Officiating...

I'm never one to complain about bad officiating..But what about that no call on the Richard Hamilton foul on Lebron? That was clearly a foul that could very well end up costing the Cavs the series. On that note, I was never a huge fan of Lebron as I always thought his comparisions to MJ were just downright unwarranted. In case you all haven't been paying attention, Lebron took the leauge's absolute worst team and turned them into a legitamite playoff contender. Hate him or not people should give respect when it's due. He's only 22 and already been in the leauge for four years. He is a proven leader and yes, a ballhog yet he doesn't have that Kobe Bryant mentality that has run the Lakers into the gorund.

Upcoming Things

THE BUFFALO SABRES avoided the sweep but, really, is there a worse city to root for? Cleveland?

SPEAKING OF CLEVELAND...LeBron James' chalk clap move is just about the dumbest pre-game-crowd-pump-ritual ever.

MORE THINGS TO COME...STAY TUNED!

Quotable

Shaq, on the Game 5 Suns/Spurs suspensions --

If you break the crime, you do the time.

Unrelated sports news...

This just in...Flogging Molly at Jannus Landing show makes flogging molly greates band ever....that is all

Late Friday News and Notes

Shibam!

I OFTEN WONDER how various game crews deal with those pesky fans in the background, fans that keep their heads in frame the entire time all while making faces or waving.

I assume that a camera grip waves them off or makes mean faces. Sometimes I imagine that during a commercial break or cut away that the crew threatens the fans, "If you put your head back in this shot we're going add a graphic of an arrow pointing to you saying "This dude bangs little boys.""

Tonight during the Warriors/Jazz game Mike Tirico taught me two of his methods.

The on-air call out. "Some stooge just spilled champagne on us"

The point blank. "Yes, we see you sir, now get out of our ears."

Awesome.

I don't really like Mike Tirico for anything than college sports. I think his laid back attitude, delivery and higher voice are great for the college environment, but sound rather amateurish and less solemn for professional color commentary.

I think he gets so many gigs due to his blackness (of which he is in short supply of).

Regardless, he has provided me with a few memorable moments last year during his 10 million different jobs.

1. MNF, circa week 2 or 3, with Tony Kornheiser still learning the ropes. TK was talking about his daughter's prom and said, "I'm not sure if can do this, give a plug, but Morton's Steakhouse..." and Tirico cut him off on air and scolded him under his breath -- right then and there -- "Stop that! What are you doing?"

2. Last year with Tiger ripping through his win streak Tirico was doing some PGA time and, while talking about VJ Singh's lack of media coverage, Tirico referred to Singh as "Dude," as in, "I mean. this dude..." Dude. During golf. He called somebody else dude later that telecast. It ruled.

BARON DAVIS' DUNK was the NBA play of the year.

DIRK WINS THE MVP...more like Man Vanquished (by) Pressure.

HOW TO WIN MORE GAMES; AN IDEA. Hire a Ninja to get a seat next to the tunnel, and after the game, when the players gives high fives, do a crazy pressure point snap to the star player's hand. I mean those are million dollar hands those guys just let regular people touch. Ninjas. I'm telling you.

I HOPE THE JAZZ LOSE, based solely on the Derrick Fisher story. I'm a sappy dude and I'm happy for the guy and his family and everything. Yeah for you D-Fish and Daughter-Fish. Hell, the movie Rudy, I cry every time. Remember the Titans, sobbing. Freaking Rudy! But as of this game, one day after Derrick Fisher mumbled Ophtamaliosis (or whatever-iosis) on national TV, it's now told on TNT that his on-air action alone heroicaly saved tens-of-thousands of children from eye cancer and cured world hunger and saved the polar bears and fixed global warming. And if the Jazz keep winning it will only get worse. He'll be fixing shit we didn't even know was a problem yet.

RACE TO THE BOTTOM UPDATE:
Washington %.286
Kansas City .306
Texas / Tampa Bay / Toronto .400

Go Nats. We Believe.

Intrusive Media, Redux.

As Absnaz points out below: the media infatuation with tragedy and death is almost -- if the subject itself wasn't so serious -- comical.

Last night, mere seconds after the Jazz secured their overtime win against the Warriors, Pam Oliver corralled the game's "hero" Derrick Fisher (which is pushing it to begin with -- Fisher had several great defensive stops and one of the most crucial shots of the game -- all while saddled with emotion and grief, but HERO? I'd say that the game's hero was the Warriors' foul shooting down the stretch, going 1-4 with under 30 seconds left. But that's just me) and asked him about playing with a heavy heart. Fisher then breaks the news his daughters cancer diagnoses and that he's making it public only to raise awareness for other families. Oliver, not content to say "I'm so sorry to hear that our prayers are with and your family. Basketball is fairly meaningless at this time," then asks, "How do you go on this series and divide your loyalty between family and team?"

WHAT?!!!

And after she sucks all the emotion she can out of the interview, without saying anything particularly nice or comforting to Derrick, she kicks it back to the TNT studio, where -- despite only hearing the news seconds before -- talk about his daughters health and his family situation for five minutes straight.

It reminds me of one the most uncomfortable moments in my sports history. After the already emotional and heated Iowa v Iowa St. rivalry game last season, they snagged the game's "hero" who'd played the game just hours after learning of his father's death. Seconds after victory was secured for Iowa they interviewed him, weeping like a child, and the interviewer had the audacity to ask "what did it feel like to play this game knowing that your father just passed away hours before?"

Memo to media; the emotion we so love from sports is the victorious celebratory emotion, the suspense of the perilous balance between the joy of winning and the pain of losing. What it is not is personal emotion, nor is it extreme close ups on any tears that the camera men can find.

Scavengers.

You tell 'em, Don Henley.

intrusive media

Upon hearing of the news of Caridnals relief pitcher Josh Hancock's death, I became a little upset with the way the media has handeling the situation. The guy obviously made a wrong decision and got behind the wheel of a car (registering a .17 or something like two times the legal limit), crashed into a parked tow truck and died on impaxt. With that being said, does anyone feel it's wrong to leak out things like he ws carrying pot on him at the time of his death? The news is tragic enough and now the family needs to hear how much weed and how drunk he was at the time of his unfortunate passing. I don't know his situation enough to judge but it seems a bit unfair for his family to hear stuff like this at a time when they certainely don't need it. As a sports fan and a human being for that matter, I think it's wrong to leak out personal things like that; as it clearly labels Hancock as someone who was an abuser and in some way tarnishes his life (Its not like he can defend himself!). I've always thought of our cultures fascination with death as pretty comical; how people called James Dean's death a "tradgedy" even though he was driving through Los Angles going 150 mph. How Tupac was "tradgically" murdered ? Tradgedy? Really? Well, before I get off course,it's not neccesary to leak information for people so harshly once they have passed on...Just a thought

Upset city

It was nice to see the Warriors beat the Mavs tonight as the Warrior have long been the laughing stock of the NBA dating all the way back as far as that Chris Mullin era...As sports fans, we all secretly wish that these teams that have suffered for so long, rise above and get out of their losing ways...Good Job Chicago Bulls and good job Warriors, it's nice to see improved franchises..

NBA Refs Burn Crosses

In white robes.

That's the implication of a new study finding that black players get called for fouls more often when refed by an all white crew in the NBA.

“Across all of these specifications,” they write, “we find that black players receive around 0.12-0.20 more fouls per 48 minutes played (an increase of 2 ½-4 ½ percent) when the number of white referees officiating a game increases from zero to three.”

Jokes and the obligatory questioning of why everything in sports must be tied to race (which, seriously, I'm at the point of just having only blacks play/coach/own/ref/cheerlead/waterboy/commentary to avoid this idiocy.) aside, I'd like to point out that the study doesn't seem to question if black players tend to play a bit more aggressively than white players. Which, I mean, duh.

The money quote..

Mr. Wolfers and Mr. Price claim that these changes are enough to affect game outcomes. Their results suggested that for each additional black starter a team had, relative to its opponent, a team’s chance of winning would decline from a theoretical 50 percent to 49 percent and so on, a concept mirrored by the game evidence: the team with the greater share of playing time by black players during those 13 years won 48.6 percent of games — a difference of about two victories in an 82-game season.

“Basically, it suggests that if you spray-painted one of your starters white, you’d win a few more games,” Mr. Wolfers said.

Baseball Power Rankings

The latest power rankings decided by writers at ESPN.com were released yesterday. The only team I want to point out on that list is the New York Yankees. They are ranked 12th on the list and I'm not sure how they could be that high. They've only won 9 games this season so far and their winning percentage, along with their team ERA is 4th worst in the league. They are ahead of the Nationals, the Royals and the Rockies in winning percentage and the Rockies actually have more wins on the year. Their pitching staff couldn't beat a high school team right now. The Rays, who are 27th on the list, are 3-1 vs the Yankees this year. Keep up the accurate, unbiased sports rankings ESPN.