The Mavericks are officially in trouble

March 24th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

The whole “Dallas hasn’t won a game against a winning team since the Jason Kidd trade” refrain is getting a little old, but it’s also undeniably true. The Mavericks traded whatever interior defense they used to have to get a balky Kidd, and the returns have been mediocre. More and more, it looks as if Dallas’ window was shut on them in last year’s playoffs, when The Bearded One of Whom We Do Not Speak took Dirk’s confidence and crushed it in his palm.And this was all before the Mavericks lost to the Spurs last night, and lost Dirk in the process.

“I fell awkwardly, and my left leg got caught underneath me,” Nowitzki said in a news release. As Cuban left the locker room toward his suite, he held up two fingers to indicate the weeks Nowitzki is expected to miss.

Working with that rough estimate, the Mavericks will face six or seven games in the next two weeks without their anchor. They are seventh in the Western Conference, two games ahead of ninth-place Denver. Moving up is looking less likely. The No. 6 Spurs are three games up and own the tiebreaker.

While I’d never call into question the accuracy of a Mark Cuban prediction on this Real Time Reporting site, two weeks seems pretty hopeful, given that this might not be an ankle sprain. But it’s not that Dirk’s injured — it’s that even if he wasn’t, the Mavs still look like a team limping to the finish. In this year’s West, Jason Kidd and Josh Howard and an overactive Avery Johnson just aren’t enough.

Quick Avery Johnson addendum: AJ has been accused of overcoaching far too often this year, which, after watching his appearance in Black Magic, is sort of baffling. Johnson’s interview for the documentary discussed about his time at Southern University and how his former coach’s system was free-wheeling and improvisational and fast-paced and still structured, and how much he liked that. After his playing career, Johnson went on to coach under Don Nelson, who is as free-wheeling as they come. So where does this current stuff come from?

I don’t mean this to sound as if Avery Johnson isn’t capable of independent thought, but it’s pretty clear he had to have gone outside of both his college experience and what one would assume was his defining professional mentorship to create his own slow, rigid style. Maybe 90’s basketball players are just destined to slow things down to a crawl. I still don’t get it.

Dept. of good ideas: Project Franchise wants you to be a sports owner

January 24th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanE

Yes, you want to be Mark Cuban. Just admit it. The dude runs his biz during the daytime, and when he’s not pausing to give contentious interviews with GQ , or answering email at the speed of light, he runs a successful professional franchise. You want that. You envy this man. Admit it.

I’ll admit it, which is why Project Franchise’s idea is pretty interesting , if not exactly revolutionary (My Football Club successfully bid on and won Ebbsfleet United in 2007). They want to do the same with a U.S. sports franchise, allowing fans to vote for everything: the coach, the lineups, the concessions stands — everything. Judging by most ESPN polls, the nation’s sports collective sports knowledge probably isn’t the best, but it couldn’t possibly be any worse than, say, Dave Littlefield, right?

But for five bucks — probably not even a fifth of what you put into your fantasy football league — who cares, right?

Floyd Mayweather’s entourage = least intimidating entourage ever

December 10th, 2007 | Posted by PostmanE

One early surprise of the really enjoyable Hatton-Mayweather fight Saturday — besides the thousands of brilliantly singing British fans in the Vegas crowd — was Floyd Mayweather’s entourage. Among the usual tough looking big dudes, and trainers, and so on were three of the least intimidating dudes ever: Mark Cuban, Helio Castroneves, and Wayne Newton. Wayne Newton!

If you’re noticing a trend, you’re spot on: Mayweather invited his Dancing With the Stars buddies. That was right around when I started cheering for Ricky Hatton.

{HT: LBS}

Avery Johnson would like you to buy his book

November 27th, 2007 | Posted by PostmanR

A few days back, Avery Johnson went batshit insane, running out onto the court to protest a call made by referee Bennett Salvatore. (For the record, it was an awful call.  Apparently the Mavs think this guy has it out for them.) In typical Mark Cuban fashion, Dallas filed an official protest to the league about said officiating in that game against the Pacers.

Johnson was ejected. Then fined. Then a reporter asked him about the whole thing and well, I don’t know what’s going on here.

Johnson was asked about the fine before taking on Washington at American Airlines Center. He smiled broadly and chuckled a bit used the opportunity to plug his yet-to-be-published book, Aspire Higher.

“In the book we have different plans like the ‘S’ plan where we talk about Standards, Systems,” he said, smile still affixed. “You have the ‘D’ plan about Dedication, Desire and Decisions. We have the ‘E’ plan about Education and Environment and Excellence. We have all of these plans.

“I was thinking though this afternoon I should call my publisher and add another plan.”

That would be the ‘C’ plan.

“In the ‘C’ plan I should have four chapters,” he continued. “One chapter should be called Conflicting Concepts, the next chapter should be called Competing Commitments, the next chapter should be called Compelling Commercials and the fourth chapter probably should be called Confused Communication.

“So I’m going to call [publisher HarperCollins] and see if they can add it in there. I think I missed the deadline.”

Obviously, Johnson didn’t want to talk about the fine directly, probably a prudent choice considering his wallet. The book, incidentally, is slated to be released in March for $29.95 hardcover. It’s meant to inspire those people at an “in between” point in their lives.

Oh, OK, this is all about shameless book promotion; I see.  Well then, let me take this opportunity to plug our line of Postmen merchandise coming out in the new year. Our best product is most definitely the PostmanR and PostmanE action figures. Each one is basically the same thing: one of us sitting on a couch with a laptop — you can’t move the body off the couch at all. You may say that’s boring and defeats the purpose of an “action” figure. I say we’re just trying to keep these as lifelike and realistic as possible.

{Via FanHouse.}

Mark Cuban believes in the spirit of competition

May 31st, 2007 | Posted by PostmanR

Let us get a few things straight: Mark Cuban has more money and more business savvy than me. When he was an undergrad at Indiana, he cheated the system and took graduate level business courses. When I was an undergrad at IU, I slept in late and rarely did laundry.

But when I hear he wants to start a league to rival the NFL, well, I’m more than a little skeptical. From Blog Maverick:

1. There is obviously demand for top level professional football. That is exactly what the UFL hopes to be someday, an equal of the NFL, if not more.

2. The NFL wants and needs competition. They have grown so big and powerful that every move they make is scrutinized by local or federal officials. A competitor allows them to point to us and explain that their moves are for competitive reasons rather than the move of a monopoly.

3. They just extended their CBA. Their CBA structure is not designed for a competitive environment. Competition for top players, even if the UFL gets just a few, increases prices at the top end for all teams. Every star will get paid more, but still have to fit under the cap. That forces teams to use more low cost players, at the expense of signing the middle of the roster. That gives us access to quite a few very, very good NFL players. The downside is that it will significantly impact small market NFL teams and its unclear how the NFL would respond to that and what the impact would be on the UFL.

4. There are a lot of markets that are bigger than some current NFL markets that do not have teams that would love to have a pro football team.

5. There are a lot of smart people involved in the UFL

6. Its a great TV product.

Although I don’t necessarily whole-heartedly disagree with any of these tenants, I think the thought process here is a little misguided. What about the AFL? You know, the Arena Football League? The league that got a sweet deal with ESPN a few months back? The league that plays it schedule opposite the NFL’s? Where does your UFL fit in here? In the fall with the NFL? No way you can go head-to-head and survive in the TV market. I know the Arena League isn’t exactly Football As We Know It, but that’s probably why it’s been decently successful.

Although, I guess if anyone could pull this off, it’d Cuban. But, I don’t know, he should probably go spend his money on something more concrete. The Cubs, anyone?

Postmen Postgame: Mavs hold first serve

June 8th, 2006 | Posted by PostmanE

Well, it wasn’t exactly the prettiest game we’ve seen in the playoffs, but it was, for all intents and purposes, a fair start to what we hope will be a series full of entertaining basketball.

The story of this 90-80 Mavs win was Jason Terry, who just seemed to be everywhere at once - coming up with loose balls, sprinting off screens and hitting shots, flying at Miami defenders in the open court. It was a complete game from Terry, who could use this series as a springboard to true league-wide star status.

Dirk was okay, but not great; he checked out in the fourth (figuratively), but the game was relatively out of Miami’s reach by then.

Wade showed up with 28 despite having fitness problems earlier in the week, but Shaq was held to 17 and ‘Toine had way too much of the ball in his hands in the second half. For Miami, too much ‘Toine is probably going to spell disaster every game.

So Shaq was largely missed and Dirk wasn’t all there. But the most noticable absence from my television throughout the game? David Hasselhoff. What, we’re past that story? Ok, fine. But if Dirk continues to have poor games, Mark Cuban better round up the private jet fleet and go grab David from…wherever it is that he hangs out these days.

Mark Cuban is a sweaty, friendly owner

May 23rd, 2006 | Posted by PostmanE

The photographic proof is right there. Mark’s just happy.

And he should be, as his Mavs took down the Spurs last night, getting over that playoff hump they’ve been struggling with for so long.

That was only the first Game 7 of the night, as the Suns and Clippers went deep into the night to finally settle that West Coast situation out there.

Not gonna lie - wasn’t awake for this one. It was a taxing day and E needed his sleep.

Nonetheless, the LA Times is telling me that the Clippers ended their dream season - when you’re the Clippers, getting to the second round of the playoffs is a dream season - last night thanks to some clever basketball by the Suns.

You have to hand it to Steve Nash here. For all the talk about Kobe, and then LeBron, Nash is quietly leading his team, sans Amare Stoudamire, closer and closer to the NBA Finals. Not bad for a Canadian, eh?

Media lessons, Cuban style!

May 18th, 2006 | Posted by PostmanE

Everyone’s favorite professional owner Mark Cuba - what? You don’t like Cuban? Well we do. He went to IU, he responds to our e-mails, and he actually cares about his team’s performance, not just its profitability.

Anyway, Cuban’s blog is an extension of that entertainment, and Mark is talking media shop in his last two posts over there, extolling all the virtues of blogs in comparison to newspapers.

This interests us not only because it’s Cuban speaking, but because we kinda pull double-duty in this area; we manage this little blog here, and we aspire to careers in the newspaper business, working for The Man.

Cuban’s most interesting point is that newspapers - available via the Web - are the best spot to go for in-depth coverage of any specific large-market team, especially when that team is in the playoffs. ESPN.com and wire services, Cuban says, maintain their boring, generalized regular-season coverage.

It’s true. If ESPN didn’t have their columnists to illuminate our lives on a daily basis, very little on the site would be of any real interest. For the passing fan, it’s fine, but for anyone desiring serious detail, the formula doesn’t work.

Leave it to Marky Mark - so sexy in that photo - to point it out.

Fun with Photography : Dirk Nowitzki

May 17th, 2006 | Posted by PostmanR

If you ever were a reader or subscriber of Sports Illustrated for Kids, then you probably remember having the chance to submit a caption for their �silly sports photos.�

We here at the Postmen have decided to start our own version of this fun little game. Here are some captions for this lovely photo of Dirk Nowitzki. As always, your captions are welcome in the comments section.

- Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! (In a distinct Sloth-like moan from the Goonies.)

- Years of praise from Mark Cuban have turned me mentally retarded. Don�t feel sorry for me. It�s okay.

- This is how you cheer in Germany, thank you very much.