JEFF VAN GUNDY LIKE SLOW WEEK 11-17-07

Ok, fireplace is blazing… right?! Check, Patron is flowin?! Yesss sirr!!!, What a life. That basically described my weekend. Everything was just a good old solid, except Saturdays sports was kind of lame. Very happy MD beat BC, I just really can’t stand Boston fans. There everywhere when there winning but no one remembers the Redsoxxx when they sucked before getting Manny, Big Papi and Pedro, they don’t remember the C’s wit the great Dino Radja(my 3^rd fave celtic ever and fave European player), but winning cures all. Speakin of Boston I saw the Departed for the first tyme since opening week at the movies. Great damn movie, I posed the question to the Get Right Clique, where would u rate it against other gangster movies. Some did didn’t even put it in the top ten, I cant see that, when match-up the master Scorsese, the diabolic one Jack, then 3 of the best young actors, Wahlberg ,Leo and Damon, u get a certified banger. E’nuff about Southie,

The first weeks of the L are in the bag and what have we learned. We learned KG (as mentioned in my earlier blog) is playin like he on a mission. We learned that Wiz our in serious trouble. I was scanning Gilly blog: http://my.nba.com/forum.jspa?forumID=400032200 and it doesn’t look good, he been playin major minutes and his knee has already been drained. The scary part about the Wiz is they have been playin bad, the big # have pout up good numbers and Brendan Haywood has been havin a career year and there still 0-5. they got make move, me personally I would love to trade Brendan for Brad Miller, that will give Brendan a fresh start and he will be a fine player; it gives the Wiz the gr8 passing big man that it a must for the Princeton Offense. Can one imagine the wings spread and Gilly back door his man and Miller hittin him from the high-post wit a perfect bounce pass. Sitting in front of my fire I was sitting Indian style and thinking about diff offense and the beauty of basketball when I was inttrupeted but Tmz.com (tv show) they had a clip about The Doggfather, has to be one of the funniest things I ever saw. Im sorry I couldn’t embed but here the link please watch and laff: http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid353549946/bctid1293608637

Anyways back to the beauty of basketball, mainly the Princeton offense, I found this old clip by the father of the Princeton Offense :

Very deep stuff he had some major upset and major scares in the nc2a tourney. Watch and learn suckas. Speakin of Nc2a my boy OJ had a killer game albeit in a loss to Mercer… which got me to thinking about upsets already, Wat the deal wit Kentucky losing to Gardner Web. The pundits will say it early and this and that but they just fired a gr8 coach in Tubby Smith for this type of loss. One can only imagine wat they would have done to him. But in lighter news I was peepin the ESPN family of networks schedule, one word insane: http://sports.espn.go.com/espntv/espnTopics?topic=Basketball&watch=CollegeBasketball

U can really o-d on this stuff. In a sidenote, I was watchin the Notre Dame game and was really in shock. It one thing to have some injuries and lose games, that happens in football, but to see the team lose to service academy’s is just unacceptable. Can u imagine the gap in athletic budgets between ND and Air-force, it has to be a diff. of about 100 mill. I found this clip by Dr. Boyce Watkins :

Peep his website: http://www.boycewatkins.com/

It’s an interesting concept/idea, I’m kind of torn to be honest, I’m a diehard Notre Dame, been one since my dad let me stay up late for the 1989 Natl. Championship game and I saw Rocket Ismail took the kick-off back and I fell in love wit those Golden Helmets. Unfortunately cant let me love be blinded by the god (touchdown jesus) awful teams. Was it blatant racism exercised at the expense of Ty Willingham, I think that pretty obvious now. Every coach should have 4 yrs min. ot prove that they can or cannot handle the job, firing him 3 yrs into his contract wit a winning record is unheard of. Now the kicker is wat if all elite Black athletes boycotted Notre Dame………..Imagine that. That would rock the sporting world on fire…….the power would inevitably return to the people oops I mean players. Stay Tuned.

Tuesday Night Special

Man the traffic coming home has been great, I’ve even managed to get a round of bowling in. Now I can admit I’m not a the best bowler, hell I have no strategy or form, in fact I just try to throw that son of a gun down the lane as hard as I can which usually end up in the gutter. But for my last frame I was like PT Weber (u know the dood who wears the sunglasses after NFL countdown), 3 str8 strikes……….an amazing feeling, comparable to a weekend marathon of real world/road rules challenge on MTV or and Intervention marathon on A&E. Anyways since it was the Bones-House medical drama on fox night, I was sanctioned to the backroom to watch ‘Cuse and St Joes. It got me thinking about that magical 2003 run, man that was a squad, the Mel-man, Gerry Mac, Colin Firth(the biggest stiff in college-basketball history), Duaney and I forgot the the other starter. I remember watchin PTI wit the big homey Mikey; were very big Melo fans since he represents East b’more not far from us; Tony asks him how ya’ll gonna do in the Nc2a, he says “if we get a 3 seed or better chalk us up for the chip”. Classic Mel man line let hope one of the great incoming freshman can have the same Swag.

A real quick entry from the "U cant blame Davey Stern" office:

I was watching the De'twat and Lakers game last night and they made injured Chauncey Billups watch the game in the locker room because he did not have on a Blazer on. Now u can look at it from multiple angles; Angle 1-who cares about a 10 mill dollar over paid point guard who blatantly dissed the rules, Angle 2- nobody could lend homey a blazer and Angle 3-he knew the dress code an s still said uck it, no matter how u call it on or off the court u better have ur uniform on.

In closing, real quick I was thinking just how good is J-Kidd, I saw he just dusted the Magic for 11-19-10 are u serious. That 19 boards……6-4’ son. Anyway I had to compare him to Magic just so see how close they are. Very interesting

Magic Johnson 6'9"
G played 906
Asts 10,141
APG 11.2
Stls 1,724
Blks 374
Pts 17,707
PPG 19.5
FG% .520
3PFG% .303
FT% .848
Rebs 6,559

Avg 7.2

Jason Kidd 6'4"
G played 954
FG% .40.2
3PFG% .33.3
FT% .77.9
Rebs 6374
RPG 6.7
Asts 8771
APG 9.2
Stls 1,915
Blks 291
Pts 13813
PPG 14.5

Kidd the sickest shit out but Magic was and is still in another level.. I leave u wit some Kidd Nuggets, Get Some!!!

Peace

Weekend Splash

Oct 27^th

Damn only 3 days left, im still pondering getting the NBA league pass. My reservations or are pretty Silly, do I really care to see those wack ass West Coast games (sac kings, clippers, Portland sans big boi Oden) or those lame east coast 7o’clock starts (hawks, indy pacers…actually The Hawks might be fun to watch)…. U know wat fugitabout it, I’m ordering the League Pass 2nite…How u think I should run this by my girlfriend, I mean she hates that fact that Thursday used to be Ugly Betty and Grey Anatomy now it Espn college football and now it NBA double-header…I’m gonna have to re-up a nice xmas gift for all her troubles……….

Sittin in the crib late/early last night depending on wat angle u wanna enter (3am) I peeped the preseason games on ESPN, Celts v. Cavs and Lakes v. Kings. They say u cant put to much stock in preseason but I think u can put a little stock. First, the C’s look in sync, the boi KG had a trip-double, he’s ready for war, I’m thinking he gonna have that get my Swag back year award. Think about the 1993 season of Mr. Affaletic Charles Barkley, he was coming off the impressive 1992 Olympics (where he led the team in scoring) and was traded to Phx. From the get-go he was on a mission, he avg. 25.6 pts and 12.2 rebs plus 4.6 dimes. More importantly he took that underachieving team to the Finals and was pretty even wit the Bulls. I can remember sittin in my friend peachy house watchin game 7 of the WCF v. Sonics, in the crazy game seven Mr Affaletic had 44 pts and 24rebs, now that wat I call money during money time. Peep these: http://www.nba.com/suns/history/1993_retrospective.html

Gr8 Shit, this man was just possessed on the court………..back to the future later…

now I hope this is the mentality for KG, to be honest I was never a huge fan until I saw an interview wit him and Big John Thompson I think during the 2005 ASG

one of the most thoro passionate interviews ever, one of the rare players of 2day who give a u ish. I’m really rooting for him to get on a roll and just dominate anybody on the court, he got the help and the squad around him……….dominate KG, please just look at those Barkley Highlight tapes and just dominate………

Since we got some tyme to speculate and talk-over, let’s do a small straw poll and analyze our fave NBA announcing teams and studio squads. I was talking wit my big brother about this, I really like Jalen Rose in the studio wit Screamin A….now I can do wit out Mark Jones but he’s better then lazy Canadian John Saunders (who u know black openly admits to liking the NHL…..). Where’s Greg Ant and Timmy Legs, there aight G.ant knows his shit and Legs a local legend, he takes it back to cheap seats in the Cap Centre (old skool bullets for u newbies that thought I was new). I love listening to Hubie break ish down, simply marvelous. In fact there was a old clip of hubie at the old 5 star camp throwin behind the back passes like clock-work. An amazing video that I will be on the hunt for. I did find a old Roy Firestone interview wit Hubie and even funnier news, Roy Firestone is a singer…….tru weird ish:

Oct 28^th

Wat a glorious lazy sundae afternoon, just 2 days left to the NBA pops off. Actually made my fist batch of mac and cheese; a complete success. So I’m getin ready for the Pats-Skins game (later found out to be renamed the Halloween Massacre) and I’m rippin thru the Wash Post Sunday paper, I come across this great Gilly article in the Wash-Post magazine: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/23/AR2007102301560.html

Please read and drop science, it one of the best articles I ever read about an athlete. I’ve been loving Gilly for a min (ask rome), he rare in 2day NBA cookie cutter wanna be perfect superstars. I’m xxpecting his game to improve this year, wit his quickness and speed he should be getting to the middle wit ease and dishin for more dimes. Still a lil away from being a total complete player but as far as pure offensive and like-abilty is Pure Man’.

Lastly for the Weekend Update, from our most popular chamber “U cant blame Davey Stern” desk. The boi Ratchet Wallace is up 2 it again :

Rasheed says NBA "wanted'' Cavs, LeBron in finals

Saturday, Oct 27, 2007 7:09 am EDT

Getty Images

It may have only been the end of the exhibition season, but Detroit Pistons forward Rasheed Wallace was in mid-season form.

"I still don't think they (Cavaliers) beat us, we beat ourselves," Wallace said. "And I think we also fell victim to that personal NBA thing where they are trying to make it a world game and get (television) ratings. They wanted to put their darling in there (the NBA Finals) and they did, and look what ended up happening.

"This game ain't basketball anymore, it's entertainment," Wallace said. "It's starting to get like the WWF. There ain't no real wrestling anymore either. It's all fake."

Source: Detroit News

It an interesting POV, I think it has some merits, to be honest every major sports is based and runned by the the huge tv conglomerates. Now most will say how can u sway a game or a particular series one-sided, well we know now refs can and do cheat when giving an chance. The bottom-line is the Cavs did win and the Pistons did let King drop 56pts on them…….who knows……….Lets just get it on..

Some Rain, Some R & R and wat some fools do wit there Cheddar

Oct. 16^th

Damn the so called Game of the Century turned out to be a str8 dud……..but anyways im over my girls parents house and just chillin after dinner (by the way the rustic pasta from Macaroni grill is bangin) so were laid up on the sofa and I filp to the NBA channel(sidebar, no I don’t have the sports package yet, u see Comcast jips us in having to pay 5 dollars xtra to get the nba channel , the nfl network and like 10 damn soccer channels, not to also include the L’ league pass for an additional 150, al the free world. Anyways on the Nba channel there’s a Shawn Kemp special titled “Reign Man”. I truly forgot how xciting and dominating he was, my fave dunk by him is the “Rim-Ratlin Gatlin”. Trust me u gotta peep these: http://broadband.nba.com/cc/playa.php?content=video&url=http://boss.streamos.com/wmedia/nba/nbacom/history/top10/kemp_top10_dunks_070405.asx&video=&nbasite=nba

The funny thing about it kids today don’t even see this type of high-flying powerful above the rim play. The NBA basketball of 2day is ISO everything and slow-down tactics, thank goodness Jeff V-G is back in the booth like HOV. I was really pondering is Kemp a hall of famer, I know must of ya’ll think the boi is on something, but let be 100 objective and let the stats and impact show.

http://www.databasebasketball.com/players/playerpage.htm?ilkid=KEMPSH01 (scroll to the bottom and u’ll see the Hall of Fame monitor)

The boi avg. 14.6 pts and 8.4 reb in the regular season.; including monster years of 1995-96, where he avg. 19.6 and 11 boards. Damn. Better then that was the way the boi played in the off’s that year. In 20 games, including a dominating run to the Chip Final, Kemp avg. 20.9 pts and 10.4 rebs. All in all the Reign Man was a great player that gets lost in the shuffle of some bad decision late in his career. So there I made my point, I backed it up wit stats, tell me why would I want to be you again?!

Oct. 18^th to 22^nd

Had to slide out to lovely Vegas for some R and R. Wow I love that city, If and when the L’ gets out there it goin to be huge. I was tryin to get a personal view of the Hardwood suite in the Palms but you have to plan in advance for a tour. Bottom-line best city in the world, hands down but back to the lecture at hand.

Oct 24^th

Damn less then 7 days to the L’ pops off. I think this week I’m going to start off wit my weekly “u cant blame davey stern” chamber:

Child support, bankruptcy trail former NBA player Caffey
Sunday, October 21, 2007
By BRENDAN KIRBY
Staff Reporter

Four years and tens of millions of dollars after his NBA career ended, Mobile native Jason Caffey is in bankruptcy court seeking protection from creditors, who include seven women with whom he has had eight children.

Caffey's child-support problems landed him in jail in Tuscaloosa earlier this year and drew an arrest warrant in Georgia.
"The only reason I filed bankruptcy was to get these arrest warrants off me," he said in an interview last week.
Under the law, creditors --
including women seeking back child support -- must halt all collection efforts during the bankruptcy.
"The guy has made more money than he has sense," said Clarence Roby, a lawyer for Nikki Brown, a Louisiana woman seeking child support payments on behalf of two children. "He has not paid anything since May of 2005. ... He's the epitome of a deadbeat dad."
Jim Altman, a lawyer who represents Caffey in a Georgia child-support case, said Caffey's $4,250-per-month obligation is far outdated. "As an NBA basketball star, he was making millions of dollars," Altman said. "It kind of goes to show how the system fails people like Jason."
Caffey, 34, was a standout power forward and center at Davidson High School who went on to the University of Alabama and the Chicago Bulls. He later signed a $35 million contract with the Golden State Warriors before finishing his career with the Milwaukee Bucks.
Records at U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Mobile claim more than $1.9 million in debts against nearly $1.15 million in assets.
The records show Caffey earns $11,500 a month from two sources: JAC Enterprises, an endeavor that invests in real estate; and Allstars Developmental Academy, a day care center on Springhill Avenue. Caffey said three more such day cares are set to open in Mobile on Tuesday.

He also owns 1608 Sports Bar and Grill on St. Stephens Road.
More than half of Caffey's reported income -- $7,000 -- goes to alimony and child support. "Who wouldn't have trouble with that after retiring five years ago?" Caffey said.
Caffey's assets include a $175,000 home on Fearnway Drive in Mobile, a $14,000 1967 Buick Wildcat, a $34,000 2006 Dodge Charger, two NBA championship rings he won as a member of Michael Jordan's Bulls and nearly $4,600 in household goods.

His ex-wife, Bebe, sued Caffey for divorce last year and got their $800,000 home in Roswell, Ga. Several other women have also sued Caffey for child support.
Lawyers for some of the women said they do not oppose Caffey's bankruptcy filing, since the law prohibits debtors from escaping child-support obligations.
"In fact, that would be better, because he would have more cash available for child support," said Randy Kessler, who represents Lorunda Brown of Lawrenceville, Ga.
Caffey's bankruptcy documents list his obligations to Brown at $70,000, although a document filed by Brown pegs the amount, including interest on the arrears and attorneys' fees, at $112,736.

"Since February 2007, he's paid not a penny," Kessler said.
A judge in Fulton County, Ga., held Caffey in contempt last month for failure to pay child support and ordered him arrested. Altman has asked the judge to set that arrest order aside until the bankruptcy is resolved.
Altman said in an interview last week that he would try to work out a settlement in the Brown child-support case.
"No one needs $5,000 a month in child support," Altman said.
Kessler said Brown understands that Caffey's income has declined since his NBA career ended.
"She's always been willing to discuss reducing it, but he has never discussed it," Kessler said. He added, "We wouldn't be a stickler for $4,250 a month."

Roby, meanwhile, alluded to the giant contract that Caffey signed with Golden State when he left the Bulls after the 1997-98 season.
"What happened to the $35 million?" Roby asked.
Caffey said the $35 million figure is misleading. After taxes, he said, the amount was about $17 million, and he missed out on $12 million of that when his NBA career ended with three years left on his contract.
He said his ex-wife got half of his money in the divorce.
Caffey said he has invested about $2.5 million on his business ventures in Mobile, creating jobs for about 65 people.
He said he believes his children will be better off in the long run if he can build the businesses. "It's generational wealth now," he said.

Nikki Brown acknowledged that Caffey voluntarily set up $125,000 trust funds for each of their two children and allowed her to tap into them when she struggled after Hurricane Katrina.
"One thing I can say financially is when Jason had money, he always paid me," she said. "He did take care of us when he was in the league."
Said Nicole Fuller, an Illinois woman to whom Caffey owes $80,000 in child support: "Jason isn't a bad person. He's a good father."

http://hoopedia.nba.com/index.php/Jason_Caffey

Whoa…I mean where do I start………I don’t really care about the kids aspect of it, he seems to be in there life to what extent I don’t know but damn “What happened to the money”. It never ceases to amaze me how dumb these guys are wit there cheddar.

That is for 2nite but the moral of the story is, strap up and holla we want pre-nup we want pre-nup!!!!

Please spread love

The Docket v1

"Either u slingin crack rocks or u got a wicked jumpshot"

Those were the powerful words rapped by Biggie Smalls. Poetic and enlightening in one small phrase. To most who read this will be very shocked and disturbed by this mantra, but one must ask why is kid (1994) have this mentality, surely he cant be the only one who thinks like that. Why in the land of milk and honey........does a kid only have 2 options of prosperity. Either way it up for debate.......but when I was thinkin about bloggin about basketball and was lookin for a title, that the first thing that came to mind.....the hustle, the determination, the use of the word wicked rather then good or great......almost like wicked has a hint of sinister sprinkled in it.....I like that, for us basketball season is like our passion, "it wat we do for a living". Your going to get a raw, introspective view on the hoops atmosphere's, no fakin nuthin be the raw ish. Please enjoy and spread mad love.

Oct. 12

Midnight Madness is upon us. Just a gr8 tyme to be sports fiend, u got Nfl & NCAA football rebounding into shape, potential super bowl match-ups, major upsets and all that poppin. But now its our season, we havin awoken from the ashes and will reclaim our glory.........but there sumthing missin.........there no buzz for the l' this year. Now u purist are going be like yes there is and I say cat's like you will watch Central Texas St at El-Paso vs. Pepperdine at 12 midnight on a wednesday on espn 8. Get the point, u don’t care u just simply love the sport, but for the other 99% where the buzz. I mean u have some all-tyme gr8 players out there but no buzz, Not from the King, Not from Bean, Tmac, hell even the champs are chumps............ I challenge you to give me 2 good reason the L' is buzz-less and wat can we do to get it back

Enuff of wat the L is lackin, College basketball is always in good hand even if the product is not as good as back in the day, the ability to have kids givin it there all everyday game in and game out will always give it a good game. 2nite the first shot is fired on who goin to be cuttin the nets down in the big city (yawwwnniing) of San Antonio, in fact it only a 177 days left. So with the countdown officially on, let see who the major players are goin to be this season:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/luke_winn/10/12/power.rankings1/index.html

peep out the boi Luke Winn Post.

I'm kind of scared and pleased having UNC number one, first very rarely does a team go wire to wire it's just too hard, secondly I cant take another year of wat happened last year in the regional finals-heartbreaking-how in the hell do u get so cold from the field. He got G-town ranked 6th, wow I think there were going to be top 3, they got a lot of talent coming back and big homey Hibbert is pure center-not that jump-shooting scared to bang cat that so all to common in the b-ball atmosphere. I'm going to be going to about 10 G'town games this year so if any of y'all in the DMV(DC,MD,VA), we can meet up and talk hoops. The most intriguing team I’M looking forward to seeing is the USC Trojans, that right the I gotta see the boi OJ Mayo get bizzy. He the uber star ballhawk, that college basketball has been missin. im hoppin he can live some up to some of the hype, but already he has some issues he has to get by like Talib, from the LA Times "He also promised that he would not be too aggressive in throwing elbows -- or anything else -- in the general area of point guard Darren Collison. USC freshman and fellow high school superstar O.J. Mayo reportedly broke the jaw of Trojans point guard Daniel Hackett with a misplaced elbow during a pickup game last month. "An elbow, yeah, right," Love said. "Dan's a good friend of mine too. I'm never going to lay a hand or lay a fist or elbow on a teammate like that." Damn that boi Mayo already spreading it on cats, rival cats at that.....

An interesting thing I saw on the net last night: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNT00hIXjLs. That the boi Mike Conley, my early preseason pick for ROY. He’s uber quick and can obviously handle the rock but like wit any pg u gotta ask about maturity and can he hit the jumper. I was wondering how he was doing down in Memphis, I found this article: http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2007/oct/10/precocious-conley-gets-hang-of-things/ , I plan on link’in up wit the writer and keep a Mike Conley weekly update.

In the “u can’t blame davey stern” office: this might be old but very crazy, this video is kind of old maybe 4 or 5 yrs old…… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4r4NSjE7jrY( u might have to copy and paste to browser, the link is not highlighting, but trust u wont be disappointed ) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Closs. This section will be updated frequently as the info comes from your local police blotter.

That it for right now, Gotta watch the battle of the century Dallas v. NE