Category: NBA Basketball

Land-o-Links – 5/31/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Chicago Bulls, Land-o-Links, Music, NBA Basketball, Politics, Sports, Television3 Comments

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As I prepare to actually have to cheer for a team from Cleveland since Deron Williams (as much as he tried) wasn’t able to derail the Western half of the impending national nightmare of another Pistons-Spurs NBA Finals, here are some links:

(1) Priceless! (Chicago Tribune) – When I was flying on JetBlue a couple of weeks ago, which has DirecTV at every seat, I came across a showing of “Happy Gilmore” and my wife had to restrain me from busting out of my seat in laughter during Bob Barker’s scenes even though I’ve seen them a million times.  There are also two programs I’ll always remember watching on TV during the days that I spent at my Grandma’s house when I was a kid: baseball on WGN and the “The Price is Right”.  As to the thought of Rosie O’Donnell or Mario Lopez as replacements for the legendary Barker, I only have one thing to say: the price is wrong, bitch!

(2) Lost Season 3 Finale Recap (The Lost Blog) – SPOILER ALERT IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN THE “LOST” SEASON FINALE.  After a pretty disappointing “24” season – CTU has been compromised more than [insert Lindsay Lohan joke here] – the “Lost” season finale more than made up for it with a simply mind-blowing turn with the flash forward.  I’m not quite convinced that the Losties are getting off of the island at the very beginning of next season; for once, I think Ben isn’t feeding a line of B.S. that the “rescuers” are going to do a lot more harm than good.  Anyway, I’m extremely glad that I didn’t encounter the numerous spoilers that were posted on the Internet prior to the show’s airing since the surprise twist had such a huge impact if you didn’t know it was coming.  I argued last year that “Lost” (and pretty much all television programs) ought to go to a “24”-type of schedule where all of the episodes run in succession without reruns, which ABC has decided to do.  Even though I still think that’s a good idea, that also means we’re going to have to wait until next February for new episodes, which is going to be an excruciating wait after such an incredible cliff hanger.

(3)  Thompson Begins Steps for 2008 Bid (Washington Post) – I personally like Fred Thompson and he was great on “Law & Order”, but with the likelihood of the two parties’ presidential nominees being decided within the first month of the primary season, the late start in the money race is going to be an albatross on the viability of his candidacy.

(4) Kobe Wants to be Traded… or Does He? (Los Angeles Times) – Don’t tease me with another NBA star allegedly on the market that would look pretty nice in a Bulls uniform.  As much as I’d like to see it happen, there’s no way Kobe Bryant is leaving Hollywood – this will blow over.

And finally…

(5)  50 Cent’s Investment Pays Off (AllHipHop.com) – Remember last year when 50 Cent starting selling grape drink?  Showing that sugar, water, and purple equals Fort Knox, Coca-Cola is buying the company that produces 50’s drink where his take is going to end up being around $400 million.  Something tells me that the “G” in G-Unit must stand for “grape”.

(Image from celebsarepeopletoo.com) 

Bulls’ Powerball Lottery Dreams Turn Into a Scratch-and-Win Card

On By Frank the TankIn Chicago Bulls, NBA Basketball, Sports7 Comments

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Well, all of you can finally get a reprieve with my nearly 2-year obsession with this year’s NBA Draft Lottery… after this monster superpost due the confluence of this event along with pent-up frustrations from the Bulls – Pistons series. With only a 1.9% chance of landing the #1 pick, I didn’t have very high hopes for the Chicago Bulls leaping into the top 2 to grab either Greg Oden or Kevin Durant. Still, like one of those schmucks that buy lottery tickets every week and spend all of their days dreaming of what they would do with all of that money if they ever won, the fact that the Bulls had even a small chance of ending up with Oden or Durant made this about as heart-pounding of an event that you could ever have in an office building in Secaucus, New Jersey. Nonetheless, the Bulls ended up right where they were projected to be at #9, while the Portland Trailblazers and Seattle Supersonics got the ultimate prizes of the top two franchise-altering picks. Here is the postmortem on the NBA Draft Lottery in general followed by my thoughts on the Bulls offseason:

  • With the Trailblazers effectively winning Greg Oden (I know some people think they might take Durant considering that they already have some size with LaMarcus Aldridge, but considering that every dynasty in NBA history that didn’t have a guy named Michael Jordan was anchored by a dominant center, I can’t see how Portland isn’t taking Oden), Brandon Roy, who was the team’s representative in lovely Secaucus, got a ton of airtime. This brings to mind the headline for my post the day before last year’s NBA Draft: “R-O-Y Spells Rookie of the Year for the Bulls” in an argument for the Bulls to pick Roy if they didn’t parlay the pick in a blockbuster trade for Kevin Garnett. Well, Roy certainly went on to win the Rookie of the Year Award but the Bulls ended up passing on him to grab Tyrus Thomas. I love Thomas’ defensive presence and freakish athleticism (I swear that he can jump up and grab the top of the backboard without a hitch), yet it’s pretty clear that Roy would have contributed a whole lot more pretty quickly, which would have been key for a club that (a) needs to make the most of its substantial financial investment in Ben Wallace as soon as possible and (b) could have done it in a year where you would have found better competition on an average night at Rucker Park than the Eastern Conference. Instead, the Bulls got bounced out of the playoffs again, while Roy is going to be paired up with Oden in what might very well become the next great NBA duo along the lines of Michael and Scottie, Shaq and Kobe (in happier times), and Magic and Kareem. I’m not saying that Roy would have propelled the Bulls over the Pistons, but they certainly would have had a better chance considering that he’s a go-to scorer and the team from the Chi shot around 35% from the field in each of their round 2 losses.
  • Speaking of the hapless Eastern Conference, it figures that the top two franchise players in years are going to both end up on the West Coast to further cement the inferiority of the collection of teams east of the Mississippi River. At least we’re not going to get many “David Stern frozen envelope” theories out of this draft – I can’t imagine that the NBA would have wanted the balance of power in the league to tip even further to the West.
  • I’ll have to say that the Blazers and Sonics fans are two constituencies that can argue that they truly deserve the next superstars of Oden and Durant. Even though they aren’t located in the marquee media markets of Chicago or Boston (more on them in a moment), at least basketball fans didn’t have to suffer through the indignity of one of these stars toiling away with franchises such as the Grizzlies or Hawks (who dodged a huge bullet since if they drew anything lower than the #3 pick, which they got, would have resulted in losing their first round choice to the Suns). Sure, the Sonics seem bent on leaving Seattle, but that’s because of the ludicrous transfer of ownership there as opposed to the lack of a fan base. I still don’t buy that they’re heading to Oklahoma City, even though that town showed great support for the Hornets. In a perfect world based purely on the viability of markets, the Sonics would stay in Seattle (too large and wealthy of a market for the NBA to leave) and then Las Vegas and Oklahoma City would respectively get the Grizzlies (Memphis just can’t sustain that franchise) and Hornets (politically incorrect to move them in the relative wake of Hurricane Katrina, but New Orleans wasn’t a good NBA market way before the levees ever broke). Hopefully, the star power of Kevin Durant is to spark a greater movement to keep the Supersonics where they belong in the Pacific Northwest.
  • While watching the Bulls get the expected #9 pick prompted an internal “Oh well, what can you do with those odds?” response from me, I audibly gasped with no one around me when I saw the Celtics come up at #5 – the worst possible position that they could have ended up with. Now, it’s hard to have much sympathy for the most successful franchise in NBA history – this would be akin to a lot of the intimations that UCLA is “due” on the college basketball side for not winning a national championship in (OMG!) over a decade. That being said, Bostonians are home to one of the few groups of fans from a particular city that I have great respect for (to me, Chicago, Detroit, Boston, and Philadelphia are the standard-bearers for across-the-board fandom, as opposed to, say, the single sport obsessions of St. Louis with the Cardinals or Green Bay with the Packers), so while places such as Memphis will move on from this evening with nary a scratch, I feel a little tinge of sadness that the 2007 NBA Draft Lottery will be vividly remembered as yet another infamous event in Beantown sports history to be included with Len Bias, the Tim Duncan draft, Bill Buckner, Bucky Dent, etc. Of course, since the Red Sox are the best team in baseball and the Patriots look like a force again with the thought of Tom Brady tossing it deep to Randy Moss next season, no one should cry too much for New England.

So, this gets to the most prominent question on my mind: what should Bulls do this offseason? If you recall my thoughts during the Final Four, I stated the following: “Lord help me if Joakim Noah ends up in a Bulls uniform.” Well, the Bulls have the #9 pick and I probably don’t have to tell you who the authoritative NBADraft.net projects at that spot right now… just drop a piano weighted down by an anvil on my head if this happens.

All of the Chicago media prior to the lottery today had reports of Bulls general manager John Paxson’s comments that seemed to give the impression that he wasn’t interested in moving this year’s pick, even assuming that it would end up at the projected #9, or making many changes to the team. I really hope that this is just a display of Paxson coyly keeping his cards under wraps before making a monster move, but I really fear that the Bulls are just going to go through the motions of the draft and make a few changes around the edges without taking any risks for greater success. I have stated before that I enjoy the effort and hustle of the Bulls team as presently constructed, yet also made it clear that simply having great character guys isn’t good enough for me – I want more NBA championships. Therefore, if that means that we need to take a risk with a guy that might not necessarily fit into the team’s “culture” on paper, then so be it.The last thing we need is a solid-but-not-game-changing young player (i.e. Joakim Noah) – it’s time for a trade for a cornerstone guy that should have been executed a year ago. Of course, that’s a whole lot easier said than done. Kevin Garnett would obviously fix all of the Bulls’ problems, but the Timberwolves GM Kevin McHale seems to be on the opposite end of the spectrum from Paxson, where he’s so obsessed with keeping his star that he refuses to make changes that would get more wins overall. Pau Gasol’s name is constantly tossed around as being the next Bull and he would certainly provide the low-post scoring presence that the team sorely lacks, yet I just don’t get the heart-fluttering feeling from him. That is, does Gasol really scare anyone outside of the fear of getting caught in his nappy neckbeard? I don’t know if that’s the case. The Bulls are already filled with highly-skilled players that opponents might respect but don’t necessarily fear.

With all of this in mind and assuming that McHale continues with his stubborn refusal to move Garnett, the Bulls need to make a real move for Jermaine O’Neal of the Indiana Pacers. He’s not the prototypical Paxson type of guy, which is exactly what the Bulls need, meaning someone with a real edge. Granted, O’Neal needs some help on the mental front with his supposed desire to join Isiah Thomas and his cesspool Knicks franchise, but I think if he’s presented with the opportunity to latch onto a Bulls team that would probably become the best team in the Eastern Conference and a true championship contender next season with his presence, he’ll pass up Broadway for the Madhouse on Madison. He won’t come cheap, but if the Bulls offer Larry Bird and the Pacers Ben Gordon, Tyrus Thomas, and the #9 pick in this year’s draft, I think (a) it would be enough of a return for the Pacers for this to be a justifiable trade and (b) the loss of an outside scorer in Gordon would be more than tempered by the prospect of giving Luol Deng and Kirk Hinrich more freedom to roam the perimeter with O’Neal as a top-tier scoring option down low.

All in all, it turned out the NBA Draft Lottery wasn’t the instant solution for the Bulls. Greg Oden and Kevin Durant, not to mention LeBron James at a mere 22 years old, are going to be in the NBA for a very long time. As a result, John Paxson can’t be lulled into thinking the Bulls as they stand today are simply going to keep progressing in a linear fashion – I have serious reservations as to how much better this team can get. While Paxson made a bold move in signing Ben Wallace last summer, this offseason is going to require an even bigger splash in order for the Bulls to really be in contention for another ring.

UPDATE: For the record, Nick Collison is definitely not my idea of bold move by the Bulls.

(Image from Philly.com)

Stuck in the Middle with A.J.

On By Frank the TankIn Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Major League Baseball, NBA Basketball, Random Thoughts, Sports5 Comments

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Since the Bulls made a decent run in the NBA Playoffs (I’ll have some thoughts on the Bulls heading into the offseason after Tuesday’s NBA Draft Lottery), I haven’t had the opportunity to focus on baseball too much yet. Fortunately, I didn’t have much time to sulk over the Bulls’ ugly performance last Thursday to be closed off by the Pistons since Chicago’s city baseball series was rekindled on Friday. Needless to say, this past weekend’s crosstown series between the White Sox and Cubs at Wrigley Field was a display of how shaky both of the bullpens in Chicago are at this point. As your resident White Sox fan, witnessing A.J. Pierzynski deal the crushing blow to the Cubs with a grand slam on the one-year anniversary of Michael Barrett’s cheap shot on the South Side catcher was sweet justice. Of course, all of this was in the wake of Ozzie Guillen’s insane and profanity-laced phone call into the Mike North show on Friday in an argument over A.J.’s playing time. Other than Jim McMahon and Dennis Rodman, I can’t think of any other Chicago athlete that’s been involved in as many controversies as Pierzynski – it’s a serious constant here. Some other random thoughts from another wacky city series:

  • I was taken aback by the sight of Emperor Palpatine calling the game in the WGN broadcast booth on Sunday, but I then realized that it was Hawk Harrelson in a black hooded sweatshirt.
  • In the battle of the pitchers involved in the latest trade between the Sox and Cubs, those being David Aardsma and Neal Cotts, there were no winners but a lot of losers.
  • Good sign for White Sox fans: the team is batting an atrocious .223, with Paul Konerko hovering around the Mendoza line, yet this team is still a game over .500. The greatest strength for the Sox coming into the season was supposed to the offense and even though that hasn’t happened so far, Konerko is going to come around, particularly with Jim Thome getting back into the lineup. So, the fact that the Sox are keeping pace in spite of some absolutely horrendous offensive stats is a very good thing.
  • Bad sign for Cubs fans: Ted Lilly and Jason Marquis have a combined 9-3 record and ERAs under 2.80, yet the team is still a game under .500. As a consummate fantasy baseball player, I know all about the statistical histories of Lilly and Marquis – eventually, they will both royally suck. Therefore, the fact that the Cubs aren’t over .500 when their two shakiest pitchers have unexpectedly pitched out of this world is a very bad thing.
  • I’ll say something nice about Bud Selig for once: his push to start interleague play has been a fantastic development for baseball even though plenty of people criticized it when it was initially implemented.
  • Of course, I’ll quickly qualify the preceding statement with the following criticism: the two unchallenged marquee interleague matchups are the White Sox – Cubs and Yankees – Mets (no others come close in terms of intensity and interest), so why do these two series take place at the exact same time every year? The NFL and NBA do everything that they can to schedule their marquee games in a balanced manner so that there’s maximum national exposure for those matchups, yet Major League Baseball always schedules the Chicago and New York intra-city series on the same two weekends every season for no good reason. Maybe it’s just me, but I would think that the nationwide Fox and ESPN audiences would want the opportunity to watch both of these intense rivalries as opposed to only one of them or, say, some “exciting” Giants – Mets or Braves – Padres games (both national telecasts on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball in the next few weeks). This seems as simple as moving Opening Day to the first Sunday in April so that it doesn’t conflict with the NCAA Tournament Championship Game and the average fan can spend the whole day watching games without having to miss work or school, but common sense hasn’t ever been one of Bud Selig’s strongest attributes.

Anyway, this wasn’t the best weekend for Sox fans, yet it at least ended on an uptick. Fortunately, the White Sox get another shot at the Cubs at U.S. Cellular Field in a month.

(Image from Chicago Tribune)

Land-o-Links – 5/15/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Major League Baseball, Music, NBA Basketball, Sports, TelevisionLeave a comment

We’ll see if the Bulls can make things interesting by extending the season tonight.  Until then, here are some links:

(1) Girth and Nudity, a Pictorial Mission (New York Times) – There are some things that you can’t unsee.  Thanks, Spock.

(2) 1st-Class Star for Second City? (Chicago Tribune) – The rumors of A-Rod going to the Cubs or White Sox pop up about as often as those rumors of Kevin Garnett being traded to the Bulls (meaning that they’ve been in the Chicago papers on a weekly basis).  These deals really ought to happen, but the respective traders of the Yankees and Timberwolves can’t get over the thought of letting their superstars go even if it’s for the greater good of their teams.

(3) TV Just Got a Lot ‘Whiter’, Says a Canceled George Lopez (Los Angeles Times) – With Jim Belushi (worst Chicago “celebrity” ever) also axed by ABC, TV also just got a lot funnier through addition by subtraction.

(4) Brett Favre: ‘I Don’t Want to Be Traded… We Can Be Pretty Good (NFL FanHouse) – Your SportsCenter lineup for the next 5 months: (1) every Barry Bonds swing, (2) every Roger Clemens rehab pitch, (3) previews of the next and reviews of the last Yankees-Red Sox series, and (4) every Brett Favre utterance about retirement/non-retirement/trades/non-trades.  This will all lead up to the Duke/UNC basketball season.

And finally…

(5) MTV Developing Reality Series ‘Rapping With the Stars’ (AllHipHop.com) – I think America is ready for a half-Asian/half-Caucasian rap superstar named Frank the Tank.  Stop snitchin’, kids.

Bulls Bust Out the Brooms and Land-o-Links for 4/30/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Bulls, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, Land-o-Links, Major League Baseball, NBA Basketball, NFL Football, Random Thoughts, Sports, Television3 Comments

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At the beginning of the year, I was supremely confident in the advancement of the Bulls and even predicted that they would make it to the NBA Finals. Still, after the way that they faltered against the Nets on the last day of the regular season, I was questioning aloud the team’s intestinal fortitude, even after beating the Heat in the round 1 opener of the NBA Playoffs. However, by the end of the third quarter on Friday night in game 3, my belief in the Bulls was resurrected. I saw a team that answered every single charge from the defending champs that will ultimately put multiple players into the Hall of Fame with poise and efficiency. In game 4, they did the exact same thing by taking one last punch from the Heat and then completely knocking them out. I’ll be honest – I thought that this was going to be a 7-game barn burner as opposed to a Bulls sweep. Yet, with the way the Bulls took out Miami with such vigor and strength, I’m ready for a true revitalization of our rivalry with the Pistons. It’s going to be a tough road and who knows whether the Bulls can hang with the Detroit team that they’re modeled after, but I can’t wait to see NBA basketball being played into May in Chicago once again.

On to some more links:

(1) Deng’s Emergence Isn’t Totally Unexpected (ESPN.com) – I don’t agree with Scoop Jackson very often, but I’m right with him in understanding long before the Heat series that Luol Deng would be the key to the Bulls when no one else noticed him. Here’s what I said in my NBA Preview in November: “The real X-factor is how much Luol Deng improves this season. If he stays injury-free, he could very well become the top all around player on the team that’s the go-to guy that the Bulls have been lacking. In my opinion, how well the Bulls will do this season will depend upon the progress of Luol Deng more than anyone else.” That is the first and last time that I’ve said anything right on this blog.

(2) ‘Idol’ Gives Back, We Give Up (Moraes on TV – Washington Post) – As a whole, I enjoy the pomp and circumstance of “American Idol”.  However, when Elvis was brought back from the dead to do a duet with Celine Dion, I almost ralphed on the couch.

(3) The Latest Must-Have for Yuppies: A Blog About the Neighborhood (New York Times) – I grew up as a south side White Sox fan and despised Wrigleyville for its yuppie quotient.  When I presented this reasoning to my wife one day, she looked at me increduously, called me out as a hypocrite and basically said that I was one of the biggest yuppies that she had ever met.  After feverishly denying this, I then took a look at myself and came to a disheartening conclusion. I have a house in Naperville after previously living only blocks away from Wrigley Field (not Wrigleyville per se, but close enough), got business and law degrees, actually crave Chipotle burritos, would take a foreign luxury sedan over a Detroit muscle car as a dream car any day of the week, don’t mind a Starbucks every once in awhile and would rather go to Ravinia than a rock concert these days. In other words, my wife was right – I have become one of yuppies I used to abhor. Really, I used to be cool… seriously, OK? I’m still a Sox fan, so that counts for something, right? Right???

(4) The Right Pick, Despite Wrong Agent (Chicago Tribune) – The Bears took tight end Greg Olsen from Miami in the first round of the NFL Draft, who looks like a beast, yet all anyone seems to care about right now is that he’s represented by Drew Rosenhaus. The slick agent also represents Lance Briggs, who is pretty much holding up the status of the Bears linebacker core for next year with his insistence on getting a long-term contract into place. Still, the fact is that Rosenhaus has a number of the top players in the NFL and it’s likely the Bears are going to have to deal with him for a long time.  I just hope that both parties can work to get mutually beneficial deals into place (unlike, say, the apparent inability of the White Sox to get anything done with baseball super agent Scott Boras).

As a side note on the NFL Draft, I’ve been saying ever since that I started this blog that Brady Quinn was overrated (I fail to see how anyone could have reasonably thought that he was in the same class as JaMarcus Russell after this year’s Sugar Bowl), but the way that he dropped down all the way to #22 after being projected to go as high as even #2 made Matt Leinart’s time in the waiting room last year look like a nice Saturday in the park.  The Browns would have been insane to take Quinn at #3 and made the right call with Joe Thomas, yet subsequently being able to get the quarterback they wanted much later in the first round (and for a lot less money) was the draft day coup.

Also, I enjoyed the fact that the Detroit Lions actually had little choice other than to take Calvin Johnson, who is yet another wide receiver for that team.  There was little questioning of this move since Johnson was almost unanimously considered the best athlete in this year’s draft class, but Matt Millen’s development of marquee first round wide receiver draft choices has been about as successful as the long term growth of Mark Prior and Kerry Wood for the Cubs.  It’s just unbelieveable that after using high first round choices on wide receivers in four of the last five years, the Lions still fell like that they had a need there.

Finally, my gut reaction to the New England Patriots getting Randy Moss in exchange for a fourth round draft pick was a great move.  There are going to be voices out there stating that the Pats shouldn’t be bringing trouble into their locker room, but the fact is that the team needs a top flight wideout and they grabbed someone who is still one of the best talents in the NFL.  Something tells me that Moss is going to have a bit more success getting back into the end zone with Tom Brady at quarterback instead of Aaron Brooks.  Honestly, I’m glad Moss didn’t end up with the Packers as was rumored for the last few weeks.  A lot of Green Bay fans might have had a visceral reaction to that thought, but judging by how that team went 8-8 last year, adding a top wideout would have made that team even more competitive immediately.  Fans can get over prior enemies pretty quickly (see Dennis Rodman with the Bulls) when they help you win after turning to your side.

And finally…

(5) Michael Jordan Ready To Bag Champaign Coeds (Deadspin) – Those that know me understand that my love for the University of Illinois knows no bounds while Michael Jordan will forever be my idol.  So, with the announcement that Jeff Jordan is heading to Illinois, the thought of MJ being on the prowl in Campustown makes me smile.

(Image from Chicago Tribune)

A Running of the Bulls in ’07 or Will ’08 Be Great?

On By Frank the TankIn Chicago Bulls, NBA Basketball, Sports1 Comment

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By virtue of an ugly loss at New Jersey last Wednesday night, the Bulls managed to go from a virtual lock to getting to the NBA Eastern Conference Finals as a #2 seed down to underdogs in the first round as the #5 seed against the Miami Heat.  Even though the Bulls were able to dispense of Shaq and Dwyane Wade yesterday in game 1, I still have a ton of aprenhension as to the prospects of this team.  Certainly, the Bulls are improved from the last year’s playoff run while the Heat are weaker with a less-than-100% Wade (which is still probably better than anyone else in the league other than Kobe Bryant and LeBron James).  Yet, the Bulls pretty much had to ride a smoking performance by Luol Deng and a fourth quarter where Shaq and D-Wade spent a lot of time on the bench due to foul troubles in order to pull out a win in the comforts of the United Center.  I think the Bulls may have enough energy and depth to get past the Heat in what could very well be a seven game series, but with the Detroit Pistons looming in round 2, it’s going to be extremely tough to get to the Eastern Conference Finals for the Bulls this year.  That’s the thing with this Bulls team – I love their energy and defensive intensity, which means that they are able to hang on most nights with the elite teams such as the Pistons and Heat, yet they are also very capable of getting beaten by mediocre teams in any given game (i.e. their continuous problems with the Nets) since they don’t have a type-A scorer or a low-post force.

Which brings us to the other side of this equation: this year’s NBA Draft.  I’ve been writing about the potential Bulls 2007 draft pick ever since I started this blog, which was several months before Greg Oden even started looking for tuxes for his senior high school prom.  As much as you hear about living for today, the fact of the matter is that this is going to be one of those history-shaking drafts that will determine the balance of power in pro basketball for the next decade.  Unfortunately, the Bulls suffered another huge loss on Wednesday with the Knicks winning and moving up one place in the final league standings.  That drastically reduced the chances of the Bulls getting one of the top two picks in the draft by virtue of Chicago owning New York’s pick from the Eddy Curry trade.  Still, is there any NBA executive, shoe company, or basketball observer outside of the 4 or 5 Memphis Grizzlies fans out there that could possibly want the Tennessee club that holds highest odds to the top pick to get either Greg Oden or Kevin Durant when the marquee large market teams of the Celtics, Bulls, and 76ers are in the same lottery?  David Stern can talk all he wants about how the 1985 Patrick Ewing draft wasn’t fixed in favor of the Knicks, but it’s time for him to give a little push in the best interests of the league.  Even if the Bulls don’t end up with one of the top two picks (as you can tell by my over one-year long obsession with this draft, the Bulls being at the top of this lottery ranks just behind the Illini winning the national championship in terms of future sports wishes), the thought of the NBA’s next superstars in Oden or Durant toiling away in Memphis as opposed to one of the large markets, regardless of the presence of Pau Gasol, is simply horrifying.  The Bulls already have the talent that could get to the top of the Eastern Conference in 2007.  The outcome of this draft, though, is going to determine whether the Bulls becomes the only NBA franchise other than the Celtics and Lakers to have multiple dynasties starting in 2008.

(Image from Chicago Tribune)

Land-o-Links for 2/23/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Bulls, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, Law, Music, NBA Basketball, SportsLeave a comment

As we head into the weekend, here is a mix of random news and sports links:

(1) PTAs Go Way Beyond Cookies (New York Times) – It was only a matter of time before Gordon Gecko started taking over PTA meetings.

(2) But Do They Cover This in Those Big Green Books? (Wall Street Journal Law Blog) – We crazy lawyers have outdone ourselves this time.  It’s not unusual to see a class action lawsuit filed.  However, it’s very unusual to see a class action lawsuit filed on behalf a group of… lawyers.  For what it’s worth, I’ll gladly take a $125 settlement from Bar/Bri (a monopolistic racket that puts Microsoft and Major League Baseball to shame), so the lead plaintiffs here need to simmer down.

(3) It Really is Time We Had a Trade or Two (True Hoop) – I think we’ve gotten to the point where the NBA trade deadline might very well be the most anti-climactic day in sports.  Every year, hoops fans banter on for months about viable swaps involving superstars yet no one ever pulls the trigger.  This season saw Jason Kidd and Pau Gasol added on to the rumor mill with perennial trade bait Kevin Garnett, which all ended up being a ton of hot air.  I mean, Isiah Thomas didn’t even get to give away another draft pick this year.

Note to Timberwolves GM Kevin McHale: for the love of God, trade KG to the Bulls already.  You’re on the outside looking in for the Western playoff race once again with the same old lineup.  You could’ve nabbed two of the Bulls’ top three players – Luol Deng, Kirk Hinrich, and/or Ben Gordon – plus a potential boon of a draft pick this summer in a trade that would’ve aided both teams by giving the T-Wolves a strong base of young players that are already playoff-tested and putting the Bulls in position to fully take advantage of what will surely turn out to be the last couple of productive seasons for Ben Wallace immediately, yet you continue to be maddeningly stubborn.  This is another missed opportunity for everyone involved.

(4) Smith on Bench a Bad Idea (Mark Tupper Weblog) – For all of the national attention on the last dance for Chief Illiniwek on Wednesday (which I didn’t get to see live since I’m not one of the five people in the country that gets ESPNU), the larger concurrent issue for the Illinois basketball program is the awful cloud surrounding Jamar Smith’s criminal charges and the appearance of him being more worried about saving his own hide as opposed to Brian Carlwell’s life.  As much as I loved Jamar’s shooting touch, there’s no place in the Illini program for someone that completely disregarded his moral responsibilities to his teammate, much less the legal aspect of it all.  I’m sure that Bruce Weber and Ron Guenther will eventually make the right call here.

And finally…

(5) Foxy Brown Arrested in South Florida Over Hair Glue, Spitting Incident (AllHipHop.com) – I’m sure that everyone has gone ballistic in a beauty shop at one time.  But twice???

Land-o-Links – 2/12/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Basketball, DePaul Blue Demons, Illinois Fighting Illini, Land-o-Links, Music, NBA Basketball, Politics, Sports1 Comment

As I sit here sulking over not winning my Grammy moment with Justin Timberlake last night, here are some links:

(1) Close Call Would Have Helped on Selection Sunday (Mark Tupper Weblog) – Putting aside my disdain for Satan’s Spawn, Illinois missed a golden opportunity to virtually lock up an NCAA Tournament bid by faltering in the final minute on the road against Indiana on Saturday. As Mark Tupper alludes to in the link, Illini fans are now going to be extremely nervous heading into Selection Sunday. I still believe that a 9-7 record in the Big Ten ought to be enough for a bid (which would require us to win 3 out of the last 4, but we’d better also win at least 1 game in the Big Ten Tournament on top of that to be sure.

(2) Bubble Watch (ESPN.com) – Speaking of the NCAA Tournament and Selection Sunday, ESPN is back with its overview of the bubble teams. What’s amazing is that UConn and LSU, who were simply dominant last year, are almost certainly not going to be invited to the dance unless they win their conference tournaments while Michigan State is pretty close to being in the same position.

(3) A New Chandler in Chicago (Zoner Sports) – In one more note on college basketball before getting onto other subjects, it should be reiterated that Wilson Chandler of DePaul simply rules. That being said, DePaul has been maddeningly inconsistent this season. With victories against Kansas, UConn, and, most recently, Notre Dame, the Blue Demons should have been a lock for the NCAA Tournament along with being at least a middle seed in the Big East Tournament. However, with 3 horrible losses to sub-100 teams in the RPI (including a dreary 49-39 early season loss to Northwestern that had George Mikan rolling in his grave), DePaul isn’t even considered to be a bubble team anymore and still could miss the conference tournament at Madison Square Garden for the second time in as many seasons as a Big East member. The remaining regular season schedule ought to play in DePaul’s favor (besides a home game versus Marquette and a return road game at Notre Dame, the Demons have 2 games against bottom-feeder USF plus a putrid Cincinnati team at home), but their game-to-game inconsistencies have made the Illini look stable in comparison.

(4) Obama Questions Rivals on Iraq (Washington Post) – The most prominent political story in Chicago and the nation from this past weekend was the inevitable announcement by Senator Barack Obama that he will be running for President. As I’ve said before, I never thought that his relative lack of experience in the Senate would matter much on the campaign trail (otherwise, the history books would be peppered with stories about Presidents Dole and Kerry).

However, the main disadavantage that Obama has against Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary and, if he survives that, Rudy Giuliani or John McCain in the general election, is that the Presidential campaign will be the first time that the Senator from Illinois will ever experience the invasive and daily media scrutiny that comes with being on the national stage. While Obama has received almost universal fawning from the national media since his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic Convention, the negative press is going to eventually come and we have no idea how he’s going to react to it. As John Kass pointed out in yesterday’s Chicago Tribune, the national and international media has been ignorant with regard to (or at least ignoring) the Tony Rezko scandal so far – I’d be willing to bet on a lot more damaging stories surfacing as we go along. (I’m not saying Obama is by any means a nefarious person, but bad stories are simply going to come up no matter what.)

Meanwhile, is there anything that can be thrown at Hillary that could be any worse than the Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky scandals while her husband was in the White House? By the same token, what hasn’t Rudy Giuliani heard while having to deal with the rabid New York press on a daily basis for 8 years? If Barack Obama is going to win the Presidency, the key for him will be how he deals with his lack of experience of dealing with the negative, if not personally invasive, media stories that will eventually come to fruition as opposed to only having two years on the national stage in the Senate.

(5) Las Vegas Has Got the Game, but It Wants a Team (New York Times) – If you thought a Super Bowl in Miami was insane, just watch out when the highest-paid athletes in all of sports all get together this weekend in Las Vegas for the NBA All-Star Game. It takes a town with 124,000 hotel rooms to be able to hold that many entourages and posses. Honestly, I’d skip the game just to watch Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley take on the house in blackjack.

On another note, it’s simply criminal that none of the professional sports leagues have set up shop in Las Vegas yet. I can understand the NFL’s reservations since pro football is by far the most wagered on sport (followed by college football and a smattering of college basketball games), but the amount of dollars placed on Major League Baseball,NBA, and NHL games are minimal. As alluded to in the linked article, the best compromise would be for the casinos to take any games played by the Las Vegas franchises off of the board, which would eliminate the largest preceived (if not misguided) fear of illicit activity by the mere presence of teams in the city. With a town that is at the center of one of the nation’s fastest growing metropolitan areas, a magnet for tourists from across the world, and more than flush with potential customers with a ton of cash, it’s only a matter of time before one of the leagues makes the plunge.

And finally…

(6) Bow Wow Launches New Label, Crew (AllHipHop.com) – Anyone can launch a new record label. Launching a new crew, on the other hand…

Land-o-Links – 2/7/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, College Basketball, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, Land-o-Links, Major League Baseball, NBA Basketball, NFL Football, Random Thoughts, Sports2 Comments

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As I thaw off here in Chicago, here are some links:

(1) Where Does Disaster XLI Rank? (Chicago Tribune) – Steve Rosenbloom’s ranking of Chicago’s worst sports disasters. As I noted in the aftermath of this year’s Super Bowl, the only time that I ever felt worse after a sports event than the Bears’ performance on Sunday was the Illini basketball teams’ loss in the 2005 National Championship Game. I can understand Rosenbloom’s ranking of the 2003 NLCS above Super Bowl XLI from a broader Chicago sports fan perspective (even though I personally didn’t feel much distraught from that event as a diehard White Sox fan), but I’m not sure how anything could have been more disasterous than the Black Sox scandal during the 1919 World Series.

(2) Bears Offseason Preview I: The Quarterback (Da’ Bears Blog) – Believe me, I have a love-hate relationship with Rex Grossman as much as anyone. However, are we really at the point where David Carr is the answer? Yikes!

(3) Illinois Has Rivals Fuming About Its Recruiting Coup (New York Times) – Ron Zook is drawing attention across the nation with a top flight recruiting class coming to Champaign next season. Of course, a lot of it stems from what he could possibly be promising such highly-rated recruits. I’ll have many more thoughts on the Illini recruiting situations for football and basketball very soon.

(4) Tempo-Free Aerial: Point Per Possession vs. Opponent PPP (Big Ten Wonk) – A quick chart showing the relative strengths of Big Ten basketball teams during conference play so far.

(5) We Hear That’s Why MJ Did It, Too (Chicagoist) – John Paxson put down a David Stern-esque hammer on Tyrus Thomas for the rookie’s comments on only particpating in the Slam Dunk Contest for the money.

(6) Mars Scraps Snickers Ad After Complaints (Washington Post) – I like to fancy my site as an equal opportunity blog. That being said, am I supposed to feel bad that I thought that this ad was actually one of the few entertaining spots from Sunday?

(7) Sweet Home Sports – A new Chicago sports blog that features the talented authors of the Chi-Sox Blog and Fleece the Pig, Flog the Pony.

And finally…

(8) In the Eye of the Beholder (Wall Street Journal) – What happens when a survey of the American public reveals that the Bellagio is one of the top 25 favorite buildings and structures in the country? Architects go apeshit, of course.

(UPDATE: I couldn’t leave this article from the Chicago Sun-Times on the University of Illinois “Girls of Engineering” calendar off of the links today. Since I was a business major – meaning that I was able to partake in binge drinking with little consequence at Illinois while still under the guise of a “practical” academic program – I’ll just let my readers that attended or are attending the College of Engineering comment on this.)

(Image from Chicago Tribune)

Land-o-Links – 1/10/2007

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Bulls, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, NBA Basketball, NFL Football, Sports3 Comments

I’ve been backed up a bit this week, but here are some links to tide you over until a new Classic Music Video tomorrow and my NFL Divisional Playoff picks on Friday:

(1) Bruce Weber’s Time Is Up (Your School Sux) – I’ve been as disappointed by the Illini’s start to the Big Ten season as anyone (based on the pasting we received on Saturday, our football program arguably has a smaller talent gap with Ohio State than our basketball program, although that might not be saying much after the Buckeyes got womped by Florida in both sports within a three-week span), but the fans need to simmer down just a bit.  If the recruiting situation doesn’t turn around for Bruce this upcoming year (if anyone has some insight on newly committed recruit Quinton Watkins, be sure to chime in), however, the scrutiny is going to be suffocating for him.

(2) Little Asia on the Hill (New York Times) – As your resident Caucasian/Asian halfbreed, this article makes it seem as though Berkeley needs an Affirmative Action program to bring back the hippies.  (Quote: “There are now mostly small protests, against the new chain stores invading Telegraph Avenue, just outside the campus entrance, and to save the old oak trees scheduled for removal so the football stadium can be renovated. The biggest buzz on Telegraph one week was the grand opening of a chain restaurant — the new Chipotle’s, which drew a crowd of students eager to get in. The scent of patchouli oil and reefer is long gone; the street is posted as a drug-free zone.”  The tone of the article makes this appear to be a bad thing.)  It’s extremely disheartening that there’s still an assumption that an influx of Asians must mean that a campus will turn into a science and engineering sweatshop without “well-rounded” students.  Sure, Asians make up a disproportionate share of certain hard science professions such as engineering, yet to somehow translate this fact into a statement that an entire racial group must not care about the arts is ridiculous, particularly when one only has to take a quick look at the number of Asian prodigies in music to recognize that it’s the farthest thing from the truth.

(3) Rachel Nichols, I’ll Let You Inside My Brain If You Let Me Inside Your Hanes Her Ways (Kissing Suzy Kolber) – On another note, this is how Rex Grossman is, uh, decompressing for Sunday’s game.

(4) Game Thread #34: Bulls vs. Detroit Pistons (Blog-a-Bull) – The most beautiful sound that I heard at the United Center on Saturday night: the return of the “DE-TROIT SUCKS” chant.

And finally…

(5) So You Think You Can Be Crazier Right Now? (Chicagoist) – I was born for this job.