John Wall is getting a little more of a kick out of this than Jameer Nelson. The Wizards did pull off the big upset last night, beating the Magic 93-85. I'm sure it helped that Dwight Howard is having some back spasms, but you have to play with who you've got. As Purdue fans have been painfully aware of the past few years. That Washington win gives the Pacers a bit of breathing room on the third seed. Tonight, the Celtics take on the Hawks. I'd rather both these teams lose, but I guess I'm pulling for Boston tonight. As long as the Pacers keep taking advantage of their soft schedule, though, it won't too much matter. On the baseball side of things, well, the Cubs just flat suck this year. They gave up five runs in the first inning, which pretty well sealed their fate. It's ace vs. ace this afternoon, as Ryan Dempster takes the mound against Yovani Gallardo. Actually, Gallardo might be the ex-ace, since the Brewers still have Zach Greinke, but it's close enough I feel comfortable writing it. Hockey playoffs start tonight, but the Blackhawks don't drop the puck until tomorrow. Here's to making sure the Coyotes still can't find their way to the second round. The Pacers did what good teams are supposed to do and took care of the not-so-good Raptors last night. The final margin was only five, but the lead for most of the game was double digits, and most of the game was played with the Pacers' bench. When things got dicey in the fourth quarter, the starters came back in and pushed the lead back out to double digits for a while. I've been writing for some time that the Pacers have a pretty soft schedule to end the year, and they've done what they were supposed to with it so far. There are nine games left in the season, and they break down like this: 2 (home-and-home) against Cleveland, 2 (home-and-home) against Milwaukee, host Minnesota, to Philadelphia, then finish out hosting Detroit and Chicago. Only Philly and Chicago have winning records in that stretch. Milwaukee is only one game under, Philly is only two games over. Philly has also been in a bit of a freefall as of late. The Pacers really ought to win all those games except maybe Chicago. And, you know, they do get the Bulls at home. I'm not going to be a bit surprised if the Pacers can pull that one out. They won't get beat up like they did last time in Chicago.* *And, it should be noted, it was really just an embarrassing third quarter in that game. The bad news is the Pacers need those games, because the grip on third place is a little more tenuous than I realized. I forgot the only reason Boston is sitting in fourth is because they're leading a weak division. At the moment, the Pacers are a game up on both Orlando and Atlanta. So, now I have a reason to pay attention to other games. I (most likely) won't actually watch them, but I will be doing some scoreboard watching. Orlando plays tonight at Washington, which probably means the lead will be back to a half game. So, now that my reporting is out of the way, let's get into some opinion. ESPN (and, to a lesser degree, Sports Illustrated) are really missing the boat on this Pacer team. They cover the ever-living shit out of the Heat, and I'm sure it draws eyeballs. But, go ask most fans, casual or not. It's mostly negative publicity. People did (and do) not like how LeBron left Cleveland to chase a ring with Dwyane Wade.* But the team is compelling, just like a good heel in wrestling is compelling. *Side note: I really with Wad's mom knew how to spell Dwayne. You know what else should be compelling, if ESPN would cover it the same way? The Heat's antithesis. And more precisely, the Heat's antithesis that still wins games. You don't have to squint too hard to see that in the Pacers. Miami has the "Big Three."* The Pacers star is. . .Danny Granger? Roy Hibbert? Paul George? David West? The answer is "yes," because they all take their turns. I linked to it the other day, but it's worth mentioning again in this context. Here's SI's take on the Pacers from a month ago or so. *Though it's pretty clearly more like the the "Big Two and a Half." Adding "Men" to the end of that designation is totally optional, depending on your taste for comedy. In case you don't have time to read all that, here is the opening quote: "The Pacers' superstar goes by many names, and there is nothing he cannot do. He rebounds and defends. He Plays close to the floor and above the rim. He posts up and passes. he spots up and slashes. He's been humbled too often to brag. He has a wingspan of something like 50 feet, his uniform number reads like a long-distance call to Poland, and he takes up more than half of the locker because he consists of more than half the team." It's not too hard to read between the lines on that one. The Pacers have no real superstar, but they have the absolute definition of a team. And, yes, look at the standings. There they are, proudly sitting in third in the conference. Having beaten the top two teams soundly on occasion. Sure, they've gotten beaten soundly by them on occasion, too, but that will happen. The fact of the matter is, though, they are not too far off from the level of a Chicago or Miami. And I do think the Pacers are a bad match up for Chicago, because Derrick Rose doesn't like how Darren Collison moves without the ball and will stick with him on defense. But it's not as fun to make up the highlights when there's no single focal point of the team. Plus, the Pacers have only just recently gotten good. ESPN will have to take notice, though. Watch for the Pacers to make some noise in the playoffs, more than the Celtics, who are still a golden child for ESPN. I'm sure their trio (maybe quartet) of starts and their location makes them more bankable to Connecticut-based ESPN, but we'll see whose talent wins out in the end. Before we get going today, it's time for another edition of international roll. Here's a big welcome to the old blog to (in no particular order): Cyprus, Bulgaria, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela. The Cubs did win yesterday, but that came after the bullpen blew the first two games. I didn't have a good feeling about how this year is going to go. But, I'm sure most Cubs fans are kind of used to that. In better news, the Blackhawks will kick off the playoffs on Thursday against the Coyotes. I think the Blackhawks can win that series, which was that advantage of being a six as opposed to a five. I totally understand the reason why the NHL guarantees a top three seed for the division winners, and I would probably make the same decision if I were in their shoes. But, after a few years of seeing that it usually gives a weak division a position they don't deserve, I probably wouldn't continue with that model. Divisions in hockey and basketball seem pretty meaningless to me, so I would just go away from them entirely at this point. Anyway, here is my big NHL Playoff Preview now that the seeding is set. Vancouver managed to capture the Presidents' Trophy again this year. Congratulations to them, but as has been talked about at length here and elsewhere, that usually doesn't translate into playoff success. Plus, this Vancouver team just doesn't feel nearly as strong to me as last year's squad. I don't know if I'm going to pick them to get to the finals or not. We'll just have to see as we roll along. Before the season started, the Kings were a trendy pick to go deep into the playoffs. Then the season started, and they turned out to be pretty terrible. Their play has picked up as of late (obviously), but as good as Jonathan Quick is, I think the Canucks will prove to be far too much for the Kings to handle. Vancouver in 5. The Blues surprised me a little bit. I knew they were a good team. They would have been a good team last year if not for being ravaged by injury. They made some good moves, especially at coach. But capturing the two seed in the conference? Did not see that coming. But, I definitely believe they're for real. The Sharks, on the other hand, well, you could pretty much carbon copy what I wrote for the Kings. Trendy pick, collapsed early, spent the rest of the season fighting back to relevance, and snuck into the playoffs. Again, I think the Blues will be way too much for the Sharks to handle. St. Louis in 5. I kind of went through this earlier. The Coyotes aren't a bad team. Honest. But do they really deserve a three? Well, they got 97 points during the season. Here is how the Central Division broke down: St. Louis (109), Nashville (104), Detroit (102), Chicago (101), and Columbus (65). If you would have avoided last just because the Blue Jackets don't belong in NHL in a strong division, I don't think you deserve third in the conference. But, all this is nice news for the Blackhawks. They won't have home ice, but I think they have superior talent to get out of the first round. Especially since Toews seems to think he'll be back for this series. He should be a pretty huge stabilizing factor if he is anything like this usual self. I'll take Chicago in 6. Now, this series could be a doozy. Granted, it is the 4-5 match up, so it should be tough. But this one just seems like it has classic all over it. You might remember the Red Wings set a record for their home winning streak this year. They are a very good team. The Predators, while they didn't set any records, are also a very good team, and did finish a point better than Detroit. I really don't know who to pick here, but I'll take the fearful Chicago Blackhawk fan and pick the Red Wings in 7. Now we're venturing into the East, which I don't know nearly as well as the West. Still, I'll do my best. The Senators were a bit of a surprise. They got the All-Star game, but I think everybody expected that to be the highlight of the Senator season. Instead, here they are. They faded a bit from their hot start, but they're in the dance, and that's the most important part. The Rangers are also a bit of a surprise. Not that they are in the playoffs or anything, but I don't think anybody thought they would challenge for the Presidents' Trophy this year. This might be a tougher series than you would expect out of a 1-8 match up, but I think the Rangers will end the Senators' surprise. Rangers in 6. I don't think there's too much to write here. The Capitals have pretty much been the poster boys for disappointment and should probably count themselves as lucky to even be in the playoffs. Boston, on the other hand, just got done engraving their names on Lord Stanley's Cup. I don't see any reason not to have all the faith in the world in the Bruins here, either. Boston in 4. Here's another big surprise team. As surprising as the Senators were and are, I think even less people saw the Panthers' rise. That said, as the three seed, their rise probably isn't quite as sharp as seeding would indicate. Take a look at what I wrote for the Coyotes. I certainly applies here. The Devils are a very good team, and I watched Mary Brodeur beat the Blackhawks basically on his own just a week or so ago. New Jersey in 6. A Battle for Pennsylvania, in the playoffs and everything. As good as I'm anticipating Preds-Red Wings being, I think this will top it. These teams share a state and a very strong mutual dislike, if not outright hatred. You might have seen these two teams (including coaches) trying to murder each other just a week or so ago. Yeah, this one is going seven games. And I know you don't typically see very much, if any, fighting in the playoffs. This might be an exception, especially given how recent this was. I'm going to take the Pens, mostly because my brother is a Penguins fan and I've never like the Flyers at all.
So there we go, the first round all picked and everything. I was going to do all the rounds, but this took a little while to write, so maybe I'll do the later rounds (based on how I picked this round) tomorrow. And since I worked in the Cubs and Blackhawks, let me also throw out that the (still) third place Pacers are in action tonight against the Raptors. A game they should be able to handle. I think they would have handled Boston if not for a big emotional win over the Thunder the day before. Ten games to go for the Pacers, so that preview will be coming soon. Mostly because I'm writing this before the Cubs kick off today. I don't want any distractions from my opening day experience. Or something like that. Probably more like I just have a couple hours to kill before the game. Anyway, the Pacers looked good in their comeback against the Knicks,* and they looked even better last night in Washington. Granted, it's not all the hard to look really good against this year's Bullets--err, Wizards. Sorry, but if you're going to go back to the old jerseys, and practically the old logo, you might as well go back to to the old name. We all know what you're trying to invoke. *We'll ignore how they looked while getting down almost twenty points. The Pacers got through the toughest part of their schedule* and are now off to a very good start going into the easiest part of their schedule.** With the exception of this Friday's game and maybe when they play the Bulls, the Pacers are going to be the favorites in every game this month. Not to say they're going to win all of them, but I would put down money that they'll win enough of them to keep their three seed in the playoffs. And I haven't looked at the standings, so I'm not totally sure who that means they would be playing, but I can sure hope it'll be Philadelphia. Philly, after getting off to a hot start against a soft schedule, has fallen on pretty hard times as of late. It would be a nice, soft draw that could boost the Pacers confidence going into a tough series. Probably with Miami, if the playoffs started today. And, as much as I despise the Heat and love the Pacers, I don't think the Pacers can win best of seven against them this year. They won't get swept, but they won't win the series. *Also called "March." **Also called "April." Also of some importance, the Pacers sealed at least a .500 season last night, and for all intents and purposes, a winning record. Now, I don't think people who have been paying attention to the Pacers are all the surprised by this. But it is still an awfully good feeling after the last several seasons of losing ball. Not losing so bad they might snag a top five pick, but still sub-.500. At least last year was close enough to even they snuck into the playoffs to give the Bulls a hard time. But, this year, no grousing. They are a legit team who more than deserve to be in the playoffs. I'll leave you with a bit of recommended reading. Here's Ian Thomsen's take on the Pacers in the March 12 edition of Sports Illustrated. It's finally here! Well, kind of. The A's and Mariners played that farce of a series in Japan. I'm sure it does wonders for Japanese MLB fans, but it does squat here in the states. Tonight, the Cardinals go down to Miami to open up the Marlins new stadium in a game that counts in the standings, but it's just a one game deal, no real series there. And the Marlins already played at least one spring training game in their new digs with the Yankees, because I watched some of that game. So, really, there's not a whole lot special here other than this game counts in the standings. And then tomorrow, actually during the day like God intended, half of the teams start their regular season. Then the last batch of teams catch up on Friday. What the hell, baseball? Why the confusing end of spring training and/or the start of the regular season? What is so wrong about declaring "this is when our season starts" and having Cincinnati kick off the start of the year? Baseball usually has the best opening to the season over all other sports, and it's not even close. It's so far ahead of other sports, that even with this trainwreck of a plan, it's still ahead. But it's definitely not good. I know tradition isn't always the healthiest thing, because it can prevent you from seeing better ways of handling situations. But, really, there is no real downside to everybody starting the same day, and why not have the nod to good old Cincinnati* and their historical significance in starting professional baseball? It just makes sense. *I honestly don't know how good or bad a city Cincinnati is. I was there once, and we just went to a Reds game and right back to Wabash, so we didn't really see much of the city. Too much sense, I guess, for the MLB marketing department. They have to cash in for those ESPN dollars and growing that Japanese fanbase. I don't begrudge them for wanting those things, but it sure seems like there are better ways to do that. For one, go ahead and send some teams to play in Japan before their (and our) real season starts. I have no problem with that. But don't make them regular season games. You might lean a little hard on the managers to have them play their "real" players a little longer than they would usually, but I don't think it would take much pressure to get teams and players to do that anyway. And why not just have ESPN carry a game on the night of opening day? Is that just not special enough for ESPN? Wait, probably not, now that I think about it. There's the whole mess of the NFL opening up on a Thursday or something wholly unnatural like that. I guess what it comes down to is ESPN is both the best and the worst thing to happen to sports over the last few decades. Please, ESPN, quit fucking with our good, wholesome traditions. Some of us happen to be quite attached to them. Program Note: The picture today doesn't have a ton to do with the story, but it thought it was a really interesting map anyway. It puts the team logos up there in relation to their attendance numbers, along with a handy list of the actual numbers. Clicking it should open up a new window where you can really blow Rating for the game Mass Effect 3: Awesome. Rating for the ending of Mass Effect 3: Could not possible suck more balls if it were Liberace. Seriously. It was terrible. I was seriously upset for a good three or four hours after I beat it. I felt so robbed. I poured a lot of time and attachment into that game. And I got bullshit in return. This Hitler video does a pretty good job of describing what I'm talking about. Because, yeah, I'm far from the only one who feels this way. My only difference is that I would have liked to have a chance to get everybody out alive, even Shepard. Mass Effect 2 kinda set up the expectation that would be possible. Hard, maybe, but certainly possible. But, it still comes down to the same thing. No matter what you chose, you essentially get the same damn ending that gives no real information what happened or any sense of closure what so fucking ever. Before I started playing the third game, I got excited about going through and playing through the trilogy again and see what some different choices would do. That most likely won't happen now. The ending ruined it that badly for me, and apparently many others.
BioWare, usually I would say stick to your guns if that's your artistic vision, but your artistic vision was like a log of a shit in the punchbowl. It |
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