Shane, Mother F'ing Battier...


This guy is killing it right now.

This guy is a Duke Robot Machine.  He has his degree in Religious Studies.  He should be running for Congress.  What is he doing instead?  Winning an NBA Championship.

He waits in the tall grass like he would against any ACC team back in the day, waiting to school you in basketball fundamentals.  He out hustles you, and then has time to do your taxes.

According to ESPN's Player Profile of Battier, he is getting too consistent.  Damnit, he's taking away the glory of Harden's Sixth Man award, and saying, "This one's for coach," as he scrambles into a festering group of pressmen, trying with all his might and Krzyzewski training to save a ball.  He rebounds, he runs plays with uber efficiency, and did I mention would probably open the car door for me without hesitation.  I'm beginning to wonder if he's married...But I digress.


I've seen this Battier.  He has taken his basketball IQ to the extremes of which I can imagine him "Z-ing" the ball after a rebound, similar to my high school varsity days, but as me, a 6'8", 225 lbs man.  Pretty hot - me in a men's x-tra large t-shirt that gave me the equivalent of wings in order for me to soar by fickle presses and end with a reverse lay up.  I don't know how "lay up" is actually spelled, doesn't make me any less of a baller does it?  I bet Jalen Rose doesn't know how to spell it.


From 4.8 points in the regular season, to now 7.0 in the PS, it doesn't seem like much, but with Bosh on board now, Miami is going to win this thing, and it's not just because of Superman and Batman.  Instead it's one, often in tears Bosh, a Miami politician in training Battier, an understanding and former Finals MVP Wade, and finally greatness, whether people are still sour about Cleveland, it doesn't matter because he's a Ferrari and everyone else is a Ford Focus LeBron.


Back to Battier.  Mark my words, Erik Spoelstra is thanking H&R Block and NASA for donating Shane Battier to his program.  He's an android; bionic and brilliant.  Give him a pocket knife, a granola bar, and a parachute, and I'm certain Bear Grylls would shake in his cargo shorts.


I heart you Battier.  Be my tour guide if I ever make it to Miami.  Love fest, the end.


Hayley

Ask Me No Favors

I can still hear the faint sound of sneakers on the hardwood of this last March Madness, or the kissing noises of Vitale's pucker to Krzyzewski's ass - but I digress...

Now that the season is over, the "Bachelor" style process of the NBA draft is hovering over the college game that will present us with who is staying or going; who will earn their degree or who will throw academia to the wind and trade a diploma for dollars.

I'm not adverse to a cutting-edge stereo system, McMansions, or plastic covered love seats, but an education seems so 20 years ago, and a $300,000 paycheck most likely does beam a little bit brighter than textbooks and 8 am classes.

On the other hand, I must admit that I engage in my inner Picasso and go through a "Blue Period" after March Madness, as I await how many great players will leave the NCAA for the NBA.

Selfish? Perhaps, but I invested in these players for a year or at least a few years in some cases. Sure, the Walls and the Favors were assumed for the major leagues, but can't I mourn their loss with the rest of college basketball fans? No longer will I be able to see Ohio State fans lose their lunch over an Evan Turner half court swish. Sigh...

When these young players leave I sense a mixture of desperation and excitement. The promise of a base paycheck of over a quarter of a million dollars would ameliorate bills and any other family financial problems nagging in their wake, not to mention a Range Rover or two. However, what is there to getting an education? There are no dollar signs when you write a dissertation - no check for finishing your senior thesis. The allure of cheers and cheddar are quite more appealing if college was simply an irritating stepping stone on your way to the ultimate goal: TV and dollar bills y'all.

Of course I am cynic, and a girl, and will never play professional basketball. I may not even know what it is like to own a Hummer. I do however know what it's like to study for three midterm exams in one week, read a painful autobiography about a lesbian poet, receive no praise for a brilliant press release because I addressed it to the wrong party. What do I know though? If I broke my leg however, I'm quite certain that my diploma won't be less valuable - no decrease in pay if I strain a ligament (although if it were fingers it might be friggin' typing possible!).

So without the diploma, a hypothetical fractured tibia and two seasons of meager results (Odom), what does one fall back on for financial security or spiritual fulfillment? Initially what comes to mind is owning a car dealership, a cell phone business, gambling, or even the prospects of a hip hop career.

I suppose it is just so dicey. Who is right? Probably not me, but my lenses are fogged and biased as I finish up the spring quarter of my college career. I want millions too. With no Gatorade contract in my future however, I suppose I will have to settle with a piece of paper that gets me in the door where others, even former NBA players, might not be able to enter.

Butler, Baby Wipes, and Bilas...

How did I manage to schedule a 6 pm appointment on the day of the Men's NCAA College Basketball Championship?! For friggin' sake, I've got three different brackets taped to my living room wall, I started a blog as I have sold my soul to ESPN and CBS coverage of the tournament, and have a tattoo of Bryant Gumbal on my right butt cheek (okay the last one I promise was a joke).

Maybe two months ago when I set the date and time of the meeting I was subconsciously vacating myself emotionally from a potential and painful loss.

Well Butler's loss that is...

When my appt was over and I left the office around 8pm, I hesitantly turned the car stereo knob to the scratchy, barely audible, station broadcasting the game. I was fully expecting a blowout - to hear eardrum shattering cheers from Blue Devil fans. Surely Scheyer had delivered at least a Walmart sized Easter basket of threes by now.

To my satisfaction, I was completely wrong (insert "I am a glutton for punishment"). Butler was in fact down only by a deuce heading into the second half.

My drive home was speedy, albeit anxiety ridden. Probably the way Jay Bilas feels when he suspects his barber is leaving a bit too much on the sides of his normally militaristic buzzed do'.

You didn't have to get a ruler out to measure my hair, or at least the follicles standing erect on the back of my neck as my Swedish auto raced the streets of the Pacific Northwest searching for my living room's television signal. The radio blared sound bytes of close game and I couldn't help but fathom that this coach from Indiana, this guy with the boyish good looks and team full of Bullpups might just be able to pull of this Cinderella story.

Tenacious D (defense that is), kept the Bulldogs within a few points up until the last minute when they came within one -- a single basket separating them from modern day Hoosier status.

Hayward, the basketball man child, the player who I thought all season resembled a kid in my kindergarten class that sported a Kool-aid mustache everyday, had a chance to win it, but in a flash of glory, his shot just barely missed.

Zoubek's free-throw sealed the victory for Dukies everywhere -- the game was over and the Cinderella story was history. The carriage that pulled Butler to the championship game turned back into a pumpkin.

On the other hand, as a fan, I couldn't have wished for a more intense final five minutes. This was no blowout. The school with barely 4,000 students produced a team worthy of rivaling any Big East, SEC, ACC, or Whatever CC, the tournament had to throw at them.

Coach Steven's team put up a valiant effort. He's friggin' 33 years-old. In fact I believe -- about as old as one of Bill Raftery's ingrown toenails!

The Bulldogs will be back-- not the Diaper Dandy's of this season. I envision them sporting "Pull-ups" and refusing the Baby Wipes next year. Sorry Dick.

Putting the "M" in Madness!

Somewhere, Dick Vitale's wife is searching the home's storage room for the emergency resuscitation machine, as Duke and Butler are just hours away from tonight's championship game.

He'll need it, but so will Joe Lunardi and all those who predicted that Butler would be ousted from the tournament in the early rounds. On the other hand, I didn't choose them to make it to the Final Four or even the Elite 8, so consider me lumped in with the rest of the nay sayers.

The reality is that most connoisseurs of March Madness typically expect to see a Michigan State, a UConn, or a Duke in the final day of play, not a team from the Horizon League, who received about as much airtime as Philippine Idol did on ESPN this season.

So I ask myself the question: During the regular season, what brings a team to the forefront of media commentary, not including academic suspensions or sex scandals?

Tradition is the first reason that comes to mind, particularly on the East Coast, where more than a handful of schools have long standing traditions of winning in their respective conferences or in the tournament. North Carolina, Indiana, Wake Forest, just to name a few. On the other hand, UCLA, a team with one of the most celebrated winning histories in college basketball, has dropped off the radar in recent years. One could attribute this to the scattered personality the Bruin's have exhibited in the past five years or so, but then I think of a team like Georgia Tech, who not until this year has produced much excitement, is a regular on the nightly broadcast lineup.

High Scoring, energetic players also bring a team to a nationally talked about level. With Kentucky for example, the "Tradition" box has already been checked, but in combination with a long standing win history, they also bring forth players like Wall and Cousins, who by any one's standards are noteworthy of media attention.

This year's tournament big dog is certainly Duke, and through much research (no beakers or DNA extractions involved) are the favorite to beat Butler later on this evening. Not only do they bring a coach whose last name is more difficult to spell than the leading Russian figure skating duo, they have earned themselves consistent NCAA tournament appearances in the last 15 years.

Duke's players aren't too shabby either. Singler, Scheyer, and Smith account for the majority of the Blue Devil's scoring, and they can rotate big men like Zoubek and the Plumlees in and out like musical chairs.

Their demeanor is also what makes opponents and many a Duke hater so frustrated. They're always so calm and collected with the exception of maybe a Zoubek flying elbow or two.

Unlike Duke, Butler can't begin to compete with the Blue Devil's tradition, nor do they have a trio that has been of any mention this year up until the tournament. The squad with two guys that I can never separate (Matt Howard and Gordon Hayward), rely on defense and a well thought-out half court game, which might thwart even Kzryzewski's best strategy for a victory.

However, while the Bulldogs may have elicited more headlines than Duke in the past few weeks, just as a result of pulling on their Cinderella slipper, ultimately, the big question is whether or not the Bulldogs will return next season, and the season after that and so on to establish themselves as a legitimate and consistent threat in the whole of the NCAA.

I sure hope the carriage doesn't return to pumpkin form, and we see Coach Steven's team for years to come.

Yes Scheyer

Mike Krzyzewski has done it again. Once more Duke's evil genius has found the correct mathematical equation and grouping of talent to make it to another Final Four. From the way the announcers have been spinning it, you would have thought that Duke hasn't enjoyed tournament success since Kennedy, but the truth of the matter is that Krzyzewski has taken his team to the big dance a handful of times -- I'm entertaining a number like 16.

Baylor on the other hand, hasn't been to the Final Four since 1953. We're talking decades, back when people were just getting warmed up to the idea of the color television, a far cry from today's halftime Hooter's commercials.

Today's Elite 8 game was quite a battle however. Baylor did everything right up until the end, when Duke, led by a pesky John Scheyer, went on a mini run that gave the Blue Devils just enough momentum to dash any Bears hopes of making it to the Final Four.

Duke had no answer for Baylor's big men. More specifically, Ekpe Udoh and Quincy Acy, who combined for 30 points. Krzyzewski and an animated assistant coach Steve Wojciechowski, were shuffling big men in and out like Tiger Wood's uses up call girls. It was Duke's outside game, chiefly the work of Nolan Smith, who led all scorers with 29 points, that sealed the "W". Zoubek and the Plumlee boys experienced the wrath of the Baylor inside game, and were forced to kick the ball out to their guards.

Unfortunately for Bears fans, their team just wasn't able to pull it out.

Baylor loses a talented senior guard Tweety Carter this year, but the Bears will certainly be back. They gave every top seeded team they encountered a run for their money, and even brought a normally cool and collected Krzyzewski to his feet in angry rage during the first half. Kudos Baylor!

The Writing was on the Wall...

If you listened to the CBS announcers calling this afternoon's Elite 8 bout between Kentucky and West Virginia, you might be wondering when Jay Bilas plans to pop the question to Wildcat freshmen John Wall; alright, at least you would be confused as to who had actually won the game.

The sound of wedding bells might be a bit ridiculous, but it was a love fest from start to finish, as you could hear the agony in both Bilas and Dick Enberg's voices, as they watched Kentucky goon multiple three-point attempts, and brick free-throw after free-throw.

Every time West Virginia made a good play or took advantage of a Kentucky mistake, you received the impression from the announcers commentary that it was only through charity that the Mountaineers were beating the sports medias' darlings of the 2010 season. West Virginia's team may as well have been made up of nameless, faceless characters with the exception of maybe De'Sean Butler, as compared to the adoration given to the Wildcat's Demarcus Cousins and John Wall, who wanked and flailed their arms over every call that didn't go their way.

However, the love affair didn't begin in March, it gained steam over the course of the season when John Calipari made headlines when he left Memphis to take on the head coaching position at Kentucky. Promising young talent in both Cousins and Wall also lit up the blogosphere, positioning Kentucky as a worthy SEC opponent, something they've lacked in the past few seasons.

On the other hand, it didn't seem to dissuade the media too much when controversy erupted over John Wall's controversial comments criticized John Calipari's coaching earlier last year. You would think that the media would be disapproving of comments dished from a cocky freshmen to a seasoned coach, but still Vitale and the rest of the sports' aristocracy were intent on blowing this kid up, despite his bad attitude. Lucky for Wall and his squad, they were actually able to live up to most of the hype this season, as I watched them steam roll over most of the teams they faced, including the match ups during the tournament.

Today however, it was obvious that Bobby Huggin's team wasn't paying attention Bilas and Enberg''s gushing -- they were too busy smashing the Wildcats. The most satisfying feeling was at the end of the game when no amount of wanking or three pointers could save Kentucky from going home, and you saw Wall and Cousins, fouled out, watching their chances of final four action going up in flames from the bench in West Virginia's 73-66 victory.

I'm interested to see if Wall or Cousins will return next year, or take their chances on the NBA draft. If they decide the latter, Kentucky will look like a completely different team; a team that I doubt we will see making it to next year's Elite 8. Maybe by then at least the media will have found a new darling -- one from the East Coast most likely. In the meantime Bilas, get a room!

Mr. Belvedere...

Not that famous butler. This one hails from Indianapolis, is also a bit leaner and sans the British accent. This Butler also likes to wear hats, especially when they say "Final Four" on the brim. These caps will be worn all the way back to their home turf, where they expect to play the winner of tomorrow's game between Tennessee and Michigan State.

Kansas State seemed to come into today's game vs. Butler overly cocky and in my opinion, over-hyped. UConn transfer forward Curtis Kelly and Junior guard Jacob Pullen are big time players within their respective conference, but ever since last year's standout from Kansas State, Michael Beasley made headlines and entered the NBA after a stellar season with the Wildcats, analysts and various media responded with way too much cred, not to mention air time.

Of course, how can you argue with the swagger a team garners after they get to the Sweet Sixteen? They're good, we get it, but so is Butler, obviously more so than the Wildcats, but yet I can't recall seeing them broadcast even once on television. In fact, I never heard a national commentator make reference to Butler's talented squad. The likes of forward and scoring machine Gordon Hayward, or the crafty athleticism of forward Matt Howard shan't never be uttered on the same program as players such as John Wall or Sherron Collins -- I mean dude, they go to Butler.

Ultimately, Pullen's facial hair was the most impressive element that Kansas State brought to their Elite 8 performance. And if that's the case, get thee a razor, and some defense!