Bulls’ young talent stepping up
Some things are like clock work. April 1 hits and the summer starts to change, baseball throws out its first pitch, Tiger gets fitted for a new green jacket, and the Chicago Bulls start planning on which beach they are hitting this summer.
Funny thing happened to that last thing though; the Chicago Bulls are actually good this season and will most likely be hosting a first round playoff season. Good news for Bulls fans who haven’t seen the playoffs since Jordan retired for the second time (1997-98), but bad news for people in the tourism industries in the Bahamas and Jamaica. The key this season is that their two young big men, Eddy Curry and Tyson Chandler, have finally matured into the contributors that everyone was expecting them to be when they were drafted with the second and third picks straight out of high school. The emergence of the two, plus the shrewd drafting of proven college winners like Kirk Hinrich, Ben Gordon, Luol Deng, and Chris Duhon by General Manager John Paxson mean that the Baby Bulls will be good for years in the future. Scott Skiles has gotten this team to buy into his defensive system and despite starting the season 0-9 the Bulls should play host to the Indiana Pacers or the Washington Wizards in a rowdy United Center in the first round of the playoffs.
The Red Zone is a little perplexed by the accounts of the Jerry Stackhouse-Kirk Snyder fight following the recent Mavs and Jazz game. The two shooting guards fought in the tunnels under the American Airlines Center for what some witnesses say was up to a minute. Now the Dallas Morning News stated that Snyder called Stackhouse out and Stackhouse was just defending himself in front of his wife. Here’s the problem, yes Snyder can be a loudmouth (hell, he cussed at me in warm-ups once, and we both knew I wasn’t getting anywhere near the court once play started), but he’s not stupid enough to go after Stackhouse when Stack had three teammates there to back him up. Also, the Mavericks as an organization felt the need to suspend Stackhouse before the NBA did, while the Jazz defended Snyder with Coach Jerry Sloan saying Snyder shouldn’t have gotten suspended at all. Sounds to me like the Mavericks are hiding something. Maybe the Mavs just don’t want to admit that their All-Star caliber sixth man let a rookie get in his head, and that he needed help from his teammates to pick a fight with him.
ESPN really has to stop putting on original programming. After the painful season of “TILT” which made the whole poker industry look like one big cheating scheme they have created a new game show called “Teammates.” The premise is basically the same as the “Newlywed Game” with sets of teammates finding out how much they know each other. The problem is the type of questions they ask are not the type of things that teammates ever talk about like “What object would your teammate hate losing the most” and “what is your teammate’s least favorite arena to play in.” Boring, plus I watched one show and only two questions were answered right the entire day (three teams playing times 12 questions equals 36 possible correct answers) for a horrible six percent correct ratio. This show would be way more entertaining if they were questions the players would get right like, “How many groupies did Dante Stallworth have surrounding him at the craps table in Vegas” and Deuce McCallister would be so giddy waiting to answer 21 because that was such an easy question. Or “How much money did Shawn Marrion make by making that three-quarter-court shot at practice in Miami this year” and Quentin Richardson wouldn’t even let the host finish before answering $10,000 and then he would do the thing where he pounds his head with both hands. Now that’s a hit show.
The Dallas Cowboys hold two first-round picks in the draft and with the second one the ‘Boys should take at look at the most dynamic athlete available. All this player did at the Senior Bowl was play wide receiver and beat Auburn’s All-American cornerback Carlos Rodgers for touchdowns repeatedly deep in practice. At the combine all he did was run the 40 at an astronomical 4.37, bench press 225 19 times, oh yeah he measured out to be 6-6, also. In college, he started four years at quarterback and became the most statistically productive player in SEC history with former LSU coach Nick Saban saying, “He single handedly won more games then anyone in the SEC.”
SEC fans know him as Matt Jones, while NFL scouts call him a force of nature, and the former Arkansas quarterback is faster, taller, and stronger then Michigan’s Braylon Edwards and Edwards is a projected top three pick in the draft. Jones makes everything look effortless, appears at times as he almost doesn’t care (seriously me and my buddy have a running joke that Jones didn’t even know the score of the game he was playing in), and was good enough to start on the Razorback basketball team as a junior. He is a one of a kind athlete who turned on the jets to run away from current first-round projected linebackers Derrick Johnson and Channing Crowder as if they were standing still. The Cowboys have a chance to get the defensive player they need (probably Johnson) at the #11 selection and then get the best player in the draft at 20. Bill Parcells is been known to make some odd draft picks but selecting this converted quarterback to catch passes might be the most conventional thing to do, because without a doubt he will be the best athlete available.
This just in, the Rangers bullpen just gave up another run.
