Wednesday, March 16, 2005
futebol
It stinks. It all stinks. Mourinho should be hounded out of the game or at the very least brought up on disrepute charges. Anders Frisk resigning should have been the last straw. Mourinho is bad for football. His coaching credentials should be suspended until he can learn to play nice.
I hate Chelsea right now, not because I envy their money, but because they are the epitome of nouveau riche. All flash. Well, all flash and 1-0 wins. Thirteen of them this season does not speak to me of a team that is thrilling to watch. If we thought Arsenal's 1971 double-wining team was dull, just look at the sub-par performances these multi-millionaires have put in for about half of the season.
I don't think that there's anyone at Chelsea who will be able to say they came by this year's silverware as honestly as Guillit and Vialli's five trophies (FA Cup 1997, 2000; League Cup 1998; Cup Winners Cup and Super Cup 1998; Charity Shield 2000). So let's not start calling this incarnation of Chelsea "great" just yet. Those Chelsea teams (Petrescu, Poyet, DiMatteo, Zola, Vialli and Hughes in particular) were great to watch, this one just isn't.
beisbol
well, the time is at hand - the baseball season is only a few sleeps away and, much as I'm becoming acutely aware of the post-season pain that comes with being a Braves fan, I'm almost hopeful of a good run this year. Some impressive pre-season performances and a little spring-cleaning of the roster has us in good shape I think. Perhaps this really could be the year.
gridiron
Well, the season's over a while ago now, but there are the trifling matters of the curret free-agency period and the draft (next month). There have been some big trades (Randy Moss to Oakland, Kevin Carter to Miami and Plaxico Burress is still looking for a new home). Here in Atlanta we let go of Jay Feely (K) brought in Pro-Bowl nickelback Ike Reese from the Eagles and retained the kick returning services of Allen Rossum. Not to metion switching Chris Mohr for Toby Gowin (Jets) in teh punting department. I wish that Peerless Price would have stepped up last year so we could have traded him (as of right now, it would cost more to pay his guaranteed bonuses and trade him than it would to keep him until the end of his contract) but he didn't so I can only hope he gets his hand/eye coordination back before Labor Day.
hoops
Let's not let it be said that Atlanta don't blaze a trail in basketball. After the wholesale trading of major talent for minor payrolls last season, the Hawks have cunningly proceeded to chase a tearing down season with something other than a rebuilding season. Yes, the NBA basement club is at 11-53 with a win percentage of 0.172, and you might ordinarily think that a bad thing, right? Well, you'd be wrong. At this point in the season, finishing dead last is what it's all about. Getting that coveted #1 draft pick is where it's at. And this year it's the precocious talent that is Chris Paul of Wake Forest most likely to go first. I'll talk more about him in the NCAA section.
The Hawks do have a couple of bright spots on their roster, though: Josh and Josh (Childress and Smith), two outstandingly gifted rookies who, along with Chris Paul or Marvin Williams, will give the Hawks the fight they need to make a run at conference champio next year...then after that, who can tell.
pucks
There's no pro-hockey this year since the league and the players association couldn't reach an agreement on whether there should be a salary cap or not. Turns out that the players think not. Who's surprised at that?
NCAA
Okay, let's talk about the college football first. Dawgs died a death, failing to overcome Tennessee when it was there for the taking, and needed to beat the undefeated Auburn Tigers and have other results go their way to stand any chance of a good bowl game. They lost 6-24.
The Southern Cal Trojans turned over the Oklahoma Sooners in the national championship game, which Auburn can feel cheated out of because, with an idetintical perfect record, they would have put up a better fight than the Sooners who succumbed 55-19.
Kudos to Heismann winning USC QB Matt Leinart (who threw 5 TD passes) for saying that he was going to stick around and finish his last year at school before going into the draft.
And now the basketball.
After the excitement and heartbreak of last year's NCAA Championship game, watching Tech put up a spirited fight but crumble under the weight of UConn's offense, last weekend we all got the deja vu feeling again.
In the ACC (regional conference) championship game, Tech (seeded fifth), who had beaten a #1 seed UNC team to face #3 seed Duke in the final. It was close, but in the end Duke edged it 64-69.
However, the good showing gave Tech the #5 seeding in the Alberquerque regional playoffs for the NCAA tournament this year. You might well ask how Tech (W19L11) can get a #5 seed while the Colonials (W22L7) only get a #12 seed.
Well, it's all about the conference you play in. Tech play their regular season in the ACC, which boasts some of the toughest teams in the land: Wake Forest, Duke and UNC, seeded 2, 1 and 1 in their respective regional brackets. Or, to put it another way, two of the top four in the nation and three of the top eight. The Atlantic Ten Conference, home of GWU, has only one representative in the tourney. And that will be a very short adventure.
Predictarama
Chicago Regional.
No surprises. There's a reason Illinois is ranked #1 in the country and they will prove it right up to the final four.
Alberquerque Regional
I'm betting that Tech can beat Louisville in the second round but that they will fall in the third round to #1 seed Washington. Wake Forest will surprise us all by crashing out against Gonzaga in the third round, too. Washington will beat Gonzaga to advance to St. Louis.
Syracuse Regional
The big match-up will be UConn vs UNC in the Elite Eight round, with little in the way of surprises getting #1 and #2 seeds to meet each other.
Austin Regional
Duke will make a second round exit when they unexpectedly get narrowly beaten by Stanford, leaving the way wide open for Kentucky, who will stomp on Syracuse to reach the Final Four.
So...Illinois v Washington, UNC v Kentucky (UNC won 91-78 in December). I think UNC will beat Kentucky again and then go on to show its pedigree by blowing out the Illini by a double-digit margin, thanks in no small part to the irrepressible forward, Marvin Williams. Who then, hopefully, will be headed down I-85 from Chapel Hill to Atlanta to sign for the Hawks.
And that's it. That's everything.
It stinks. It all stinks. Mourinho should be hounded out of the game or at the very least brought up on disrepute charges. Anders Frisk resigning should have been the last straw. Mourinho is bad for football. His coaching credentials should be suspended until he can learn to play nice.
I hate Chelsea right now, not because I envy their money, but because they are the epitome of nouveau riche. All flash. Well, all flash and 1-0 wins. Thirteen of them this season does not speak to me of a team that is thrilling to watch. If we thought Arsenal's 1971 double-wining team was dull, just look at the sub-par performances these multi-millionaires have put in for about half of the season.
I don't think that there's anyone at Chelsea who will be able to say they came by this year's silverware as honestly as Guillit and Vialli's five trophies (FA Cup 1997, 2000; League Cup 1998; Cup Winners Cup and Super Cup 1998; Charity Shield 2000). So let's not start calling this incarnation of Chelsea "great" just yet. Those Chelsea teams (Petrescu, Poyet, DiMatteo, Zola, Vialli and Hughes in particular) were great to watch, this one just isn't.
beisbol
well, the time is at hand - the baseball season is only a few sleeps away and, much as I'm becoming acutely aware of the post-season pain that comes with being a Braves fan, I'm almost hopeful of a good run this year. Some impressive pre-season performances and a little spring-cleaning of the roster has us in good shape I think. Perhaps this really could be the year.
gridiron
Well, the season's over a while ago now, but there are the trifling matters of the curret free-agency period and the draft (next month). There have been some big trades (Randy Moss to Oakland, Kevin Carter to Miami and Plaxico Burress is still looking for a new home). Here in Atlanta we let go of Jay Feely (K) brought in Pro-Bowl nickelback Ike Reese from the Eagles and retained the kick returning services of Allen Rossum. Not to metion switching Chris Mohr for Toby Gowin (Jets) in teh punting department. I wish that Peerless Price would have stepped up last year so we could have traded him (as of right now, it would cost more to pay his guaranteed bonuses and trade him than it would to keep him until the end of his contract) but he didn't so I can only hope he gets his hand/eye coordination back before Labor Day.
hoops
Let's not let it be said that Atlanta don't blaze a trail in basketball. After the wholesale trading of major talent for minor payrolls last season, the Hawks have cunningly proceeded to chase a tearing down season with something other than a rebuilding season. Yes, the NBA basement club is at 11-53 with a win percentage of 0.172, and you might ordinarily think that a bad thing, right? Well, you'd be wrong. At this point in the season, finishing dead last is what it's all about. Getting that coveted #1 draft pick is where it's at. And this year it's the precocious talent that is Chris Paul of Wake Forest most likely to go first. I'll talk more about him in the NCAA section.
The Hawks do have a couple of bright spots on their roster, though: Josh and Josh (Childress and Smith), two outstandingly gifted rookies who, along with Chris Paul or Marvin Williams, will give the Hawks the fight they need to make a run at conference champio next year...then after that, who can tell.
pucks
There's no pro-hockey this year since the league and the players association couldn't reach an agreement on whether there should be a salary cap or not. Turns out that the players think not. Who's surprised at that?
NCAA
Okay, let's talk about the college football first. Dawgs died a death, failing to overcome Tennessee when it was there for the taking, and needed to beat the undefeated Auburn Tigers and have other results go their way to stand any chance of a good bowl game. They lost 6-24.
The Southern Cal Trojans turned over the Oklahoma Sooners in the national championship game, which Auburn can feel cheated out of because, with an idetintical perfect record, they would have put up a better fight than the Sooners who succumbed 55-19.
Kudos to Heismann winning USC QB Matt Leinart (who threw 5 TD passes) for saying that he was going to stick around and finish his last year at school before going into the draft.
And now the basketball.
After the excitement and heartbreak of last year's NCAA Championship game, watching Tech put up a spirited fight but crumble under the weight of UConn's offense, last weekend we all got the deja vu feeling again.
In the ACC (regional conference) championship game, Tech (seeded fifth), who had beaten a #1 seed UNC team to face #3 seed Duke in the final. It was close, but in the end Duke edged it 64-69.
However, the good showing gave Tech the #5 seeding in the Alberquerque regional playoffs for the NCAA tournament this year. You might well ask how Tech (W19L11) can get a #5 seed while the Colonials (W22L7) only get a #12 seed.
Well, it's all about the conference you play in. Tech play their regular season in the ACC, which boasts some of the toughest teams in the land: Wake Forest, Duke and UNC, seeded 2, 1 and 1 in their respective regional brackets. Or, to put it another way, two of the top four in the nation and three of the top eight. The Atlantic Ten Conference, home of GWU, has only one representative in the tourney. And that will be a very short adventure.
Predictarama
Chicago Regional.
No surprises. There's a reason Illinois is ranked #1 in the country and they will prove it right up to the final four.
Alberquerque Regional
I'm betting that Tech can beat Louisville in the second round but that they will fall in the third round to #1 seed Washington. Wake Forest will surprise us all by crashing out against Gonzaga in the third round, too. Washington will beat Gonzaga to advance to St. Louis.
Syracuse Regional
The big match-up will be UConn vs UNC in the Elite Eight round, with little in the way of surprises getting #1 and #2 seeds to meet each other.
Austin Regional
Duke will make a second round exit when they unexpectedly get narrowly beaten by Stanford, leaving the way wide open for Kentucky, who will stomp on Syracuse to reach the Final Four.
So...Illinois v Washington, UNC v Kentucky (UNC won 91-78 in December). I think UNC will beat Kentucky again and then go on to show its pedigree by blowing out the Illini by a double-digit margin, thanks in no small part to the irrepressible forward, Marvin Williams. Who then, hopefully, will be headed down I-85 from Chapel Hill to Atlanta to sign for the Hawks.
And that's it. That's everything.
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