View My Seats

At the Intersection of Sports and Culture

Photo Credit for Header: Alex Foucre-Stimes

Breaking Down The Bracket: A Sports Bloggers Rite Of Passage

by

While most everyone else, including your boss and mother in law, is bickering over their brackets and comparing cinderellas, I decided to take a slightly different approach to March Madness. Rather than focus on any specific 7/10 matchup or share with you my gloriously irrelevant Final Four prediction, (Go Jackrabbits!!!!), I figured that what was most needed at this time was a closer examination of the second/third round host cities. Here are superlatives for each of the 8 locations, including Greensboro.

Best Scrabble Score: Albuquerque – It may not be “sesquioxidizing” but with 31 points the largest city in New Mexico is clearly the highest scoring scrabble word on the board. And there isn’t even a close second. Go ahead, do the math. Nashville (15) and Greensboro (12) don’t stand a chance. Maybe if a second/third round game were being played in Jacksonville (28) would you then have an argument. But in board game reality, none of this even matters because as anyone who plays scrabble knows you can’t play a word that starts with a capital letter which is always a bummer for me whenever I try to sneak “Xanadu” by my opponents.

Best Explorer as a Namesake: Columbus – The capital of Ohio wins by default and really only because there are no tournament games played in either Hudson, NY or Ponce de Leon, FL. One of my absolute favorite books to teach in my World History class is “1491” by Charles Mann which gives an in depth look at what American civilizations were like before European contact. Contrary to many of our textbooks, indigenous peoples were able to cultivate and sustain incredibly complex and technologically advanced societies. Of course, if like me you grew up watching Disney movies then the notion of the Native Americans as neither “noble savages” or “incurably vicious barbarians” comes as somewhat of a shock. Now that I have kids of my own I suppose this is what they call a teachable moment.

Best Beer for Under $2: Nashville – It’s impossible to not at least respect a place where a 16oz can of PBR costs you right around $1.50, including tax. The Music City has a pulse and vibe unlike any other city in the country. (Granted I have yet to visit New Orleans, Miami, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Austin, or Seattle.) The only downside, the water mocassins. My grandmother was born and raised in Nashville and she use to tell us how when the Cumberland River would rise and flood the surrounding plains that it would leave behind dangerous cottonmouth water moccasins in people’s gazebos and living rooms. These stories always use to give me the willies and made me appreciate my idyllic upbringing in New England where the only menacing wildlife that I encountered was my neighbors rabid golden retriever named Molly.

Best City Where I Would Have Liked To Live If It Were 2008 Before Every Hipster Dufus From Williamsburg Brooklyn Hadn’t Already Moved There: Portland – I caught a few promos for the MLS opener Monday night between the Portland Timbers and the Philadelphia Union and walked away totally freaked out by the passion exhibited by soccer fans in the pacific northwest. For instance, were you aware that the Timbers unofficial mascot is some brawny guy named Timber Joey who after every Portland win fires up a large chainsaw and cuts a section off the “victory log”? Timber Joey and victory log: two things that I never thought I would mention in the same sentence.

Best City Where I Would Have Liked To Live If It Were 2009 Before Every Hipster Dufus From Williamsburg Brooklyn Hadn’t Already Moved There: Pittsburgh – I’ve expressed my preoccupation with the Steel City before, but it bears repeating, this town has everything young professionals are looking for including affordable housing. Andrew Carnegie would be so proud.

Best Billionaire: Omaha – Speaking of the Gospel of Wealth, Omaha remains the home of the oracle himself Warren Buffett, who for some odd reason I always get confused with Rupert Murdoch even though one believes that the richest 1% should pay more in taxes while the other owns News Corp, a company known for it’s conservative politics and illegal phone hacking. Perhaps it’s the glasses. Or the vaults full of money.

Best City To Mispronounce: Louisville – Or is it “Loo-ee-vil”? Let me just say that the outsiders way is much, much easier. My dad and I are constantly at odds over how to pronounce his hometown of Baltimore, MD. He prefers “Bawl-mer” while I favor the more prevalent, albeit incorrect, “Ball-ta-more”. The fact that we are even still having this argument just proves the theory that my dad has yet to fully recover after Barry Levinson failed to cast him as one of the leads in Diner. It’s funny, dad has always considered himself to be a lot like Boogie where I have always seen him as a taller version of Eddie.

Best City In North Carolina That Is Also A Site For a 2012 NCAA Tournament Game: Greensboro – Part of me wanted to give this category to Louisville too but that wasn’t going to work seeing as how Kentucky and North Carolina are two different states, even though both can boast a #1 seed in the NCAA tournament. And why is it that Greensboro always seems to be a host city? Probably has something to do with its close proximity to the Research Triangle and the rich basketball tradition along Tobacco Road. If that’s the case, why no love for Manchester, NH?

view from Dayton Arena courtesy of @gregwrubell

How To Turn Your Place Of Employment Into An Actual Real Life March Madness Bracket

by

What if life were like March Madness where the hierarchy of every business/place of employment were determined by a bracket? As a high school history teacher I am absolutely fascinated by this concept. Who hasn’t spent endless hours during their lunch break comparing their value to that of Jim over in accounting? What if during contract negotiations your boss were to rank all of the top employees in the company from 1 to 64 and go through the bracket, matchup by matchup, region by region, until a winner, or most valuable employee, was determined? Isn’t this a meritocracy at its best?

I also think it would be interesting to assess what your own personal seeding would be heading into the tournament. For instance, I’m one of 60 or so teachers at my school and that number isn’t even counting administrators, support staff, coaches, etc. Would I even make the top 64? If I don’t, should I be worried about my long term job security?

If I were to make the field it would probably be as an automatic bid from the Southern Conference. I would most likely enter as a #13 seed and take on a high powered at large bid out of the development office. Think Davidson vs Wisconsin. Once the brackets are announced I all of a sudden become a very trendy upset pick, probably because most teachers don’t really understand how the development team got to be a #4 seed in the first place. Then you have guys like Doug Gottlieb and Digger Phelps picking me to make it all the way to the regionals in Phoenix where I would end up taking on a #1 seed like Kansas. Here is were my Cinderella story through March comes to an end as the Dean of Faculty beats me into submission before we even reach the half.

But, as a history teacher, I can feel good about making it to the Sweet 16 especially when very few colleagues predicted me to make it that far. Hopefully my performance in the office value bracket would allow me to keep my job for at least another year until we are ready to start the madness all over again.

view from Madison Square Garden courtesy of @chrisfreezy17

Hoop Dreams: More Relevant Today Than Ever Before

by

2012 marks the 18th Anniversary of Hoop Dreams, a landmark sports documentary about two young Chicago basketball players, Arthur Agee and William Gates, with high aspirations and hopes for the future. At least that’s what it says on the iTunes plot description. What the movie is really about is two families struggling to overcome all the obstacles and stereotypes that continue to beset African Americans. The film has been airing on one of the ESPN’s recently and it is recommended viewing for anyone looking to revisit many of the complex socioeconomic issues that continue to effect our inner cities. Here are just a few points to consider when watching Hoop Dreams today.

Chicago has been in the spotlight recently due to an unseemly amount of violence throughout certain parts of the city, especially the Western portion of the proper around Marshall High where, coincidentally, Arthur Agee went to school. Agee went to Marshall after not being able to foot the bill at St. Joseph’s. But in reality, if Agee were able to play up to head coach Gene Pingatore’s expectations he probably never would have had to leave the program.

Pingatore, or “PING” as his license plate reads, is a very complex figure. On the one hand, he has had an incredibly successful coaching career, helping place several of his most prized pupils, like Isaiah Thomas and more recently Evan Turner, in some of the most prestigious universities and basketball programs in the country. But at what cost? For every William Gates who shows promise early and is rewarded with Coach Ping’s eternal loyalty there is an Arthur Agee who couldn’t live up to expectations on the freshman team and would be unsympathetically weened off the teat before having an opportunity to complete his education at St. Joe’s.

And speaking of Isaiah Thomas, Hoop Dreams was filmed right around the same time that the Detroit Pistons star point guard, and future office creepster, was left of the 1992 Olympic basketball roster.  As the story goes, it was Michael Jordan, amongst others, who wanted Zeke left off the Dream Team because nobody wanted to play with him.  MJ always seems to be the center of unsubstantiated rumors. Was he kicked out of the NBA for a season because he gambled on basketball? And is he selling his $29 million Highland Park estate because he needs to the money to meet payroll for the Charlotte Bobcats?

But back to Hoop Dreams, one has to wonder whether or not William Gates would have had a better basketball career if he hurt his knee in 2012 instead of 1990. Those scenes from the film where he is having his knee scoped are pretty gruesome. Schools like Indiana, Kansas, and NC State would have probably kept knocking on his door if he still had both menisci.

When he was at the top of his game, it was pretty cool to see Gates compete in the ABCD summer camp alongside future member of Michigan’s Fab Five Juwan Howard, Chris Webber, and Jalen Rose. And how perfect was Dick Vitale when speaking to the prospects? He hasn’t changed one bit. Same enthusiasm. Same hairline. Same tight fitting coaching shorts. Dicky V was talking to the campers about the pitfalls of being a big time college athlete.

Hoop Dreams sheds some much needed light on the cut throat process that is the college recruitment process where young student/athletes are played against the odds. Marquette coach Kevin O’Neill, yeah that Kevin O’Neill, sits down in William’s living room and explains to the high school senior that the Golden Eagles have 2 spots for 7 recruits.  O’Neill probably sat down with each of those 7 families and dropped them all the same line about how if they say they want to go to Marquette then he will stop recruiting other players. This sort of parlor trick no doubt employed by the majority of DI coaches puts a tremendous amount of pressure on the player to make a quick decision lest he be passed over for a more spontaneous recruit.

A few final points/observations. First, it would have been really fascinating to witness a one-on-one game between Agee and Gates during their respective primes. Agee probably had the higher ceiling because he was an incredibly gifted athlete who could get to the basket and create his own shot. But Gates had the polish/mid range game that would allow him to blend in easily with a more established program and coach.

Secondly, it’s pretty amazing when you realize that Williams Gates Jr. is one of the stars of the current St. Joe’s team. Judging from the youtube clips, it looks like Jr’s game is much more reminiscent of Agee than his father. Not surprising considering that Arthur Agee and William Gates will be inextricably linked for all eternity because of Hoop Dreams.

view from Champaign courtesy of @clayharbs82

 

 

You Can’t Spell Optimism and Orioles Without an O, I, & S

by

I’m getting sick and tired of all the baseball fans out there hating on the Baltimore Orioles. Since when did we become a sports society built on a foundation of hostility, name calling, and dismissive cynicism? Yes, the Orioles haven’t had a winning record in 14 seasons. And so what if they still play in the uber-competitive AL East with an owner, Peter Angelos, who is more concerned with maintaining a lucrative law firm and regional sports network than putting a winning product on the field.  Certainly as a lifelong Orioles fan I have every right in the world to compose a 1000 word missive bashing the Birds for over a decade of ineptitude. But instead, I’m going to turn the other cheek and do like my brethren over at Camden Chat and give you 8 quality reasons for optimism if you’re a Baltimore Orioles fan in 2012.

1 – New Uniforms/Old Logo: Murray. Ripken. Palmer. Reimold. Andino. This is Birdland!!! In all honesty, Baltimore was probably due for a minor uniform alteration and as much as I love the ornithologically correct bird, the cartoon Oriole does bring us back to a day and age when the team was one of the prohibitive favorites in the American League. Now if we can just get Brooks Robinson healthy and back manning the hot corner.

2- Weight Watchers Worked For Me: Speaking of third baseman, Mark Reynolds supposedly lost over 20 pounds this offseason and is dedicated to improving his defense which is a very good thing since he committed 31 errors last season. To be fair, in his first season with Baltimore Reynolds did compile some impressive offensive numbers leading the team with 37 HRs and 86 RBI. The free swinging slugger also cut down on his strikeouts as well. Between a slimmed down Reynolds, and rock solid SS JJ Hardy, the left side of the infield should be in reliable hands this season.

3 – Dylan Bundy and Manny Machado: Most casual baseball fans haven’t heard of either of these two rising stars down on the Orioles farm but the mere mentioning of either prospect is enough to give Birdland goosebumps. Machado, a SS from Miami, has drawn comparisons to a young Alex Rodriguez and while I would certainly take ARod’s production for the next decade, I could really do without the banned substances and failed Snow White parodies.

Bundy, a right handed pitcher and 4th overall pick in the 2011 draft, makes throwing a baseball 100 mph look easy. (Think Rory McIlroy hitting a driver or Meryl Streep accepting an Academy Award.) Probably too early to expect a big league call up for either player this season but the future is certainly looking brighter with these two horses in the stable.

4 – The Life Of Brian: Brian Matusz spent the entire offseason working out with Brady Anderson in SoCal. I’m ok with his strength and conditioning program so long as it didn’t involve any hyperdermic needles and helps the young lefty pitcher return to his once promising form. 2011 was all but a lost year for Matusz who entered the season with an injured abdomen region and was never able to find the form that made him such a promising pitcher during the second half of 2010. Maybe a healthy, stronger Matusz can help eat up some of the innings that would have been consumed by Jeremy Guthrie had the former Orioles starter not been traded to Colorado.

5 – The United Nations of Pitching: I hope being permanently kicked out of South Korea was worth it. New GM Dan Duquette made a concerted effort to beef up the international scouting department and in the process managed to add a few veteran pitchers. Wei-Yin Chen and Tsuyoshi Wada could add some much needed depth to the starting rotation and hopefully challenge some of the younger arms like Chris Tillman, Jake Arrieta, and Zach Britton.

6 – Following the Wieters: After a gold glove winning 2010 where he hit 22 HRs and threw out 37% of potential base stealers, Matt Wieters has emerged as one of the best catchers in baseball. Buster Olney has already begun to  speculate about Wieters plans post playing career and believes the Orioles catcher has a chance to eventually emerge as a top managerial candidate a la Joe Girardi. Here’s hoping for at least another decade behind the Camden Yards dish before Wieters even considers contemplating a second career.

7 – Sigh No More: It has been too long since we last saw Brian Roberts take the field for the Baltimore Orioles. Recently the former all star second baseman has shown signs of overcoming a concussion that has kept him sidelined for nearly an entire year. It wasn’t long ago that Roberts was a considered a hot commodity and the cornerstone of the franchise. Now all the diminutive spark plug can do is take it one day at a time while the Orioles wait for the return of an undeniable difference maker.

8 – The AL Least?: The Orioles division can’t be as strong as it has been in the recent past. The Red Sox are bound to revolt against some of the policies being implemented by new manager Bobby Valentine. The Yankees lineup is getting older and the Rays can’t possibly continue their magic, even with one of the most impressive pitching rotations in baseball. If everything goes right this could be the year that Baltimore finally breaks the .500 barrier.

Remember, it’s Spring Training. Optimism reigns supreme.

view from Ed Smith Stadium courtesy of @kevindayhoff

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The NBA All-Star Break Means It’s Time For The Academy Awards

by

This is a big weekend for both the NBA and Hollywood. As basketball enjoys its All-Star break Tinseltown gears up for the Academy Awards this Sunday night. Now is as good a time as any to predict both the winner of the Best Picture Oscar and the NBA Championship.

Outside Looking In

New York Knicks/Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close: After last night’s humbling loss to the Miami Heat I have some serious reservations about even including New York on this list. But the Knicks still deserve mentioning in large part because these past few weeks of Linsanity have been much too captivating to at least not consider a title run for this team. The Knicks will probably not get past either the Bulls or Heat but their presence in the Eastern Conference playoffs will do wonders for the television rating, that is of course if you are a Time Warner customer living in Manhattan.

Movie buffs aren’t quite sure how Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close ended up being nominated for a Best Picture Oscar with some reviewers calling it “self important” and “crass”.With Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock leading the cast, EL&IC boasts an impressive starting lineup but much like Knicks, the movie’s crunch time lineup includes crucial performance by supporting players like Max von Sydow and Viola Davis. But can you really win a championship wtih JR Smith launching 3 pointer after 3 pointer?

Dallas Mavericks/War Horse: Can’t discount the champs, even if free agent acquisition Lamar Odom has spent more time worrying about how to fix his sex swing than trying to figure how to help the Mavs win another title. You have to wonder whether or not this team has the drive again this season to push themselves all the way to the NBA Finals or maybe they are just satisfied to wait a year until they can go out and sign both Deron Williams and Dwight Howard this summer.

Speaking of running on past laurels, War Horse, directed by Steven Spielberg and based on a famous play, is the story of a boy and his horse and World War I. In other words, how did they ever turn this into a Broadway show? This film, much like the Dallas Mavericks, is on this list because of the past successes of Spielberg. And just like Dirk Nowitzki, it’ll take a whole roster of thoroughbreds for this director to win the big prize on Sunday.

Los Angeles Lakers/The Tree of Life: The Lakers have no point guard, zero depth, and are rumored to be shopping Pau Gasol. However, as long as they have Kobe Bryant they remain a threat to win the Western Conference, even if he is surrounded by a group of ripening corpses and Andrew Bynum’s fragile skeleton.

The Tree of Life is very very hard to understand, which is probably exactly what director Terrence Malick was shooting for. Is it about a middle class family in Texas during the 1950’s or the end of the world as we know it? Does Malick really believe that dinosaurs will inherit the earth once again or was he simply trying to make a statement about the ephemeral nature of human existence? Either way, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that The Tree of Life is much too ambitious to appeal to the average Academy voter. And like the Lakers, it’s really hard to win a championship when your roster is full of lifeforms from the Cretaceous era.

The Darkhorse

Denver Nuggets/Midnight in Paris: The Nuggets are an incredibly entertaining basketball team. They get up and down the court, defend, and take boatloads of threes. They also have the depth and athletic ability to match up very well with the Clippers and Thunder.

Midnight In Paris is a whimsical tale that brings us back to the Belle Epoque of Woody Allen’s illustrious career. But just like the Nuggets, the most entertaining movie doesn’t always win the Best Picture Oscar. (see 1997)

The Contenders

San Antonio Spurs/Moneyball: The Spurs have always spent their dollars wisely, acquiring a valuable stable of role players like Matt Bonner, Gary Neal, and Kawhi Leonard to compliment veteran stars Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, and Manu Ginobili. Once again the issue for the Spurs will be the health of their aging nucleus. If any of their stars are unavailable or hobbled for the playoffs then it becomes next to impossible for the Spurs to keep up with the younger legs of the Western Conference.

The Oakland A’s, like the Spurs, have a history of cobbling together a starting lineup by signing other teams castoffs. Moneyball is a baseball movie about the island of misfit toys with Brad Pitt at the center of a statistical revolution that transformed professional sports. The story ends in defeat which may be an ominous sign for Spurs fans.

Los Angeles Clippers/Hugo: Hugo is a movie about the magic of movies. (Go figure. Scorcese going the PG route.) There’s a lot of magic taking place at the Staples Center this season and for once it’s not just the Lake Show. Blake Griffin continues to defy gravity and Chris Paul has established Lob City as more than just a passing fancy. It will be interesting to see whether or not the Clippers can carry this mystique into the second half of the season. In either case, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see either walk away with big prize.

The Favorites

Oklahoma City/The Descendants: OKC is young, energetic, and most importantly after last season’s playoff run, experienced. The Thunder certainly have the young legs to outlast their Western Conference competition but the question will always be, who takes that final shot: Kevin Durant or Russell Westbrook?

When it comes to Hollywood, there is no doubt that George Clooney is the man in charge. However, his character in The Descendants is very un alpa dogesque. The Descendants is two hours of scowling self loathing woe is me catharsis. In other words, a typical night in the life of Thunder center Kendrick Perkins.

Chicago Bulls/The Help: It was unfortunately only a matter of time before Derrick Rose broke down. His bad back is asymptamatic of his relentless style of play and effort on both ends of the court. Bad backs are really hard to overcome, just ask your dad.

Rose certainly could use a little help in Chicago but he has recently denied reports that he was asking the Bulls front office to trade for Pau Gasol. The Help is riding waves of momentum and it would make a lot of people smile to see the feel good movie of the year ride away with Hollywood’s biggest prize.

The Winner

Miami Heat/The Artist – The regular season does not matter because this Heat team will be judged by their performance in the playoffs. However, if recent games are any indication, LeBron James and company are motivated and capable of eviscerating any foe in their path. Silence has never been the answer for the Big Three but it could be the gimmick that pushes The Artist over the top. But, as with the Heat, there will be a lot of people rooting against it on Sunday night. If the past is any indication then Harvey Weinstein will not mind that there are a lot of movie fans out there who don’t like him. Unlike LeBron James.

 view from American Airlines Arena courtesy of @PLRLifestyle