in making in-game adjustments is embarrassing. This was supposed to be the most talented defense Mack Brown ever had, and it was pretty much the worst defense Texas has had under Mack Brown. To compare Chizik to 2004 Texas DC Greg Robinson... Robinson gave up THREE! 3rd quarter points ALL REGULAR SEASON in 2004 (17 to Michigan in the Rose Bowl). Chizik's defense has given up 55 points in the 3rd quarter this year and we still have one more game to go against a tough bowl opponent.

I hope Chizik gets a head coaching job somewhere, but I don't know who's stupid enough to hire him at this point.

I only went 6-4 in my picks last week, but it was good enough to win my company's office pool and the cool $35 that came with it. Still not up to the level of accuracy I'd like to see, but this did get me back up over .500 for the year (15-14-1), which is more than I can say for the Astros, who have not been over .500 since June 22.

Before I get to my Week 4 picks, I wanted to say something about the World Combat League event happening tonight in Austin. I have been looking forward to this for almost two months, since I bought my brother Nate and I a pair of tickets to WCL for his birthday way back in late July. Chuck Norris, yes THAT Chuck Norris, is the Owner/Founder/CEO/Promoter for WCL.

To promote WCL, Chuck Norris showed up at the Texas/North Texas game. The moment they showed Chuck Norris on the Godzillatron I was fully expecting the lethal combination of these two forces to instantly kill everyone in the stadium with the simulated force of a roundhouse kick. In addition, I expected the mere presence of Chuck's facial expression on Godzillatron alone to scare the earth off it's rotational axis, thus killing everyone on earth with the exception of Chuck and Chuck's hot girlfriend, who Chuck swallowed whole 5 minutes prior to showing up on Godzillatron. Chuck swallowed his girlfriend whole so that he could protect her in his stomach from the force of the earth being thrown off it's axis, and then regurgitate her after killing everyone on earth. Together, they could repopulate the earth with a race of Chuck Norris. (Yes, Chuck Norris is his own race, he's not white, he's not black, he's not hispanic... He's simply Chuck Norris). Fortunately, due to the fact that Chuck wanted all 50 people who bought tickets to World Combat League to actually show up, he decided to have mercy on us and did not kill everyone in the stadium that day.

I digress... Onto my ten college football picks against the spread for week 4.

Iowa St/TEXAS (-20) TEXAS - The Horns will take a 3-7 point lead into the half before wearing out Iowa St over the course of the 2nd half and winning by 3 TD's. I'll stick with my preseason score prediction of 38-17.

Louisiana Tech/TEXAS A&M (-23.5) LOUISIANA TECH - I made the mistake of picking A&M to cover a similar spread against Army last week. I won't make that mistake again this year.

Penn St/OHIO ST (-17) OHIO ST - In the score tiebreaker, I'm taking Ohio St 34-14 in this one.

usc (-16)/ARIZONA USC - Arizona has looked awful so far this year, already losing to LSU 45-3. Maybe Mike Bell really was that good and we shouldn't be surprised that he is Denver's starting RB right now.

wisconsin/MICHIGAN MICHIGAN - After last week's beatdown of Notre Dame (my favorite game of the year to watch so far), I truly believe Michigan is the real deal, and it would not surprise me if Michigan has a better record than Ohio St when they meet at the end of the year to effectively decide the Big 10 championship.

notre dame (-2.5)/MICHIGAN ST NOTRE DAME - I was surprised to hear Michigan St has actually won 7 of the last 9 meetings between these two, and who could forget the OT thriller last year in South Bend, won by Michigan St 44-41. If the spread was 3.5 I'd take Michigan St here, but I think Notre Dame wins by a FG and covers by half a point.

Arizona St/CAL (-7.5) ARIZONA ST - Not that I didn't already have enough reason to hate Cal after the 2004 BCS fiasco and my aforementioned stance on Jeff Tedford, but they embarrassed me for picking them to win against Tennessee on opening week. Look for a similar effort on the road this week by Tedford's underachievers.

Colorado/GEORGIA (-27) GEORGIA - Before making this pick, I had to double-check to make sure -27 wasn't just the first-half line.

Louisville (-8.5)/KANSAS ST LOUISVILLE - Since Tuesday, the line on this game has jumped from 8.5 to 14. Needless to say, I'm not the only one that thinks Louisville will win by a lot more than 8.5 points. After seeing what they did to Miami, if you're looking for a legit team in the Big lEast, it's Louisville, not the more trendy pick of West Virginia.

Alabama/ARKANSAS (-1) ARKANSAS - Made this pick based strictly on home field advantage.

I'll be back soon... that is if I survive being in the same arena as Chuck Norris for 3 hours tonight.

Well it was a tough Saturday for me, so it took me six days to recover to where I am finally able to refocus and come up with objective thought's on Texas' 24-7 loss to Ohio St. last Saturday night. It was doubly tough as I only went 3-6-1 in my college football picks over the weekend. It was so bad, I'm going to call myself the cooler as far as making picks goes until I get it turned around.

On to the Texas/Ohio St. game... it must be discussed. Several things stood out to me as I watched this game from my season tickets in row 53 of the upper deck. First, I had a bad feeling going into the game when I looked on the sidelines and saw Drew Kelson standing there in street clothes. I'm not one to make excuses, I just knew it would be a tough night for the Texas defense when they were without 3 of their best 11 players for the entire game (Tarell Brown, Drew Kelson, and Sergio Kindle) and without a 4th (Marcus Griffin) for a majority of the game with an ankle injury suffered in the first quarter.

Now onto position breakdowns: At QB, Colt McCoy exceeded expectations in the passing game, going 19-32 for 154 yards with one TD and one interception on a very bad decision/throw. The interception cost Texas 3 points, but McCoy played well enough for Texas to win, and that's all you can ask of a freshman making his second career start in such a big game. The biggest criticism of Colt right now is that he needs to make better decisions on the zone read as to when he should hand the ball off and when he should keep the ball and run it himself. One play that comes to mind is a 3rd and 1 where Colt would have had 8-10 yards had he kept the ball, but instead he handed it off to Charles for a 5 yard loss forcing a punt.

The running backs and offensive line played better than any other position group on the field. The Texas running game was good some of the night, and dominant the rest of the night. Selvin Young played his best game as a Longhorn with the exception of one dropped screen pass, and Jamaal Charles played well, but not spectacular. Neither player fumbled the ball once, which was a good sign.

The WR's/TE's were MIA for most of the night. With a young QB, it's imperative that they step up their level of play against an inexperienced secondary and that did not happen. On more than one occasion, the Texas WR's and TE's had opportunities to make tough, makeable catches but could not get the ball secured. And then there's the Billy Pittman fumble at the 1 yard line, easily the biggest play of the game. Completely inexcusable, and there's really nothing else to say.

On defense, pretty much the only unit that played well was the defensive line. Brian Robison, despite battling a case of pneumonia throughout the week, was the best player on the Texas defense, recording two sacks and a TFL. The Texas run defense was surprisingly solid, only allowing 79 rushing yards on 27 carries. (Note: this is the first loss ever for Mack Brown at Texas when outrushing the opponent after 73 straight wins to begin his career at Texas when this is the case).

The back 7 on defense can all be grouped together if you ask me, because none of them played well at all, with the exception of Marcus Griffin prior to injuring his ankle in the 1st quarter. The pass defense was the worst it has looked since Carl Reese was patrolling the sidelines in 2003. One thing to point out about a game like this is it shows just how valuable a guy like Cedric Griffin was to the defense. The guy was a four year starter who was solid in all aspects of the game, and the 2nd game after he is gone, our secondary has it's worst performance in years. Huff got all the headlines, but Cedric Griffin was just as important to our defensive success last year.

I came up with four plays that could have resulted in a swing of 20 points and allowed Texas to escape with a win (and believe me it would have been a Houdini-like effort to escape with a win):

1. Billy Pittman's fumble at the one yard line - Cost Texas 7 points
2. Aaron Ross failing to bump Ted Ginn on the last play of the half, a 30 yard TD pass to Ginn. If Ross bumps him, it not only disrupts the timing of the play but allows Ross to stay with him step for step AND gives the safety more time to arrive with help over the top - Gave Ohio St. 7 points
3. Colt McCoy's INT at the beginning of the 3rd quarter - Gave Ohio St 3 points
4. Greg Johnson's missed 45-yard FG - Cost Texas 3 points.

So it would have taken pretty much a perfect game with no mistakes to beat Ohio St. They didn't make any mistakes, and Texas made way too many, as the list above shows.

I guess that's about all there is to say. I'm not counting Texas out of the championship race yet. There are 7 teams ahead of Texas right now, with a couple sure to lose this weekend, and so long as 6 of those teams lose by the end of the season, Texas will be right back at the top. This is provided Texas can win the rest of their games, and I still see a loss at Nebraska right now, but at the same time, Texas will be favored in every game they play the rest of the year.

Time to rebound with my picks for week 3. It's a very exciting week in college football, and I will have my HD DVR working overtime to record as many games as possible while I travel to Houston with my brother and wife to attend the Texas-Rice football game with my sister, the Rice grad.

Game
Texas (-31)/RICE: Texas (sorry Laura, it's a blowout)
army/TEXAS A&M (-27): Texas A&M (buzz-cut alert in San Antonio tomorrow)
lsu/AUBURN (-3.5): Auburn (Lester Miles the difference)
Michigan/NOTRE DAME (-6): Michigan (Man I hope Michigan wins this game outright)
ou/OREGON (-4.5): Oregon (OU still sucks)
miami/LOUISVILLE (-4): Miami (undefeated in 6 straight games as the underdog)
texas tech (-1.5)/TCU: TCU (good run game usually beats Tech, wrong team favored)
nebraska/USC (-18.5): Nebraska (USC more worried about covering Bush payments than this spread)
florida (-3)/TENNESSEE: Florida (Tennessee missing 2 def. starters just like Texas last week)
clemson/FSU (-4.5): FSU (both teams might be unranked by the end of the year)

Here's to all hell breaking loose in college fooball and everyone ending the year with 2 or more losses.

Well, first things first. I went 6-4 last week in my picks, which I'm a bit disappointed with, but I look forward to coming back strong this week. About the only game that truly surprised me over the weekend was how terrible Cal looked against Tennessee, or how great Tennessee looked against Cal. I should have known ever since the 2004 Holiday Bowl that Cal can never perform when people are watching them. Let's be honest, their claim to fame is a close loss to USC in 2004; they have yet to win any games of significance to this day under Tedford.

While we're on Tedford, I would like to comment real quick on how overrated I think he is as a QB coach. Somewhere along the way, he developed a reputation as a developer of great QB's, but the reality is, he has a reputation as a developer of QB's who go very high in the draft and then end up as complete busts in the NFL. Let's just take a quick look back at some of the QB's who have studied under Tedford and a synopsis of their career in the NFL.

Trent Dilfer - #6 overall pick in 1994 draft. Career stats: 107 starts, 55.7% comp., 106/117 TD/INT ratio, 71.3 QB rating.
Akili Smith - #3 overall pick in 1999 draft. Career stats: 17 starts, 46.6% comp., 5/13 TD/INT ratio, 52.8 QB rating.
Billy Volek - Career stats: 10 starts, 60.3% comp., 26/13 TD/INT ratio, 86.9 QB rating. Not bad, but when you consider the fact that when he was finally given a chance to start, he performed so poorly in the preseason that the team put him on the trading block before the end of the preseason and signed Kerry Collins to take his place.
Joey Harrington - #3 overall pick in 2002 Draft. Career stats: 55 starts, 54.7% comp., 60/62 TD/INT ratio, 68.1 QB rating. And of course you have to mention he put up these awful stats in spite of his team drafting a WR with 3 straight first round picks and a RB with another first round pick. It's not like he had a shortage of talent around him to work with.
David Carr - #1 overall pick in 2002 draft. Career stats: 59 starts, 57.8% comp., 48/53 TD/INT ratio, 73.7 QB rating.
Kyle Boller - #19 overall pick in 2003 draft. Career Stats: 34 starts, 55.6% comp., 31/32 TD/INT ratio, 69.2 QB rating - benched this season in favor of Steve McNair.
Aaron Rodgers - thought to be in contention for #1 overall pick in 2005 draft, then falls to #27 pick in the draft, I'll give him an incomplete because he hasn't played yet, but based on this track record of other Tedford QB's, my guess is he will crash and burn like the rest of them.

OK, back on topic now, my week 2 picks against the spread:

GAME FAVORITE WINNER
Ohio St./TEXAS: Texas -3 OHIO ST
NOTRE DAME/Penn St: Notre Dame -11.5 PENN ST
Auburn/MISSISSIPPI ST Auburn -20.5 MISS ST
LSU/Arizona LSU -14.5 LSU
Georgia/SOUTH CAROLINA Georgia -3.5 SOUTH CAROLINA
OU/Washington OU -15 WASHINGTON
Clemson/B.C. BC -1 CLEMSON
CAL/Minnesota Cal -6 MINNESOTA
TEXAS A&M/uLaLa A&M -20.5 TEXAS A&M
Ole Miss/MISSOURI Missouri -8.5 OLE MISS

I will do my Texas/Ohio St preview in a separate column. A game of this magnitude deserves it's own post. Stay tuned.

OK,

Here's my picks (against the spread of course) for the games involving teams ranked in the top 10 of the coaches poll. I realize the lines may have moved since Tuesday when I made these picks, but these are the lines I chose and have made my picks based on these.

Northern Illinois @ Ohio St (-18.5) - OHIO ST
Notre Dame (-7.5) @ Georgia Tech - NOTRE DAME
North Texas @ Texas (-41) - TEXAS
Washington St. @ Auburn (-14.5) - AUBURN
Marshall @ West Virginia (-22.5) - MARSHALL
USC (-9) @ Arkansas - USC
Southern Miss @ Florida (-20) - SOUTHERN MISS
Louisiana-Lafayette @ LSU (-31) - LSU
California @ Tennessee (-1.5) - CALIFORNIA
UAB @ OU (-21) - UAB

Once again, my goal for the season is 65% correct against the spread, so we'll see how it goes.

College football season starts this week. It's my favorite time of year. It's uniquely special this year, as the Texas Longhorns open the season as the defending national champions for the first time in my lifetime. They are currently riding a 20 game win streak that will easily reach 21 before the biggest home game in the history of Texas fooball vs. Ohio St. Sept. 9th.

I will try to do a new post every Monday during college football season talking in general about the greatest sport in the world and the state of the Horns from week to week. For this week, as I have no games to discuss, I will discuss the depth chart released today for Texas.

The position that gets the most attention nationally is at QB, where UT attempts to replace Vince Young, the greatest player in the history of college football to never win a heisman trophy, the only QB in history to pass for 3,000 yards and rush for 1,000 in a season. Colt McCoy will begin the season as the clear starter, and it's probably in Texas' best interests that he finishes the year in the same spot. If McCoy doesn't finish the year as the starter, it means he has done something to lose the starting job, or that Texas has gone back to a QB rotation that destroyed their seasons in both 2000 and 2003.

Bunny Path: I have always been adamately against a QB rotation for several reasons. First, no team has ever won a super bowl or a college national championship while utilizing a 2-QB system. Second, it leads to lack of team chemistry, as all players undoubtedly have their own opinion about who should be getting the snaps. My final piece of evidence? Just take a look at all 8 of Mack Brown's Texas-OU games and how Texas did with a clear starter vs. how Texas did rotating QB's:
1998 Applewhite clear starter - Texas wins 34-3
1999 Applewhite clear starter - Texas wins 37-27
2000 2-QB system (Applewhite/Simms) - Texas loses 63-14
2001 Simms clear starter - Texas loses 14-3
2002 Simms clear starter - Texas loses 35-24
2003 2-QB system (Mock/Young) - Texas loses 65-13
2004 Young clear starter - Texas loses 12-0
2005 Young clear starter - Texas wins 45-12
Games with clear starter going in: series tied 3-3, Texas outscored OU 143-103
Games with no clear starter going in: OU leads series 2-0, OU outscored Texas 128-27

OK, on to the rest of the offensive positions. At RB, Selvin Young is listed as the starter over the more talented Jamaal Charles, but this means nothing, as both will play extensively and the better player on any given week will be given the majority of the snaps. At WR, Texas has 4 guys who will play extensively in Sweed, Pittman, Cosby, and Shipley, and Nate Jones and Myron Hardy will contribute but probably won't see the same number of snaps as the top 4. I think our best offensive play this year could be just lobbing the ball deep for Sweed, as he looks primed for a breakout year. At TE, Tweedie is a great blocker and underrated receiver, but JerMichael Finley has the ability to be a true difference maker as a playmaker for the offense. Finley is the best player on the Texas team that nobody knows about. On the OL, I expect the primary rotation will consist of the following 7 players: Tackle (Hills, Blalock, and Ulatoski) Guard (Studdard, Blalock, Dockery) Center (Sendlein, D. Griffin).

On to the defense, which will be relied upon heavily early in the season as the offense works things out with a freshman at QB. I'll admit I'm a little worried about the depth at defensive tackle, as I don't think the staff trusts more than 3 guys right now (Okam, Miller, Lokey) at a position where you need a minimum of four guys and an optimum of six guys to stay fresh. Candidates to be the 4th DT are Aaron Lewis, Ben Alexander, and Thomas Marshall. I see DT play as the key against Ohio St., as we will have to stop what will be a strong running game to beat them, and that all starts with the DT's. At DE, Texas is absolutely loaded, and this might be the first year in Mack Brown's time at Texas where we can get consistent pressure on the QB by only rushing the front 4. Texas has no superstars at LB, but once Sergio Kindle gets healthy and integrated into the rotation, we will have 6 guys that can all play multiple positions at LB. Texas will once again be very strong in the secondary, with 3 seniors that will all be in the NFL next year playing in the secondary, and the best DB in the nation, Michael Griffin, starting at safety.

The biggest uestion mark on the team is probably at placekicker right now, where both Greg Johnson and Hunter Lawrence have had kicks blocked during scrimmage work as a result of not kicking the ball high enough. After overcoming about 10 missed extra points last year, all I really want to see is for us to make all our extra points, make all FG attempts within 35 yards, make half of the FG attempts outside 35 yards, and not have any attempts blocked. Anything less might not be enough to win close games.

Now, to close this post, I'll give you my (objective) prediction on the season. As a Longhorn fan, I am not going to concede any games until the clock runs out and the Horns are behind. But if you ask me how the season will end, this is what I think will happen.

North Texas - Win big 55-3
Ohio St. - Lose 28-24 (Yes, they are inexperienced on defense, but when you play on the road, it's more important to have an experienced offense to deal with crowd noise, and Ohio St. certainly has that. When it comes down to it, asking a freshman QB making his 2nd career start to beat the consensus #1 team in the country is asking a little too much)
at Rice - Win big - 59-0 - Rice OC Major Applewhite will be taking option personnel and trying to implement a west coast offense. As highly as I think of Major, he obviously learned very little from both Greg Davis and his time at Syracuse last year when it comes to running an offense that best fits your personnel, even if that means running a different offense than you want to run until you recruit the type of players you need to do it.
Iowa St. - Win 38-17
Sam Houston St. - Win 77-0 (If Rhett Bomar actually plays in this game, it could be the highlight of the season for me. I'm rooting for him to be ruled eligible to play in this game.)
OU - Win 17-10 - Defensive struggle, with the difference being OU's terrible OL rendering their offense useless.
Baylor - Win 48-10
at Nebraska - Lose 21-17 - Tough road game, I have to pick one loss between this one and Texas Tech, and I pick this one because Neb. has a better crowd, better coaching, and a much better defense than Tech.
at Texas Tech - win 41-20. Typical of the last two times we've played them.
Oklahoma St. - 51-7 - the days of falling way behind to OSU early are over.
at Kansas St. - Win 38-10
Texas A&M - 44-14 - The dominance of the sheep screwers continues.
Big 12 Title game, rematch vs. Nebraska. Just like Nebraska did with us in 1999, we will avenge the road loss during the regular season with a clear victory in the conference title game to the tune of 31-10.
Too early to say on the bowl game, but the season I've picked probably leads to the Fiesta Bowl against either Louisville or TCU, two teams that we would simply dismantle.

I will also be picking winners against the spread for the top 10 ranked teams in the AP poll every week this season and tracking my record. I'm going to shoot for a 65% victory rate, so we'll see how it goes. Come back in the next couple days for these picks.

Just to set a little background for this post...

Last night I stayed up until 12:30 AM to watch the Astros lose to the Cubs in 18 innings. Texas legend Roger Clemens was in line to get the win with the Astros holding a 6-5 lead heading into the top of the 9th. Chad Qualls and Dan Wheeler were completely dominant in the 7th and 8th innings respectively. Garner brings Lidge into the game, who has the highest ERA of any person in the Astros bullpen, and he promptly gives up a lead-off game tying HR to Matt Murton. Just to further make my point, disregarding the 18th inning, when Dave Borkowski was obviously out of gas, let's look at the stat line for Lidge and all other relief pitchers last night from the 7th inning through the 17th inning...Here's the box score

Lidge: 0.2 IP, 3H, 1 HR, 1 R, 1K

All others: 10.1 IP, 3H, 0R, 6K, 1 BB, and not a single Cub hitter advanced to 2nd base against an Astros reliever in the 7th, 8th, and 10th through 17th innings.

So with that said, here is a copy of the email I sent to the Astros, and copied to Fox Sports SW and AM 1300 The Zone, the TV and radio affiliates for Astros broadcasts in Austin.

"I am a loyal fan (of the Astros) over the last three seasons. I live in Austin, so I am not a season ticket holder or a regular attendee of games, although I do see the Round Rock Express play from time to time.

I have only one purpose for writing this email. I wanted to let your organization know that I will no longer be watching any Astros games on TV or listening to any Astros games on the radio until Brad Lidge is either sent down to AAA for the rest of the year or demoted to a role in the bullpen where he has no control over the outcome of any games (i.e. not pitching unless the game has a minimum 6-8 run differential either way).

We're 120 damn games into the season, and the Astros closer continues to be the guy with the highest ERA on the team. I checked, and the only pitchers with a higher ERA than Lidge are either in Round Rock right now (Gallo, Astacio, Buckholz) or have a grand total of 4 innings pitched all season (Hirsh). I don't give a damn who the closer is as long as it's not Lidge. It can be Qualls, Wheeler, Springer, Miller, Nieve, or Borkowski. The standard issue Garner “Closer-by-committee” speech he gave after the all-star break isn’t good enough, because he said the exact same thing after the All-star break, and Lidge has continued to remain the closer throughout.

Once I see a press release that states that Lidge is either pitching for Round Rock or no longer the closer or set up guy, I will begin once again watching every game I can on TV, or listening to every game I can on the radio when I don't have access to a TV. Until that moment, I am boycotting Astros broadcasts entirely.

And just so that this email has a little bit of teeth, I will be copying this email to Fox Sports Southwest and AM 1300 The Zone, the Austin affiliate for the Astros. I know several thousand people feel the same as me from reading sports message boards last night; if a few thousand feel like sending the same email, maybe we can evoke a change, because we all know Garner is too much of a dumbass as the manager to make a change on his own."

Back again after a 6 week absence. I've finally recovered from the depression of the Spurs and the UT baseball team not winning titles, so I'm ready to post once again. Here is my first annual draft diary...

6:22: Just got home, draft coverage started 22 minutes ago, but Toronto has yet to make their first pick. JJ Redick being interviewed. I can’t say there’s another guy that has done more to destroy his draft stock in the last 3 weeks than Redick. Then again, the NBA likes guys with DWI's and back injuries.

6:23: Stu Scott interviewing Adam Morisson… are there two people who’s look alone is a more perfect example of unintentional comedy than these two?

6:24: Mark Jones comments that Rudy Gay has won the green room award as the best dressed. Coincidence that a guy named Gay is best dressed? I think not.

6:29: Still no pick… By the way, I plan on going back and keeping a running tally of the number of times Jay Bilas says the word “long”. Actually I’m wondering if anyone will be called “not long”.

6:32: David Stern announces the Raptors have 5 minutes. In reality they had 4 weeks. I think Toronto should pick Gay, because they already have their starting frontcourt set with Rasho, Bosh, and Villanueva. They will take Bargnanni, barring any surprises. Bargnanni will be a #1 overall pick who will be sitting on the bench to start his career. Is he the next Darko or the next Dirk? I lean towards Darko myself.

6:36: Stern announces the first pick: Andrea Bargnanni. 2nd straight year a foreign guy with the initials A.B. is the #1 overall pick. Do you really want to make the first pick in the NBA Draft a guy with a girl's name? Standing next to Stern, he looks like a white Manute Bol. Dan Patrick makes instant reference to Italy in the world cup after the pick… how many weeks ago do you think he came up with that idea?

6:40: Awkward moment of the night #1: Stu Scott interviewing Bargnani in English, when Scott’s native language is Ebonics and Bargnani’s native language is Italian.

6:42: Andy Katz just announced that Aldridge will go to the Blazers via trade. Chicago picks Aldridge #2 overall. Aldridge will be the 2nd UT player picked by Chicago in the top 10 and traded to another team on draft night (See Chris Mihm, drafted 7th by Chicago and traded to Cleveland on draft night).

6:44: First long reference – Bilas on Aldridge

6:46: Brian Colangelo getting interviewed to explain his choice of Bargnani #1. Meanwhile, I have flashbacks to Charlie Casserly on NFL Draft day explaining the pick of Mario Williams over Reggie Bush and Vince Young.

6:48: Charlotte selects Adam Morisson. Ten years from now, everyone will remember how goofy his mustache looks more than the team that drafted him and what he did in the league. My prediction – Gay will be a better pro.

6:52: Morrison admits he gets advice from Chris Dudley on how to play in the league with diabetes. (If Morrison has as successful a career as Dudley had, I’ll be surprised)

6:53: Dickie V calls Aldridge ‘soft’, says he doesn’t rebound. Dickie V doesn’t realize Aldridge was 2nd in the conference in rebounding.

6:54: Portland picks Tyrus Thomas who will be traded to Chicago. Can you say 2nd coming of Stromile Swift?

6:55: Bilas wingspan reference: Thomas

6:58: My brother Nate calls, tells me he thinks Thomas is the best player in the draft. I disagree, obviously, thinking he’s the next Swift. So we’ll see who has the better career between Aldridge and Thomas. I’ll take LaMarcus.

6:59: Stu Scott gives a shout out to Frederick Douglas.

7:00: Atlanta picks Shelden Williams. Atlanta will be picking in the top 5 once again next year. Draft picks like this one is why. Vitale says Williams will be better than Aldridge as well. I don’t think he’ll be as good of a defensive player when he’s not playing under Duke rules anymore.

7:02: Adam Morrison makes a commercial where he admits crying. He’s a girl.

7:06: Minnesota selects Brandon Roy. Everyone has been on this guy’s bandwagon. Is he a top 10 player in any other draft?

7:10: Boston picking for Portland. Aldridge’s future teammate. If you ask me, an Aldridge/Gay combo will bring home an NBA title if they stay together 10-12 years. Bilas just says Foye is the best player in this draft, but has Gay #1 on his current draft board over Foye at the same time.

7:15: Portland takes Foye with Boston’s pick. I like this pick, because he’s a big physical player with a good outside shot. Portland has probably had the best draft of anyone, getting Aldridge and Foye by giving up no more than Telfair.

7:20: Looks like Houston will trade #8 pick with Rudy Gay for Shane Battier. I like this trade for both teams. Memphis has been a team needing a star scorer to get over the hump and Houston can always use a guy like Battier who can play the 2, 3, or the 4. If Rudy Gay becomes a 20 ppg scorer, Memphis will be a legitimate contender. 7:23: SAS says Houston should keep Gay because they can’t score enough. They didn’t score enough because Yao and TMac only played in 30 games together all year.

7:28: Golden State selects Patrick O’Bryant from Bradley. The first “Who the hell is that?” pick in the draft.
7:29: Wingspan alert: Bilas on O’Bryant

7:33: Now Portland trades Foye for Roy straight up. At this point, I just think Portland is trying to set a record for most draft day trades. They have now made 3 trades in the the last 24 hours. So Aldridge’s running buddy will be Brandon Roy.

7:34: Wingspan alert: Dan Patrick on Saer Sene – 7’8” Wingspan, biggest in the draft. Seattle picks Saer Sene – so total of two “Who the hell is that?” moments in the top 10 picks of the draft.

7:37: After 10 picks, my best available… Marcus Williams, PG from UConn. Best point guard in the draft, one of the 3 critical positions for a successful NBA team. (The other two are a low post presence and an athletic scoring wing player… all the best teams have 2 of 3 if not all 3 of these positions).

7:40: Orlando takes JJ Redick. Prepare for Dick Vitale slobber-fest. Hey Dickie V, want some beer to help wash the taste of JJ Redick’s weiner out of your mouth? (Just as I write this, my brother calls and says “I’m surprised Dickie V can talk so clearly with JJ Redick’s c*ck all over his tonsils). Obviously there’s something to this, or we wouldn’t have both had the exact same thought at the exact same moment.

7:46: NO takes Hilton Armstrong. Excellent defensive player. The only thing I have to say here is maybe they will stop talking about JJ Redick. Therefore, Hilton Armstrong is the MVP of the draft for the viewers so far.

7:50: Sixers on the clock… Will they go another year without trading AI after constant trade speculation?

7:52. Answer: NO. They pick Thabo Sefolosha. ok, whatever.

7:55: Sefolosha goes to Chicago. So the sixers do make a trade, but it’s the wrong one. Unintentional comedy moment… Sefolosha talks about how much he looks forward to playing in Chicago while wearing a 76ers hat.

7:57: Jay Bilas makes the worst joke I’ve ever heard. “The draft is like a Lids store in the mall… 2 for 1 hats, everyone gets 2 hats.” Word of advice Jay… Stick to what you know… upside and wingspan.

7:58: David Stern just called out Dan Patrick from the podium for not saying anything nice about any of the draft picks. Dan Patrick responds by saying he likes commissioner Tagliabue more. This is the worst awkward TV moment of the night so far.

7:59: Utah picks Ronnie Brewer. ESPN interviews Brewer’s dad, who looks like Nick Van Exel’s long lost twin brother.

8:00: Bilas describes Brewer as having “freaky length and wingspan”. That a way to mix it up and keep us on our toes.

8:02: David Stern announces the Roy for Foye trade, then has this clueless look on his face like he wants to make a joke about the fact that their names rhyme, but he can’t come up with anything, so he decides to stay silent for 4 seconds followed by a matter-of-fact “ok.”

8:03: NO picks Cedric Simmons, who got completely schooled by UT’s front-line in the NCAA tournament. Stu Scott gets in a “baby daddy” reference when interviewing Simmons. His goal is clearly to work his way through the entire ebonics dictionary by the end of draft night.

8:09: Philly takes Carney with via Chicago. I like him as a player if he can be a good defensive player. He and Iguodala are pretty much the same player, that could be the only problem.

8:13: Dan Patrick interviews the Hornets’ GM, who looks like Jesse Ventura. Texas Sports Gal thinks his head looks like an egg.

8:15: Indiana takes Shawne Williams of Memphis. They blow it big-time by not taking Marcus Williams, the best pure point guard available in the draft. At this point, I’d love to see my Spurs trade up to get Marcus Williams to instantly have the best backup PG in the league.

8:16: Bilas Long reference: Shawne Williams “very very long, 7’3” wingspan”

8:19: Dan Patrick puts Larry Bird on hold. ESPN having technical problems that are increasing by the moment.

8:20: Greg Anthony has said the following statement about AT LEAST 10 players to this point in the draft: “He has the chance to have the biggest impact of any player in this draft”. He’s approaching Jay Bilas “long/wingspan” status with his “impact” comments.

8:23: Washington takes Oleksiy Pecherov – How long will it be before someone on this broadcast announces his name as Pecker-off.

8:25: Token audience shot of Spike Lee. Who else has maintained his celebrity status in spite of not doing a thing of significance in the last 10 years as well as Spike Lee?

8:28: Queens select Quincy Douby of Rutgers. David Stern, a Rutgers grad, feels the need to announce that Douby comes from a great university. This is probably the only player drafted from Rutgers in Stern’s tenure, so I wonder how many years he’s been waiting to pimp his university.

8:30: NYC Crowd boos fervently when profile of Isiah goes up at the draft.
8:31: Knick fan suggests they draft Marcus Williams. While he is the best player available, I wonder if Isiah planted this guy in the crowd. Who else would suggest that their team needs a point guard when it already consists of Stephon Marbury, Steve Francis, Jamal Crawford and Jalen Rose? I’m convinced, Isiah planted that fan in the crowd.

8:34: Knicks select Renaldo Balkman 20th. Never heard of him. This is the highlight of the draft… David Stern, after announcing the pick, says “Renaldo Balkman is not here”, followed by Dan Patrick saying “…and that’s probably a good thing.” I guess Isiah felt he had enough shoot first point guards and he didn’t have enough undersized power forwards. They draft a 6’5” power forward who everyone agrees is a 2nd round pick at best. My brother and I spend about 2 minutes straight on the phone laughing at the Knicks organization after this pick. I’m going to miss Isiah in New York, as he won’t be around come draft time next year.

8:40: Suns pick Rajon Rondo. Rondo is basically a rich man’s Royal Ivey. Good defender, long arms (I’m starting to sound like Bilas), good ball-handler. I like his game a lot.

8:43: I’m still laughing about the Knicks picking Renaldo Balkman. I mean if they wanted to draft a 6’5” power forward, they could have gotten two that were better than Balkman in PJ Tucker and Eric Hicks of Cincinnati.

8:46: Nets get Marcus Williams at 22. Steal at this spot. I actually thought Toronto would have been better off with him at #1 than they will be with Bargnani. Point guards are critical positions and the Nets got the best one in the draft at pick #22. Prediction: He will be first team All-NBA Rookie team if he gets enough playing time behind Kidd.

8:47: Dickie V adds to the legend of the bad Knicks pick. Out of 100 names included in the NBA’s draft media guide, Renaldo Balkman is not on the list.

8:49: Nets with two picks in a row, take Marcus Williams teammate at UConn Josh Boone. Good defensive post player. True 6’10” tall. Not a good offensive player, but doesn’t need to be with Carter and Jefferson already on their team. Nets have had the best draft of any team to this point.

8:56: Memphis takes Kyle Lowry. I thought they would have been better off with a post player, someone like Leon Powe of Cal or someone that can play the center position. Memphis was terrible at center last year with Tsakilitis and Lorenzen Wright.

8:58: Cleveland at 25. Rumors spread all week saying Cleveland has promised the 25th pick to Daniel Gibson. It’s possible he got promised the 25th pick, but if you ask me, there’s no way Cleveland honors that promise and actually takes Gibson in this spot. I think Cleveland would be an excellent fit for Gibson because he could play the point guard on defense and the shooting guard on offense with LeBron handling the ball. It’s one of only a handful of teams where Gibson could fit in and play a role without being a true point guard. Gibson is a better version of Damon Jones. We’ll see what Cleveland does…

9:01: I was right, Cleveland takes Shannon Brown. However, the analysts just talked about how Cleveland needs a shooter and instead they get a slashing wing player instead. I have no doubt Gibson is one of the best spot up shooters in this draft.

9:05: Interview with the logo. I’ll say this on the Rudy Gay trade. The last 6’8” athletic 2-guard the logo traded for on draft night is a guy named Kobe Bryant. Is Shane Battier the next Vlade Divac? Is Gay the next Kobe?

9:08: Lakers take Jordan Farmar. Not a difference maker, but anyone is an upgrade over Smush Parker.

9:13: Trailblazers potentially making a 4th trade of the night to get the Suns 27th pick. Suns take Sergio Rodriguez, who Dan Patrick informs us goes by the nickname “Spanish Chocolate”. He’s Spain’s Jason Williams.

9:15: Dallas on the clock. I’m worried they will pick PJ Tucker, and that he will cause all kinds of problems for the Spurs. Tucker reminds me quite a bit of Josh Howard as far as his college career.

9:16: Jim Gray is losing his voice while interviewing Mitch Kupchak. He sounds like he did on location after the brawl in Motown, when he sounded like he was holding back tears while doing his commentary.

9:17: Dallas takes Maurice Ager. Another great athlete for Dallas’ team. I’m worried that Dallas is going to get better and better over the next 3-4 years, while the Spurs will slowly decline over the same period of time. Bilas says Ager doesn’t know how to pick up concepts, while the Texas Sports Gal and I both wonder how the hell he would know something like that?

9:18: Knicks on the clock, with a pick they got from the Spurs in their stupid trade sending my team Nazr Mohammed for undersized PF Malik Rose. I can’t wait to see who they will pick next. If they picked Renaldo Balkman at #20, maybe they’ll pick me at #29. Greg Anthony has no clue who the Knicks will pick.

9:23: Knicks take Mardy Collins of Temple. Another guy I’ve never heard of, 6’5” guard. I don’t know how he’s going to get any playing time with J. Rose, Marbury, Francis, and Crawford. So with their 2 first round picks, on a team that won 23 games, the Knicks get a 4th undersized power forward and a 5th guard.

9:29: Portland takes Joel Freeland with the final pick of the 1st round, and Dan Patrick instantly comments that “they spotted him bagging groceries in England.”

9:32: David Stern comes out to boos, as he announces Russ Granik, doing his final NBA draft as debuty commissioner. Russ apparently has a cult following in NYC.

9:40: Portland takes Cincinnati guard James White. The over/under for him to end up in a jail cell is 9 months.

9:47: Clippers take Paul Davis at 34, good college player, reminds me a lot of Nick Collison. Tucker and Gibson still on the board.

9:48: And as I say that, Toronto takes Tucker at 35. First words out of Jay Bilas’ mouth, as if he’s running on autopilot… “7’1” Wingspan”. All the analysts have a lot of positive things to say about Tucker. He will make Toronto’s team as a 2nd round pick, he’ll get a contract, and he will be a contributor.

9:56: Running out of things to talk about… At this point, just waiting for Gibson to get picked and waiting for the Spurs only pick of the draft at 59. Before discounting the importance of the 59th pick, keep in mind that the Spurs drafted Manu Ginobili with the 57th pick in the 1999 draft.

10:02: Cleveland up at 42. I’d actually be shocked if they don’t take Gibson here since he’s still available. If Gibson doesn’t go here, he could drop all the way down to Cleveland’s pick at 55 or off the board altogether.

10:06: Gibson does go to Cleveland at 42. The analysts like the value at 42 and his outside shooting. Pretty much spot on in saying he needs to improve his point guard skills. Gibson is likely to win a ring as long as he can stay on with the team, because LeBron is destined to lead this team to at least a couple titles before he retires.

10:16: 45 picks in, I’ve targeted my guy that I want the Spurs to pick if he falls to them. Hassan Adams from Arizona. Zona guys always seem to be effective NBA players. Adams is a guy that I could see eventually replacing Bruce Bowen as a defensive stopper. He’s the kind of athlete the Spurs were missing when trying to match up with Dallas this year in the playoffs. Maybe not a good character guy, so I doubt this happens even if he is available at that spot, which I don’t think he will be. If I was the Spurs GM, and Hassan Adams was available, I would certainly take him.

10:17: Indiana just drafted Alexander Johnson of FSU with the 45th pick. Since this guy is from Florida State, I put the over/under on time before he is arrested at about 11 months.

10:23: Portland has made their FIFTH trade of the night. This has got to be some kind of record. They trade James White to Indiana for Alexander Johnson, so the over/under on the time it takes for Johnson to end up in jail is now at 6 months, while White’s over/under odds have been raised to one year.

10:29: ESPN has a marketability analyst, Darren Rovell. This guy is a fruit, without a doubt. My gaydar just shot off the chart the moment this guy showed up on my HDTV.

10:31: Portland made their SIXTH trade of the night. They trade Alexander Johnson to Memphis for a future 2nd round pick. Alexander Johnson’s over/under odds on how long it takes him to end up in jail just shot back up to 18 months. This odds-maker (and Johnson’s lawyer) is starting to get pissed off at Portland’s GM for all these trades.

10:37: Hassan Adams just went to the Nets at 54. CRAP!!! Almost fell to the Spurs at 59. Not like the Spurs would have picked him anyway, but I’d take him on my team any time. Now the only suspense left for me is whether or not Portland will make any more trades and to find out the name of the foreign player I’ve never heard of who the Spurs will draft. The Nets easily have had the best draft of any team in my view.

10:49: Dallas’ 2nd pick coming up, then the Spurs and Detroit with the final pick in the draft. Dallas picks Danilo (J.R.) Pinnock. Who cares?

10:53: Spurs take Damir Markota, 6’11, 240 lbs, 20 years old of Serbia. Looks like a future guy to add depth on the frontcourt, no more no less. Definitely not a Manu-type prospect if you ask me, but since 1999, it’s a lot tougher to find top foreign prospects in the draft without anyone else knowing who they are.

10:58: Detroit takes Will Blalock of Iowa St. 6’0” shooting guard if you ask me.

Can’t wait until next year’s draft.

So I saw this article today announcing the voting for the All-NBA defensive team, and I have three basic complaints, which are listed here in order of increasing lack of understanding.

1. How does Tim Duncan not make the 1st team All-NBA defensive team every year of his career? This is a lot like asking how does Shaq not win the MVP award every year that he is healthy and plays a full season? Duncan missed the cut this year and wound up on the 2nd team.

Since Hakeem Olajuwon retired and David Robinson began having back problems, Duncan has been THE BEST low post defender in the league, and this includes Ben Wallace. Wallace gets all the credit because he is a better rebounder and blocks more shots, but let me ask you this... If you are at the end of the game, and you need one stop to win the game, and the other team has Shaq and everyone knows Shaq is going to get the ball, who would you rather have defending him between Ben Wallace and Tim Duncan? I'll take Duncan every single time. Not only does Duncan rebound the ball and block shots just about as well as Wallace, but he is also a much more versatile defender and nobody since Hakeem has defended Shaq as well as Duncan can in a man-to-man scenario.

2. How does Bruce Bowen receive more votes for the All-NBA defensive team than Ben Wallace, but Ben Wallace still wins the defensive player of the year award?

Bowen finished first in All-defensive team voting with 29 first-team votes and 3 second-team votes for 55 total points (who the heck voted Bowen on the 2nd team?) Ben Wallace finished with 29 first-team votes and only 2 second-team votes for 54 total points. Yet Ben Wallace is the 2005-06 defensive player of the year. Maybe a better question is the following... How does Ben Wallace have 4 defensive player of the year awards in his career, while Tim Duncan and Bruce Bowen have a combined 0 defensive player of the year awards in their careers? Your answer is the award has always favored people who do nothing BUT play defense. It's also because the award has also always favored post defenders over perimeter defenders, even though the top 5 vote-getters in the MVP voting this year are all perimeter players (including Dirk as a perimeter player which he is, your top 5 MVP vote-getters are Nash, Kobe, LeBron, Dirk, and Billups). So you could make the argument that Bowen defends more spectacular players on a nightly basis, but Wallace still wins the award because he gets a lot of rebounds and blocks a lot of shots.

3. Last but not least (this one just boggles my mind)... How does Tayshaun Prince make the All-NBA defensive team but Shawn Marion gets left completely off the list?

Since Ben Wallace won the defensive player of the year award almost entirely on a statistical basis, and since Prince and Marion play similar positions and similar minutes a night, it seems fair to compare their defensive abilities of these two players based on their rebounding, steals, and blocked shot statistics.

Marion: 40.3 minutes per game, 11.8 rebounds per game (3rd in NBA), 1.98 steals per game (5th in NBA), and 1.69 blocks per game (17th in NBA).

Prince: 35.3 minutes per game, 4.2 rebounds per game, 0.76 steals per game, and 0.48 blocks per game.

If you add up the ranking of each player in the league based on their rebounds, steals, and blocks per game, Shawn Marion, with a total score of 25, ranks 2nd in the NBA in this analysis. The ONLY player even close to Marion in this analysis is defensive player of the year Ben Wallace, who checks in with a total score of 23 (4th in rebounding, 9th in blocks, and 10th in steals). Just to further prove my point about the slight to Marion, 1st-team all NBA defender Andrei Kirilenko checks in with a combined ranking of 53, Kevin Garnett at 44, and .

Looking at this, Marion should justifiably be right there with Wallace and Bowen for the defensive player of the year award, but he is nowhere to be found on the first and second team All-NBA teams, while Tayshaun Prince is on the All-NBA defensive team.

This, combined with Steve Nash winning the MVP, is why the NBA regular season awards mean about as much as the heisman trophy these days.

Since I did not create this blog until near the end of Round 1 of the NBA Playoffs, and because there was so much that happened throughout Round 1, this entry includes my thoughts on all eight first round series. Each playoff series is discussed in order from the least impressive level of play to the most impressive level of play. Or in the words of Bill Walton, they are ranked from “the most horrible display of basketball I’ve ever seen in my life” to “this reminds me of the time I played with the Boston Celtics with Larry Bird and Robert Parish and Kevin McHale.” NOTE: Not every column will be this long, but I have to cover two weeks of basketball and 8 series in one column, so bear with me.

(As a side note, as I write this column, I am watching the Rocky marathon on TNT. Rocky just went toe-to-toe with Hulk Hogan, playing the role of a pro wrestler named Thunderlips, who can best be described as a cross between WWE Superstars The Godfather and Val Venis. My favorite thing about the Rocky movies is that in 5 movies and multiple fight scenes, there is not a single punch blocked in the entire series; every punch either connects right on the kisser or hits nothing but air. If real boxing matches were anything like the fights in the Rocky movies, I would order every single boxing pay-per-view. I have never ordered a boxing pay-per-view)

8. New Jersey vs. Indiana (New Jersey in 6 games)

Is this series over yet? Who won? Since only two games in this series made it on national TV, I saw about 2 quarters of play in this entire series, and judging from the Sportscenter highlights, I don’t really feel like I missed anything. New Jersey won the series in 6 games, and only one game was decided by 5 points or less. This was your typical post-1998 Eastern Conference first round playoff series between two teams that probably wouldn’t even make the playoffs if they played in the West.

Jason Kidd got outplayed by his former backup Anthony Johnson. I bring this up as it relates to my favorite NBA team (the Spurs) and the current state of their franchise. After the 2003 NBA Finals, when the Spurs beat the Nets, Kidd became a free agent that summer. Kidd expressed an interest in playing for San Antonio with Tim Duncan, and the Spurs made a fairly strong push to sign Kidd that offseason, due primarily to the struggles of the 21-year old Tony Parker during this series. Because Kidd was the runner up to Duncan in the MVP voting in 2002 and just led the Nets to back-to-back NBA Finals appearances, the 30-year old Kidd was commanding a max contract on the free agent market at the time. Signing Kidd would have been a huge mistake and the Spurs would not have been able to re-sign Parker or Ginobili if they signed Kidd. The best Kidd could do against his former backup in this series was 8 ppg on 29% shooting. Meanwhile, Parker and Ginobili have both made an all-star game since Kidd signed with New Jersey, and both have signed 6 year deals with the Spurs. The COMBINED value of Parker’s and Ginobili’s contracts is a mere $118M, and against Sacramento, these two combined for 37 points a game on a combined 49.7% shooting. Kidd not signing with the Spurs is the best thing to happen to the Spurs organization since winning the Draft Lottery in 1997.

The only other thing worth noting in this series… Peja Stojakovic only played 2 games in the series. Anyone else think that Larry Legend regrets not pulling the trigger on the Artest-for-Maggette trade right now? This decision by Bird is magnified even more when you consider Peja is a free agent this summer.

7. Denver vs. LA Clippers (Clippers in 5 games)

This was the series of the quitters. One team quit with 3 weeks left in the regular season (LA Clippers), and the other team quit once the playoffs began (Denver). The Clippers took an intentional nose-dive at the end of the season, going 5-6 in April to avoid the 5th seed in the West and consequently avoid the Dallas Mavericks in the first round. But then again, what else would you expect from a team who is known more for losing than anything else?
Worrying about your first round series opponent enough to intentionally lose games is not only chicken-[censored], it is also the sign of a team that gets satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment by getting to the 2nd round. Let me use this as an avenue to comment on the current NBA playoff seeding format, which has drawn constant criticism for the Mavs being seeded 4th despite having the conference’s 2nd best record…

As a Spurs fan, it doesn’t bother me one bit that the Spurs have to play the Mavs in the 2nd round instead of the conference finals, because my expectations are that the Spurs should win the NBA title every year, so if they don’t win the title, it doesn’t make a bit of difference to me whether they lose in game 7 of the NBA Finals or get swept in the first round. This is why you will find a lot more Mavs fans complaining about the playoff seeding system than you do Spurs fans. Mavs fans care about making the conference finals, while Spurs fans care only about winning the title.

I also want to mention that my thoughts and prayers go out to George Karl and his family, as he has had a very difficult year. George underwent treatment for prostate cancer earlier this season, and we know now that George’s son Coby is currently undergoing radiation treatment for thyroid cancer . May God bless the Karl family, and deliver George and Coby from their battles with cancer. “By His wounds, we are healed” -1 Peter 2:24

Back to the action on the court… The only real event worth commenting about in a series of quitters is the testy exchange between Chris Kaman and Reggie Evans in game 4. If you haven’t seen it or missed it, you can see the video here. I’ve been watching NBA games for roughly 20 years, and I have NEVER seen anything like what Evans did to Kaman on this play. I’ve never even seen anything like this in my 15 years of being a fan of pro wrestling. In fact, the only time I remember anyone even suggesting anything remotely close to what Reggie Evans did was by R. Lee Ermey in Full Metal Jacket, when he speculated that Private Cowboy is “… the kind of guy that would [censored] a person in the [censored] and not even have the [censored] courtesy to give him a reach-around!” As a result, from this moment forward, Reggie Evans will be referred to as Private Cowboy.

The thing that bothers me the most about this incident is the punishment Private Cowboy got from the league relative to all other fines and suspensions handed out in the first round. Private Cowboy received a $10,000 fine and no suspension from the league for grabbing and pulling on Chris Kaman’s nuts. Here’s a catalog of all other fines/suspensions in the first round:

Raja Bell: Suspended one game w/out pay for clothesline and take-down of Black Mamba.
Dirk Nowitzky: Fined $15,000 for flagrant foul of Pau Gasol, excessive hard foul.
Richard Hamilton: Fined $15,000 for what looked like an inadvertent elbow to the head of Michael Redd.
Shaquille O’Neal: Fined $25,000 for criticizing officials
James Posey: Suspended one game w/out pay for shoulder checking Kirk Hinrich.
Ron Artest: Suspended one game w/out pay for an elbow to the head of Manu Ginobili when it appeared to me that Manu did a bit of embellishing the impact of the elbow. The irony here is on the first play of the same game, Manu inadvertently elbowed Artest in the mouth and Ron Ron needed 3 stitches in his mouth. Manu, meanwhile, was fine after the Artest elbow.

So if you ask me what I would least like to have happen to me between having my job performance criticized, being elbowed in the face, being clotheslined, or having my nuts grabbed and yanked from behind by another man, the latter is the one that would bother me the most. But according to the league office, the nut-grabbing incident warranted the smallest penalty of any fines and suspensions handed down by the league. Maybe Stu Jackson has no balls after all.

6. Cleveland vs. Washington (Cleveland in 6 games)

The only thing that keeps this series from being ranked #8 on my list is the spectacular talent of LeBron James and Gilbert Arenas. The series had some exciting finishes and was very competitive throughout, with two games going to overtime and Cleveland winning three of their four games by only one point. However, both teams play absolutely no defense, both teams do nothing but play one-on-one offense, and if you removed LeBron and Arenas from their respective teams, each team would win about 15 games. These are easily the two worst-coached teams in the playoffs.

As good as LeBron was offensively in this series, it’s hard to ignore the fact that he averaged 5.67 turnovers a game for the series. Part of this I put on LeBron for trying to pass the ball too much (does he know how bad his teammates are?), and some of this I put on coach Mike James for having only one offensive play in his playbook – Give LeBron the ball at the top of the key and let him try to beat his man off the dribble or pass to an open shooter.

LeBron’s game winner at the end of game 3 might have been the worst case of a missed traveling call the NBA has ever seen, and that’s really saying something when you consider traveling was unofficially removed from the NBA rule book in 1985 when Patrick Ewing entered the league.

I was hoping Washington would win this series, as I felt they had a better chance at challenging Detroit than Cleveland. I found it hard to believe, but Washington swept the season series against Detroit this year 3-0. Needless to say, Detroit breathed a sigh of relief when LeBron’s game-winners went in and Gilbert’s wide open 3-pointer at the end of game 3 rimmed out.

5. Detroit vs. Milwaukee (Detroit in 5 games)

Everyone knew Detroit was going to win this series going away in 4-5 games, and that’s exactly what happened. Detroit would have faced much more resistance from Orlando if they had managed to make the playoffs. The only reason I paid any attention to this series was it marked the first playoff games in the career of former University of Texas and Naismith/Wooden award winner TJ Ford.

Detroit pretty much dominated the series, with the exception of game 3, when Milwaukee shot lights-out and pulled away for a 124-104 victory. Milwaukee has the same problem as Phoenix and Washington, which is also the same problem Cleveland will have with Detroit in Round 2. They don’t play any defense.

TJ Ford’s stats for the series: 12.6 ppg, 6.4 apg (3.2 TO/game), 4.0 rpg. Ford’s best game of the series was easily game 3, when he had only 7 points, but 7 rebounds and 15 assists with only one turnover. Against one of the league’s top 2-3 defenses, the assist/TO ratio in this game was really something special. It’s good to see TJ back playing again after returning from surgery for spinal stenosis and a bruised spinal cord suffered during his 2003-04 rookie season.

4. Miami vs. Chicago (Miami in 6 games)

I’ve been a big fan of the baby Bulls since they hired Gritty, Gutsy Scott Skiles as their head coach. This very young team of NCAA All-Stars has taken on the personality of their coach, the man who holds the NBA record for assists in a game (30). While the Eastern Conference is currently owned by Miami and Detroit, the future of the Eastern Conference is Cleveland, Chicago, and Orlando. These three teams will be dominating the Eastern Conference within 2-3 years.

This series featured 11 players who played in the Final Four during their college career, including three from 2003 and four from 2004 (Luol Deng, Chris Duhon, Ben Gordon, Kirk Hinrich, Luke Schenscher, Derek Anderson, Michael Doleac, Udonis Haslem, Wayne Simien, Dwyane Wade, and Antoine Walker). I’m too lazy to look up if this is a record or not, but it has to be close.

Not much else to say about this series, except to state the obvious that Pat Riley has screwed up everything for the Heat organization in the last 11 months. He ran Stan Van Jeremy out of town. He gave Shaq $100M to play for another 5 years, and Shaq will probably play in about half the regular season games during this contract. So on an 82-game basis, Riley is paying Shaq closer to $40M a season, and Shaq has already been passed over by Yao in productivity this year. Riley brought in as many egos (including his own to the bench) as Isiah Thomas has shoot-first point guards and undersized centers. There are no decent role players on this team, and Shaq’s contract will destroy any chances this team has of getting any to help win a title between 2007 and 2010.

How many good years will Wade have left after Shaq’s contract finally comes off the books and they can rebuild again? How effectively will they rebuild with Riley making the personnel decisions? Who can fire Riley as the head coach, and if nobody can, how long will it be before he realizes he should have never come back to the bench in the first place?

3. Phoenix vs. LA Lakers (Phoenix in 7 games)

I know what you’re thinking… why isn’t this series ranked #1 on my list? This series went 7 games, pretty much every game going down to the wire. It included the guy who reportedly won the MVP award and the guy who should have won it (see Simmons column here on why Mamba should have won it instead of Nash. Numerous ESPN columnists even suggested in the last week that this was the best first round series ever (I disagree by the way… the best first round series I remember watching was the 1999 best-of-5 series between the Sacramento Kings and Utah Jazz).

The reason this series ranked no higher than third on my list is I think both teams involved in this series would have lost a series to either team in the Dallas/Memphis or San Antonio/Sacramento series.

The thing I love the most about game 7 is every single pre-game quote from every player on both teams includes the TNT slogan “Win or Go Home.”

The turning point in the momentum of this series had nothing to do with this series at all. The series turned at the point when the Clippers won their series 4-1. With the Lakers already up 3-1 at the time, every sports-writer in America, including Bill Simmons, proceded to write an article speculating on the possibility of a Lakers/Clippers 2nd round playoff, dubbed the “Hallway Series”. The cardinal rule of sports is whenever the media assumes that anything is a foregone conclusion, the opposite will pretty much always happen. The most blatent example of this in recent memory is the ESPN series on whether or not USC’s 2005 football team was the greatest team ever, BEFORE THEY EVEN WON THE ROSE BOWL! Well, we all know how that turned out, don’t we? Other examples include Miami also being called the "best ever" prior to losing the 2002 Fiesta Bowl and Oklahoma’s 2003 football team, called the “greatest offense ever” before they scored 21 combined points in their final two games of the season, both losses. Unfortunately for the Lakers, they weren’t able to overcome the cardinal rule.

The highlight of following this series has to be Mamba’s “Who IS this guy?! Do I KNOW this guy?!... Maybe he wasn’t hugged enough as a kid” trash talk lesson he gave to Raja Bell. In my view, it has already achieved the same status in terms of humor, memorability, and repeat listen-to-ability as Jim Mora’s “Playoffs?!?” press conference and AI’s “Practice!” press conference. The only thing that separates them is that Jim Mora’s and AI’s soliloquies were great examples of unintentional comedy, while Black Mamba’s display of comedy was completely intentional.

2. Dallas vs. Memphis (Dallas in 4 games)

Dallas was pretty much the most impressive team in the first round of the playoffs, but then again, so were the Spurs when they played Memphis in the first round in 2004 and the Suns when they played Memphis in the first round in 2005, and neither of those teams won the title. Dallas was the only team to get a sweep in the first round, and they did so against a high-quality opponent in Memphis, who is the tough-luck team of playoff pairings. The teams the Grizz have played in the first round of the NBA Playoffs the last three years won 57, 62, and 60 games during the regular season. So while they have the worst losing streak to start the playoffs ever, they have also probably played the hardest schedule of any team in their first three playoff series.

Now that Dallas has finally replaced Nellie with Avery Johnson, and because Dallas kept their core roster together for the first time since Cuban bought the team, the Mavs are a legitimate title contender for the first time ever under Cubes. Dallas will win an NBA title in the next 5 years as long as they keep Dirk, Howard, Terry, and Devin Harris, but I don’t think they can win it all this year.

This is the first time anyone on Dallas’s roster other than Dirk has faced San Antonio in the playoffs. Ironically, San Antonio has more players on their current roster from Dallas’ 2003 team that played the Spurs (Van Exel, Finley) than Dallas has (Dirk). The way to win a title is to get a good core group of 3 or 4 guys, keep them together for a long time, have them lose to the team that won the title recently, and keep the same group together until you get over the hump and beat them.

The Bad Boys Pistons had to lose to Bird’s Celtics and Magic’s Lakers before beating both in 1989. Jordan’s Bulls had to lose to those same Celtics and Pistons before beating them in 1991. The Knicks had to lose to the Bulls from 91-93 before reaching the finals in 94. More recently, the Lakers were swept by the Spurs in 99 before winning the title and dominating the Spurs through 2002, and then the Spurs had to lose to the Lakers in 2001 and 2002 before beating them in 2003 and winning another title.

So the Mavs are still a year away. I’m willing to bet that the year the Mavs beat the Spurs in the playoffs will be the same year they win their first title.

1. San Antonio vs. Sacramento (San Antonio in 6 games)

I went to see game 1 of this series live with the Texas Sports Gal, and watched the Spurs turn an 8 point first quarter lead into a 34 point blowout by halftime. From the moment the teams came out of the locker room at halftime of game 1 until halftime of game 6, this series was as highly competitive, evenly matched, and displayed the highest level of play from both teams as any first round series this year. If Dallas was the most impressive team in round one and Detroit was the 2nd most impressive, San Antonio and Sacramento check in at #3 and #4, respectively. Bonzi Wells played at an MVP level throughout the series, and I have never seen anyone dominate Bruce Bowen over the course of an entire series like Wells did here. Wells averaged 23.2 ppg, 12 rpg, and shot 63% on 3-pointers in this series, numbers that compare very favorably to Duncan’s two MVP seasons (2002: 25.5/12.7 2003: 23.3/12.9). So Bonzi Wells is this year’s Jerome James, the guy who will parlay one playoff series in a contract year to get an NBA GM like Isiah to pay him twice what he is worth.

Quick story… The Texas Sports Gal is a big Manu fan… she has a figurine of Manu over our fireplace, she wears a Manu jersey whenever we watch the Spurs play, and today I found a laminated newspaper photo of Bonzi grabbing Manu’s pants. After Manu lost game 3 on his 7th turnover of the night in the final seconds, I told the Texas Sports Gal I would burn the Manu jersey if he had another game like this one. After Manu scored three points in game four, I told her I won’t have to burn it because it will become obsolete once the Spurs trade him in the off-season. But Manu came back strong in game 5 as he always seems to do, so her #20 jersey is safe for at least another couple weeks.

Two final things I wanted to mention about this series. First, although Duncan’s stats in this series are very comparable to his season stats, he looked better in this series than he has all year. Second, Rick Adelman did a very impressive coaching job in this series, and the Maloofs would be insane not to re-sign him to a contract extension and keep him around as long as he wants to be around those two loonies. Nobody, including Phil Jackson, did a better coaching job than Adelman.

Bring on the Mavs.