Amare Returns!

So Amare Stoudemire returned today after missing about 6 months of the NBA season. Seeing him play gave me one of the most giddy feelings I have ever gotten watching sports. I mean, Amare is back! That’s HUGE! Forget the fact you could have slapped a Chris Webber jersey on his back and no one would have known the difference, it still looked damn good to see. Although he was not explosive (a lot of finesse lay up finishes instead of the power dunks we know and love) he had the jump shot working beautifully (you could tell he had been working on that all this time, it was automatic). One thing Amare can still do, even without his explosiveness right now, is get to the free throw line. The suns put up 125 points tonight and it didn’t even seem like they played that great offensively. Lets just say seeing Amare back was awesome, I am stoked for the playoffs and pumped to see how Amare returns and progresses. {edited 4/1/06: Forget everything I said. :( }

Okay OC talk. First off for those who read this blog and don’t really know me all that well, you may think the OC is my favorite show. Well its not, I can’t say I really like this show but I don’t miss episodes. It’s hard to explain, everyone watches it and it’s a good conversation piece. At the same time I don’t really like any of the characters except for Sandy, who is awesome. Seth’s comedic impact to the show, in my opinion (of course), is so overrated. He is not funny at all; in fact I really don’t like this character at all. That being said the show needs him, all that being said its still damn fun to watch and talk about. So here I go with a few quick points on the latest OC episodes:

• Promo for the next weeks episodes states ‘The most explosive episode yet.” Can we put a cap on the amount of times the OC can use this tag line? Because I think I have watched about 10-12 most explosive episodes yet.
• Volcheck (sp?) is a creep! I mean honestly girls, could I be a complete bitch to you and your friends, kidnap you, fight your boyfriend and then when you break up with him I stalk you and creep you out so much that you just end up having sex with me? Does this really work? (Answer is no in the real world, yes in the OC world. Just another reason why we should all live in the OC world). Exact quote from J to the ustin about Marissa and Volcheck’s relationship: “That is going to be a great relationship.” (note heavy sarcasm).
• I think Sadie is damn hot.
• Sandy Cohen is hands down the coolest TV dad ever.
• WTF happened with that Jes girl? I mean she went of being a slut on acid to living in a mansion and being obsessed with Ryan? Umm Random.
• How about the last episode. Just a bunch of sex. I mean I was watching it on TIVO at like 2am and I was pretty sure I had accidentally switched over to a free trial of Skinamax.
• I don’t see why Sandy was so upset at Matt for letting Marissa spend that night. To make my point let me substitute a few words from the famous Ghostbusters quote: “If an underage girl asks if she can sleep over at your house, you say YES!”
• I am genuinely nervous about what Sandy is going to do with Matt. He needs that hospital to be built, but he also knows Matt is getting the raw deal. I would hate to be in his situation, I cringed when Matt called him late in the episode. Luckily Sandy didn’t answer, that’s a problem future Sandy can deal with.

Finally I want to pimp myself. I had LSU beating Duke in the sweet 16. Redick going 3-18 in the game? Ouch. The collective universe hating JJ might have finally caught up with him (I am the only one in the world I think who does not hate him, and he will be drafted by the Utah Jazz, more on that late in the blog.) I cant believe how UCLA came back to beat Gonzaga. That was insane, I mean JP Batista was so careless with the ball and when Ravio go the ball after UCLA scored to take the lead he was so unnecessarily out of control with the ball it was ridiculous (redickulous?). I really don’t like Ravio, I mean I think I hate him. It was rough seeing Morrison cry hard on the court (although he really doesn’t look like a guy who would cry). I felt for him though, I hope he succeeds in the next level. I think Matt Baker was devastated by the loss too. I am only basis this on the fact that he his a huge Gonzaga fan, and about .000001 seconds after the game ended he kept asking me and J to the if we wanted to watch the OC. However we were so shocked by what just happened we couldn’t answer (well I couldn’t answer at least, I was in some kind of coma shock just watching Morrison cry) anyway after we didn’t answer Baker threw the remote at us and went upstairs. Bottom line: That whole last 2 minutes of the Gonzaga game was just surreal. Oh yeah and the Texas-WVU game was crazy too.

One last comment on Utah, I watched a Jazz game while in Utah on Wednesday and I must say I think they are trying to phase out black players from their team. Seriously, look at their starting lineup. AK-47, Matt Harping and Mehment Okur are white, and Carlos Boozer and Deron Williams are very light skinned “brothers” (probably to help ease the transition to all white guys). The Jazz lack outside shooting the most and I bet Redick is around when they are up in the NBA draft. Crazy Mormon city.

Spring Break NCAA Style

I’m back from spring break, aren’t you happy? Anyway as you all probably know I went to Salt Lake City and got to see the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament. Here are my observations:

• I have BC in the championship game, so I was a little worried when Pacific took them to double OT. BC waited about 45 minutes to long to start going into the full court press. When they finally started pressing in the 2^nd OT, Pacific had no answer and completely got shut down and BC went on their run. Although I personally cheered for BC center John Oates for some reason, I do not know why he starts. #51 Shaun Williams comes off the bench and is much better, he is taller, athletic, he can throw down and he is a great shot blocker. He completely owned Montana in round two of the tournament with his shot blocking alone. I was not overly impressed with Jared Dudley, but he is pretty solid. Craig Smith, however, was amazing. I know he was playing non power conference teams, but he completely owned the inside in both games I saw. Needless to say, BC looks pretty good. They will beat Villanova!
• Montana was a fun team to root for. Although I originally wanted Nevada to win because I had picked them in my bracket I very quickly found myself rooting for Montana. They are fun to watch, well coached and have some good players. Their best player is #34 Andrew Straight. He is about 6-7, only a sophomore and is always around the basket playing the power forward position. The kid I liked the most on their team was Jordan Hasquet. He is a 6-9 freshmen center from the heart of Montana. He has a developing inside game, but he can shoot and hit the three. He also played good defense on Nick Fazekias (I know I spelled that wrong) although I was shocked to find out in the box score that Fazekias had 22 and 14. He did not play well at all in that game, I have no clue how he got that line. Anyway I was very impressed with Hasquet, he had to guard Fazekias all game and did a good job on him I thought. Plus he killed Nevada by hitting three pointers and stretching the D while playing the center position. He is the next Adam Morrison (maybe less scoring and more inside/defense) but he is gonna be damn good. Watch out for Montana, the majority of their best players are back next year.
• Gonzaga is good. They are talented, deep and they play good defense this time around. Morrison is great, and he saved that team from losing at the hands of Xavier (just another example of a highly seeded team sleep walking for the first half of their first game, but when they wake up and come back to win it seems to help propel these high seeds in the next round). Morrison hit big shot after big shot down the stretch was pretty much was their whole offense while Ravio was killing them on offense (Gonzaga seemed to make their run after he fouled out, he played much better in the 2^nd game). Batista was in foul trouble too and Goznaga was getting beat down. But Morrison brought them back. In the 2^nd game Morrison played like crap, but it was impressive to see Gonzaga play much better with him having a bad game. Batista played great and completely took Marco Killingsworth(less) out of the game. Marco did not even play late in the 2^nd half when Indiana kind of made a run (when they hit every three they put up. Seriously, look it up).
• Marco Killingsworth should have stayed at Auburn and be a very very very very very very very poor man’s Charles Barkely.
• It was funny sitting behind two Xavier fans on Thursday and they were just ripping on Adam Morrison. Saying how he takes 600 shots a game in order to get his 28 points and saying how he is overrated and never passes and how he will suck in the NBA. I just wanted to turn around and say, “HELLO! This is the same guy who is single handedly 0wning your team right now.” I don’t mind people being fans of their team, but take the blinders off please.
• It is amazing how EVERYONE roots for the underdog. In the BC-Pacific game the place was 90% for Pacific. People who have no idea what the school is or where it’s at just want and underdog to win so hardcore. It was even worse when BC played Montana; the crowd was a rowdy, pro-Montana crowd. So let’s just say BC fans did not travel at all. It was a shame they had to end up in the Salt Lake area to start out (not for me, I liked watching them play) but those in essence played two road games, not neutral site games. Only when Gonzaga was playing was the underdog not rooted for. The majority of people who bought tickets to the sessions defiantly were there for Gonzaga.
• It’s amazing how everyone thinks everyone travels on every play. If the refs called as many travels as the fans sitting next to me wanted to be called, we all would have witness the most mind numbingly annoying basketball games in American history.
• The NCAA tournament is amazing. It’s an absolute blast, the best sporting event out there. There will always be close games and its amazing how a 12 will always beat a 5. Its always fun to root for the underdog and see the big time players step it up when their teams need them the most (a la Craig Smith and Adam Morrison). Without further delay I give you my all Salt Lake City tourney team: F Craig Smith (BC), F Adam Morrison (Gonzanga), C Jordan Hasquet (Montana), G Eric Calloway (Indiana), G Tyrice Rice (BC, because he completely destroyed Montana with his three point shooting in the 2^nd half). Sixth Man: Andrew Straight (Montana).

A few non salt lake city tournament points:

• I hate Northwestern State
• Billy Packer made a complete fool out of himself this past week. He hates on mid-major schools, especially the ones from the Missouri Valley conference. Then admits he has not seen a Missouri Valley conference game. Are you kidding me you are a college basketball analyst. I don’t even watch much college basketball and I still know more about the Missouri Valley then him! That’s insane. He got ripped apart by some guy on the selection committee (it was well deserved). So he goes on PTI to defend himself by restating his point that bigger conference teams should be in over Missouri valley teams. When Wilbon asks how these teams from mid major conferences are supposed to get recognition Packer says, in a completely unnecessary condescending tone, “Have you ever heard of the NCAA tournament?” If I was Wilbon I would have gone off on him. At the end of the interview Packer says he would love nothing more then to have an all Missouri Valley conference final four, and he loves it when underdogs win. So to summarize Billy Packer would love to see the mid-major tournament teams win in the NCAA tourney, he just doesn’t want them to be there in the first place (this led to about 1,000 jokes between me and the crew up in Utah the past week. Something along the lines of, “man I really love watching Montana play I just don’t think they should be in the tournament.”) Thanks Billy Packer for making a fool of yourself, I never really liked him all that much to being with. Now I will never listen to anything he has to say.
• Speaking of mid majors, they had a great tournament. Some big upsets some unlikely sweet 16 teams (Bradley, Wichita State and George Mason) and a number of close calls (the most shocking moment of the tournament so far was seeing Albany had a 10 point lead with 10 minutes to go.) Good job by mid majors this past weekend, I say let more in. People love rooting for them.

Overall it was a good weekend. Park City, Utah (where the cabin we stayed at was) was very pretty and it snowed a lot. I have seen snow like 3 times in my life so it was pretty cool. The cabin was real nice, it included a gas fireplace that was always on and some HD TVs with surround sound, you really cant beat that. I had to rent a car and drive back from Salt Lake City to Phoenix though due to complications from flying with a buddy pass (flying standby is seriously the worst idea one could ever envision. The only worse idea ever was when Eve ate that forbidden apple). The drive was long (10 hours) and it stormed the whole way (seriously the storm system stretched from SLC to Phoenix, I have never seen anything like that). Staying in the cabin along with me were the Baker Bros and their father, Jordan and his dad, boomsquad Eric and Will, Mark and Ben. So it was quite the fun time. But now I am back in the real world, and I have a lot of work to do until the semester ends. So it should be fun.

Welcome Edge

The Cardinals signed the Edgerrin James today. I still do not believe it. These are not the Cardinals I know and love! The Cardinals I know and love would have talked to Edge for the weekend and then Edge would have left town, gone straight back to Indy and gotten an extra $2 million a year from the Colts, so basically using the Cardinals as a bargaining chip. The Cardinals I know would sign a few fringe guys like Kendrick Clancy and Milfrod Brown (who they did sign) and then maybe add one somewhat name like Will Allen (who they might sign), call it a free agency and still be 10 million under the cap. The fact that they went out and got a stud, big name, future hall of famer IN HIS PRIME is insane. Not normal Cardinals here, but I love the signing. James is going to be HUGE for them (they still need to improve the line, Brown will help a little but they should use the #10 pick on an lineman). Edge, Boldin and Fitz? Its over, see ya. The 2006 squad will easily be the most talented Arizona Cardinal team to ever take the field (but they last years was probably the 2nd most talented and they only won 5 games). It looks like things are turning around for this once hapless franchise, I know expect, instead of hope, them to make the playoffs next year for the first time in my life.
This leads me to wonder why the Colts let him go. I guess they wanted to give that money to Reggie Wayne, but is Reggie Wayne really more important to that team then Edge? Do they think a James Mungro is going to step in and do what Edge does? Whatever RB goes there is going to have it easy because of the attention put on the passing game, but they will miss edge.

The World Baseball Classic is in full swing and I must say, its pretty awesome. I did not know what to think of originally but it is alot of fun to watch, it is popular (trust me, you would not believe how many people come into my store looking for WBC stuff) and it is interesting. Its critics say it interferes with Spring Training and no one cares. Not true, I would think playing in "exhibition" games of this magnitude against some of the talent these teams have would be better for a player then playing some of the scrubs they play in Spring Training. Plus it is nice to see all these stars playing together in games that actually mean something (the WBC means ALOT more then homefield advantage in the World Series, which was a good idea but I think it needs to stop being decided by the all star game). My favorite random moment of the WBC so far: Getting home from the bars at like 2am on Friday morning March 3rd and seeing Byung Hyun Kim pitch for Korea on ESPN vs some team named Chinese Tapiea. That was fun.

The first Saturday of spring break started out pretty bad when I had to get called into work, but it ended awesomely. After I got off of work I went to the bars with Baker, Bjorn and their friend Mike Benne (Did I spell that right). Anyway Mike is one crazy funny dude, so he made the night entertaining. We pulled into Maloney's parking lot at about 10 and there is a part of Maloney's parking lot that kind of dips and tonight it was just filled with water (In case you live out of state, Arizona's record drought ended on Saturday with about 20 straight hours of constant rain). We were going to drive through it untill we saw an SUV go through it and its tires disappear in the water. If an SUV barely got through it, a Ford Tourus (which we were driving) was not going to get through it. Of course this led to about 100 Oregon Trail jokes (i.e should we ford the river, should we take the ferry, should we hire an Indian guide to help us across, what if Aaron drowns or dies of a disease, what if we lose an Oxen or break an axle. Okay actually those were all the jokes we made.) After spending about 10 minutes at Maloney's we went to the Vine and enjoyed free food and drink (thanks to gift money Bjorn had via poker). We even had the waitress pick our drinks at one point. She came back with some crazy shot that included alot of Tabasco sauce. I backed out of that, thats to much shot for me. Bjorn took his shot and proceeded to puke all over the table. I must say, it was high comedy. Moral of the story is, dont let a waitress pick your shots.

Okay kids its off the spring break for me. Enjoy selection sunday!

My Oscars

Lets see, it’s a Sunday night and I have a management test to study for, I have to start writing my 25 page research paper, I have a four page research proposal due on Thursday and a two page research paper on a certain type of dance due sometime soon. Instead of working on any of this today I went to IHOP, watched the Mavs-Suns game in beautiful HD (suns look great), and watched the Academy Awards. So, yeah I will look back on this blog in about two months and be able to pinpoint the exact time in which my grades went to hell.

Anyway like I mentioned earlier I watched the Academy Awards tonight (well not all of it, just the parts that mattered). Anyway I decided to have my own Oscars. Since I, like most Americans, like movies other then the dramas. The Oscars only reward dramas usually, however there are also some very good comedic and action performances that go unnoticed. So for that I give you my Oscars:

Best Supporting Actor:

Nominees: Mickey Rourke (Sin City), Liam Neeson (Batman Begins), Paul Rudd (40 year old Virgin) and Seth Rogan (40 year old Virgin).

Winner: Mickey Rourke-

His character was so unbelievably cool in this movie and I never get sick of watching it. I thought he did a great job acting and making Merv one of the coolest characters I have ever seen on the big screen.

Best Supporting Actress:

Nominees: Catherine Turner (40 year old Virgin), Isla Fisher (The Wedding Crashers), Rosario Dawson (Sin City), Dakota Fanning (War of the Worlds).

Winner: Catherine Turner-

I have a feeling the 40 year old Virgin is going to win a lot tonight. Catherine did a great job however as the girl Steve Carell finally loses his virginity too. She is very believable and I thought she did a pretty good job.

Best Actress:

Nominees: Rachel McAdams (The Wedding Crashers), Reese Witherspoon (Walk the Line), Jessica Simpson (Dukes of Hazzard).

Winner: Reese Witherspoon

Okay so Jessica Simpson didn’t deserve to be on the list, its just I was all out of other nominees and she is hot. Anyway of course Reese was going to win this, I mean she won the real life awards. I wanted to give it to McAdams because her performance in Wedding Crashers put her on the map. But it is hands down Reese’s award. She did a damn good job in Walk the Line.

Best Actor:

Nominees: Christian Bale (Batman Begins), Nathan Fillion (Serenity), Vince Vaughn (The Wedding Crashers), Steve Carell (The 40 year old Virgin), Jamie Foxx (Jarhead).

Winner: TIE! Steve Carell and Christian Bale-

Am I allowed to split the vote between to actors? The answer is yes because these are my awards. Anyway I could not decide, Carell was so darn good in 40 year old Virgin that it’s impossible not to give him the award. I mean he actually had his chest waxed in that movie! The pain was real! Christian Bale single handedly brought the Batman franchise back from oblivion with his strong performance as both Bruce Wayne and Batman. Both men deserve this award.

Best Picture:

Nominees: Sin City, The 40 year old Virgin, The Wedding Crashers, Serenity, Star Wards Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Batman Begins.

Winner: The 40 year old Virgin-

Hands down the funniest movie of the year (I will argue this over the Wedding Crashers). Good story, good acting, very funny and very strong characters. Some of the best parts of the movie weren’t even what the main story was about, like the scenes in which they are all working. In the end the movie turns into more of a chick flick but its very entertaining throughout and I think stands up stronger then the Wedding Crashers which kind of fades at the end. It was really hard not to give this honor to Sin City, which is one of the coolest movies ever made. Serenity was the darkhorse, the movie was not about to win any real life awards but it was very well acted and very entertaining to watch.

Well I hope you guys enjoyed my first ever Oscars. I hope you tune in next year to read what I have to say. Over the coming weeks I will not have a chance to write that much because I am very busy. Spring Break is next week though and I will have a lot of blog material so that is coming up. Other then that it might get pretty slow until school ends but be on the lookout for my TV year in review coming up in May. Until then I hope you keep tuning it, because I will try to provide you all with some good stuff during my busy times.