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Tuesday’s 6-pack
NBA trends submitted for your perusal……
— Thunder won 12 of last 15 games, covered last eight road games.
— Detroit lost last six road games; they’re 7-4 ATS in last 11.
— Celtics covered five of their last seven games as a road favorite.
— Charlotte is 2-5-1 ATS in its last eight road games.
— Lakers won/covered four of their last five home games.
— Golden State lost last five home games, covered one of last five at home.
NFL Combine Note of the Day:
“Joe Burrow’s hand size was measured at 9 inches; the length from pinkie to thumb was tied for the smallest among first-round quarterbacks measured at the combine since 2008.”
ESPN.com
Tuesday’s quiz
Which NFL team has gone the longest since drafting a QB in the first round?
(Hint: They’ve gone 18 years longer than any other team)
Monday’s quiz
Roy Williams was the basketball coach at Kansas before Bill Self.
Sunday’s quiz
Of the 30 major league baseball teams, 15 train in Arizona, 15 in Florida.
************************************************** ***************************
Tuesday’s List of 13: Nobody asked me, but…….
13) Major League Baseball needs to promote its product better; they’ve become arrogant/entitled and don’t promote their great sport to younger people.
They also need to get rid of TV blackouts, so more people can see the game and learn to enjoy it.
12) Another thing baseball needs is a Hard Knocks-type program in spring training, where HBO would focus its cameras on one team every year during exhibition games, the way an NFL team does it every year. For the first year, I’d pick the Astros as that team, as part of their punishment for the whole sign-stealing thing.
11) Wisconsin Herd (G-League) head coach Chase Buford was suspended for two games after his epic rant about the officials Saturday night. After posting his quote in this space yesterday, I became curious who Buford was, where he came from.
I mean, his team is 28-9, as the best record in the league; why was he so mad?
10) Buford is 30, went to high school in the San Antonio area:
— He scored 9.2 ppg in his junior year of HS, as a 6-3 guard
— He didn’t play as a senior; he had mononucleosis.
— Despite that shaky resume, he landed at Kansas as an invited walk-on, where he almost never played for three full seasons.
Huh?
9) Turns out that Buford is the son of RC Buford, GM of the San Antonio Spurs, who was a Kansas assistant in the Larry Brown era. His mother played college golf at Kansas.
8) Young Buford has worked his way up the ranks in his pro coaching career:
— 2012-14— Regional scout, video intern for the Atlanta Hawks
— 2015-17— Coordinator of player development, Chicago Bulls
— 2017-18— Assistant coach, Erie BayHawks, G-League
— 2018-19— Assistant coach, Delaware Blue Coats, G-League
His dad got his foot in the door, but he is earning his stripes the right way.
7) Florida State 82, Louisville 67— Seminoles are 24-4, 14-3 in the ACC; they’ve got a legit chance at making the Final Four. Louisville lost three of its last five games after 21-5 start; they don’t play again until Sunday, which helps at this time of year.
6) Scott Cochran is joining Kirby Smart’s staff as Georgia Bulldogs’ new special teams coach; he had been the strength coach at Alabama since Nick Saban took over in Tuscaloosa in 2007.
Cochran was making $595,000 at Alabama; I’m assuming he makes more now, plus this will be his first job as an on-field coach. Alabama-Georgia meet on September 19.
5) ESPN televises cornhole tournaments, which isn’t compelling TV. I’d much rather watch guys play poker or bowl than play cornhole.
4) You watch NBA games and guys travel and lot of times it doesn’t get called, partly because they have a different, more liberal interpretation of what traveling is.
What is traveling everywhere else in the world isn’t always a travel in the NBA; I think it hurts their product, but no one asked what I think.
3) 76ers star Ben Simmons is out with lower back tightness, and is expected to miss an extended period of time.
2) Kansas 83, Oklahoma State 58— OSU is 4-11 in Big X, in 9th place in a tough 10-team league. Cowboys were 10-3 out of conference, beating Houston, Syracuse, Texas A&M, but they’re not good enough to beat the big guys in one of the country’s best leagues.
1) Orioles have 69 guys on their roster right now, Red Sox have 66. Part of the HBO series they should have would be showing the logistics of getting all these guys at-bats, innings on the mound, as teams pare their rosters down to 26 before Opening Day.
Sending guys down to the minors wouldn’t be as emotional as cutting guys the way NFL teams do, but it would still be good television.
NBA trends submitted for your perusal……
— Thunder won 12 of last 15 games, covered last eight road games.
— Detroit lost last six road games; they’re 7-4 ATS in last 11.
— Celtics covered five of their last seven games as a road favorite.
— Charlotte is 2-5-1 ATS in its last eight road games.
— Lakers won/covered four of their last five home games.
— Golden State lost last five home games, covered one of last five at home.
NFL Combine Note of the Day:
“Joe Burrow’s hand size was measured at 9 inches; the length from pinkie to thumb was tied for the smallest among first-round quarterbacks measured at the combine since 2008.”
ESPN.com
Tuesday’s quiz
Which NFL team has gone the longest since drafting a QB in the first round?
(Hint: They’ve gone 18 years longer than any other team)
Monday’s quiz
Roy Williams was the basketball coach at Kansas before Bill Self.
Sunday’s quiz
Of the 30 major league baseball teams, 15 train in Arizona, 15 in Florida.
************************************************** ***************************
Tuesday’s List of 13: Nobody asked me, but…….
13) Major League Baseball needs to promote its product better; they’ve become arrogant/entitled and don’t promote their great sport to younger people.
They also need to get rid of TV blackouts, so more people can see the game and learn to enjoy it.
12) Another thing baseball needs is a Hard Knocks-type program in spring training, where HBO would focus its cameras on one team every year during exhibition games, the way an NFL team does it every year. For the first year, I’d pick the Astros as that team, as part of their punishment for the whole sign-stealing thing.
11) Wisconsin Herd (G-League) head coach Chase Buford was suspended for two games after his epic rant about the officials Saturday night. After posting his quote in this space yesterday, I became curious who Buford was, where he came from.
I mean, his team is 28-9, as the best record in the league; why was he so mad?
10) Buford is 30, went to high school in the San Antonio area:
— He scored 9.2 ppg in his junior year of HS, as a 6-3 guard
— He didn’t play as a senior; he had mononucleosis.
— Despite that shaky resume, he landed at Kansas as an invited walk-on, where he almost never played for three full seasons.
Huh?
9) Turns out that Buford is the son of RC Buford, GM of the San Antonio Spurs, who was a Kansas assistant in the Larry Brown era. His mother played college golf at Kansas.
8) Young Buford has worked his way up the ranks in his pro coaching career:
— 2012-14— Regional scout, video intern for the Atlanta Hawks
— 2015-17— Coordinator of player development, Chicago Bulls
— 2017-18— Assistant coach, Erie BayHawks, G-League
— 2018-19— Assistant coach, Delaware Blue Coats, G-League
His dad got his foot in the door, but he is earning his stripes the right way.
7) Florida State 82, Louisville 67— Seminoles are 24-4, 14-3 in the ACC; they’ve got a legit chance at making the Final Four. Louisville lost three of its last five games after 21-5 start; they don’t play again until Sunday, which helps at this time of year.
6) Scott Cochran is joining Kirby Smart’s staff as Georgia Bulldogs’ new special teams coach; he had been the strength coach at Alabama since Nick Saban took over in Tuscaloosa in 2007.
Cochran was making $595,000 at Alabama; I’m assuming he makes more now, plus this will be his first job as an on-field coach. Alabama-Georgia meet on September 19.
5) ESPN televises cornhole tournaments, which isn’t compelling TV. I’d much rather watch guys play poker or bowl than play cornhole.
4) You watch NBA games and guys travel and lot of times it doesn’t get called, partly because they have a different, more liberal interpretation of what traveling is.
What is traveling everywhere else in the world isn’t always a travel in the NBA; I think it hurts their product, but no one asked what I think.
3) 76ers star Ben Simmons is out with lower back tightness, and is expected to miss an extended period of time.
2) Kansas 83, Oklahoma State 58— OSU is 4-11 in Big X, in 9th place in a tough 10-team league. Cowboys were 10-3 out of conference, beating Houston, Syracuse, Texas A&M, but they’re not good enough to beat the big guys in one of the country’s best leagues.
1) Orioles have 69 guys on their roster right now, Red Sox have 66. Part of the HBO series they should have would be showing the logistics of getting all these guys at-bats, innings on the mound, as teams pare their rosters down to 26 before Opening Day.
Sending guys down to the minors wouldn’t be as emotional as cutting guys the way NFL teams do, but it would still be good television.
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