It just might work
The Star's Pete Grathoff recently wrote a story "Sprint Center doing fine without NHL or NBA franchise." He pointed out the arena has been profitable to the city and AEG thanks to AEG's concert connections. Okay the finances have been good but why not look at increasing the revenue stream with an NBA team? You say there is no owner, true but study this proposal. An email respondent suggested a shared NBA franchise, St. Louis and Kansas City. At first thought that might seem strange and perhaps unworkable but let's take a look at the advantage. Kansas City has a metro population of 2.2 million, St. Louis 2.7 so the populace is there. Each city would only need to black out 21 dates for Sprint and Savvis Center thus lucrative concert dates would remain available. The cities would share ownership responsibility, one group in Kansas City the other in St. Louis. I know this still might sound strange but I can remember back to the days of the Kansas City-Omaha Kings, we knew the Kings were only in Kansas City for X number of games, there might have been fan complaints regarding the arrangement I don't remember. Understand me there are unexplored kinks in this proposal, an undertaking of this sort just might work.

Is contraction the answer?
This might be considered a cousin to the above. The American way is to never go backwards, we never retreat in war or the boardroom. On second thought perhaps the NBA should consider retreat if the financials are as bad as the commish claims. NBA owners have been crying the blues and it would appear a smaller NBA might aid the solution. Are there teams that could be contracted without causing a ripple in the fabric of the NBA? The NBA could be reduced from 30 to 25 teams and remain successful. Who are the five teams, the Hornets of New Orleans would be at the top of the list because they have no owner. The NBA has run the Hornets franchise since December 2010. Next the Kings, yes the team Sacramento fans seemed to be determined to keep although finances appear to be a problem there too. As for the others, the Milwaukee Bucks, Memphis Grizzlies and perhaps the Pacers of Indiana would be included in a smaller version of the NBA. Should contraction occur the only real losers will be the fans plus arena employees who would lose their jobs. As for the players there would be a dispersal draft and they would simply be absorbed into the remaining teams in a manner similar to the ABA-NBA merger.

It all depends on your perspective
The world knows the true story, Larry Brown was an excellent coach at both UCLA and Kansas. Brown's desire to teach the game possibly aided in his teams winning, this culminated with an NCAA championship. The downside to Brown's coaching was the fact he was a terrible recruiter, he hated to scout and hustle kids. This might be untrue of Mizzou's Frank Haith, referees are yet to toss up the first ball so we still don't know if he can coach. To date we know he and his coaching staff certainly can recruit, a couple of weeks back there were howls by some of the faithful because there were no incoming freshman to the program. The worry in my view was unfounded, the cupboard is not exactly bare. They lose Justin Safford to graduation and Ricky Kreklow has transferred, the balance of players are returning to this 23-11 team. Not signed but committed are several prospects for the 2012-13 season and Mizzou added another on Saturday. Aaron Scales, a 6'9" 265 center from North Carolina announced he was headed to Columbia.

Baseball or basketball, which way do I go?
How would you like to be rated by Rivals as a 4-star basketball player and have a 96-mph fastball? That's the story on prep star Amir Garrett who plays for Findlay Prep in Henderson Nevada, Henderson is located 16 miles from downtown Las Vegas. When is a high school really not a school, when it's similar to Findlay. The following is from an article I read. "The basketball players are the school's only students, they take classes at Henderson International School a pre-school through grade 12. The school's founder Cliff Findlay established a foundation that pays for each player's $17,000 tuition at Henderson." (Tom King, UMass.com January 18, 2011) Garrett recently signed a letter of intent with the Red Storm of St. John's and might be headed to NYC. There is a question, he might be headed to a minor league baseball team. This past May there were 37 major league scouts in attendance to watch this 6'5" lefty with the 90+ fastball pitch for Findlay.

"When I hear somebody sigh, "Life is hard," I am always tempted to ask, "Compared to what?"
Sydney Harris