Category Archives: Duke

Andre Wiggins, David Stern, Duke, Jabari Parker, Julius Randle, Kentucky, NBA, NCAA College Basketball, tanking

Empty Tanks

Riggin’ for Wiggins. Sorry for Jabari. Scandal for Randle.
The catchy phrases are already piling up as NBA teams make themselves into ugly ducklings for the 2013-14 season in an effort to maximize their chances at landing one of the premium talents that have hit the college hardwood this season.
And alliteration aside, this happens all too frequently in the NBA. The Draft Lottery is a joke, a punch line to the league and the more you look at it, should be a mark on David Stern’s legacy.
From Andre Wiggins at Kansas, Jabari Parker at Duke, Julius Randle at Kentucky, Aaron Gordon at Arizona to a host of other heralded freshmen, the 2014 NBA Draft has GMs everywhere lining up to give away an entire season in hopes of landing one of these potential franchise players.
But should they even be allowed?
In an exchange years ago will ESPN’s Bill Simmons, noted thinker Malcolm Gladwell had this to say:

                “I think, for example, that the idea of ranking draft picks in reverse order of finish — as much as it sounds “fair” — does untold damage to the game. You simply cannot have a system that rewards anyone, ever, for losing. Economists worry about this all the time, when they talk about “moral hazard.” Moral hazard is the idea that if you insure someone against risk, you will make risky behavior more likely. So if you always bail out the banks when they take absurd risks and do stupid things, they are going to keep on taking absurd risks and doing stupid things.”

And he’s right. Nowhere else on earth is poor performance, malfeasance, mismanagement rewarded. Well, except in Washington, D.C.
Think about it. Everything else that we do must be done to the best of our efforts – or at least some minimum level of trying – or we lose it.
From relationships to our jobs, we can’t tank and get ahead. And when we’ve tried it – as Gladwell said, with banks, it proves to be a hazard to society and one that doesn’t work.
Just picture it: going all George Costanza and sleeping under your desk all day and earning a promotion? That was funny because it was ridiculous to us.
What if we put no effort into our relationships? Just try not taking your girlfriend or wife out for dinner and a movie, even every now and then, and see how quickly your single. You even have to put effort into that – the pick-up. Try going to the bars in sweats, smelling like a dirty sock and looking like you just woke up from a bender. No woman would come within five feet of you.
Think of how outraged we’d be if this practice existed in schools?
Teacher: “Johnny is failing tests, farting in class, humming the Star Wars imperial theme when I lecture and demanding peanut butter and cheese sticks be instituted as the school lunch. We’re going to have to move him up a grade, name him Student of the Month and recommend he teach my class.”
Parent: “Well, we were worried, but hopeful this would happen. We’ll now make sure to reel him in and try a little harder on his schoolwork and behavioral issues.”
Cheat your taxes? How about some money back to make sure you have enough for next year?
It used to be that NBA teams would at least try to not be horrible, or at least be less obvious about it, until after the holidays. It was a passing rite of spring, really. Hit March, and go into full tanking mode. Now? Teams are trotting out a collection of barely passable NBA talent in hopes of getting a head start at being at the bottom by season’s end.
The lack of logic in this practice is astounding. After 30 years, aren’t we clear that this doesn’t work? A handful of well-run teams keep winning the championship. The bad teams stay bad because they are poorly run and because just getting one young superstar doesn’t fix the problem.
How many times do the Bobcats/Hornets, Hornets/Pelicans, Clippers, Raptors, Timberwolves, Grizzlies and Kings have to get a lottery pick before they are good? Those teams have had at least 6 or more lottery picks since the 1984-85 season.
In a recent case study, it was discovered that nearly 90 percent of teams that win 25 games or less are still not contenders five years later. This is the same as saying someone who sits on their couch, plays video games online and tweets about not having a wife or a job is still doing the same thing five years later.
Not exactly surprising.
While I would agree with Gladwell’s theory that we should not reward this kind of team, I think the most egregious thing is that it has become such a glaring problem that everyone openly acknowledges it but nothing is done about it by the league.
David Stern will fine San Antonio for not having their star players face the Heat last November, but he won’t do anything about this? Oh, wait, that’s because he’s helped create it, incentivize it and continue it. Stern will never admit how failed this logic is.
The question, I suppose, is why doesn’t the NFL have this problem? Why is the NFL, the envy of the NBA and Major League Baseball, facing this issue? Because management doesn’t last if they tank. There’s too much risk in throwing away a season.
What I’ve never understood is how you convince people to throw away an entire year of their careers? Imagine telling Michael Jordan, the player, you were going to openly stink for a season to get him some help? Now, Jordan the executive is managing one of the worst teams in professional sports – in any league – in an effort to build a roster of young players where one might pan out.
Not that anyone cares, but it must be difficult to be a fan of these teams. It’s against everything we know to root for losing. Yet, the NBA allows it and rewards it.
Yup. The NBA.

It’s fantastic.



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Dr. Seuss, Duke, Jim Valvano, Kentucky, March Madness, NC State, NCAA Tournament, The Meaning of Life

The Tournament of Life


And so begins perhaps the greatest 48 hours of our sports year. Sixty-four teams, 32 games. In the next two days, we’ll have basketball for 24 hours. It’s wild, it’s chaotic. Your bracket will be busted, but it matters little right now, because you think this is it: the year you pick ‘em all right.
(Um, I don’t know how to tell you this, but you won’t pick them all right – well, unless your bracket looks like mine, of course.)
To quote Seth Davis, “I love the smell of Madness in the morning!”
Let’s be honest, we’re all just swimming in giddiness right now. Like a kid on Christmas morning. I’ve got that Bill Cosby smile happening at the moment, the one where your head bounces from side to side, with a permanent smile plastered across your face.
I don’t know if it’s because of the pools, the actual filling out of the brackets, the madness, the sound of the buzzer, the anticipation, the fact that every team has a chance to have One Shining Moment or something else entirely, but there is always – always – something magical about this Thursday and Friday in March.
It’s a way of life, really.
As a kid, I’d sneak into school with a hand-held radio, run the headphones up through my sweatshirt and listen to the games all afternoon in class. Trick was to appear as though I was intently listening to whatever was being said by the teacher. He or she sounded like the teacher from Charlie Brown, but I nodded like I understood – and appreciated – the insight. In truth, I was in The Pit, or in Dayton or San Jose or wherever the game I was listening to was broadcasting from.
Oh yes, I’ve used the “Boss Button” – the button you would hit that would pull up a fake Excel spreadsheet at your desk in case someone walked by while you were watching the games. I’ve called in sick. I’ve gone to the games (when they were local).
I’m guessing many of you have done the same. There’s just a palpable hue in air, a feeling of great expectations and anticipation. What’s this year going to be like? Who’s going down? Who survives? Who advances?
Watching the ESPN “30 for 30” documentary Sunday on Jim Valvano’s 1983 NC State team was a reminder of this logic. Survive and Advance. The Wolfpack had to win the ACC Tournament just to get in – then went through a ridiculous stretch of overtime thrillers to keep surviving, keep advancing. They had to beat Ralph Sampson and Viriginia a second time, not to mention Houston and Phi Slamma Jamma, which was the 1989-90-91 UNLV of the early 80s.
There have been Cinderella’s, like NC State, and there have been years of total domination, too: UNLV in 1990, Duke seemingly every third year, Kentucky in ’96. Nearly every year memorable, every year magical. For the longest time, I could tell you every Final Four team in each season beginning with 1980.
The point is, people from all walks of life, from all over the country, young and old, get into this tournament. Maybe it’s the all-inclusive nature of the Big Dance. Maybe it’s the drama or the vulnerability of rooting for 18-22 year olds to be perfect for three weeks when they can barely keep themselves organized for three hours. Perhaps it’s the fact that really, every game is a Game 7 in the NCAA Tournament. There really is no tomorrow if you lose.
Today, my daughter’s school celebrates the life and writings of the great Dr. Seuss. And my favorite book is, has and perhaps might always be “Oh, The Places You’ll Go!” The very real message in the book still rings true. About life’s ups and downs, the fact that you control your own destiny, that sometimes you’ll be going so fast in life you are out of control, and other times, you’ll realize you’re going down a dark and dangerous path. Sometimes there will be negativity, others people will be essentially singing your praises and rooting for you to win.
The message: you can do it, you can accomplish it, because you control your fate due to your ability to steer and guide yourself anyway you choose.
And really, isn’t that just a microcosm of what the NCAA Tournament is? Isn’t that really what life is? It can be done. You can survive and advance.
We choose and chose the lives we lead, the families we have (or don’t), the significant others, the jobs, the cars, the clothes, the house, the city we live in and the friends we surround ourselves with. We chose our the college we went to, the classes and major, whether or not to study for an exam.
These are our picks. Life is our real bracket.  
Really, we fill out the bracket of life as we go along our own tournament. Sometimes there are upsets, sometimes the favorite wins by 30. And maybe that’s why March Madness resonates with us just a little bit more, because it’s comparable, relatable in ways we don’t even realize. The only difference is, we can change our picks as we go.
Some days we are the No. 1 seed, others the 16. One moment, we’re a mid-major, at times, we feel like we’re from a power conference. We’re tournament-tested and prepared, then suddenly, we don’t look like we should even be in the field. One day, we’re sponsored by Nike, the next, we look like we’re sporting homemade uniforms and our name is misspelled. We’ve hit game winners, we’ve been blown-out. We’ve accidently called a timeout with none left. We’ve hit a shot as the buzzer sounds.
And truthfully, we like it this way. It’s unpredictable, just like this tournament. We never know what’s going to happen. And the options are endless. Each day, we survive and advance. Sometimes, it’s a struggle, other times, we look like we’ll run the table.
We’re all really just playing our own Tournament of Life, looking for as many Shining Moments as we can create for our highlight reel. We just have to keep filling out our bracket each day.
Surviving. Advancing. Hoping. Dreaming. Competing. Playing the game.
Let’s just enjoy the madness of it all.
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Arizona, Duke, Ed O'Bannon, Indiana, Jeff Sheppard, Mike Krzyzewski, Miles Simon, NCAA College Basketball, North Carolina, Rick Pitino, UCLA

The State of College Basketball


College basketball fans, media pundits, NCAA regulatory members, and hoop junkies from sea to shining sea:
A few days ago I had an interesting conversation with a friend. It began with a question: in your opinion, what was the greatest period of college basketball? Our answers aligned: the 1990s to early 2000s.
For some time, we recalled some of the great teams and players from that era of amateur roundball, of which there are far too many to name here. We lamented, with that nostalgia in mind, how over the past decade we have become bigger fans and followers of the pro game than of college basketball. And we wondered where the game was headed from here, this point, with no truly great teams.
But to identify the state of college basketball is to essentially begin with why that is so.
On its surface, the college game seems to be maintaining the foundation that was built so long ago. If we were to name some of the top teams and coaches from those glory years of the 1990s and early 2000s, we would find many of them still thriving near the top of the collegiate ranks: Indiana, Michigan, Duke, Kansas and Arizona. And the NCAA Tournament remains as exciting as ever, with surprises coming each year that no one can foresee, lovable underdogs like George Mason, VCU and Butler.
Hereto with, attendance and viewership remains high: the NCAA Tournament commands record crowds and audiences, as well as massive TV contracts, where now you can view every NCAA Tournament game between partners CBS and Turner. And look at the atmosphere created at campus’ all around the country, like Indiana, where Bloomington was bursting with energy and enthusiasm – enough to make Dick Vitale blush – prior to the Hoosiers showdown with then No. 1 Michigan on Feb. 2.
It is a testament to the love and devotion of college basketball around the country. At a time when so much about sports seems to let us down, from performance enhancing drugs and contract disputes to petty personality conflicts and illogical ways of determining a champion in the other big college sport (to be clear, we are talking about you, BCS), college basketball remains a sport filled with unified team ambition. Players and coaches focus on the mission at hand, working together towards a common goal of a tournament bid, a conference title, a Final Four run. 
There is something about the one-and-done playoff format of college basketball that will forever hold its grip over the NBA and the institution of the seven game series. Are you good enough to be the best, on one night, in one shining moment? Coaches hold a much greater aura of respect and authority than they ever could in the pro game. In other words, they seem to have a point.
Yet there is still something unsettling about the state of the college game. Something is missing.
While college basketball will go on, its transfixing hold on us might continue to dwindle without proper intervention. Thus, today, we lay out our plans of prosperity for the game.
First, we must no longer dance around the issue of prep-to-pro eligibility. The “One and Done” is a silent killer of the unspoken pull we have to the college game. Imagine if Kentucky returned all their players from last year’s championship team, combined with this current team? Could they threaten Indiana’s 1976 undefeated team? How many schools would be dominant with more players in school than in the NBA? Thusly, how many great games would we have on a week-in, week-out basis?
Part of the reason the 1990s and early 2000s were great is that the teams were deeper. Think of those Duke, Arkansas, Kentucky, Arizona, North Carolina and Kansas teams that were so loaded during that period. And once one of those schools lost a couple seniors and a junior, another loaded, talented team was ready to take the mantle. Kentucky played in three straight championship games between 1996-98, with rosters that overlapped, yet changed completely.
From the Untouchables in 1996, with Antoine Walker, Ron Mercer, Derek Anderson, Walter McCarty, Tony Delk and Jeff Sheppard – and so many more – to the 1997 runner-up team (that lost the title game in OT) featuring Mercer, Anderson, Anthony Epps, Scott Padgett, Wayne Turner and Cameron Mills on to the 1998 team with Sheppard (back from redshirting since the team was loaded), Turner, Padgett, Mills, Allen Edwards and Nazr Mohammed.
Nearly all went pro, but there was just a slew of talent that passed through that program from 1993 to 1999, and even if some only stayed two seasons, like Mercer and Walker, those that stayed three of four were the continuity that bred basically a dynasty.
That’s just one program. Duke seemingly went to every Final Four over a 15-year period, won titles in 1991, 1992 and 2001 – they nearly won the 1994 title as well – with an abundance of talented and memorable players like Grant Hill, Christian Laettner, Bobby Hurley, Shane Battier, Trajan Langdon, Rashawn McLeod, North Carolina featured talent like Eric Montross, Rasheed Wallace, Jerry Stackhouse, Vince Carter, Antwan Jamison and Shammond Williams over a period of 1993-1998. Final Four appearances in 1993, 1995, 1997 and 1998, and the National Championship in 1993.
And here was Arizona’s talent, from about 1994-2003: Damon Stoudamire, Khalid Reeves, Miles Simon, Mike Bibby, Michael Dickerson, Jason Terry, Richard Jefferson, Jason Gardner, Gilbert Arenas, Luke Walton, Salim Stoudamire, Hassan Adams and Andre Igudola. Three Final Fours, two title games, one NCAA Championship (1997).
That’s barely scratching the surface: Michigan’s Fab Five, Indiana’s early 90s reign atop the Big Ten, Purdue’s streak of conference titles, Michigan State’s loaded rosters and Final Four appearances – and we haven’t even mentioned the Big East, with Syracuse, Georgetown, Connecticut (titles in 1999 and 2003). Or Stanford’s rise from 1996-2002 that challenged Arizona in the Pac-10. Or Florida’s budding program that led to back-to-back titles in 2006 and 2007, or Michigan State’s loaded rosters and Final Four appearances, or Maryland taking on the big boys of the ACC and winning the 2002 title.
And I did all that from memory, without looking up a single player – not to prove I could, but because this was the era where even the best of the best went to school, at least for a little while. It’s most likely not even a full or comprehensive list. Undoubtedly, I am missing names and teams.
Now, many will see this as a plea that players stay in school, to which I would argue is a misplaced objective.
No, my fellow basketball fans, we may never see that era of hoops at the collegiate level again. Because the truth is, I can’t name more than 25 current college basketball players, and I feel like I’ve watched my fair share of games over the past three or four years. But we’re doing a great disservice to the game in general by waffling back and forth on this issue of age.
Either pressure the NBA to institute a new rule where players cannot enter the league for two – or even three – years post graduation, or lift the restriction altogether, allow them to go to the NBA directly out of high school, yet adding the caveat that if you choose to enter college, you cannot be drafted for two or three years.
Second, we’re stripping the fabric of college basketball and college sports completely away with conference realignment. It is an abhorred tragedy that the Big East will soon cease to exist. The Big Ten is now the Bloated 14, with the additions of Nebraska, Maryland and Rutgers. Syracuse in the ACC? Utah in the Pac-10, er, 12? Texas A&M in the SEC?
We are losing our rivalries, which are the underbelly of college basketball. No Syracuse vs. Georgetown is like no Indiana vs. Purdue, no North Carolina vs. Duke. Rivalries made college basketball what it was, what drove it to greatness. I remember just as much from our golden era in-conference games and tournaments as I do NCAA Tournaments. Big Monday and Super Tuesday on ESPN, Pac-10 Thursday nights on Fox Sports West, SEC and Big 10 games on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.
These are the ties that bind. Yet everything has a price, and for the right price, we’ll dissolve any institution? That is, except for the institution of the NCAA, right?
Money and the NCAA transition nicely to our next critical item: the student-athlete.
Tell me, dear citizens of Krzyzewskiville, Rock, Chalk Jayhawk and so many college basketball villages coast-to-coast, how much is someone a traditional college student if they practice, travel and play games late at night during the school week? You’ll hear some folks tell you stories that illustrate that this was always the case, but what would be omitted is that due to said conference realignment, teams are crossing multiple states and time zones to play now.
How quickly can Iowa get back from a Tuesday night game in New Jersey? Miami to Syracuse? Nebraska to Maryland? The season lasts from mid-October through March, meaning student-athletes can completely focus on the student part for about six weeks at the start of the year and six weeks at the end of the year.
Perhaps – just perhaps – it is time to begin to turn a portion of the proceeds over to the student-athletes. And maybe not during school, but as the case of Ed O’Bannon (former UCLA great who led the Bruins to the 1995 title) vs. the NCAA proved, if you are going to use someone’s name and likeness that long after they were a student-athlete, then perhaps some of the money earned from doing so should be shared.
In 2011, the 31 conferences that received automatic bids received $180.5 million, which is then divided by the number of games each conference played over a six-year period. Each game is worth $240,000. Which meant a conference like the Big East, which played 109 games over the span of 2005-2010, took in $26.1 million. According to Forbes, by 2017, one game in the NCAA Tournament will be worth roughly $377,369 and a single game played in 2012 will have accrued a gross value of $1.9 million.
Quite a deferred play by the NCAA. Now, isn’t that just the way Dr. James Naismith drew it up?
We get confused on the numbers, when really, the battle was technically over whether or not they should receive anything but school expenses? That’s the definition of a full-ride scholarship. The NCAA simply muddied their own waters by introducing the stipend, and upping it to $300 is laughable – not because it’s only $300, but because this is the line, apparently, between heinous evildoers of sports and the kind and gentle NCAA bylaws?
What’s the difference again? Morals and ethics are being defined by the very people who make the rules here. Simply put, if any amount of money changes hands, it’s pay for performance, now we’re just arguing over fair market value.
As crafty as the “most of us go pro in something other than sports” slogan is, it doesn’t mention that most student-athletes name and likeness are used for profit over not just a college or conference, but a sanctioning body. The NCAA is like the bank in monopoly, except no one ever hits Free Parking.
Does this open a can of worms? Maybe, but no more so than continuing to use an outdated term like “student-athlete”.
Which brings us back to the beginning. The very era we hold near and dear began this battle cry and pulled back the curtain.
As Charles Pierce wrote about on Grantland.com last week, it was the Fab Five at Michigan who hand-checked the NCAA on this matter. As the university used Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, Juwan Howard, Jimmy King and Ray Jackson in the ways of advertising that would make Mad Men proud, the players started asking questions.
Fast-forward to the present the NCAA is dipping it’s pen in company ink: allowing for video games to feature the name and likeness of players, who’s video game counterparts wearing the same jersey numbers additionally feature similar skills to those of the real athletes.
You’re telling me it’s happenstance that USC’s QB #3 from the 2003 NCAA Football game was right-handed, white and had a similar throwing motion, to, say, Carson Palmer…who wore No. 3, was right-handed and white. It’s one thing to tell the players to keep the amateur in athletics, quite another to use them for profit on merchandise. When I was a kid, I didn’t just want an Arizona jersey – I wanted Miles Simon’s #34 jersey, Jeff Sheppard’s #15 or Steve Wojciechowski’s #12.
There was no coincidence.
It’s not a matter of should that player get a percentage of those jersey sales after their time in school is done, but how. As others have suggested recently, just put it aside and allow the athletes to have it after they leave school. That way, they aren’t getting paid while in school and under scholarship, but it could be a graduation present of sorts, a thank-you for all the money generated by you and your achievements, notoriety and skills while in college.
And so, my fellow basketball fans, the state of the college game is like a double-digit lead: a mirage. All looks fine on the scoreboard, but the momentum has shifted and a sea change is taking place.
We can either embrace this and embark on a new path which will benefit us all in terms of fairness and product, or we can continue to keep our head in the sand as our great sport falls further into the overall sports abyss. But this game will still be pure, still provide joy and opportunity as long as we remain united in common purpose and intent, as long as we maintain our resolve for logic and realize that moving forward can bring us closer to the glory of the past.
The state of college basketball is at the line with a one-and-one opportunity.
Let’s make them both.
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