Hello everyone, making it quick this week since it is a holiday week. And considering it is the 4th of July (BOOM BOOM HOO-RAY) and there isn’t much of shit happening in the world of sports…we only have three topics this week. So say it once, say it twice, third time’s a charm…I’ll eat anything you want me to eat, I’ll swallow anything you want me to swallow, come on down now…I’ll chew on a dog…while yooouuuu….
1.) The Fall Of NFL Europe
Paulie: Poor Europers. Never again will they get to see the wonderment of real football. Since they’re never gonna send contending teams overseas to play, the best they’ll be able to hope for is Oakland Vs Cleveland. The league that gave rise to Kurt Warner (After the Arena League) and Jake Delhomme is gone. Probably for the best if it’s only brought up two name players in 16 years. I remember back in the early 90’s when the WLAF first started. We were so excited around here. REAL pro football was coming to North Carolina! We got us some Raleigh/Durham SKYHAWKS BAYBEE! Coached by legendary NC State QB Roman Gabriel. Boy, did we get fooled. The talent pool was atrocious then and barely got better when the NFL officially adopted them and started feeding them players and moved all the teams to Germany via a few other European cities. It was nice to see football in the summer. But, really, ya gotta be honest, the level of play was better in the Arena League, Canada, hell even the XFL was less brutal to watch than NFLE. I doubt it will really be missed. It never really developed any players. It’s not sucking money from the owners anymore. And Europeans will only have to endure ONE contest a year of the game they see as so vastly inferior. Only reason any of them ever went was cuz they couldn’t get tickets to that day’s kickball jog-around or didn’t want to get killed in the ensuing riot.
Charles Joseph: Yet another sign that Europe is backwards and no where near as cool as a certain country celebrating their Independence this week. They couldn’t support one Professional football league, and we support like 7. This league has been doomed for a while. When the Sun Belt conference has a higher level of play than your “professional†league, it’s time to fold up. I don’t think anyone is going to miss the league. Expect Danny, because he’s not quite right in the head. I think it’s the post “Katrina Trauma.†Keep your head up, you’ll get through this.
Danny: Of course I’m going to miss it because it is more football. But that doesn’t mean I thought it was the best football either. There was no way this league was going to last much longer if it made it another year anyway. When you are down to only six teams and four of them are in one country, then I wouldn’t necessarily consider that much of spreading out the league. Attendance actually was higher for five of the six teams this past year then the last but the league was still destined for failure soon anyway.
The thing that bugs me about this is that they couldn’t keep a league going with actual NFL players in producing such as Kurt Warner, Jake Delhomme, etc…so what does the NFL do? They go and take one game a season away from the home fans here in the states to give the European fans what was just taken away for lack of support. Explain that one to me. And now the NFL is considering more regular season games being played in such locations as Germany, Mexico, and Canada? Come on now. The game in London next season is probably already close to being sold out and yes, that is fantastic. But I still don’t believe that the fans who have been so supportive of this league for decades should lose even one game for locations that didn’t support the football they had. You want to take some preseason games to other countries, be my guest. But don’t take the regular season games away from those they mean the most to, the hometown fans.
2.) NBA Draft – Winners and Losers?
Danny: The Blazers are the big winners of this draft as they reeled in Greg Oden and Josh McRoberts. They also had a bunch more picks that include Taurean Green out of Florida and Derrick Byars out of Vanderbilt. That right there could be 4 out of 5 in any starting line-up immediately. They also unloaded Zach Randolph which is a blessing but picked up Steve Francis. Even with the arrival of Francis, I think the Blazers are in for a big year next year. Other winners of the draft in my opinion include the Celtics, Sonics, and Chicago Bulls (Joakim Noah is a great talent and getting Aaron Gray so late is a real steal).
The Rockets made some outright awful choices in the draft especially with their first pick of guard Aaron Brooks. He’s a good talent, but one that will need at least two years before stepping up into the starting line-up. Other then that, everyone seemed to do alright.
My Hornets had one good pick and one pick I don’t quite understand. I would have given anything to see a backcourt of Chris Paul and Nick Young out of USC. But they did what I always think is the right choice and instead of going for team need; they took the best player available in Julian Wright. If Wright can pick up the speed of the NBA game quickly, he could jump right into the starting line-up with Paul, Tyson Chandler, Peja, and David West. Wright would be excellent on the fastbreak with Paul’s passing ability.
Paulie: BWHAHAHAHAHAHA Josh McRoberts. You’re kidding me, right Danny? McRoberts is probably the only guy Coach K has ever encouraged to go to the NBA because he wanted the kid out of his lockerroom. McRoberts was a bust at Duke and he’ll be lucky to live up to Danny Ferry’s NBA career.
Winners: Teenagers who are tall but woefully underdeveloped.
Losers: Guys under 6’5†that can actually hit a jump shot outside of 7 feet.
Charles Joseph: Josh McRoberts SUCKS! He alone completely negates the positives they could have got having just Oden. That team could be pretty good for awhile now. Roy, Jack, Miles, Aldridge, Oden as a starting 5 is pretty intimidating. Except Miles, they need a new SF. Wasn’t Taurean Green Ohio State? Celtics weren’t winners either. They picked up a 32 year old Shooting Guard for the 5th overall pick. You just like their draft because they got a big baby in the second round. T’wolves didn’t do terrible. A player who’s been a career back up at center, and a guy who doesn’t project to have much offensive potential. Just what we needed to keep KG happy.
Danny: Yall act like I gave verbal fellatio to McRoberts. Jeez, all I said was that the Blazers had a good draft and named who they picked.
3.) Wimbledon
Charles Joseph: Rain rain, go away, come again another day. It always rains on Wimbledon and throws off the scheduling. Wasn’t too bad this year yet. Everything is going pretty much to plan so far. Federer and Nadal are on course to have another match between themselves on the men’s side and Maria and someone less hot are working towards the finish on the women’s side.
The Americans aren’t doing terrible, which is a huge step up from the French. Its week two and we still have people left. And being a cocky American, I’m going to call that a win for our county. Although Serena, despite not feeling the greatest, is a threat to actually win the tournament and give us two wins. Roddick and Blake have been playing pretty well on the men’s side but I don’t see either of them knocking off either of the big two. Winners should be Federer and Maria.
Danny: Nice rain nursery rhyme there CJ…ya heauxmeaux.
I give the Williams sisters credit because they are damn talented, but I’ve never liked them. I think I would contribute that to two things. First of all they are both men plying in the women’s division which is unfair and also their father is a first-class schmuck.
Now that I’m off my high hobby horse, I believe Venus will still take the women’s side. She has a tough match with Maria, but I think she’ll be able to take the match from hot bod and go all the way through without much more competition. The rain though is really making everything so damn complicated and causing this tournament to last as long as the damn MLB season does. Give it enough time and we may be calling Roger Federer the new “Mr. October.â€
Speaking of Federer, I do believe that he is going to take the whole damn thing but he first has to get past Nadal. Anyone who can play a match for five whole days (thanks again to the rain) and still have enough sanity to pull out a victory is one tough bastard. And he is one 21 year old kid that is going to be around in the tennis world for a long time to come, but I just don’t think he’s up to taking such a prestigious title yet and getting past Federer if they eventually match up.
Paulie: Well, as I write this, Chuckles’ pick of Miss Sharapova is looking kinda grim as Venus has taken the first set 6-1. Of course, I’m sure if anyone ever got the courage to look they’d find out that Venus is really about as much of a woman as Joanie Laurer, clenis and all. Nadal had a hell of a time in his 4 day long 3rd round match. Four days? What the hell? I think he’ll make the finals, but only because his side of the bracket is HORRID at this point. Djokovic may have a shot, but I don’t think it’s gonna happen. The only one left that I think could stop Federer is Roddick. And I believe that the winner of the Federer/Roddick semi is going to be the eventual winner on the men’s side.
On the women’s side of the world… man do I hate the Williams sisters. Always have. And who the hell told them they could be models? But I digress. If Henin gets past Serena she should cruise on in to the finals. The other side of the bracket, I like Ana Ivanovic. With Sharapova looking like she’s going down to Venus, I like the little Serb chicky’s chances. But Henin will take her in the finals. Will be a damn fine match though. If it ever stops raining and they can finish this damned tournament before August.
Editor’s Note: All our picks were made before Venus actually took out Maria 6-1, 6-3 in a huge ass delayed match due to the rain!
Like movies but never know which are good and which suck? Then head over to The DVD Lounge where there are a lot of good people watching a lot of crap so you don’t have to. And for a person who has over 1300 DVDs and watches every movie imaginable, Travis really finds some things that even I have never heard of.
Popcorn Junkies is a place you really need to go check out as well because there are great people like Caroline, Ping, Michaelangelo, Kubryk, and more bringing you news and movie reviews at all hours of the night and day.
That’s it, we’re done and out of here until next week. Congratulations go to Mr. Joey Chestnut though for bringing home the Mustard Belt after downing 66 hot dogs in Nathan’s hot dog eating contest. Kobayashi was defeated even though I’m sure it will be blamed on his “injuries.†The man had a wisdom tooth pulled and has jaw arthritis and still ate 63 hot dogs? Me thinks he needed an excuse since he knew he could be beat this year.
Go here in the forums and yell at us!
Hope you had a Happy 4th everyone and we’ll see you next time on PTI.
