Basketball from a fans perspective   

Published Monday through Friday

Russell Westbrook can’t shoot!

Why be shocked by the headline, it’s true. Westbrook’s career numbers reflect him being an average shooter at best, .473 from the field and .343 from the 3-point line for his career. We could simply define Westbrook as a volume shooter, what is a volume shooter you might ask? “A volume shooter is a player who takes a lot of shots to score a lot of points”, that sounds about right for Westbrook. It’s the other things that make him such a talent, his ability to distribute the basketball in addition he’s a monster on the boards.

For a guy 6 foot 3 he often outrebounds much taller and heavier players, his past problem revolves blending his game with teammates. It’s been said (probably unfairly), Westbrook was the culprit in James Hardin and Kevin Durant leaving the Thunder. Now with the LAkers this might be the last opportunity for the 32-year-old Westbrook to win a championship. The road to an NBA Championship lies in front of him with an older but veteran team in LeBron, AD, Carmelo and crew. At this point in his career the basketball is most certainly in the hands of Russell Westbrook, let’s see what he can do.

Remember him?

Adem Bona the 6-foot 10-inch 225-pound prospect from Prolific Prep in Napa California was headed to Kentucky or that was the early sign. Instead of that occurring the Nigerian-Turkish player instead has decided in favor of UCLA over Kentucky as his school of choice. ESPN and 247 Sports awards Bona 5 stars while Rivals ranks him a 4-star prospect. Whatever the case it would appear Mick Cronin and crew have another high-profile athlete headed to the Westwood campus of UCLA.

Texas

If you are associated with the sports program at the University of Texas, you might avoid this. If you are fan or just live in Texas forget this it will only upset you, so you have been warned. By now you realize Texas along with Oklahoma will soon leave the Big XII for the SEC, Mizzou has been an SEC member since 2012. Mizzou left the Big XII due to Texas and they will soon become rivals again on the football field and basketball court. At the time, the Southwest Conference dissolved Texas along with others became members of the newly formed Big XII Conference. Within a time, headquarters for the new Big XII was moved from Kansas City to you guessed it, Dallas. Then what occurred, it was discovered through the Longhorn Network formed after entering the Big XII the University of Texas was earning more revenue than other conference members.

Mizzou along with others complained, what was the result? The University of Colorado left for the Pac-12, Nebraska left for the Big 10. Mizzou along with Texas A&M left for the SEC. Have we seen this movie before, Texas moving and shaking by leaving the Big XII after receiving much of what it desired? The most interesting part of this picture Kansas coach Bill Self focused his ire on Mizzou, the coach a winner on the court but a loser with Mizzou fans. Is it the border between the two states that caused the issue between Self and Mizzou? His Jayhawks played Colorado and Nebraska although they too had left the conference. Self finally relented on a charity match and then it occurred. He agreed to a home and home series which was to have begun last season. Covid prevented the game to be played in Kansas City however Mizzou will play Kansas in Lawrence on December 11^th, a rematch will be played next season in Columbia. You might ask is the feud over between Kansas and Mizzou, I don’t think so?

Did we overlook them

Recently we profiled arenas throughout the NBA, and we omitted Seattle. Why did we skip over the Emerald City? No NBA team presently exists in Seattle although there is a strong probability when expansion occurs in the next 4-5 years Seattle will one of possibly two teams added to the NBA. Is the Climate Pledge Center a new building, not hardly but more on that later? The lone tenant of the arena for now is the expansion NHL Kraken.

The most interesting part of the story this refurbished arena was considered unfit for NBA play at one time. The lack of an adequate facility is the main reason the Thunder exist, and the Sonics don’t Climate Pledge is essentially a new building although one of the names familiar to most is the Seattle Center and later it became Key Arena. It opened in April 1962, this renovation turning the arena into Climate Pledge is the 3^rd renovation since the 1962 date. How am I so sure the NBA will return to Seattle, I’m not however that appears to be the prevailing thought in much of the present NBA ownership.