Greg Skipper’s Weblog

Hedo-esn’t Play Defense

May 23, 2009 · Leave a Comment

A lot has been made of LeBron James’ game winning shot over the Orlando Magic, in Game 2 of the NBA East Finals.

You can’t take anything away from a guy that catches and shoots from 25 ft with a guy in his face and 1 second remaining on the clock.  It’s a skill set even few NBA players possess.  There’s a reason the Cavs weren’t inbounding to Anderson Varejao.  And you can’t expect the highlights to not dominate SportsCenter, certainly when said player is commonly referred to as “The Chosen One” by fans and insiders alike.

What will undoubtedly be missed in all the post game hoopla will be the actual events that got us to this point – and that is a disappointment.

I’m going to bypass the details of the Magic’s actual comeback.  For context’s sake, it was a relentlessly chippy, grueling display, orchestrated over the course of 2.5 quarters and 23 points.  It’s something you rarely see in professional basketball – the type of effort that is almost exclusively saved for the play-offs, where time is actually a constrained resource. 

As time wound down in the 4th quarter, the game took on a borderline WWE feel, as if Vince McMahon and the Rock were somewhere lurking in the locker rooms, just waiting for LeBron to challenge somebody for the NWA TV Title.  There were mystery calls and make-up calls, bouts of non-contact contact, and official conferences that saw personal fouls overturned as travels (thats right, travels).  In one stretch so many charges were taken, even Shane Battier was uncomfortable.  Oh, and don’t forget that great NBA rule that enables a team to advance the ball, via warp zone, from under the basket on one side of the floor, to the total opposite side of the floor,  simply by calling time out.  Can somebody tell me why this makes sense?

All that said, it was an entertaining game, and to say that the Magic stepped up, even when the future looked bleak (or even predetermined),  is an understatement.  As a guy whose passion for NCAA hoops is only matched by the players’ themselves, I was impressed by the Magic’s desire and effort, from top to bottom.  It seemed no matter who checked in – Marcin Gortat, Courtney Lee, Mickael Pietrus, even J.J. Redick – the level of intensity never diminished. 

I don’t think it’s even necessary to speak to the clutch play of Rashard Lewis and Hedo Turkoglu down the stretch.  Hedo’s play in the final 60 seconds of basketball was the stuff that makes guys named Hedo household names in Indiana.  LeBron was LeBron, single handidly willing his way through the lane and to the hoop.  Carrying the city of Cleveland on his back.

Alas, Hedo will be better known for being the victim of a driving cut, only moments before becoming the Craig Ehlo to LeBron’s Michael Jordan.

This is truly unfair.

Without becoming too Encyclopediac, there are distinct differences between LeBron’s game winner last night and Michael Jordan’s dagger against Cleveland in 1989*.

Let me emphasize that LeBron’s version took place at home, in Game 2, on a catch and shoot situation, in a seemingly man on man defense, against a defender with the closing speed of a tree. 

I’ll spare you the fact that in order to get open, Michael had to weave his way in and out of oncoming traffic.  I won’t make Michael’s coming to the ball, placing him farther away from the basket, as an actual obstacle to scoring.  I’ll gloss over details, like the ones where he needs three dribbles simply to position himself and his body in such a way to square up and get a reasonable look at the basket.    I’ll ignore the fact that Craig Ehlo was actually playing defense, so much so, that Michael released the ball on the way down.  Oh, and did I mention that if Michael misses, the Bulls go home?

Think Michael’s shot didn’t hurt?  Look at Craig Ehlo.  Look at him.  That’s the face of a man that did everything he could, yet could not stop the greatest player to have ever lived, at a time, when his legend was yet to exist.  It’s the face of man who just watched a chance at the NBA Finals go down the drain.  It’s the face of a guy that just realized he became the punchline for somebody else’s game winning shot. 

LeBron, your shot was amazing.  It truly was.  But it wasn’t even in the same hemisphere.  Frankly, you shouldn’t have even been able to catch. 

Why Stan Van Gundy is in a man to man, I’ll never know.  Why he isn’t over playing LeBron, completely denying a catch, I can’t answer.  Why he guarded LeBron with the likeness of a lamppost, is beyond me.  Why Hedo actually thought LeBron was going to go back door, where the best that could happen (from LeBron’s perspective) is a tie, I couldn’t tell you.  For the life of me, I can’t explain why a shot, so hard, was allowed to be so easy.  Maybe LeBron’s talent makes it seem effortless, or maybe, after tirelessly coming back for 47 minutes and 59 seconds, Van Gundy and the Magic were just thoughtless.

In any event, see you in Orlando.  You know, for game 3?

*At the time, the first round of the NBA Play-offs was a best of 5 game series.

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I Make Promises

May 22, 2009 · Leave a Comment

If there is one thing that I love to do, it’s to make a promise. I love it. It’s so easy. You just say silly things like, “I’ll call you right back” and then you don’t. Maybe you’ll saying something like, “I’ll definitely go to that concert with you”, only to go completely AWOL on the evening of said concert. I’m a huge fan of “just call me tomorrow night and we’ll grab a beer”, and then promptly ignoring all text messages, phone calls, telegrams, and Western Union carriers.

Promises just feel good. Everybody walks away happy, and by the time somebody is upset about the turn of events, it’s kind of too late anyway. Can’t cry over spilled milk.

If there’s one thing I dislike, it’s breaking promises to myself. I’m unusually cruel to myself. Perhaps is has to do with the fact that my parents forced me to create and maintain a five-year plan beginning at age five. Perhaps that punishing, self doubt forcing act, has just desensitized me overall, I don’t know. I digress. I mean seriously, at no point did I intend on dissolving into a post filled with self introspection and critique.

My purpose was to repond to my legions of readers who have pummeled me with fan mail over the last eighteen months (correct me if I’m wrong, but dead fish do typically accompany fan mail, right?). Fans – you are right. I promised each and every one of you crackpot reporting, literary hijinx, and a humbling life lesson with every post – and I have failed you. Greg you are right too – you are awesome. Oh wait, that’s not what I was going for. Greg you are right too – you promised yourself you would hone up your writing skills and your Google Page Rank with mind numbing chatter about YOURSELF (your favorite person) – and you have failed yourself.  My sincerest apologies to you and me.

So, in the interest of making promises that I can keep… I’m going to promise to try harder, to spend less time watching Bridget’s Sexiest Beaches, and to spend a few minutes, every once in a while, to keep it real.  And what will you get?  A nugget about a great new band or a review of a crappy album (much more fun than singing the praises of the Kings of Leon, that’s easy), an analysis of why Greivis Vazquez will be a far superior pro than college player, an update on my newest Pandora Station and why no matter what I do I can’t avoid the Goo Goo Dolls, maybe a heads-up on an upcoming show or even a re-cap of a recent race.  Hell,  I ran a 17.24 PR in the Dundalk Pondskipper 5K two weeks ago.  If there aren’t three blog posts that can come out of that headline, there isn’t one.

Hang in there, I promise…

And until the next time…

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Larry Are You OK?

January 8, 2008 · 3 Comments

Something interesting happened to me last weekend. 

Amid NFL Wildcard action (for the record, there’s nothing “wild” about watching a sub 10-win team, with a quarterback fresh off the home insurance circuit square off against a Divisional winner whose most popular player is routinely mistaken for the retired identical twin brother of another guy that still plays), the International Bowl (congratulations to The State University of New Jersey, I guess), and Roger Clemens’ 60-Minutes Interview (ease up, my trainer injects me with B-12 all the time), I fell in love with an old friend.

For those of you who have been sleeping under a rock, NBC premiered “A New Breed of Gladiator” Sunday, January 6.  That’s right, American Gladiators is back!  Now a lot has been written about these Gladiators online, and I’ll be perfectly honest, the instant the two-hour premier ended (that’s right, Wolf, Toa, and Venom got as much airtime last weekend as front-running presidential candidates), I immediately started up my laptop with the intention of unearthing and compiling every available Gladiator fact.  With the help of NBC and fans across America, I, Greg Skipper, would become the Internet’s premier American Gladiators Blogger.

My work would be showcased across the Internet.  Journalists around the country would source me as they filled their silly “newspapers” with second-rate American Gladiator news and stories.  And from time to time, when Tony Kornheiser was on vacation and Bob Ryan was covering an away game, I would fill in on The Sports Reporters, and completely nail questions surrounding the physical and psychological demands of Powerball.

Of course, that’s all just a pipe-dream.  I’ve accepted that this will probably never happen.   So while the rest of America was out Googling “Gina Carano” Monday, I did some homework.

My intention with this post was to do a little tribute of sorts, to Larry Csonka.  Larry Csonka – Pro Football Hall of Famer, American Gladiators Analyst from 1990 – 1993, master of the Csonkastrator, I could go on forever.  That, however, was not possible, due to Mr. Csonka’s apparent, and quite specific, loss of memory.

You see, it all started when I made my way over to LarryCsonka.com to do some research, you know, the home of Larry Csonka.  Anyway, it was there, while reading his biography that I discovered some holes in Larry’s past.  The kind of holes that take away, say, 20 years of your working life.  The kind of holes that eliminate your work on American Gladiators from your own biography on your own website.

Some would argue that ole’ Larry probably thinks he’s too good for the rest of us these days.  After all, he’s no longer just a jock.  Not even just an ex-jock.  The guy travels around the country as a motivational speaker, owns and operates his own outdoor wildlife sanctuary in Ohio, maintains a seafood house in Florida, and stars in his own show on the Outdoor Life Network.  You might think the guy is too big for his own britches, but I don’t buy it.  Not the Csonk that would clown around with Gemini and Nitro after a successful go at “Breakthrough and Conquer”.  Nope, not that Larry Csonka. 

So Csonk, if you’re out there, there’s hope.  While I am sure your memory loss is a direct result of years of explosive collisions on the football field (a subject that I know little about, I rarely got dirty when I played), I can provide you with this bit of recovery advice.  Hit it Malibu…

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The Baltimore Sun Finally Gets It’s Priorities In Order

January 6, 2008 · Leave a Comment

One night a week for the past four or so years I have laced up the same sneakers I bought my senior year of college, met up with some friends from high school, college, and most recently, work and played basketball.  We travel all around the Baltimore metro area to play.  Sometimes we play in Glen Burnie, sometimes in Columbia, sometimes we drive out to Olney to run up and down a court for 40 minutes.  Once in a while, when we play poorly, or when we are playing so well that we feel we could make reasonable opponents for the Chicago Bulls of the 1990’s, we go to UMBC and get a couple of games with college kids.  They quickly put us in our place, making the 1991 – 1992 Dallas Mavericks a more reasonable foe.

At any rate, in our last week of action leading up to the holidays, the Baltimore Sun felt our basketball league was worthy of a rather lengthy piece in it’s Wednesday edition.  Moreover, captivated by the Pork Chop Express’ thrilling double overtime loss to the heralded Raptors, the Sun’s Jeff Seidel fell in love with my team and our “story”.  

Self indulging?  Yep.  Ridiculous?  You betcha.  Most excited I have been to open the Sun since my first high school touchdown?  Absolutely. 

With that, I give you the human interest story of the year. 

The Pork Chop Express

 

And for the record, that is not me in the picture – that would be Dustin Grant.  Enjoy…

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Welcome

January 6, 2008 · 2 Comments

Thanks for stopping by.  I apologize for the mess, things are “Under Construction”, if you will. 

Starting and maintaining this blog is part of a New Year’s Resolution to myself.  The goal?  Simple.  I promised myself that I would start writing more.  I guess what I should say is, start writing again.  The truth is, a portion of last year’s list of resolutions included selling and buying a house, and when the curtain closed on 2007, I was successful.  I decided to take a step back in 2008.   I mean, you can’t sell your house and buy a new one every year, that doesn’t make any sense.  I have to believe that publishing some of my observations and hyperlinking to an interesting article or two, every once in a while, has to be a much healthier hobby than routinely arguing with real estate agents, lenders, contractors, and anybody else in between.  It’s a lay-up.  At least, that’s what my cardiologist says.

My hope is to get something positive out of this experience.   And by “something positive”, I obviously mean a cult  following online that ultimately leads to a nationally syndicated editorial column and a nightly news magazine supported by one of the major networks.  All this with the sole intention of transforming millions of free-thinking readers into mindless advocates of my completely contrived, if not stolen, rhetoric.

I kid.  Sort of.  But seriously, my sincere hope is that this blog generates meaningful conversation, or thought, or even just a laugh.  A laugh, for whatever reason, would be the greatest compliment.  People love to share laughs.

 Anyway, thanks again for stopping by.  Here’s to a great 2008… that was stupid.

 -Greg

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