The Sports Rumors

March Madness, NBA Season Winding Down, MVP Race

It’s been a hell of a long time since I’ve written on my world renowned website… well, not really renowned. But it has been what, a month? There were so many times over the past few weeks where I felt like I had to put my two cents out there and ruffle some feathers but something kept coming up. You people with the angry text messages and emails forget that I have a job and a career! But regardless, that’s neither here nor there though because I’m back and I guarantee that I’ll have a good percentage of you foaming at the mouth, pissed off and wanting to strangle me. But that’s what I do and that’s why you read, so let’s get this thing going.

First order of business. As you all know, we’re in the center of March Madness. Every year, ESPN goes absolutely ape sh*t about this month and all the upsets and how crazy fun this time of year is. Let me be the one to say it as a former college student and now working professional:

MARCH MADNESS IS OVERRATED.

Wait, what? Did he just say that? Yeah, you’re damn right I said it and I’ll say it again. March Madness is the most overrated event that we have in sports. And please, spare me your financial figures. I know it grosses the most money in Vegas. Here’s why, genius… it’s a month long! There are 63 games (check my math on that one). 63 games present 63 opportunities at minimum to gamble. You think if the Super Bowl was a month long, it wouldn’t gross a higher dollar figure? Secondly, if you like watching school’s you have never heard of, with players you likely won’t ever see again, and free throw shooting percentages from the top seed Memphis that make Shaq look like Jeff Hornacek, then go for it. Watch all the March Madness you want. Me, personally… I like to watch players who can sink open jumpers. I like to watch teams score more than 50 points a game. I don’t like watching players who are incapable of beating a backcourt trap. I like quality, skilled basketball.

Now mind you, I wasn’t like this before. You go back to the days of UCLA and the O’bannon brothers, the Duke years, the Fab Five years, and so on and so forth; that was quality college basketball. Today? Not so much. For God’s sake, the best players in the college ranks are freshmen! The only reason they are even playing in college is because they are forced to. Kevin Love, Rose, OJ Mayo, Beasley… that is talent. Tyler Hansboro is a good college player, but in the NBA, he’s just a more skilled Mark Madsen. Yeah, I said it. He won’t amount to anything in the NBA other than a nice off the bench energy guy. Think I’m wrong? How’s the career of JJ Redick and Adam Morrison working out?

Now I won’t be a total scrooge, and there is no getting around the fact that filling out those brackets and joining office pools is fun. But seriously, I just care about if the teams I selected win; I don’t care how they did it and I certainly don’t care for watching the games. I can honestly say that I’d much rather watch the Warriors-Lakers or Suns-Celtics than Wisconsin-Davidson. That brings me to my next topic of conversation…

God the NBA is so great right now. I can’t remember a time where I was so into every single game and every single box score. Think of all the compelling stories. The Western Conference playoff seeding, the MVP race, Lebron vs The East, the injury bug hitting contenders, and even garbage teams like the Knicks publically preparing to make a run at Lebron and Wade. Since I haven’t written in a long time, it’s hard for me to cover every interesting story in depth, but I will touch on a few.

My ranking of the best teams? Not going to be one of the topics I hit on. Why? Because I don’t know. If I don’t know something enough, I won’t talk about it and hopefully, you can respect me for it. I can’t tell you if the Lakers are the best team in the NBA because I don’t know how healthy Gasol and Bynum will be. I don’t know what the state of the Spurs is because they have been so topsy turvy the past few weeks. I don’t know if the Suns are just hitting a little fluke or if they are actually adjusting to each other (which I doubt). I can’t tell you how good or bad the Mavs are. I can’t tell you with certainty if the Celtics have enough to beat a western conference team in a series, or even the Pistons for that matter. I just don’t know. I do know that ANYONE in the west can beat anyone. I do know that Boston and Detroit from the east are going to be a hell of a challenge in the finals for the Western Conf representative. I do know that Lebron won’t be in the finals this year, much to David Stern’s dismay.

What I do know is that the MVP race is between two, and only two players.

All season long, I was convinced that Kobe Bryant was the most valuable player in the league. I had the following ranking in mind:

1. Kobe
2. Kevin Garnett
3. Lebron James
4. Chris Paul

That’s how I saw it for much of the season. But then I reevaluated things.

Lebron James has all but fallen out of the race in my opinion due to his team’s record in the east. You’re not the most valuable player in the league if you’re team is 40-31 in the east. I’m sorry, but you’re not. This is the conference where the Atlanta Hawks are nine games below .500 and have sole possession of the eighth and final playoff seed. Only three teams in the east have a winning percentage greater than .600, and Cleveland is not one of them. The “Lebron has no help” argument is getting old. Zyrdunas Illguaskas, Drew Gooden, Ben Wallace are three of the big men he has played with. That’s more than a lot of teams have had.

Kevin Garnett has, without a doubt, turned the Celtics from a bottom feeder to a title contender. However, it’s hard to give an MVP award to a guy who has Ray Allen and Paul Pierce playing alongside him. I’m not knocking KG in any way. He’s the pin that keeps that team intact. However, they would still be a playoff team without him.

That leaves us with two players. Kobe Bryant and Chris Paul. Ironically, both are tied for first place in the western conference, which makes this even harder.

If you are not impressed by Chris Paul at this point in the season, you never will be. I responded to friends who asked me about him after the first 30 games and I said, “Let’s wait and see if he can sustain it over a whole season.” Sustain it? He has surpassed EVERY expectation I could have set for him. He is a fierce competitor, makes his teammates better, finds ways to win and can do everything on the court. He can score 40 plus, he can dish 20 dimes, and he could be the first player in league history to average three steals a game. He has an average supporting cast that he has made look great. Basically, he has done everything that he could possibly have done to win the MVP award. Unfortunately for him, the next guy is also balling at a very high level.

Kobe Bryant. He’s been the best player in the game for the past three, maybe four years. No one compares with his tenaciousness and pursuit of perfection. No one. In the past, he did not make teammates better. Now, he does. Look at guys like Jordan Farmar, Ronny Turiaf, Sasha Vujacic, and Luke Walton. They are all playing the best ball of their careers and it’s because Kobe has finally learned how to involve and trust his teammates. Put your past perceptions about him aside and look at this single season alone. He has gotten his teammates involved, sensed when he has had to take over, and done so accordingly with a strikingly high success rate. Pau Gasol has been a great help, but keep in mind, he hasn’t even played 20 games yet with the Lakers. Just in the past ten days alone, Kobe has gone on the road and led the Lakers to victories over the Mavericks and Jazz, snapping their 19 game home win streak. There is nothing more that he can do to win the MVP award, just like Paul.

So who’s my MVP right now?

I’m an honest person and I’ll be real. My bias as a Lakers fan AND the fact that Kobe has been robbed of MVP awards in the past leads me slightly more on his side. I mean, he was ranked the second best shooting guard by ESPN and affiliates in NBA History, second only to the great Michael Jordan, yet he’s never been the most valuable player? That just doesn’t make sense. Now I said it was a slight edge to Kobe. How slight? I’ll give Kobe 50.5% of the vote and Chris Paul 49.5%. And believe me, for those of you who know me and my religious following of Kobe, that’s saying something.

Chris Paul does get love for being in the best damn commercial I’ve seen in a long time though, as seen below:

The NBA season is far from over. Actually, the real season is just about to begin. I cannot wait to see every single playoff matchup (Except the Celtics-Hawks…. I think I’ll pass on that, thanks). I was going to end this article with a mundane sentence, but maybe this will be better, or at least give you a chance to hate on me a little more. Here are some predictions for you to chew on:

Rookie of the Year: Luis Scola (Has intangibles that Durant doesn’t)

NBA Regular Season MVP: Kobe Bryant

Biggest Underachievers: Dallas Mavericks

Surprise Playoff Team: Washington Wizards

Best Playoff Series: Suns vs Spurs

Worst Trade: Shaq to Phoenix (Ruined what that team was based on)

Best Trade: Obviously, Pau to Lakers for dirt

Eastern Conference Champion: Boston Celtics

Western Conference Champion: LA Lakers

NBA Finals: Lakers over Celtics in 6

NBA Finals MVP: Kobe Bryant

And of course…

Ugliest MotherLover in the League: DJ Mbenga

You Might Not Want to Read This if You’re a Dallas Fan

My intentions were to write this piece yesterday, but I obviously didn’t get around to doing so. I wanted to hit on a few topics and throw my valuable two cents out there, starting with this past weekend’s dvisional round of the playoffs.

The Patriots won’t, can’t, be stopped. The Jaguars put everything they had out there and Tom Brady responded by going a nearly perfect 26-28. I’m not going to harp on this too long and I’ll leave it at this; The Patriots are going to win the Super Bowl by double figures.

For all the love Ladanian Tomlinson gets for being a team player and being focused and devoted to the success of the team, he sure didn’t look like he was really interested in what was going on in the third quarter when he was seeing laughing and joking with a buddy on the sideline. I would have much rather seen him hanging around the coaches and watching the game with some interest. His team was losing at that point; it wasn’t like they were up 20.

While I’m on the topic of LT, I wanted to get another thing off my chest. Last year, he whined like a pansy about how the Patriots showed “no class” by dancing on the field after beating the Chargers. He went on to say that it was a reflection of their head coach. Well, LT, your team puts itself out there to be ridiculed and mocked the way they dance and celebrate after every god damned play, including yourself at times. Luis Castillo and Shaun Phillips go out of their way to do ridiculous, and unpleasant to the eye, dances. No one wants to see two fat asses dancing jiggling on the field after stopping a runningback for a one yard gain. And don’t get me started on Philip Rivers and the amount of trash talking he does considering he’s an average, at best, quarterback. If you’re going to go out there and dance and celebrate like idiots after every play, then don’t whine to the media when you get stomped by New England next week and they mock your absurd and unnecessary shows of celebration.

The legend of Brett Favre continues. I can sit here today and admit that I was 100% wrong in the offseason to say that he should have retired. I now have come around to agree that Brett should retire whenever he wants to. He has earned it. The level he has that young team playing at, along with himself, is nothing short of remarkable. I don’t think the game against the Giants next weekend will be close, despite the Giants amazing road record. I have the Packers winning by a landslide, only to go on to lose to the Patriots. But if there is anything I’ve learned this season, it’s that you never know with Brett Favre. I wouldn’t be shocked if he somehow pulled the miraculous upset. I really wouldn’t.

Now to “America’s Team”. For a second straight year, the Dallas Cowboys choked in the playoffs. It would take an entire page to cover all of the subplots associated with this team, so I’ll just hit on the main ones. Tony Romo brought this on himself. Yes, he has the right to do whatever it is that he wants to do in his free time. Yes, he’s a grown man who can choose to spend time with whomever he pleases. But there are times where you have to look at all of the possible outcomes of your actions when you are affecting as many people as he does. You have to realize that fans have invested millions of dollars all season long for tickets, merchandise and other things related to the Cowboys. You have coaches, players, an owner, that have all put years worth of work in to get to this point. Your team is in the best position to get to the Super Bowl. Now, that being said, you know that your team struggled its final month going into the playoffs. You know that there are things that you need to improve on in order to ensure a successful run. A trip to F’ing Mexico can wait! A trip with a celebrity girlfriend who notifies all the tabloid magazines about her whereabouts before she even reaches there, CAN WAIT. Spending time with Joe Simpson and the rest of the strange Simpson family, CAN WAIT. You have an obligation to a team and a city that is paying you millions of dollars to win in the playoffs, not just the regular season. Make a wise decision, especially knowing how last year ended, and spend your free time studying a little harder so that you don’t play as terrible as you did on Sunday in the most important game of your career up to this point. Using your free time to better yourself shows maturity and devotion. Well, Tony Romo dug his own grave and now he can go party the rest of the damn year with whoever he wants. You know what separates the great ones from the fads? Dedication 365 days a year. You can’t convince me that Tony Romo is as dedicated to the Cowboys as he should be in order for them to win a title, even if you cry in a press conference about it.

Which leads me to Terrell Owens. I saw right through that press conference and you should too. I’m not buying this, “that’s my quarterback, that’s my teammate” garbage. If this was Chad Johnson or Reggie Wayne or someone, then yes. But I’m supposed to believe the words of a guy who has publically humiliated every single quarterback that he has played with since becoming a star? I’m supposed to believe the guy who upset Jerry Rice, the best receiver to play the game, because he ran his mouth too much and showed no respect for anyone…not even Rice himself?! Now he’s crying for Tony Romo?! Get the hell out of here. If there is a master of publicity stunts in this world, it’s Terrell Owens. No one even brought up Romo at that point in the press conference. He wasn’t even mentioned! And Owens just goes into this highly emotional state of defending his quarterback?! Please. You should cry about how you had zero second half catches and couldn’t shake single coverage instead of shedding tears and defending your Joe Namath-wannabe quarterback who was partying in Mexico when he should have been partying with his playbook.

One more thing I wanted to throw out about TO that I just remembered. He was talking about “losing as a team” after having a bad game himself. Funny that when he had that hell of a performance in the Super Bowl in which he caught 9 catches for 100 plus yards and lost, he didn’t find that the Eagles lost as a team. He found it necessary to call out McNabb for being tired. You think if he had 10 catches for 145 yards and 2 TD’s against New York and the Cowboys lost, he would still say “we lost as a team” with tears streaming down his face? I think not. I know not.

NFL Divisional Playoff Previews

Seattle @ Green Bay (-7.5)

Lambeu Field.  January 12^th.  30 degrees with snow showers.  Playoff game.  Brett Favre. 

I should conclude my preview of this game by just pasting those 5 statements over and over, but I will elaborate for those who are not familiar with the point I’m trying to make.  Seattle is not going to go into Lambeu field with their non existent run offense and beat Brett Favre in a playoff game, especially while it is snowing.  You think Matt Hasslebeck is going to be able to throw all over that Green Bay secondary that features Charles Woodson and Al Harris?  I don’t.  You think Shaun Alexander and Co. will be able to muster up much of a run game at Green Bay, after they couldn’t do it against Washington in Seattle?  I don’t. 

There is no question that Seattle’s front four is impressive.  Patrick Kerney is a monster.  I’ll be honest; I didn’t think he was AS good as he looked against Washington last Saturday.  But let’s not forget that disrupting the game of Brett Favre is not the same thing as disrupting the game of Todd Collins, with all due respect.  Throw in the fact that Green Bay running back, Ryan Grant, has been as good as anyone in the league as of late, and you’re looking at a pretty big problem.  He has amassed 770 yards on 141 carries over the past eight games.  That comes to a 5.4 yards per carry average. 

I’ll put it as simple as I can.  Green Bay’s young defense (youngest in the league) will outplay Seattle’s old and talent lacking offense.  Seattle’s young defense will play well against Green Bay’s offense, but not well enough to hold them under 20 points.  I foresee Green Bay feeding off of the Packer faithful early, jumping ahead in the first quarter, and never looking back.

Final Score

Seattle 13

Green bay 24

Jacksonville @ New England (-13.5)

All week long, I have heard nothing but praise for Jacksonville and how they are the team that has what it takes to knock off the big bad wolf.  They have the dual running threat.  They have the quarterback that doesn’t make mistakes.  They have the front four that can put pressure on Brady and leave 7 others to congest the passing lanes.  People.  There is a reason Vegas has set them as 14 point underdogs. 

Everything that we have heard about how good Jacksonville is, the Patriots heard too.  Everything that we, in our coaching genius minds, have come up with to beat the Pats; the Patriots heard too.  All this water cooler talk, “Yeah Jim to beat the Patriots, the Jags will keep Brady and Moss off the field by running Taylor and Jones-Drew effectively and the Jax defense will get enough stops because that front four is going to harass Tom Brady.  Yep, this is the week the Pats fall.”

Bull.

The Patriots are going to win and they will win big; here’s why.  They will have an answer for the two headed monster that is Taylor & Jones-Drew just like Pittsburgh did.  Do you know how many yards the two of them got combined on the ground?  77.  Do you know WHY Jacksonville beat Pittsburgh on the road?  It wasn’t because of their formula for success.  It was because of a 96 yard kick return by Jones-Drew and two interceptions by Mathis.  THAT is why they won.  All of the things people have said the Jaguars will do against the Patriots is the same stuff they failed to do against the Steelers.  David Garrard, the mistake free quarterback, made mistakes.  He didn’t even complete 10 passes.  Think about that for a moment.  9 completions in 4 quarters means slightly more than 2 per 15 minutes.  The passing game failed.  The running game failed.  So now what makes you think that they will suddenly hit on all cylinders against New England?  Oh, and that front four of the Jaguars.  Yeah, they are pretty good.  But that defense gave up 29 points to Pittsburgh, most of them in the second half.  You know who is really good in the second half?  Tom F’ing Brady. 

All the angles we take and the studying we do as fans still fails to give us insight on what Belichick is going to do.  I couldn’t tell you with certainty if the Patriots are going to come out and run the ball 30 times with Maroney or if they’re going to pass 30 times in the first half with Brady.  You just, don’t, know.  What we do know is that Tom Brady can beat you in two styles of football.  He can beat you with the clock management, run the ball with a pass here and there type of game (see previous Patriot championships), or he can beat you with 5 guys spread out like it’s a video game. 

You know what element people forget to add to their formulas for beating the Patriots?  Luck.  You need to play your best game of the year on offense, your best game of the year on defense, avoid any mistakes on special teams, and then hope for some luck.  You need to hope that a ball slips out of Brady’s hands inside his own 20.  You need to hope that Randy Moss drops a wide open pass on 3^rd and 10.  You need to hope that one of your corners gets hold of a tipped ball and runs it back for a touchdown.  Basically, if you are Jacksonville, you need the 96 yard return of Jones-Drew and the two interceptions of Mathis, PLUS a great game from Garrard and the rest of the team to have an opportunity to win in the fourth quarter.

Problem is, Jacksonville might have spent all of their luck in the last game. 

Final Score

Jacksonville 17

New England 41

Overrated Vikings and NFC Playoff Predictions

Why is everyone suddenly hopping on Minnesota’s bandwagon?  Because they’ve won 5 straight games, 4 of which are against teams with losing records?  Tavaris Jackson is playing good? Really?  5 touchdown and 5 interceptions is good?  Wow.  I guess NFL quarterbacks really are that bad if Tavaris Jackson is suddenly considered “good”. 

I listened to analyst after analyst talk about the scariest team to play if your Green Bay, Dallas, Seattle or Tampa Bay is Minnesota; not Washington.  Let me point out that it was Washington that went into Green Bay and lost by 3.  It was Washington that went into Dallas and was inside the 10 yard line, down by 5 with seconds remaining before Campbell made an errant throw that ended the game.  It was Washington that was inside the 15 yard line of Tampa Bay, on the road, before Ronde Barber had an interception to seal the win for the Bucs.  Yes, I understand that they lost all three games but by an average of 4 points!  Minnesota on the other hand lost by 7 and most recently, 34-0 to Green Bay this season.  They lost by 10 to Dallas.  They didn’t play Seattle or Tampa Bay.  Now look at those games and explain to me why Minnesota is the bigger threat.  Three of the four division winners have defenses that can stop the run.  So you think Tavaris Jackson is going to go into Lambeu, Texas Stadium, or Raymond James and win with his arm?  Please. 

I’m not saying that Washington is suddenly New England-esque or anything, but they are better than Minnesota.  Their defense is clicking and getting better each week.  From 5 weeks ago to now they have given up, in order, 28, 19, 17, 16, and 10 points.  That’s the kind of trend you want to see going into the final two games of the season. 

Here’s what’s going to happen.  Minnesota is going to get beat at home by Washington, then go on the  road and lose to Denver, putting them at 8-8.  The Giants will go into Buffalo and win, then lose to New England, putting them at 10-6 and secure 5^th place in the playoffs.  New Orleans is going to lose to Philadelphia, and then win at Chicago, putting them at 8-8.  Washington will beat Minnesota and then beat Dallas in Washington, putting them at 9-7 and the final spot of the playoffs. 

In the playoffs, Seattle will beat Washington and the Bucs will beat the Giants.  The Bucs will go to Green Bay, the one seed, and lose.  The Cowboys will beat the Seahawks, avenging last year’s heartbreaker.  Dallas will go into Lambeau field, and lose.  Green Bay will go on to the Super Bowl.  That is what will happen.  Start watching my correct predictions next Sunday. 

 You really think this guy has what it takes to make the playoffs? You must be joking.

Weekend Recap

The NFC Playoff Push.  If you stayed up to watch last night, you would have seen the Redskins go into New York in a must win game and give the Giants a beatdown with a 22-10 victory.  It is the second straight for the Redskins, and third straight home loss for the slumping Giants.  The win puts the Skins at 7-7 and drops the Giants to 9-5.  New York, who had a clear path to the 5^th seed in the NFC playoffs, suddenly finds itself in a must win at Buffalo, who also is in a must win situation.  If the Giants lose at Buffalo and drop to 9-6, they will have to beat a Patriots team that will likely be going for a 16-0 mark.  If the Giants manage to drop their last two games, which is very possible, they would potentially miss the playoffs.  The Redskins travel to Minnesota for what is basically a playoff game next week.  They follow that up with a home game against Dallas, who suddenly looks banged up and down.  The status of Tony Romo’s thumb is not known at this time, but that could serve as a serious problem for a team that has hopes of reaching the Super Bowl.  If the Redskins win out, they’d be a lock for the playoffs.  The Saints are also in the mix after winning 3 of their last 4.  They have a home game against the Eagles followed by a road finale at Chicago.  A loss in either game would basically eliminate them from the wild card chase.  The Vikings are most in control of their destiny with two of their final three games at home (the road game being at Denver).  What it comes down to is each team controls its own destiny.  Win and you’re in; lose and the tiebreakers and odds come into factor.  Should be an interesting and entertaining final couple of weeks. 

No more celeb girlfriends in Dallas!  Dallas fans are pretty upset this Monday morning; and they’re upset at Jessica Simpson.  She is the second celebrity girlfriend that Tony Romo has brought to a game and for the second time, he’s had a terrible game and the Cowboys subsequently lost.  Last year, he brought Carrie Underwood to the playoff game against Seattle.  I think we all remember how that turned out.  Yesterday, Jessica Simpson was sporting a pink Romo jersey in the press box.  Romo had his worst game of the season, and in some statistical categories, the worst of his career.  The Cowboys lost to a sub .500 Eagles team and failed to score a touchdown for the first time since 2004.  “Leave your girls at home” is the common sentiment in the big D this morning.

Another College Football coach peaces out.  Extension through 2013 huh?  Yeah, we all know the way this story goes.  College football coach flirts with a different university.  Comes back to his own university and signs a big extension.  And the following year?  Gone.  Rich Rodriguez was raised in West Virginia, attended WVU, put WVU football on the map as a perennial top 15 program; and has now left it for the lures of Michigan.  Rodriguez signed with Michigan faster than Lindsay Lohan would sign a movie contract these days.  Rumors are that the Athletic Director and Rodriguez didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things.  Who knows.  All I know is that another college coach sold out on his team by going to a more attractive school.  Now that the WVU job is open, I wonder which football coach will be the next to slip his way out of his current contract and come to Morgantown.