June 20, 2019
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HOUSTON ASTROS BASEBALL
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THE WIZARDRY OF OS
I have been on a crusade trying to convince the sports world that building a winning team in the NBA requires the same components as other team sports. It is not about acquiring the best players possible like an All-Star team. It is about acquiring the right mix of players for your team. The Raptors showed that this year, though they needed to catch some breaks along the way (all championship teams do).
The foundation of the team does need to be 1-2 great players. The Pelicans are going to have that very soon when they pair Zion with Holiday. I am not foolish enough to think that Zion won’t need time to grow into the role, but his ability to rebound and score in the open floor will translate quickly to the NBA.
Being efficient in the half court is always the toughest transition in any level of basketball. The same will surely hold true for Zion. The question is, though, how can the team be built in a manner to ease the transition? Also, how can this team be more well rounded? They had the foundation with Holiday and AD, but that alone wasn’t enough.
The great news is that the Pelicans have lots of room to maneuver due to the assets they have gained from the AD trade. But the trade has led to more questions than answers at this point. Have the Pels acquired the right assets? Will they maneuver to gain more draft picks? Will they turn some of these assets into a veteran player?
I agree with most NBA experts in believing that the Pels need players who can spread the court. “Floor spacers” as they are called, take away the help defender in the NBA more than any other level due to the defensive rules. These types of players are what LeBron has always had around him because he is so physical and cannot be guarded by one defender. He creates help and average players with the ability to shoot are effective because of LeBron.
Zion’s style of play can have a similar impact on half court offense, though he will surely be more aggressive than LeBron to finish in the paint. He just has more of a scorer’s mentality than LeBron. I don’t say that as a good or bad thing. It is just who they are as players.
So, how good of a fit are the players the Pels acquired from the Lakers? Lonzo Ball is not a floor spacer. But, he is a player who is excellent at pushing tempo and breaking down the defense with his size and ball handling. Elfrid Payton is the same type of player, so I can’t see keeping both players.
Brandon Ingram is not a floor spacer either. He is better with the ball in his hands breaking down the defense, and too many players like that on the court does not blend well. A lineup with Ball, Holiday, Ingram, Williamson, and anyone else is potentially a good defensive group due to their length and athleticism that would allow them to switch. But on offense, my defense is going to help off Ball, Ingram, and Williamson leaving few driving angles and forcing a lot of mid range shots or threes from below average three point shooters.
The third player the Pels acquired was Josh Hart and he is my favorite of the three. He has excellent fundamentals just like every guard from Villanova. He is a winner who is unselfish and a hard worker. He shoots the ball well enough to space the floor, but is intelligent enough to do the little things to help the half court offense be efficient. Also, he can defend. He is the type of player the Pels have been unable to acquire or keep to build depth to sustain the team over the course of the long NBA season.
If you agree with my conclusions so far, then the David Griffin clearly has work to do to make this roster the right combination of players to be successful next year and beyond. Not a shock. The good news is they can move all over the draft to get players if they desire.
If you have read anything about the draft, it is clear that the top three players (Zion, Morant, and Barrett) are a cut above the rest. It is also fairly apparent that the Pels will get Zion and the other two are not going to be available. While I think there are a number of good players in the draft, as I have stated, the Pels need floor spacers. Deandre Hunter, Darius Garland, Kyle Guy, Tyler Herro, Cam Johnson, Bol Bol, and Cam Reddish would all fit the bill and will be available anywhere from #4 to the end of the first round.
The only thing better than getting one of those players would be acquiring 2 of them as none of them are guarantees. Hunter is a little stiff as an athlete. Garland played five games before getting hurt in college which makes him a huge unknown. Kyle Guy and Tyler Herro could eventually be JJ Reddick, but they could also be Jimmer Fredette. Cam Johnson, Bol Bol, and Cam Reddish are long and can shoot, but thin and possible defensive liabilities.
I haven’t come close to touching on all the factors that go into the decisions Griffin will be making in the draft and throughout this off season. NBA contracts and the draft process are more confusing than health care. There are short term and long term considerations that need to be weighed in order to turn the Pelicans into a long term success. One thing for sure, is the AD trade has set the Pels up with a good hand of cards for years to come.
HEY REF
Things have gotten so bad just about every state is passing laws to help protect their game officials. Louisiana is but the latest to have on its books the possibility of arrest and/or jail time for those that harass, threaten or physically contact game officials. Neither this law nor the many that’ve been in place will serve as a real deterrent since the vast majority of attacks on game officials are “in the heat of the moment”. I do understand both sides of this issue where parents and fans might feel an official didn’t make the correct call or administer the proper penalty for an infraction. But fans and parents alike must abide by all rulings a game official makes no matter their personal feelings. Every sport has written in its rulebook those things that can’t be changed simply because some feel wronged. And there are the proper channels that must be followed to file an appeal or right a wronged call or enforcement. And yes the perfect example is the Superdome meltdown by a group of NFL refs that for some unknown reason simply blew the easiest call that should’ve been made.
And of course officials feel that no matter what they do their every action is constantly being questioned. There’s always been a perceived “line in the sand” that’s not to be crossed by fans, coaches and officials. Somehow that line has been thrown away with gusto. I’ve had games where our crew has just walked out onto the field and certain fans have already begun to lash out at the officials more than an hour before kickoff. I wonder about these people because it seems these people wait all week long to unload. American society as a whole seems to have forgotten the word RESPECT.
So many times I’ve seen where someone is shot because “he disrespected me”! There’s not been a loss or a feeling of being disrespected in today’s society but it seems common respect has met the same fate of the dinosaurs. So for this week I’m reaching into the archives of another “Best of Hey Ref” in the hope of shinning a light on what may be the “WHY”. If you see yourself or a friend then I’ve done my job this week.
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How many parents are scratching their heads trying to figure out why their children’s behavior has hit rock bottom? Maybe all they should do is look in the mirror. I’m referring to some parent’s behavior at their children’s ballgames.
I remember a thing called SPORTMANSHIP, that thing fewer and fewer adults are bringing with them when they go to watch their kids play football, basketball and/or baseball. I remember the pure disgust that stirred inside my gut during a little league baseball game I was calling. The game was out of hand and the coaches were emptying the benches and giving everyone a chance to play.
This one player who happened to be the smallest on the team had struck out twice and was “on deck”. His mother came out of the stands and shakes the fence so hard it sounded like a wild animal trying to get out of its cage. At the top of her lungs she screams at him “If you strike out one more time I’m going to whip your (derriers)”! Just about every jaw dropped and as I called “Batter-up” he looked so terrified I thought he was going to run back into the dugout.
The first pitch was right down the middle of the plate and the biggest “STRIKE” I’d ever seen. I yell “BALL”. The next pitch was a clone of the first and again I called “BALL”. As you can guess the next two weren’t going to be anything but ball 3 and 4. Not a single voice of opposition was uttered. I saw his eyes get big as watermelons and after he got to first his bench erupted and the opposing coach asked for a time out.
After a minute went by I started the slowest walk to the mound in my 15 years of calling baseball. The only two things the coach said to me was “even if we didn’t have a 12 run lead I’d have to agree with you that every pitch was a ball and THANKS for doing what you did”. I didn’t know what to say and then we noticed the celebration at first as the opposing coach gave me a big “Thumbs up”.
I started calling games, both football and baseball back in ’79 and am asked all the time “what changes have I noticed most”? My pat answer most of the time is “well, the biggest change has got to be those sitting in the stands watching games”. It seems to me that many of those fans don’t have lives. Each game feels like I’m headed to an execution. In that I mean those on the losing side wouldn’t have anything to live for once the game was “in the books” so to speak. These amateur games are supposed to be where an athlete would begin to learn the game from the inside.
In football what seems to be happening are many parents believe this 9th grade game tonight is all that’s left in this world. Parents you’ve got to understand when officials try to help these young athletes line up and stay set before the snap it isn’t meant to help the other team beat your team. We strive to help youngsters when we can so that we don’t spend the majority of the game walking five yards this way then five yards the other.
And YES we can call holding on every play, hands down. But how many parents want the officials to do this? The only ones that do are the parents of the team with the ball. I wonder how many parents are living their lives through their child’s life. Well, all I can think it’s more than 90% just by their behavior during the games. Of course “little Johnny” never holds he always plays by the rules. It has to be the OTHER guys that are holding.
If you’ve never heard the term “PREVENTATIVE” officiating let me educate you. A simple example is when one player’s head is in the neutral zone we as officials will tell the player between plays to back up or get back depending on what side of the ball they’re on. One coach will thank you for not calling the foul on his team but as soon as the other team has the ball he goes ballistic if you tell the other team to back up a bit.
If I had my way each and every parent would spend an entire year working football games for nothing. This way they might actually learn the rules. There are so many experts sitting in the stands that I feel you are hurting the game by staying home or sitting in the stands trying to tell everyone the rules and how the officials on the field really don’t know what they are doing.
So, please do the game a great service, get off your butts and try to call a few games. Then everybody will see just how much you really don’t know! I’m not about to let the officials off the hook by no means. I spent nearly 20 years calling football in this area before a bad injury caused me to “retire”. Well, I’ve tried to return to the field but what I’ve found is scaring me to the core.
The quality of the officials calling games has drastically declined. So many of the best that have put on the striped shirt have left the game entirely. And I feel it’s due to the lack of respect given them by parents, coaches and the media. For whatever reason the games are suffering because so many good officials have hung up their whistles and aren’t returning year after year.
So, I’ll close by asking all the great officials instead of sitting in the stands please put on the uniform and help the sport you know so much about by getting involved and start at your earliest convenience and start calling real games and not those video games on your TV!!!
Till next week… …
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