I'm starting to warm up to the idea of Dampier and the new Mavericks team. If Dampier has Avery Johnson's stamp of approval then the guy's alright with me. Still I think their success will come down to whether Nelson can coach a legit center who plays in the low post. I'm not sure that he can.
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Bill Simmons "The Sports Guy" to the rescue.
It's been two months since the NBA finals finished and it's two months before next season starts. Trying times for a rabid basketball fan. After barely getting by on scraps of NBA news (like trade rumors and box scores from the olympics) the sports guy comes through with some methodone for the NBA addict, four days and 59 hours of NBA classics, including 27 hours of the Basketball Jesus himself.
I'm sure I'll watch a couple hours throughout the weekend, but I have a tough time getting into replays of games. Even taping a game, then watching it later, when I have no idea what the outcome was, doesn't have the same magic as watching the game live.
I'm sure I'll watch a couple hours throughout the weekend, but I have a tough time getting into replays of games. Even taping a game, then watching it later, when I have no idea what the outcome was, doesn't have the same magic as watching the game live.
Sunday, August 22, 2004
What are the Mavericks Doing?
Looks like the Dallas Mavericks are poised to trade Christian Laetner, Eduardo Najera and a first round pick for Erick (not a typo) Dampier, Dan Dickau and Evan Eschmeyer. At first glance it seems like a good deal for Dallas except fot getting Even Eschmeyer back, that guy is completely worthless. How do you end up with this guy, not once but twice? It's not like they loved his skills the first time around.
I must admit that I have a soft spot in my heart for the Gonzaga alum, which doesn't mean necessarily that I think he can play in the NBA. Dampier is obviously the jewel of the trade for Dallas. He has legitimate size for a center, will bang underneath and grab rebounds. However, I tend to agree with the sports writers who think his 12 point 12 rebounds per game last year was directly related to this being a contract summer for him. His stats tend to show marked improvement before he's due to sign a new contract.
This trade seems like a desperation move on Dallas' part to placate the reporters and sports talk show hosts, who keep pointing to the lack of a legitimate center as blocking the Mavericks from greater success in the playoffs. This past offseason they've aquired 5 new centers (Booth, DJ, Dampier, Evan, and the next big white stiff Podkolzin). None of them are particularly skilled players. I don't see Don Nelson utilizing any of the centers they've assembled effectively. His tendency is to prefer playing 5 smaller skilled players than a traditional NBA starting 5. Which makes me think that Dampier essentially takes Fortson's spot on the bench this year.
I have trouble believing that Dallas will make the playoffs this year. They've lost Nash, Jamison, Walker and Najera while picking up Jason Terry, Jerry Stackhouse and Erick Dampier. While I like Terry and think that he will be a better perimeter defender than Nash was, I can't picture the Terry and Nowitzki pick-and-roll being anywere near close to the pick and roll perfection Nash and Nowitzki had going. Jamison settled in great a sixth man last year even winning the sixth man award. No way in hell do I see Stackhouse being happy with a bench role. I predict him to have received the locker room cancer award by the end of year.
At least they still have Marquis Daniels, Josh Howard, Dirk and Finley. And I do like the additions of Jason Terry and Devon Harris. With any luck they will still be fun to watch.
I must admit that I have a soft spot in my heart for the Gonzaga alum, which doesn't mean necessarily that I think he can play in the NBA. Dampier is obviously the jewel of the trade for Dallas. He has legitimate size for a center, will bang underneath and grab rebounds. However, I tend to agree with the sports writers who think his 12 point 12 rebounds per game last year was directly related to this being a contract summer for him. His stats tend to show marked improvement before he's due to sign a new contract.
This trade seems like a desperation move on Dallas' part to placate the reporters and sports talk show hosts, who keep pointing to the lack of a legitimate center as blocking the Mavericks from greater success in the playoffs. This past offseason they've aquired 5 new centers (Booth, DJ, Dampier, Evan, and the next big white stiff Podkolzin). None of them are particularly skilled players. I don't see Don Nelson utilizing any of the centers they've assembled effectively. His tendency is to prefer playing 5 smaller skilled players than a traditional NBA starting 5. Which makes me think that Dampier essentially takes Fortson's spot on the bench this year.
I have trouble believing that Dallas will make the playoffs this year. They've lost Nash, Jamison, Walker and Najera while picking up Jason Terry, Jerry Stackhouse and Erick Dampier. While I like Terry and think that he will be a better perimeter defender than Nash was, I can't picture the Terry and Nowitzki pick-and-roll being anywere near close to the pick and roll perfection Nash and Nowitzki had going. Jamison settled in great a sixth man last year even winning the sixth man award. No way in hell do I see Stackhouse being happy with a bench role. I predict him to have received the locker room cancer award by the end of year.
At least they still have Marquis Daniels, Josh Howard, Dirk and Finley. And I do like the additions of Jason Terry and Devon Harris. With any luck they will still be fun to watch.
Thursday, August 19, 2004
REAL Ultimate Power!!! - The Book
I was cleaning up my bookmarks and decided to check out this old favorite The Official Ninja Webpage: REAL Ultimate Power!!!!. Looks like Robert Hamburger, the creater of REAL Ultimate Power, has written a book on Ninjas. The comments about the book on Amazon are hilarious.
Here's a little sample:
Better than the Bible, August 18, 2004
If Jesus read this before the last supper, he would have flipped out, flew across the table and chopped off Judas' head! That would be sweet. I could be in the sequal to The Passion. And by sweet, of course, I mean totally awesome.
Here's a little sample:
Better than the Bible, August 18, 2004
If Jesus read this before the last supper, he would have flipped out, flew across the table and chopped off Judas' head! That would be sweet. I could be in the sequal to The Passion. And by sweet, of course, I mean totally awesome.
I Almost Saw a Pit Tonight
I went to room 710 tonight for a potluck of metal. Today the potluck turned up blood of the patriots. This was pretty much a stereotypical death metal band, with the thoaty devil like vocals. You had the typical Austinites getting into it and showing the old devil horns hand signal. At one point they started a mock mosh circle pit, which I must admit was fun to see. But it never amounted to anything. Which made me think that I haven't really seen/been in a pit in Austin besides one for some ska band with a drunk Josh.
It seems weird to me that in my younger punk days a pit was pretty much a natural thing. We would get so worked by the music that we were compelled to pogo around and slam into our best friend or whoever else was around.
What ever happened to moshing? Is it that the bands I chose to see nowadays don't lend themselves to it? It not cool any more and thought of as a joke like raising your lighter in the air or flashing the "metal" hand signal?
It seems weird to me that in my younger punk days a pit was pretty much a natural thing. We would get so worked by the music that we were compelled to pogo around and slam into our best friend or whoever else was around.
What ever happened to moshing? Is it that the bands I chose to see nowadays don't lend themselves to it? It not cool any more and thought of as a joke like raising your lighter in the air or flashing the "metal" hand signal?
Tuesday, August 17, 2004
Lame first post
Seems like everyone has a blog, so I figured that I may as well have one too. After looking around at different blogging software that stored the posts in the local file system or a user managed database, I decided to try out blogger. Thinking that the odds on losing all my posts would be less likely, since I won't be jacking with the database. Also, changing blog software would require differently formatted posts, requiring either a data conversion, or losing everything created with the old blog software.
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