There was one thing from the Denver beatdown that bothered me most. More than making Linas Klieza look like an all-star. More than the 11th loss in their last 12 road games. More than Jason Hart's ineptitude. More than Carlos Boozer's infatuation with his jumpshot. More than Paul Millsap continuing to get zero respect from the referees. More than the "it's not the team, it's their schedule" excuses.

It occured in the 3rd Quarter when Kleiza had a fastbreak layup looking for 2 of his eventual 41 points, and Kover fouled him while clearly going for the ball. Clean play? Yes. Hard foul? You betchya. Kleiza took exception to this and blatanlty kneed Kover in the back while Korver was trying to get up, and stood over Kyle as if to punk him. This occured right in front of Carlos Boozer and Deron Williams and no one did anything.

This is the problem with this team. No toughness. If you're doing the radio shows, if you're talking about being the future of this team, you gotta get in Kleiza's face. Do you think Michael Jordan or Karl Malone would have stood there and did nothing? Heck, Raja Bell would be suspended by now.

I don't care if Boozer's making $64 million or DWill's going to get max money. Like the school yard bully, Linas Klieza just took their milk money and the Jazz did nothing to stop him.

1. The Giants and Packers have both built their teams "The Patriot Way." Find a franchise QB, draft really well and don't overspend in free agency. It's fitting they're the two teams playing for the right to play the Patriots.

2. Regardless of what happens Eli Manning can be proud of his performance heading into this offeseason. But this Sunday he has a chance to permenantly step out of Big Brother's shadow.

3. I hope Vincent Jackson can keep his head screwed on right because he has a chance to be a really special player.

4. Does Shawn Merriman, Shaun Phillips or any of the Charger’s DL ever drop into coverage? If I always know who San Diego's rushing don't you think Tom Brady will too?

5. The 49ers were supposed to be good this year and the Cleveland Browns bad. The Cowboys or Bears win the NFC and the Giants and Packers not even close. That's what's great about football. It's a team sport where it's having the better players is not the same as having the better team. Don't believe me? Just ask Wade Phillips.

To my loyal and faithful readers (not that there are any) and everybody else,

Due to school and personal issues I haven't been able to write much recently but now I'll have some time so I'll try and get back to making a weekly post.

 

So we'll wind up right back where we started. An NBA season that started with a Stephen Jackson Shot (the type with a gun, not with a basketball) will end with another Big Shot Bob Shot (cheap shot). In between, was alot of David Stern talk about cleaning up the league's image and eliminating whining and complaining. Great move! Remember All-Star week in Vegas? Remember the Kobe suspension and the subsequent "oh we'll looking to clean up the game" response? Remember the Sonics looking for a new home. Good thing hockey can't figure out how to attract viewers. Then the NBA got lucky. They got the Warriors going on an March Madness like cinderella run. They got a Phoenix/San Antonio gem of a 2nd round matchup. They got the Suns battling back and making what looked like another Spurs cake-walk into a realy series that could go either way.

Just when you thought not even the NBA could mess this up, they did exactly that. I applauded the league for not taking any action against Bruce Bowen, against Jason Richardson and Baron Davis. Hard, and cheap? Definitely. But the gray area between intent to injure and frustration and hard play was tough to interpret. I was happy the league decided not to intervene and let the series be decided on the court. Then they go and pull this.

Let's pretend the body check never happened and Cheap Shot Bob is still Big Shot Bob. We're talking about Steve Nash with two of the greatest assists of the year. We're talking about Amare Stoudemire stepping up and scoring right in Duncan's face. We're taking about the Suns finally going back the small lineup that gives them such an advantage. Playing Amare at center, Shawn Marion at power forward and a 3-guard lineup with Nash, Bell and Barbosa finally allowed the Suns to break lose and spread the Spurs defense and play the uptempo style they need to play to win. (Duncan battling foul trouble most of the 4th quarter also played a role, but Nash and Amare pick n'roll with the court spread with 3 shooters is virtually unstoppable)

Instead, we're talking about two guys who did the unthinkable: they stepped onto the court when their teammate was thrown into the scorer's table with less than 30 seconds left. Forget the fact that Stoudemire and Diaw got no more than 15 feet down the sideline, forget the fact that Duncan and Bowen did virtually the same thing in a 2nd quarter incident where Francisco Elson was undercut, forget the interpretation of the rule. This is not about the rule. It's about David Stern's greed for power. No question the right thing to do would have been to say "you know what, sure they technically they stepped onto the floor but Tim Duncan did the same thing. But the important thing is nothing serious happened so let's the guys on the floor decide this insteand of Stu Jackson and myself."

That would have made too much sense. Instead David Stern, who was critisized for not taking action against Bowen, against Davis, against Richardson, felt letting this slide would mean losing the iron fist he only thinks he rules by. After all, remember waaaaay back when he was talking about eliminating all the whining and complaining? Yeah that worked real well. For once I wish Joey Crawford was still officiating just to throw some of the Spurs out for excessive whining. Just watch them after any call. It's ridiculous.

The bottom line is the biggest and most important shot of the playoffs will be a cheap shot. I don't care that Horry's suspension is two games. San Antonio could lose Horry for the rest of eternity and still come out on top of this deal. Unless a miracle happens and the Suns can pull this series out, the Spurs will be off to the finals (the last time the Jazz won in San Antonio Thurl Bailey was still playing with them). All because of the clutch play of Cheap Shot Bob.

 

The first two games of the Jazz/Warriors may have been two of the greatest, most exiciting and well-played games in the last 10 years. The scoring, drama and just pure excitement has been unbelievable, and the best part is we're just getting started.

That being said, as unbelievably good as the basketball has been, the announcing has been just as bad. It's so awful that TNT's Reggie Miller is actually making his partner, DickStockton-who generally has no idea what's happening right in front of him, bearable to listen to.

You could be sitting at home with your tv on a different station and get more calls right than DickStockton. It's unbelievable how the guy just can’t get anything right, and HE’S SITTING RIGHT THERE AT CENTER COURT. How hard is it to call a foul and say who it was on, especially when it’s being announced over the PA as well. If you can’t see what’s happening twenty feet infront of you or from it being blared over loudspeakers, exactly what can you do? Insert Hellen Keller Joke Here

My favorite part is on ####-#### plays, DickStockton usually just spurts out three random calls and hopes one of them is the right one. It’s defintely time to start a count on how many calls DickStockton gets wrong (although it’d be a lot easier to count how many he got right).

 If you listen to Reggie, you’d think the entire universe revolved around Baron Davis and that knucklehead Stephen Jackson just won the Nobel Peace Prize. Even without noting his UCLA/Pacers connections, there’s not question which team he is “rooting” for.

Reggie even critisized officials for reversing a call in the Jazz’s favor as he said “even if it is the right call.” I can imagine the TNT producer either just getting up and quitting or having a heart attack during the broadcast.

 

Another Reggie line is “in five years, Deron Williams will be just like Baron.” Hmmm..the way DWill is playing right now is the only thing Jazz fans should look forward to more hamstring injuries?

 

All the while, Kevin Harlan and Doug Collins are calling the Piston’s drubbing of the Bulls. Just think how many “Right between the eyes!” have been wasted!

Had Marv Albert been doing this series it would be one non-stop "YES"-fest, which would have made the announcing all the more memorable, rather than forgettable.

Not going to grade every team (I'll leave that to the draft-niks who don't have a life), but here's a quick mention of a couple of teams I thought did great. Also, hard to grade who were the losers until 3 years down the line, unless you're Mel Kiper who likes to criticizes the teams who made his mock drafts look foolish. So here a several teams I thought did very well:

#1 Minnesota Vikings - Not bad when you get potentially the best offensive player (Adrian Peterson), and WR with 1st-Round talent in the 2nd (Sidney Rice). I also think they got a steal in the 3rd with CB Marcus McCauley from Fresno State. If you flip his junior and senior seasons, he could have been a top-10 pick. Before the year, alot of people had him rated as the top corner in the draft. WR Andrae Allison in the 5th round could also be a steal. Could be this year's Demetrious Williams.

#2 Carolina Panthers - able to trade down and still fill their #1 priority by drafting their best LB available, Jon Beason. With Dan Morgan and Chris Draft questionable, this was a position the needed to address. Also, Beason paired with Thomas Davis and Nail Diggs gives the Panthers a couple of fast, heat-seeking missiles who pack a whallop. Plus they held on to Kris Jenkins. Sometimes the best moves are the ones you don't make.

They also got great late round talent. Ryan Kalil will be their starting center for the next decade. Charles Johnson is a tremendously talented pass-rusher who could eventually replace Mike Rucker.

This leads to my favorite draft moment, involving Keyshawn Johnson. After tooting fellow USC WR Dwayne Jarrett's horn merclissly, so much that Steve Young had to intervene to prevent Keyshawn and Mel Kiper Jr. from having a BIll O'Reiley/Jeraldo Rivera type moment (If you haven't seen it, heres the link, pretty funny: http://youtube.com/watch?v=tLPuGuaZTx8) I can already picture Keyshawn pointing his finger in Mel's face and saying "Speed doesn't matter! IT DOESN"T MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!!"

Anyway, after repeatedly saying Dwayne Jarrett is a huge talent who is the next Keyshawn Johnson, how funny/awkward was it when the Panthers picked him in an obvious move to eventually be Keyshawn's ultimate replacement? I love the draft and I kept waiting for Mel Kiper to get some digs in about the Panthers' looking to get younger at the WR position.

I love the draft.

#3 Indianapolis Colts - while Anthony Gonzales might have been a reach, he's the perfect slot receiver and replacement for Brandon Stokely. Tony Ugoh in the 2nd is great value at a position the Colts must be solid at. Daymeion Hughes is another corner who was one of the top players at his postion entering this year and is a proven playmaker. He'll make the loss of Jason David absolete.

*While many fans and experts alike will argue the Browns are the big winners, acquiring tackle Joe Thomas along with Brady Quinn and a potential steal in CB Eric Wright, I don't like what they did quite as much as other teams. I like the Brady Quinn pick for Clevelend, he's better than anything they could sign or draft next year, whether they have a top-5 pick or not.

If Eric Wright can stay clean off the field, the I agree he'll be a good pick. However, with the way the NFL and Roger Goodell has handled things, I think that's a big risk.

While Joe Thomas will solidify their OL for the next 10 years, I didn't like this pick for them. Just last year they gave Kevin Schaeffer $40 million to play LT. That's an awful lot of money to pay a RT. Combine that with the money thrown at Eric Steinbach and the injury plagued LeCharles Bentley, I think the money they've invested in their offensive line (plus the $18 million or so guarenteed to Joe Thomas) is a big risk to take given Thomas's durability questions as well.

First observation is this was Utah's best shot at winning in Houston, and they just blew it down the stretch (more on this later).

-The difference for Houston was their role players finally made a basket. The production of their role players (Howard, Head, and Battier combined for 35 pts) out*played Utah's bench mob (Harpring, Giricek and Millsap only had 19 pts).

-Andrei Kirilenko has finally broke out of his slump. He left his fingerprints all over the 1st quarter, blocking shots, deflecting passes and completely confusing Yao Ming. In the 3rd, he finally got his offense going. First he hit a little turn-around over Battier. That gave him the confidence to hit two mid-range jumpers, all-in-all: 3-3, 6 pts in the 3rd (he only had 2 fg in the other four games combined). In the 4th he cut down the lane and Boozer fed him for a dunk, and also returned the favor with two gorgeous passes to Boozer cutting down the lane. Kirilenko was much more active in Games 3 and 4, now if finally started showing up in the box score.

-Yao Ming continues to underachieve. After two awful games in Utah where he let Mehmet Okur out physical him, he continued to settle for fall-away jumpers while looking like he's never seen a double-team in his life. Thank goodness the Rockets one, because it's almost unforgivable the way he's allowed Okur to slow him offensively. Perhaps his biggest accomplishment this series is the fact that he's tired Okur so much from having to lean on him that Okur has no legs in his 3pt shot (just 4-25 in the series).

Finally, Jerry Sloan and the Jazz just absolutely thew it away down the stretch. They were down 85-92 with 3 min left when they pulled Derek Fisher who was getting burned by T-Mac and went with the bigger line-up of Deron Williams, Matt Harpring, Andrei Kirikenko, Carlos Boozer and Mehmet Okur.

They then proceeded to score 6 straight points. They scored 3 times in a row by running high-screen roll with Deron and Booze. Battier had to rotate to pick up Boozer rolling down the lane, getting Harp two open jumpers on the baseline. The third time, Deron made the extra side-pass to AK on the wing who found Boozer cutting to the basket behind Yao. Then they run a cross-screen to free Boozer and pick up a foul. Then they run high screen roll and get Okur a wide-open 3 that rimmed out. AK gets the rebound, and in the scramble they never reset their offense, and Harp had to force a jumper with Battier in his face. Then, only down 2pts, 2pts meaning they didn't need a 3!, and Sloan takes AK out (who was passing it beautifly in the 4th) and puts Derek Fisher in, going away from the line-up that got them back in the game and had that 6-0 run. They don't run pick n-roll, they give the ball to Boozer at the 3pt line and have Deron go down and set a pick (he didn't actually even screen anyone) with Harp and Fisher coming off. Fish gets the ball at the 3pt line and does something that's happened much too often and makes every Jazz fan cringe. He ducks his head and drives. Offensive foul. Close call, but the home-team definitely deserved it.

The point is, high-screen roll with Boozer got Utah back in the game, but on the game's biggest possessions they went away from it. It's one thing not to call time-out when they know what we're going to run (high screen-roll) like the back of their hand, but it made no sense for Jerry not to take a timeout when their offense broke down or they were running something different. Bizzarre, and they wasted a spetacular performance by Boozer.

 

Boozer played like a true superstar. He displayed the competitive greatness that separates the good players from the great ones. Over the course of this series he has developed the mindset where he says "You know what Yao, forget about worrying about your size. You need to worry about how you're going to guard me." He mixed up his game beautifully, knocking down mid-range jumpers when Yao backs off and driving by and dunking it on Yao when he closes out. He's altered this matchup from one of size to one of skill and movement.

He played like a true superstar down the stretch and gave Utah a great opportunity to win this game. It's a shame they never gave him a chance to win it for them.

2007 NFL Mock Draft

 # Team     Player                      #### Ht Wt School

1 Oakland JaMarcus Russell QB 6-6 260 LSU

2 Tampa Bay (From Det) Calvin Johnson WR 6-4 225 Georgia Tech

3 Cleveland Browns Adrian Peterson RB 6-1 219 Oklahoma

4 Detroit (From TB) Gaines Adams DE 6-5 261 Clemson

5 Arizona Joe Thomas LT 6-7 313 Wisconsin

6 Miami (From Was) Brady Quinn QB 6-4 227 Notre Dame

7 Minnesota Laron Landry FS 6-2 202 LSU

8 Atlanta (From Houston) Amobi Okoye DT 6-1 287 Louisville

9 Washington (From Mia) Alan Branch DT 6-6 324 Michigan

10 Houston (From Atl) Levi Brown OT 6-5 328 Penn State

11 San Francisco Adam Carriker DE 6-5 296 Nebraska

12 Buffalo Leon Hall CB 5-11 194 Michigan

13 St. Louis Jamaal Anderson DE 6-6 280 Arkansas

14 Carolina Patrick Willis ILB 6-2 235 Ole Miss

15 Pittsburgh Lawrence Timmons OLB 6-2 235 Florida State

16 Green Bay Marshawn #### RB 5-11 217 West Virginia

17 Jacksonville Reggie Nelson FS 5-11 198 Florida

18 Cincinnati Darrelle Revis CB 6-0 200 Pittsburgh

19 Tennessee Tedd Ginn Jr. WR 6-0 175 Ohio State

20 N.Y. Giants Paul Posluszny ILB 6-2 237 Penn State

21 Denver Jarvis Moss DE 6-5 256 Florida

22 Dallas Aaron Ross CB 6-0 196 Texas

23 Kansas City Joe Staley OT 6-5 300 Central Michigan

24 N.Y. Jets Greg Olsen TE 6-5 254 Miami (Fla.)

25 New England (From Sea) Chris Houston CB 5-10 185 Arkansas

26 New Orleans Anthony Spencer DE 6-3 266 Purdue

27 Philadelphia Robert Meachem WR 6-3 210 Tennessee

28 New England Michael Griffin S 6-0 195 Texas

29 Baltimore Ben Grubbs G 6-3 311 Auburn

30 San Diego Dwayne Bowe WR 6-2 217 LSU

31 Chicago John Beason LB 6-0 225 Miami (Fla.)

32 Indianapolis Justin Harrell DT 6-4 303 Tennessee

33 Oakland Dwayne Jarrett WR 6-5 210 USC

34 Detroit Trent Edwards QB 6-3 223 Stanford

35 Tampa Bay Glenn Dorsey DT 6-2 299 LSU

36 Cleveland Eric Wright CB 5-11 190 UNLV

37 Chicago (From Was via NYJ) Steve Smith WR 6-0 196 USC

38 Arizona Charles Johnson DE 6-2 271 Georgia

39 Atlanta (From Houston) Tony Ugoh OT 6-5 304 Arkansas

40 Miami DeMarcus Tyler DT 6-2 314 N.C. State

41 Minnesota Sidney Rice WR 6-4 191 South Carolina

42 San Francisco Ryan Kalil C 6-3 292 USC

43 Buffalo Antonio Pittman RB 5-11 207 Ohio State

44 Atlanta LaMarr Woodley DE 6-2 268 Michigan

45 Carolina Zach Miller TE 6-5 262 Arizona State

46 Pittsburgh Justin Blalock G 6-4 335 Texas

47 Green Bay Anthony Gonzalez WR 6-0 195 Ohio State

48 Jacksonville Quentin Moses DE 6-5 248 Georgia

49 Cincinnati Aaron Sears OL 6-4 328 Tennessee

50 Tennessee Kenny Irons RB 5-11 202 Auburn

51 N.Y. Giants Marcus McCauley CB 6-1 201 Fresno State

52 St. Louis Tanard Jackson CB 6-0 200 Syracuse

53 Dallas Craig Davis WR 6-1 207 LSU

54 Kansas City Jason Hill WR 6-1 204 Washington State

55 Seattle Victor Abiamiri DE 6-4 275 Notre Dame

56 Denver Brandon Merriweather S 6-0 188 Miami (Fla.)

57 Philadelphia Turk McBride DL 6-3 277 Tennessee

58 New Orleans David Harris ILB 6-2 243 Michigan

59 New York Jets Jonathan Wade CB 5-10 195 Tennessee

60 Wash (From NE thru Mia) Eric Weddle S 5-11 203 Utah

61 Baltimore Daymeion Hughes CB 5-11 188 California

62 San Diego Brandon Mebane DT 6-1 309 California

63 N.Y. Jets (From Chicago) Ray McDonald DE/DT 6-3 276 Florida

64 Tampa Bay (From Ind) Tim Crowder DE 6-4 270 Texas

65 Oakland Stewart Bradley OLB 6-3 254 Nebraska

66 Detroit Brian Leonard RB/FB 6-2 226 Rutgers

67 Cleveland Browns Troy Smith QB 6-0 215 Ohio State

68 Tampa Bay Buster Davis LB 5-11 246 Florida State

69 Arizona Josh Wilson CB 5-9 189 Maryland

70 Washington Doug Free G 6-6 324 Northern Illinois

71 Minnesota Drew Stanton QB 6-3 225 Michigan State

72 Houston Chris Henry RB 5-11 230 Arizona

73 Miami Ben Patrick TE 6-3 252 Delaware

74 Atlanta Michael Bush RB 6-1 246 Louisville

75 San Francisco Aundrae Allison WR 6-0 198 East Carolina

76 Buffalo Tim Shaw LB 6-1 237 Penn State

77 St. Louis John Beck QB 6-2 212 BYU

With the NFL draft quickly approaching there is bound to be a least a few (I expect atleast one major move) trades of teams looking to jump into the top 3 to get their hands on one of the elite talents (Adrian Peterson, Calvin Johnson, JaMarcus Russell - if Raiders pass). NFL teams beware. While it may be great from a immediate marketing aspect and look good on paper, upon further review you just might be the sucker a bad franchise needs to get going.

The perfect Example is the San Diego Chargers.

Flashback to 2004. San Diego Chargers: Bad Team. So bad the #1 Quarterback in the draft says he doesn't want to play for them, even if it means he'd be the #1 overall pick. Ouch. So you find someone who wants him more, and trade him to them for a ransom of draft picks.

Back to the Now. San Diego Chargers: Best runningback in the NFL (LaDanian Tomlinson). Best offensive line. Best tight end (Antonio Gates). Best defensive lineman (Jamal Williams). Best pass-rusher (Shawn Merriman). Not too bad.

Years from now we might be looking back to the Eli Trade as the modern-day Herschell Walker trade. The Chargers didn't make out quite as well as the Cowboys (who made out like bandits) but in this era they did just fine.

Ask Mike Dikta how the "Ricky Williams for his entire draft" deal went.

Would you risk your team's future for a runningback who's taken the beating Peterson already has and still can't even stay healthy at the collegiate level?

So when Calvin Johnson and Adrian Peterson are both still on the board at #2 and the Lions are on the trade phones, just be hoping your team isn't on the same line.

Tuesday marked the official announcement. Not that it left anyone suprised. Toronto Raports Coach Sam Mitchell, won in what basically a two-horse race his first Coach of the Year Award. Utah's Jerry Sloan finished second. Again.

This year Sloan led Utah to a 51-31 record, and it's first division title since 2000. The 51 wins was a ten win improvement from 2005-06, which was a 15 win improvement from 2004-05. Sam Mitchell led Toronto to 47 wins and the 4th best record seed in a very week Eastern Conference.

So no one picked Toronto to do much of anything. Why? Because they haven't in Sam Mitchell's previous two season, where he won 37% of his games, alienated Vince Carter (who claimed Mitchel tried to fight him in the locker room), and was believed to be in danger of losing his job had Brian Colangelo had a suitbable replacement available. So since the expectations were so low, having a winning basketball team suddenly looks alot better, so much so that 47 wins in the morebound Eastern Conference outdoes 51 wins in a conference with 6 of the leagues 7 best teams.

In his 19 years coaching the Jazz and 22 years coaching in the NBA, Sloan has never once won coach of the year. Although many other curius names have. Doc Rivers won one for leading his Magic to a 41-41 record and a first-round exit in the playoffs. Sloan won 55 games that year. Mike Dunleavy, Del Harris, Larry Bird are among the other winners during Sloan's tenure. Are they better coaches than Sloan. All Sloan has done with the Jazz is win 940 games, lead them to the playoffs in 16 of his 19 seasons and take them to the Finals twice. Mike Dunleavy has coached three different teams in that span, fired from two of them.

What makes Jerry Sloan so great has also kept him from winning the award. He epitomizes old-school. Basketball is simple to him. He doesn't believe he does anything special. He draws up plays (he remarkably calls every set play, even when John Stockton was his PG), expects his players to run them and then fight and compete as hard as they can to keep the other team from scoring. Simple right? But definitely not flashy, nor tremendously popular in small-market Salt Lake City.

Which has helped the new-millenium Jazz  find a new annual national media-tradition. Ever since losing to Portland in the Conference Finals in 1992, the Jazz were constantly counted out as a Western Conference contender, yet surpassed expectations by the end of the decade Jazz fans stopped listending to the "experts and Peter Vescey" because they knew they would be in the playoffs.

Now the media has found a new game to play, called the "Let's Make It Sound Like Sloan has been done an injustice, then continue to do an injustice to him." At first it was funny, now it's becoming repetitive. Every announcer or national media member who covers a Jazz game always says "how has Jerry Sloan never won coach of the year?," yet five minutes later will say "I think (Insert Name of any NBA Coach who's last name is not Sloan Here) deserves to win it." Guys like Marc Stein, Greg Anthony, John Hollinger, Mike Tirico and Mike Breen will use the "How has he never won it" ploy to give them material to talk/write about, but when it comes down to it, they are largely the reason that Sloan has never won it.

It's getting to the point that I hope Sloan never wins it. It would be much better to retire having been snubbed for 20+ years than to win it in your last year and have everyone forget about the previous 19 yrs of snubbage.

For a guy who is all work and no hype, it would be a fitting way to be remembered.