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      Line of the Night (12/23): Jerryd Bayless & Kevin Durant

      December 24, 2009 /

      Since it’s the holiday season and I’m feeling generous, I’m going with a two-fer for the LOTN. First up is Jerryd Bayless, who has been getting a ton of minutes with all the injuries that the Blazers have been suffering. Last night, Portland (without Brandon Roy, Greg Oden, Rudy Fernandez, Joel Przybilla) beat a healthy Spurs team in San Antonio, 98-94. Bayless posted 31 points and seven assists.

      This is the kind of game that makes one wonder if something is seriously wrong with the Spurs.

      Meanwhile, in Phoenix, it was youth over experience as the Thunder beat the Suns, 117-113. Durant had 38 points, six rebounds and three assists, and hit 12 of 20 shots from the field, including a crucial jumper that put OKC up four with just seconds to play. Amare Stoudemire had 35-14 for the Suns, and basically had his way inside. If the Thunder can land a good power forward/center this offseason (Chris Bosh?), they’ll be in business. It’s hard to root for OKC given what the ownership did to the city of Seattle, but it’s just as hard not to like the young core of Durant, Russell Westbrook, Jeff Green and James Harden.

      Fantasy Basketball, NBA

      Stafford, Delhomme’s seasons over

      December 24, 2009 /

      The Lions will place quarterback Matthew Stafford on injured reserve, effectively ending his rookie season. In similar news, the Panthers will place Jake Delhomme on injured reserve, ending his season.

      Stafford showed promise in his rookie year and demonstrated toughness as a rookie. He’ll finish his first year with 13 touchdowns and 20 interceptions, which are common numbers for rookie quarterbacks. If Detroit could ever build him on offensive line, then he could do some damage as a pro quarterback.

      As for Delhomme, one has to think that Carolina would cut ties with him in the offseason. The problem is that he’s set to make $13 million in guaranteed money, so he’ll probably be back to challenge Matt Moore (who has made strides in the past couple weeks) for the starting job next season.

      Delhomme turned the ball over 27 times in 12 games this season, making the Panthers look incredibly foolish for extending his contract in the offseason.


      Photo from fOTOGLIF

      NFL

      Thanks for these early bowl games, BCS.

      December 24, 2009 /

      Want more proof that the current bowl system is crap in college football? Take a look at the scores from bowl games so far:

      Wyoming 35, Fresno State 28 OT.
      Rutgers 45, Central Florida 24.
      Middle Tennessee State 42, Southern Miss 32.
      BYU 44, Oregon State 20.
      Utah 37, California 27.

      Outside of Wyoming’s thriller over Fresno State, all of these bowl games have been laughers and not worth watching deep into the second half. If you’ve turned on any of these games in the third quarter, you’ve already missed everything worthy of tuning into.

      Before anyone points this out, I get that none of the marquee bowl games have kicked off yet. And I also get that the BCS system only cares about its five games and furthermore, only really cares about the national championship.

      But isn’t that reason enough to hate the BCS? They’re basically admitting that out of 34 bowl games, only one really matters. If there were a playoff, every single game would have meaning. Instead, we have 33 fluff bowls that don’t mean anything and worse yet, they’re all terrible games. Outside of the Wyoming-Fresno matchup, every bowl thus far has featured one team that is excited to play and one that can’t wait to get back on the bus to go home.

      The system sucks and so do these bowl games so far. Sorry, I don’t mean to take away from Rutgers, Middle Tennessee State, BYU and Utah’s wins, but as a fan I couldn’t be more disappointed and the worst part is, this is exactly what I expected. Some will say, “Well then just don’t watch the early games” but that’s not the point – I want to watch as much college football as I can before the season is over for seven months. I just don’t want these meaningless drivel.

      Thanks, BCS.

      Photo from fOTOGLIF

      College Football

      Love ‘Em & Leave ‘Em: Week 16

      December 23, 2009 /

      It’s championship week in most fantasy football leagues, so it’s not a good time to get cute. There’s a saying — dance with the guy that brought you. In other words, don’t bench a stud unless you have to.

      On the subject of the Colts…

      At this point, only Indianapolis appears to be ready to rest its players, so I’d expect Peyton Manning, Reggie Wayne, Joseph Addai, Dallas Clark and Pierre Garcon to play a half of football. Moreover, the Jets are a pretty bad matchup, so it’s (relatively) safe to bench those Colts. It’s unfortunate that fantasy owners are forced to bench these players in such a crucial week, but this is a great argument for a fantasy league to end its playoffs in Week 15.

      The “love ‘em” players are listed in the order that I’d start them this week.

      love-em

      Philip Rivers (TEN) and Tom Brady (JAX) are good fantasy QBs with good matchups, so start ’em..Matt Schaub has a very nice matchup against a Dolphins defense that is 23rd in the league against the pass…In a pinch? Alex Smith has the Lions this week. Detroit has given up an average of 268 yards and 2.1 TD through the air this season…David Garrard has a pretty good matchup with a Patriots defense that has really struggled to stop the pass of late.

      Continue reading »

      Fantasy Football, NFL

      Wade and LeBron plan to “sit down and talk about” playing together in 2010

      December 23, 2009 /

      This came straight from Dwyane Wade, via Peter Vecsey of the New York Post…

      “A lot of times in this league, players usually wind up going where they can get the most money. We’re both blessed within that area. We’ve made a lot of money. So we wanted to base our decision on two things, the organization and the ability to win a title. And that’s what we’ll do. When the season is over, we plan to sit down and talk about it.

      “I’m not saying it will happen. But I’m intrigued by the idea.

      “I probably couldn’t have handled playing with someone like LeBron earlier in my career, but I’m older now. You’re talking about two big egos and meshing them. That’d take a lot of sacrifice on LeBron’s part and it’d take a lot of sacrifice on my part to succeed. But we would succeed because we know winning takes care of everything.”

      The Heat will have the cap space to re-sign Wade and sign another max contract free agent, but other than that, there aren’t any teams out there with that kind of flexibility. If the Knicks can shed Jared Jeffries’ contract (which seems more likely than moving Eddy Curry at this point) they would also be able to sign two max players.

      If the Heat were able to sign both Wade and LeBron, I think they’d have to agree beforehand to take the same money, so the two are on equal footing. (The Heat can offer Wade an extra year since they hold his rights.) It’s not often that two swingmen of this caliber are paired together, but it worked pretty well in Chicago with Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen and I don’t see why it couldn’t work in Miami (or New York, for that matter). The Jordan/Pippen combo was a bit different as MJ was the clear alpha dog while Pippin was tasked with being the team’s defensive stopper, though with their Team USA experience, LeBron and Wade are going into next summer with open eyes. They know they can play together.

      Cavs fans shouldn’t hold out hope that Wade will land in Cleveland. The team doesn’t have the cap space necessary to sign a free agent of his caliber, so it would have to be done via sign-and-trade (i.e. the Heat would have to agree to trade him). The chances of that happening are slim to none.


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      NBA, News, Rumors & Gossip

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