Basketball from a fans perspective
The ring, the ring
Just in case you didn’t hear the news, the Cavs have reached out to former Coach David Blatt. They contacted him regarding a championship ring. I believe it was deserved despite being dismissed in the middle of last season. I love that my homie Tyronn Lue was made head coach but I’m a realist. Whether “it” was working for Blatt and the Cavs we can debate that. I dare you to locate a head coach that was fired when he’d lead his team to a 30-11 record and first place in their division.
Finally he’s arrived
7 foot Joel Embiid scored 6 points snatched 4 rebounds and blocked 2 shots in 13 minutes of game action. The significance of the event the 7-2 center finally arrived on an NBA court. It almost makes up for the bad news of Simmons. By the way the 76ers won the pre-season game over the Celtics. He said he was rusty but provided evidence why the 76ers drafted him.
They haven’t forgotten
The NBA pre-season game on Saturday I spotted a number of Vancouver Grizzlies jerseys worn by attendees. The game between the Warriors and Raptors was played at Rogers Arena in Vancouver. The game was announced as a sell-out which is not surprising. The question what occurred with the franchise now located in Memphis. The Vancouver Grizzlies first began play in 1995 as an expansion team. Why the Raptors have tasted success and the Grizzlies failed are too difficult to dissect in a couple of paragraphs.
If we just looked at the attendance figures they were relatively good by comparison to the on-court performance.
In the teams first year they averaged 17,183 in the 18,000 seat arena. The lowest attendance figure occurred in their last year in Canada 13,737 in attendance. Unfortunately the win totals were pathetic as they never proved very competitive on the court. The highest win total was their last year in Vancouver winning 23 games. If we look over the draft choices a number were above average it happens they had better seasons elsewhere. These are but a few of the players drafted by the team while in Canada.
Shareer Abdur-Rahim
Steve Francis-traded to the Rockets before playing for the Grizzlies
Shane Battier
Matt Barnes
Mike Bibby
Bryant Reeves-injuries curtailed a promising career
"Give ‘em some love!"
A friend of mine said; “Why don’t you give UMKC some love in your blog.” I believe he doesn’t realize I’ve been quietly rooting for the University of Missouri-Kansas City for a number of years. I‘d mentioned earlier I wanted Louisville, DePaul or St. John‘s a successful basketball program in a large metropolitan city. The problem in Kansas City unless you win the shadow of Kansas basketball looms over college basketball here.
Although Sprint Center is in Kansas City (MO) Kansas basketball will draw a larger crowd than Mizzou. Part of the problem Lawrence is less than 50 miles where as Columbia (MO) is 120 miles away. UMKC has gone through a succession of coaches and athletic directors over the years and that’s been a big problem. Three years ago Kareem Richardson was hired as head coach and this will be the year the team turns the corner on success. I’m not saying you will see highlights on SportsCenter however play should improve.
