Addiction

I can't stop playing this new baseball game I was telling you about a few days ago. It's like heroin. I can take just a few moments out of my busy schedule of trying to pull my Cubs team out of a little slump to write some weekend thoughts:

--Some guy named Ted Purdy won a golf tournament while Tiger Woods missed the cut. It's like bizarro world. Next you'll tell me that Bill Murray will play in the FESJC Pro-Am. Don't be ridiculous.

--I guess the Mavericks figured out what to do against the Suns--stop Amare Stoudemire at all costs. They more or less allowed Steve Nash to operate at will and the man ended up with 48 points on 20-28 shooting; however, the passing game was cut off to a large degree. Steve Nash had just 5 assists and 9 turnovers, and you and I both know that won't get it done, regardless of how many points you score. The other problem with the Suns, a problem that is only surprising if you never actually watched the Suns play, is that their defense is a complete embarrassment. They shot over 50% from the field and scored 109 points, yet they managed to LOSE by 10 points. Something is clearly wrong. The only decent defender the Suns have is Amare Stoudemire, and even he's only truly effective coming over from the help side. Incidentally, Steve Nash's poor defense is another reason why he really shouldn't be the MVP.

--As I said this morning, of the three series left in Round 2 (all of which are tied at 2 games apiece), the Pacers have the best chance of winning. Something is not quite right with Detroit--even after they won yesterday to even the series, they still look a little bit off. They haven't hustled consistently throughout this series, and these are the Pistons we're talking about! They were the kings of hustle. Not so much anymore. I think they've tuned out Larry Brown's whiny mismanagement, and I just can't see them getting by the Pacers.

--Is LeBron really better than Dwyane Wade? Just asking.

--Chris Webber is telling his friends that he can't play with Allen Iverson in Philly any more. He even said he'd be willing to take a pay cut (from his $500 million/yr or so salary) to get out of there. There goes that trade, huh? I bet Philly fans never thought they'd be wishing for the halcyon days of Kenny Thomas so quickly. This has been a colossal and spectacular disaster on all levels, and it is becoming clear that neither AI nor C-Webb are a real treat to play with. Good luck Philly--you've got a lot of rebuilding to do.

--Of course, I should point out that Sacramento didn't exactly excel as a result of this trade either.

--I genuinely dislike Skip Bayless. Actually, pretty much everyone on ESPN's afternoon shows except Kornheiser and Wilbon (and occasionally Woody Paige) get on my nerves. No one more so than the feathery-haired Bayless, though.

--Am I the only one who is completely annoyed by people misusing apostrophes? I saw a store today with the name "Sofa's Today". "Sofa's Today"! What does that mean? The name would indcate they are trying to tell me that the sofa is today. Yet that doesn't make sense. I can't imagine buying a sofa from a place named "Sofa's Today". Still, if you leave the apostrophe out, you're left with "Sofas Today", which sounds like the most boring TV show ever.

--Eli's gone for the rest of the week, so here's the schedule: Tuesday is Carrie Anderson, Wednesday is Will Askew, Thursday and Friday are Matt Stark. Hope you'll enjoy--I've got some good stuff planned.