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Archive for February, 2012
Documentary, “Undefeated”, Blindsides Competition At The Oscars
It may not be “The Artist,” but on Sunday, “Undefeated” nabbed the Best Documentary Oscar at the 84th Annual Academy Awards with an upset win over presumed favorite “Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory.” The film, directed by Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin (Western Washington University Graduate), follows a the football program at Manassas High School in Memphis, Tennessee, and coach Bill Courtney, who looks to lead the team to their first playoff birth in the school’s 110-year history. “Undefeated” is in limited release now. Watch a short preview of the movie above. The documentary has been compared favorably to 2010′s Academy Award Best Picture nominee “The Blind Side”. A ’based on a true story’ film (that follows Undefeated’s similar story) of an inter-city youth overcoming his traumas and poverity while rising to prominence with the help his high school football team; eventually, becoming a star in college at Ole Miss, and a future 1st round NFL Draft pick by the Baltimore Ravens.
From Sac-Town To Puget Sound, Kings Move To Seattle Sounding More Unlikely.
Building a new arena for the Sacramento Kings has never been closer to reality.
The city, the Sacramento Kings and the NBA announced a tentative deal Monday to finance a new arena that would keep the team in California’s capital for the long haul. The City Council will vote on the plan March 6.
Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, NBA commissioner David Stern and the Maloof family, which owns the Kings, emerged from three days of talks in Orlando, Fla., — where they had been negotiating during All-Star weekend — to announce that the framework of a deal had been reached, giving fans some 3,000 miles away in the Central Valley reason to cheer for a comeback story that fittingly came straight out of Fantasyland. Read More >>
Deal Or No Deal? Franchise Tag Most Likely For Hawk’s Lynch.
The Seahawks have slightly more than a week remaining to get a deal done with free agent running back Marshawn Lynch. If the Seahawks and Lynch cannot come to terms on a new contract by March 5, the Seahawks have the option of tagging him their “franchise” player, which would virtually assure Seattle would retain Lynch’s services.
If the Seahawks apply the franchise tag to Lynch, any other team signing him to an offer sheet would have to compensate Seattle with a pair of first-round draft choices, absurd compensation, particularly for a running back, and especially for one already in the second half of his NFL career.
Seattle’s other option is to use the “transition” tag on Lynch. In this event, the Seahawks would not be entitled to draft picks if Lynch signed an offer sheet with a competing club, but they would be able to match that offer. A match would ensure that Lynch, Seattle’s leading rusher the past two seasons, would remain a Seahawk. Read More >>
Successfully Appealed Suspension Helps Braun’s Image More Than Just On The Diamond
National League MVP Ryan Braun won his appeal yesterday, becoming the first Major League Baseball player to have a positive drug test overturned when an arbitration panel ruled in his favor on appeal and decided against a 50-game suspension for the 2012 season.
The agency that represents the Milwaukee Brewers outfielder, CAA Sports, has a hugely successful baseball business: the agency represents 57 first round draft selections and has negotiated more $120 million in amateur draft signing bonuses. Braun’s agent at CAA Sports, Nez Balelo, was responsible for getting the slugger a five-year contract extension prior to the 2011 season that guarantees the All-Star outfielder $145.5 million through the end of 2020.
The agency was expected to capitalize on Braun capturing the MVP award last season but put those plans on hold after it was leaked in December that Braun had tested positive for a performance-enhancing drug, a charge Braun always denied. Read More >>
This year it’s Big XII, next year it’s Big (10) 12
If you didn’t know university’s like Kansas, Missouri, Baylor, Iowa State and Kansas State were feared teams, then you probably 
haven’t watched too much college football, and not enough college basketball. The Big 12 conference rich in collective history, and home of the original innovator of basketball, James Naismith, is actually a relatively young conference formed in 1994 out of the cores of the longstanding Big Eight and Southwest Conferences. Although known mostly for rivaling the Big Ten and SEC for distinction in college football, the Big 12 was not slow in making its presence felt in college basketball. In just its second year of integration, the Big 12′s Oklahoma State Cowboys reached the NCAA Tournament’s Final Four in 1995. Historical NBA staples such as Iowa State’s Jeff Hornacek, (former conference team) Colorado’s Chauncey Billups, and Kansas’s Paul Pierce and Wilt Chamberlain have all graced Big 12 schools with their talents. Two of the NBA’s current arguable top 10 players have both come out of the Big 12: Oklahoma City Thunder’s elastic scorer, Kevin Durant, and Los Angeles Clipper’s dunking phenom, Blake Griffin. Read More >>
Uno, Dos, Tres… Ichiro
The lineup change Seattle Mariners manager Eric Wedge hinted at during the offseason is going to become permanent.
It won’t be Ichiro Suzuki at the top of the Mariners batting order to begin the 2012 season.
Wedge announced Tuesday that he will move Suzuki from his traditional leadoff spot down to No. 3 in the Mariners batting order. It’s not a simple spring training experiment — Wedge is set to make Suzuki’s move permanent and he will figure out who is Seattle’s best option to take over in the leadoff role.
“I’ve done a lot of thinking about it this winter. … Bottom line, it’s for us to have the best lineup 1 through 9 out there,” Wedge said. “I want our lineup to be extended. I think our best opportunity is for Ichiro to be hitting third for us.” Read More >>
Bigger and Better
Big East men’s basketball has twice as many teams as it football counterpart: 8 teams football to 16 teams basketball. And it’s been apparent since 1979 that having such a large conference, 3 more teams in basketball than any other NCAA Division I conference, hasn’t watered-down the talent level or competitiveness of the league. The conference’s proudest moment might’ve happened either in 1985, when 3 of the 4 Final Four team’s comprised itself of Big East teams (Villanova, Georgetown and St. John’s; the tournament winner going on to be Villanova) or last year, when 11 of the conference’s 16 teams went on to enter the NCAA Tournament comprising 16 percent of the tournament’s total field (Connecticut, Big East’s conference winner, also going on to win the 2011 championship game). Although not all of the Big East’s teams have done it while members of the conference, all of the Big East team’s, besides USF, have made an appearance in the Final Four at some point in their history’s.
For the last 30 years the spotlight of this mega-conference’s season-ending tournament has been played at basketball’s virtual mecca, Madison Square Garden, where 12 of the conference’s top 16 teams annually make the pilgrimage. This year the most highlighted team heading into the Garden will be #2 AP-ranked Syracuse. The Orangemen are one Notre Dame loss removed from a perfect season, and have been winning in the face of on-going former assistant coach Bernie Fine’s child abuse scandal, and a subsequent slander case against head coach Jim Boeheim, surrounding comments about the abused ball-boy children made soon after child abuse allegations first surfaced. Read More >>
In SEC Men’s Basketball, Kentucky always rules
Throughout its history, SEC basketball has really been about one team: the Kentucky Wildcats. If you don’t quite understand the above video, you probably have not watched a lot of Kentucky basketball (fans hold a sign of the number 3 everytime they make a 3-point shot… I.E. so they make a lot of 3′s). Wildcat Men’s Basketball has had a dominant presence in a portion of every decade since the SEC’s inception in 1932. Only one coach that coached multiple seasons at UK finished with an overall losing record in his tenure: W.W.H. Mustaine, UK’s first ever men’s basketball coach. And no coach, after Kentucky’s first joined the original SEC, has left the university with an overall losing record.
There is no doubt the standard of excellence is high at basketball university USA. Perhaps, where Kentucky has shined most has been in the tournaments. Kentucky has won over half of SEC tournaments in history (27 of 52), owns 7 total NCAA tournaments Titles (Second most to UCLA in history), the most appearances (51) and wins (105, currently tied with North Carolina) in NCAA tournament history. If those stats were too much for you, then know UK also owns 2 NIT Titles in its history too (the only school with multiple NCAA and NIT tournament Titles). It’s no wonder Rupp Arena in Lexington, where the Wildcats play, is the biggest basketball arena in the nation, and regularly leads college basketball in attendance. More often than not considered the Yankees of basketball, fans annually expect a Sweet 16 and Final Four appearances from their Wildcat basketball squad. This year’s crop talent, despite their youth, is not letting expectations fan expectations down. Considered by many the best team in the nation, and tied with the Syracuse Orange for the best record in the NCAA so far this year, the Wildcats are a virtual lock for one of the four tournament #1 seeds. Barring an early exit in this year’s SEC tournament, they are in best spot to grab the overall #1 seed of the tournament’s field of 68. Read More >>
This is not Madness…
It’s awkward time as we approach the 15th of March. A day also known as the Ides of March, in Ancient Rome the day was a celebration of Mars, their God of war, but was more famously the day of Julius Caesar’s untimely assassination and betrayal by the friends he considered close. On the 15th of March fans of NCAA College Basketball will be celebrating the famous ‘Ides’ in their own way. Yes, after the opening round of the First Four (the first four play-in games to enter the tournament’s overall field of 64 teams) the NCAA Tournament will officially begin. March Madness is the colloquial term for the time over the duration of the NCAA Tournament; where buzzer-beating shots regularly encroach on narrowly-lead teams and lesser known teams ordinarily poach off more commonly branded basketball. It is a time of passion, persistence and revelry in the arts of war; not unlike the ancient Roman’s celebrations of the God of war. Today, I’ll be starting off tournament coverage of possible tournament teams conference by conference, each of the major conferences, and a bundle of the mid-majors. Read More >>
Mecca of Basketball
New York is a city of a storied sports history. There are six professional sport franchises, between the NHL, NFL, NBA and MLB, who call the 5 county – 305 square mile city their home. The New York Rangers representing the NHL; New York Knicks, the NBA; New York Jets and New York Giants, the NFL; and New York Yankees and Mets, the MLB.
Not counting former NYC sport franchises, the city’s current teams own a total of 43 league championship; 4 Stanley Cups, 2 NBA Finals, 9 Super Bowl / NFL-AFL Championships (8 by the Giants, 1 by the Jets) and 29 World Series (27 by the Yankees, 2 by the Mets). Counting its former franchises and the teams within its greater metropolitan area the league championships would total up to 57 overall championships, 23 more than the runner-up metropolitan area and of the Greater Los Angeles. If championships were equivalent to fan support and popularity though, it could be argued only the Yankees and their 27 World Series would correspond to the championship juxtaposition. Read More >>
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