Awesomeness of the day: USOpen.com

June 16th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

Live streaming video of the open playoff, no commercials … awesome. this has been embraced by myself, tons of friends, and even several of my co-workers, and if you knew how unusual it is to openly talk about streaming internet sports in our office, you’d know. The internet blows me away sometimes.

Cheer up, Maj. It’s right there for you.

Andy Gray has been a pleasure to watch

June 16th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

You’ll have to forgive me for this little bit of heresy: I’ve been paying just as much attention, if not more, to Euro 2008 as I have to the ongoing NBA Finals saga.

The Finals have been disappointing to me; the Lakers have been flat and uninspiring, the Celtics have been businesslike and boring (they managed to somehow maintain that ethos even as they were coming back from 24), and the notion that Paul Pierce’s game is currently more successful than Kobe Bryant’s is baffling to me. Piece is like a good Antawn Jamison. The mind boggles.

So the Finals are not really getting it done for me. I’m still watching. I’m just not as excited about it. Which is why it’s worth heaping praise on ESPN’s soccer talk gun-for-hire Andy Gray. Gray has been brilliant announcing Euro 2008 matches thus far, something EPL Talk nails today:

Gray is a perfect fit for ESPN and American soccer fans. The way that he’s so naturally enthusiastic about the games makes you want to watch them. Plus, I find myself listening to the commentating more closely. I’ve learned something in every match I’ve watched so far where Andy Gray has been co-commentating.

Agreed. Gray has been insightful, endlessly enthusiastic, smart, funny … he’s been, as he might say, a pleasure to watch. He’s no Marcelo Balboa, but he’s OK.

On three: Hahahaha. Marcelo Balboa. Just kidding. Andy Gray is eight thousand bajillionzillion times better than Marcelo Balboa. Maybe even more times than that. I’m not very good at math.

Nick Young latest victim of blog humanization

June 16th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

There was a plethora — yes, I just used plethora; eighth grade vocab tests bow to me — of fantastic sporting events this weekend. The NBA Finals. That ridiculous Turkey match. Tiger Somebody hitting golf balls. Rick Reilly being totally annoying on television. The list goes on.

But why celebrate the good things about sports? Why revel in the legendary performances of top notch athletes when you can be both speedy and cruel merely by posting a video? Nick Young, meet the internet:

That video totally humanizes Nick Young. I can feel the solidarity. Professional athletes … they’re just like us!

{HT: Ball Don’t Lie}

Cautious excitement, Vinny Del Negro-style

June 12th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

Every time I’ve talked about the Vinny Del Negro hiring, I’ve said at least one thing: I’m confused, but cautiously excited. It seems to entirely possible to me that Del Negro is Mike D’Antoni Lite — someone who learned everything he needs to know from Seven Seconds Or Less, and who wants to defend in the interim. Some sort of sneaky rogue pilfering ideas from his genius co-workers. I will take this pilferer, and gladly.

After his press conference yesterday, that caricature sounds an awful lot like reality. Check out these quotes:

“Do I feel totally prepared right now? No,” he said. “And that bothers me. But by the time those decisions need to be made, I will be.”

Means: I have little more than a philosophy. D’Antoni didn’t show me any inbounds plays. I’m working on it.

“If you look at greatness in any sport, all great teams have defensive resolve,” he said. “What I like tremendously about this roster is looking at Thabo [Sefolosha] and Tyrus [Thomas] and [ Joakim] Noah, they’re all versatile guys we would have loved to have had in the draft in Phoenix. They have versatility and can play and defend two or three positions.

Means: I know we have good defensive players on this roster, and I plan to use them. If you think Tyrus Thomas isn’t hard enough to start, you’re dead wrong. I like youth. I’m mentioning these guys by name for a reason — they’re going to play. A lot.

“Offensively, there’s no question my philosophy is to play the game fast and quick. With young players, they have a tendency to try to play fast but be in a hurry. They have to take their time. When you play fast, there’s an unpredictability to basketball that makes it exciting and interesting. We’re going to have to get the percentages in our favor with the unpredictability. But the defensive resolve, we’ll start with and try to play at a fast pace and put players in positions to succeed.”

Means: We’re not going to play fast just to play fast. There’s going to be order. But the minute I have Derrick Rose in my clutches, I will let him go. I will put players in a position to succeed, not succeed for them. I AM D’ANTONI DISTILLED.

“Obviously, you have to be a disciplinarian, but my style also will be to put my arms around them and take them to lunch and talk to them,” Del Negro said. “These are young players who need guidance. Just because you draft players at a high position and they wear the Chicago Bulls jersey doesn’t mean all of a sudden they’re professionals. It takes time.”

Means: Skiles was too mean to these fragile young minds. I believe the children are our future. You must occasionally touch them in reassuring fashion; none of this break-em-down-to-build-em-up stuff. I look forward to our first team campout. I’ll bring s’mores.

I like pretty much all of the above. If Vinny Del Negro is who he says he is, this could be the start of a long and prosperous professional relationship. Vinny has a vision. It’s just a bit blurry, is all.

Programming alert: MLB FanHouse live chat, 1 p.m.

June 10th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

For all concerned parties, I’m doing a live chat at 1 p.m. at MLB FanHouse with AOL Sports MLB Producer Andrew Johnson. I’m not sure what we’ll talk about it (though Griffey will surely be on the docket), but it should be a nice forum for our lovely commenters to address us in real time. And by address, I mean swear.

Please do stop by.

Surprise: The Bears release Cedric Benson

June 9th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

Farewell, Cedric. I’ll never forget your incredibly awesome NFC Championship touchdown run. Or the above photo, which is your legacy. It sucks that you weren’t better at football; surely, you could have stretched the goodwill into having like six or seven assault rifles in your home. Maybe you could have even raped somebody! Teams tend not to care about that stuff when good players do it. Shame.

Meh. Now that I think about it, forget that whole “I’ll never forget” thing. I’ve already forgotten about it. Who are you, again? What are we talking about? Where am I?

Vinny Del Negro: Um, OK

June 9th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

It’s official, or at least as official as Doug Collins was last week. Which is to say, not really all that official. Still: Vinny Del Negro is the new coach of the Chicago Bulls.

In scanning that Tribune story, I kept waiting for a paragraph or two about Del Negro’s basketball philosophy. Is he a yeller? A teacher? A runner? A squatter? (A joker? A smoker?) Will he work well with some minor internal strife? Will he utilize Derrek Rose appropriately? What the hell will this man do?

That paragraph never came, not until this at the end:

Little is known about his basketball philosophy since he never has coached before. Del Negro interviewed for the Suns’ coaching job that Terry Porter landed on Saturday, but failed to make Kerr’s list of four finalists.

Well then. No one knows, apparently except John Paxson and Jerry Reinsdorf and Del Negro himself. The one thing we do know about Del Negro is that he’s never coached anywhere before. He has literally no experience. Since he was promoted from his radio gig in Phoenix, he’s always been a front-office guy. So instead of hiring him as an assistant, or as a special advisor to the general manager, the Bulls make him the head coach.

That sounds about right.

Update: Watson just messaged me with this question. This is basically a more concise version of the above.

Matthew: let’s play a game. i say a word or phrase, and you tell me the first thing that pops into your mind:

vinny del negro
go!

me: hair

Needless to say, that word was not “coach.”

Here comes the flood

June 9th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

It’s June. It’s baseball season. The Sox and Cubs, each the product of their own demented universes, are playing extremely good baseball. This means one thing: Lame national attention time!

Oh my God! Did you know Chicago “does weird” better than anyone in the country? I don’t know what that means, but you can bet it’s going to lead to a tremendously confusing Wojo column, in which he lists the reasons why Chicago is the most compelling sports city in the U.S. Seems like a flimsy premise, doesn’t it? It is!

Or, what’s this: An argument about a topic that pretty much everyone, even White Sox fans, would agree is not that much of an argument? Let’s have at it! (Oh, and it’s the Cubs. Come on.)

Finally, let’s roll some footage. How about John Kruk on how Ozzie’s rant magically energized the White Sox clubhouse, just in time for them to restore their 2005 awesomeness. It was the rant, of course, and not the fact that they’re hitting better and scoring more runs. It’s Ozzieball! Totally!

Everyone who had June 9 in the “When will ESPN realize both Chicago teams are good?” pool, please collect your winnings in human resources. Thank you.

This weekend was exhausting

June 9th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

It’s been a long time since we don’t a Monday morning recap of the weekend’s sports, but think about everything that happened this weekend:

– Euro 2008 kicked off, featuring four matches on both Saturday and Sunday
– Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer faced off in the French Open final
– Big Brown attempted to win the Triple Crown
– The U.S. faced the No. 1 team in the world, Argentina, in an international friendly
– The Lakers and Celtics played Game Two of the NBA Finals

I’m almost positive I’m missing stuff. Like, somewhere, Tiger Woods probably played a hobbled round of golf. College football players were probably doing nefarious things after summer practice. NASCAR probably had some sort of circular driving competition. A tree fell in a forest. Etc.

So, in the spirit of comprehensiveness, let me see if I can remember everything I felt about sports this weekend:

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