Black & Blue Tuesday

It’s bad enough taking a shot to the gut, but to have it followed up with a jab to the face, ouch. That’s how my Tuesday went, when I learned that John Wall was headed to Lexington and Gerald Henderson signed with an agent, thus ending his career as a Blue Devil.

First, let me take the high road just this once. Congratulations to Kentucky. You got a solid talent in Wall. There is no doubt, with or without Meeks, Kentucky is now an instant top-10 team. I know some of you Blue Grass faithful will want to stick them No 1 right now, but let’s let these kids earn something before we award them the title.

It’s ‘Wall’ or Nothing

It’s official now, Duke gets John Wall, or they can kiss any title run goodbye next season. Yes, he’s that important.

Today, point guard Eric Bledsoe, picked the Kentucky Wildcats, leaving John Wall the last solid point guard still uncommitted. A while back, we talked about whether the Duke coaching staff was making a mistake going after one-and-done Wall over Bledsoe (assuming he could qualify). Sure Wall is a lot better and can step right in and make an impact, but Bledsoe ain’t half bad either.

The 6-1 point guard from Alabama is a pass-first guard, who knows how to get into the lane (something Duke clearly needs now). He nearly averaged a triple-double in high school;  20.3 points,  11.5 assists and 9.4 rebounds per game. Whether he could have led Duke to a championship this season is surely questionable, but it would be hard to argue against the fact that he would have been the best point man from day one.

This leaves John Wall. Obviously, there are concerns about his recent run-in with the law, but trust me, it’s not a big deal. It appears he and some friends entered a vacant house, looking for a place to hang out with some ladies.

While I think Bledsoe to Kentucky helps the Blue Devils in the John Wall recruiting saga, my personal opinion has always been that wherever Calipari landed, that’s where Wall would end up…and that hasn’t changed.

Sadly, I can see Calipari convincing Bledsoe that a year on the bench, behind Wall, would be good, allowing him to take over the point guard duties in 2010 after Wall leaves for the NBA. I can see Coach Cal convincing Wall of this scenario as well. I hope I’m wrong. I really do, but after seeing Duke get burned by top-notch talent the last few years, I’m not confident the coaching staff can close the deal.

Having said that, I still believe that it would be a smart thing for John Wall to come to Duke. First, he’ll start from day one for a veteran team and he’ll get to compete for the title now. Second, he’ll be on television nearly every game. Third, there is no better uniform to wear to improve his slightly battered image.

Let’s hope and let’s pray, because if Henderson decides the NBA is the right way (That’s where I’d put my money), Duke will have no TRUE point guards next season, and only three guards total (Scheyer, Smith and Williams).

Irresponsible Journalism at its Finest

Today, I stumbled across an article on the Huffington Post, where some guy named Chris Kyle (nope, never heard of him either), accused Grant Hill of being a doper (nope, I’m not kidding). You see, after battling a bad ankle over the years, Grant Hill played in all 82 games this season, the first time since his days in Detroit.

From the Huffington Post:

How?

How does a 36-year-old man play in all 82 regular season games and do it in style, finishing his final game with 27 points, 10 board, 5 assists, four steals and a block?

If I were hoping, I’d say that Grant Hill is an Outlier, straight from the pages of Malcolm Gladwell, but if I were betting, well, you get the idea…

I don’t like to think about Grant Hill taking HGH, or whatever else, because he’s always been one of my favorite Blue Devils. I say that because some people might think it’s unfair for me to the raise the performance-enhancing drugs issue with a guy like Hill. I don’t know. But I do know that my friends and I sit around and talk about stuff like this.

This might be the most irresponsible article I have ever read on the Huffington Post? Seriously. I read that site more than any other on the web and I still can’t believe I came across this filth.

Without a trace of proof, without a single whisper from a single source, this person can simply write an article on one of the most popular news sites, linking Grant Hill to HGH, just because he can’t believe Grant Hill can do it?

Chris’s so-called proof is that Grant Hill played in all 82 games this season after suffering through injuries throughout the latter half of his career? Is it really that amazing? Let’s look back.

In Grant Hill’s first six years in Detroit, he was one of the NBA’s best. He scored 9,383 points, grabbed 3,417 rebounds and dished out 2,720 assists. Only Larry Bird and Oscar Robertson produced better numbers in their first six years.

Then came the trade to Orlando and the health issues. Granted, it wasn’t a rash of injuries, it was just one bad ankle, followed by many failed attempts to fix it. Because of this ankle, Grant Hill played in only 48 games in a four-year stretch from 2000-2004.

After taking a full year to recover in 2004, he came back and played 67 games. The following year though, he only played in 21 games thanks to a hernia injury caused by the fact that he was still favoring one ankle. After that season, Hill went and saw a new specialist in Vancouver. The treatment appeared to help, although it wasn’t an instant recovery (you know, the kind a player usually gets when he’s using HGH). Hill came out and played in a respectable 65 games, along with a trip to the playoffs that season.

Following 2006-2007 season, Grant went to Phoenix. His ankle held up again and he played in over 70 games. He did miss two weeks because he suffered an emergency appendectomy. And finally this season, he played a full 82, although his stats were his lowest in years.

So after seeing all this, Chris Kyle things, but hopes it’s not true, that Grant Hill used HGH. Stunning.

What do I see? A player who had a bum ankle,  who slowly, year after year, worked his way back to complete health. But wait, Chris says 36-year-old players are suppose to break down at that age. Obviously, Chris doesn’t take into account that when Grant missed all those games, his body avoided the NBA beat-down in 280 games during that stretch. So maybe, just maybe, it’s reasonable to assume that if Grant Hill’s ankle got stronger and stronger over a three-year period, then he could somehow manage 82 games in one season. Is it really that much of a stretch? The guy comes off the bench, averaging under 30 minutes per game. Can HGH be the only way?

Again though, this isn’t a post about Grant Hill and HGB. Like I already said, there’s not a single ounce of evidence linking Grant to the drug or to anyone associated with HGB. And unlike Chris, when I know a person has been a class act his whole life and has never done anything in his career or life to tarnish the game he loves, guess what…he gets the automatic benefit of the doubt in my book.

This article is about Chris Kyle though, who despite getting a top-notch education at Duke University, just doesn’t get it. What was that award winning reasoning he had again:

I don’t like to think about Grant Hill taking HGH, or whatever else, because he’s always been one of my favorite Blue Devils. I say that because some people might think it’s unfair for me to the raise the performance-enhancing drugs issue with a guy like Hill. I don’t know. But I do know that my friends and I sit around and talk about stuff like this.

No Chris, no one thinks it’s unfair to write a B.S. article about Grant Hill because you like the guy. My issue is the fact that you get to use the Huffington Post to post a ‘gut feeling’ simply because you and your friends “sit around and talk about stuff like this.” Discussing Grant Hill and drug use without a shred of evidence with your friends IS the proper forum. Trashing a great NBA player and a good guy with no proof whatsoever in a national news site is slander.

It’s no different if I wrote that Chris Kyle’s mother was a whore, who sleeps with men for money. That would be wrong. Sure I can sit around with my buddies and debate the merits of the whoring mother of Chris Kyle, but to post it on this site would be wrong, no matter how much my gut says it so. I shouldn’t do it because I don’t have any proof that she works the streets for money.

Just imagine the possibilities if I used his logic.
- Tyler Hansbrough uses HGH. My friends talk about it all the time. Look at his body, he’s built. I have no proof, but I’m just saying.
- Crying causes Cancer. Again, I have no proof, but a friend and I were talking about it yesterday.
- When the Tar Heels win, a baby dies. Sure I’ve never seen it happen. But come on, at one point in this world a puppy had to die when Carolina won. It just makes sense, right?

That’s really all I can say about it. A classless article by a clueless writer. Huffington Post, if you’re looking for a real writer, let me know, my neighbor’s kid is pretty good at making shit up out of thin air.

BART STARR, BRETT FAVRE, GREG PAULUS?

Pro Football Talk is reporting that former Duke point guard, Greg Paulus has worked out for the Green Bay Packers.

Really?

I know Greg was a football star in high school and could have played at Notre Dame, but was he really so good that he could basically take four years off and suddenly land on an NFL roster? It’s not like Paulus has a Tim Tebow build. He’s 6′1, about a buck-eighty. He’s Pat White without speed. I figured Paulus would be roaming a sideline somewhere as an assistant basketball coach.

As best as I can tell, the Packers already have Aaron Rogers, LSU’s Matt Flynn, Louisville’s Brian Brohm. I just can’t see Paulus betting out any of these guys for a third-string job.

Gerald Henderson Going Pro?

Word on the street says that Duke forward, Gerald Henderson, is leaving college for the NBA…and he will be signing with an agent?

Gerald Henderson is also expected to announce he’s leaving college shortly, and is expected to hire an agent with strong ties to Duke.

WTF? I get the declaring yourself eligible for the NBA, but why sign with an agent? Any reasonable junior would declare so they can go workout with NBA scouts in Chicago. There he can be evaluate by the brightest minds in the NBA (much like Ellington, Green and Lawson did last year). Afterwards is when you make that final decision whether to return or not. If you decide not to, then you hire an agent.

This rumor doesn’t make a lot of sense. There’s is no harm in not hiring an agent now. However, as soon as he hires one, his college career is over, whether he bombs during the workouts or not.

We’ve said it before, we think Henderson is going to be a solid pro (assuming he remains healthy), but he needs more work. He still struggles to drive to his left, especially against real athletes and he doesn’t have NBA (three-point) range yet, which he’ll need since he’s only 6′4 and will be asked to play shooting guard.

Carolina, Classless as Always

Congratulations to the 2008-2009 North Carolina Tar Heels. They were a great team and they had a hell of a tournament run. I hate the Tar Heels, but you can’t deny them their props.

However, former Tar Holes remain classless like always.

Even in their team’s finest moment, they still can only think of us. How sweet.

For the record, Vince Carter, Antawn Jamison, Julius Peppers (in football) and Makhtar Ndiaye (holding the sign) produced a total of ZERO championships for North Carolina. Yep, that’s ZERO titles.

As for Ndiaye, it must have been nice to see some real players step up in the big moment. He wouldn’t know it from experience of course. In his one Final Four appearance, he started for a Carolina team that was upset by Utah. His game stats…ZERO points (0-3 shooting), two rebounds and five fouls.

If he still doesn’t ring a bell, as a commentator below reminded me, he was the disgraced Tar Heel who lied after the Utah defeat, claiming a white UTAH player called him racist names, and then admitted afterwards he made it all up.

He’s also the guy who, after his career at UNC ended, was arrested for attacking/beating/choking a ‘friend’ who gave him a ride to Raleigh.

Eventually, this class act had a brief NBA career, but ended up blaming the end of it on stewardess. Yep, you read that correctly.

Tyler Hansbrough and Josh McRoberts, the Story of Two Tall White Guys

Today is suppose to be a good day. The weather is getting warmer, the baseball season is up and running, even the wife is getting nicer. Today though, is not a good day. Today is when North Carolina will win their second championship this decade.

Don’t get me wrong, Michigan State is a fine team and they are good enough to pull off the upset, but let’s not kid each other. This Carolina team is a team on a mission. They are ripping through the competition, including three easy wins over top-10 teams like Gonzaga, Oklahoma and Villanova.

I haven’t seen a team breeze through the tournament this easily since the ‘98-99 Duke Blue Devils.

Of course, I know what you are going to say…that Duke team lost in the finals to Connecticut. You are correct, but there’s a difference between that team and this team. That Duke team had only two upperclassmen (senior Langdon & junior Carrawell) who played in the team’s eight-man rotation.

For the Tar Heels, six of their top seven players (based on minutes in the tournament) are either juniors or seniors. More importantly, all of them have been through this before in last year’s final four.

The point of all this is not to predict a winner in tonight’s championship game. We’ve tried this whole “predicting” thing and it hasn’t worked out well for us.

Instead, when I watch this Carolina club tonight, I can only think back to the incoming recruiting class in the summer of 2005, particularly Tyler Hansbrough and Josh McRoberts.

Blue Devils Up Against a (John) Wall

If you’ve been paying attention (and we always assume you have), you are fully aware that point guard John Wall (right), the top rated high school player in the nation (our nation, in case you were unsure) visited our beloved Duke Blue Devil’s coaching staff this past Sunday. This of course was not Wall’s first stop on campus, but it was the first time the top rated point guard and Coach Krzyzewski sat face-to-face to discuss his possible role on the 2009-10 Blue Devils.

Of course, if you’re a Duke fan, you didn’t even have to be in the room to know what was said. Duke is a good team, with plenty of talent along the wings, but lacks both a legit big man in the middle and an athletic point guard who can run the show and penetrate through the lane (keeping the opponent’s PG out on the defensive end). Mr. Wall would naturally be a perfect fit. He could be the next Jason Williams, who led Duke to the 2001 championship.

While Coach K officially offered up a scholarship to John Wall during his visit, he will remain undecided for at least three more weeks (if not longer). While Wall has a list of five-seven teams, prior to John Calipari’s exit from Memphis, the Tigers were always the front-runners. However, with his move to Kentucky, the situation is even muddier.

It’s Recruiting, Stupid

It’s been four days and I can finally allow myself back onto my own site. After a blowout defeat by Villanova, I needed to take a break, sit back, relax and let results of that game and this season sink in. Now I’m fresh and ready to look back at what we saw and what we can expect in the future.

On the morning of black Friday, the biggest question being asked was a simple one; was Duke a fraud? The answer is NO. To be a fraud, you had to not achieve what everyone thought you would achieve? Almost all experts predicted Duke to lose to Villanova. If you had Duke going to the Final Four in your bracket, then you’re an idiot. The Wildcats really were that much better. Just ask Pittsburgh.

Duke won 30 games this season, playing the toughest schedule in all of basketball and won the ACC tournament. Not bad. However, everyone knew that when it came time to face elite teams, the Devils could be stopped. Everyone keeps talking about how this is the fifth year in a row where Duke has lost to a lower seed, but let’s get serious people…a two seed losing to a three seed is not an upset. Duke was a good team, not a great team.

ACC Bitch Slapped in the NCAA

After two days of basketball, it’s almost hard to believe that prior to the start of the 2009 NCAA Tournament, we were actually discussing which conference was the best; the ACC conference or the Big East?

That debate is no longer happening. Now I’m not even sure the ACC is as good as the PAC-10 or the Big 10. The breakdown in the first round was:
- Big 12: 6-0
- Big East: 5-1
- PAC 10: 5-1
- Big 10: 4-3
- ACC 3-4
- SEC: 1-2

Well, at least we’re still better than the SEC. The worst part was the 0-2 mark against the Big Ten (Florida State lost to Wisconsin, Clemson lost to Michigan).

What went wrong?

No 4 Wake Forest - There was no excuse for the Demon Deacons to lose to Cleveland State. They have three players who would be drafted in the first round of the NBA draft. In fact, I’m sorry Wake fans, but I hope you enjoyed your first round ride, because the big three will be gone. Do you really think these three are going to pass up million dollar paychecks in two months just to come back and lose to Cleveland State. We should have known this was coming. Despite being number one at mid-season at 16-0, but the Demons finished 8-6.
History should have told us what to expect: Since 1997, Wake Forest has made it to the second weekend in the tournament only once (2004).

No 5 Florida State - The Seminoles were young, but they had Tony Douglas, one of the best players in the NCAA. Who was going to stop him? Um, Wisconsin did. Wow. The Seminoles were so talented, they were even going to give Pittsburgh trouble in the Sweet 16. Luckily for the Seminoles, even though they’re losing Tony Douglas, they have a young group of solid players and have another great recruiting class coming in.
History should have told us what to expect: How could we expect a team who hasn’t sniffed the NCAA Tournament since the 1997-1998 season, the suddenly make a run this season?

No 7 Boston College - We could simply argue that the young Eagles ran into a hot Southern California. The Trojans finished 5th in a weak PAC-10, entered the tournament with a five-game winning streak and a PAC-10 tournament title. Unlike the Seminoles’ Tony Douglas, who had a great game in defeat, Tyrese Rice finished his career with a nine-point game on 4-11 shooting.
History should have told us what to expect: The Eagles have survived the first weekend only once since 1994.

No 7 Clemson - Seriously, was anyone surprised by this. It’s becoming a yearly tradition…Clemson rolls out of the gate in the first half of the season, falls apart in the back end, drops out the ACC tournament quickly and loses in the NCAA tournament even quicker. Too much talent for this team to fall like this.
History should have told us what to expect: The Tigers haven’t won a NCAA Tournament game since 1997.