Notes from the Heat's win

Who is the more self-absorbed jerk here...

A couple of notes from the Miami Heat's closeout win over the 7th seeded Philadelphia 76ers last nights. Philly was a .500 team in the comparitively weaker Eastern Conference of the NBA. Miami beat them 4 to 1 in the series and by six points last night. A couple of notes for basketball insider from the game: LeBron James no field goals and only three points in the fourth quarter. Delonte West not only stole his Mom, but his mojo, too. The Heat, as a team, no field goals in the final six minutes and forty-three seconds as mediocre Philly whittled a ten point lead down to one, save for a Wade breakaway dunk in final moments after the outcome had been decided.

Very solid, Miami. Very solid. Well done. Seven titles here you come...

OKC's Westbrook must set the tone

The Zombie Sonics, as Clarion fave Bill Simmons calls them, were a popular second choice to win the Western Conference behind the two time defending champs, the Los Angeles Lakers. The Zombies had been holding true to form blowing the Denver Nuggets out of the water. The Nuggets are a collection of bit players and B-list stars and OKC should be pounding them. Last night, the Zombies slipped and they won't be getting to the Finals, let alone winning them, if point guard Russell Westbrook distributes like this: check out the brutal boxscore here.

30 shots attempted, five assists handed out. It is not possible to win titles with your point guard doing that. OKC fans hope it was an aberration not a sign Westbrook has been channeling his inner Calvin Murphy.

SEC tops itself

The SEC can always be counted on to top itself, that is to say, when you think that you have seen just how slimy it get can get, the SEC is happy to demonstrate it can go lower still. So in off-season where March saw four Auburn football players charged with first degree robbery, in an incident where students in an off-campus house were robbed at gunpoint, the University of Georgia is angling to beat that standard.

The Auburn robbers included the leading tackler on the national title team. UGA can trump that however, because this week they demonstrated that they like players who are criminals while they are still star high school recruits. Over at Auburn and Alabama, you have to wait until you get into school to become a felon, not at Georgia.

Seven Georgia players were the victims of locker-room thefts of iPods, iPhones and other small electronic devices. Whodunnit? Allegedly, three top Georgia football recruits who stole the items during an open house event at the Butts-Mehre Heritage Hall. Because the value of the property stolen did not exceed $1,500 the recruits in question were only charged with misdemeanor theft, clearly, leaving Alabama and Auburn free to argue that they recruit guys that are harder than that...

As ESPN SEC blogger Chris Low notes, this likely will hardlly even slow the recruiting of these kids in the scum filled pond that is SEC football, "Talent usually wins out, even when a kid has a troubled past." So that even after word of this incident broke, two of the three recruits involved were invited by Nick Saban and Alabama to attend their Spring football game.

Eastern conference playoffs

Derrick Rose and the Bulls will have to battle Hansbrough's Pacers for everything they get.

The NBA's Eastern Conference playoff match-ups have begin to come into focus this week. The Boston Celtics have continued to stumble down the stretch in the wake of the Kendrick Perkins trade. Last night it became official, the Miami Heat locked up the number two seed, ahead of the Celtics, in the Eastern Conference. The Chicago Bulls had already sealed up number one last week.

Strangely enough, the Celtics and Heats reversal of positions may help both teams. The Heat are lucky to avoid a match-up with the Knicks and their two high scoring star forwards. The Heat were the only Eastern Conference contender dumb enough that they might get lured into playing the Knicks and Coach Mike D'Antoni's run and gun style. No such thing will happen for the Knickerbockers against the Celtics, whose defensive will should crush the softies Melo and Amare. Rondo will make Billups look every bit of his fifty years old.

Ironically, the Heat will get a better match-up too. The Sixers cannot keep up with the Heat's offense. The Celtics low scoring ways might have allowed Philly to steal a couple of games with hustle and offensive rebounding. The Heat will simply blow Philly out of the gym on offensive talent.

Surprisingly, the toughest opponent for a Eastern Conference favorite might be the top seeded Chicago Bulls matching up with the eighth seeded Indiana Pacers. As noted in this space, the Pacers have benefited tremendously from a mid-season coaching change. They are playing smashmouth basketball and pounding it into the post with their huge front line. Roy Hibbert is a legitimate NBA center with post moves. Tyler Hansbrough is a never stop grinding, banging, hassling and hustling power forward. Danny Granger, back at his natural small forward position, is silky smooth and a match-up nightmare for most of the league because of his height. It will take Derrick Rose his full arsenal, plus a little bit of offensive help from either Boozer or Gibson, if the young Bulls are to get through the Pacers.

Rangers and Knicks both make the playoffs

The New York Rangers and the New York Knicks are both in the playoffs at the same time for the first season since 1996-97. Eons have passed. Whole careers in both sports have started and ended. How long ago was that? Boris Yeltsin was running Russia and Bill Clinton was running America, coincidentally with much the same methodology.

In the 1995-96 offseason, the Rangers had made the karmic sin of letting the Captain and the bringer of Lord Stanley's Cup to 8th Avenue, Mark Messier, walk, over money. It was stupid and petty. The Rangers and their fans paid the penance of seven straight seasons of missing the playoffs, plus a year lost to a lockout. It was a dark time in Madison Square Garden.

Shortly after the Messier free agency debacle, the Knicks dealt Patrick Ewing. Dave Checketts and Scott Layden came in from Utah on a mission to destroy the Knicks. They brought with them Shandon Anderson and Howard Eisley. They signed Allan Houston to deal that the franchise has still not recovered from, for it started the cataclysmic chain of events that led to the Isiah Thomas hiring, which spiraled to and through Starbury and Larry Brown. The Knicks have made the playoff once in the last nine years, getting swept out of the first round by the heartless Vince Carter and the ignominious Toronto Raptors in 2003-04.

By 2003-04 the Rangers had brought back Messier, but he was forty-three and not going to carry the team the way he once did. They missed the playoffs for a seventh straight year. They dealt away signature stalwart and future Hall of Famer, Brian Leech. The next season brought the NHL lockout and the league has never been the same. The Rangers have tasted to the playoffs a few times since, but the Garden faithful have been waiting on the Knicks.

This year has been one of revival for the Knickerbockers, though it was nearly snuffed out at mid-season though a disastrous deal brokered by owner James Dolan with a whiff of Isiah Thomas behind the scenes. Knicks fans are desperate, so desperate that any playoff appearance will make this season a success. The Rangers had to win the last game of the season, against their hated arch-rival, the New Jersey Devils, and then sweat out a Carolina Hurricanes loss to know that they had qualified for the postseason. As a reward, they get the top seeded Capitals and their star leader, Alexander Mikhaylovich Ovechkin.

Hey, Jim Mora, at least the New York teams, the tenants at the world's most famous arena, are in the playoffs!

Baseball salary notes

A couple of interesting baseball salary notes from legendary football writer Peter King. "The infield of the New York Yankees (Mark Teixeira, Robinson Cano, Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez) makes more money than the 53 players on the Royals and Rays."

Wow!

And how about this one, "Peter Bourjos plays center field for the Angels. Vernon Wells plays left... After four games, Vernon Wells has made more money ($651,234) than Bourjos will make for the full season ($414,000)."

These statistics do answer a critique of basketball salaries made by Clarion Content fave, Bill Simmons. Simmons pointing out that the NBA's owners have made their own bed economically by over-paying fringe and mid-level players says

"In Hollywood, you don't pay "character actors" like Mike Miller or Travis Outlaw $30-35 million to appear in your next five movies. Why? Because it's bad business!!! Because it would be irresponsible! We're headed toward a lockout because NBA "character actors" should be paid like what they are -- character actors -- and because the dopey owners need to be saved from themselves. It's a broken system. Luke Walton and Ron Artest should not be making half as much combined as Kobe Bryant. Brandon Bass, J.J. Redick and Chris Duhon should not be making as much combined as Dwight Howard. If NBA owners ran Hollywood, the creepy uncle from "Winter's Bone" would be enjoying Year 1 of a six-year, $58 million movie deal."

Baseball, as one can tell from Peter King's salary statistics, has at least figured this one out.

Game Two

This coach is in the title game for a second year in a row...

There was a strange dichotomy in the two NCAA Final Four games played last night. In game one, there were two gritty, mid-major teams that few expected to be there. In game two, there were a couple of storied programs with long but sordid histories. It made for a strange rooting dynamic, in game one we felt sad that one of these gallant underdogs had to lose. In game two, we felt perturbed one of those cheaters was going to win.

Who do you root for one when on one bench is a coach who has had to vacate both of his previous two Final Four appearances and on the other side is a coach who the NCAA has cited for multiple violations, including lack of institutional control? Blech.

The narrative was undermined and we predict the television ratings reflect it.

Auburn back in the news

The ink was hardly dry on the Clarion Content's last critical post about Auburn football, four of their players were charged with armed robbery and kicked off the team, before HBO was airing a scandalous documentary about the university.

HBO's "Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel" aired an episode that included four former Auburn football players saying they were paid during their time at the school. Does this shock anyone? Is their any meaning left in the phrase institutional control when it comes to the state of Alabama, home of the last two college football national champions?