It's Gone

Time Out

2011-04-26T09:26:00.004-04:00

For the next couple of weeks, I plan on only occassionally making use of the Internet, largely because I can no longer differentiate between my own ideas and the web's. I need a break from blogging and Tweeting and what has become a desperate, semi-daily search for something of note about which to write. (Early morning check-ins with Google analytics have grown tedious, and tedium, it's been said, is the worst pain.)

There are, you'll be happy to know, still tons of wonderful and timely and hilarious subjects or public misadventures and humiliations still waiting to be found online, but I'm not particularly interested in finding them. At least not now.

I knew it was time to unplug when my friend John tried his hand at writing 30 posts in 30 days. Though he's off to a wonderful start, the idea of undertaking a similar exercise here, frankly, exhausts me. My eyes cross at the thought. I'm simply not up to the task, which is I why I'm going offline.

I leave you with My Morning Jacket's "Circuital," the eponymous first single off the band's forthcoming album.

An Easter Story

2011-04-22T14:21:00.007-04:00

In Easters past, my mother used to cut out bunny footprints for my sisters and I to follow to our Easter baskets, which were usually hidden in dark corners of our house, like the laundry room or mud room. Places we weren't normally allowed in or rarely visited under normal circumstances. It was a cute idea, but my mother had no sense of scale. The footprints were probably a size 12. Because I was a literal-minded child, these enormous bunny paws naturally terrified me. All I could think about was a 7-foot bunny skulking around my house, while I slept unprotected, in my jammies, down the hall.

With that in mind, take a look at Funny or Die's slideshow of disturbing Easter Bunnies and may the Resurrected Christ have mercy on your soul.

Capital Punishment

2011-04-21T08:43:00.008-04:00

I went to the Rangers game last night. Oof. Thank the Virgin Mother I'm only a casual fan, otherwise I might still be trembling under the covers this morning. I have yet to hear from my friend, a lifelong fan--and season ticket holder--who spent most of the second overtime with his head in his hands.

"What a bad loss," he kept repeating in the crowded stairwell after the Capitals came back from a 3-goal deficit to take a 3-1 series lead. "What a bad loss."

It was. Such a shame, too, because the night held so much promise, so much fun. Stirred by the team's exciting victory in game 3, the Rangers faithful was in fine form. We had a point to prove to Bruce Boudeau, the Capitals' head coach who called Madison Square Garden a dump. He also said it wasn't loud. He might as well have called Mark Messier soft. His insults would not go unpunished.

Through the opening minutes of the first period, I couldn't hear the whistle. I could hear only the steady rumble of the crowd and the hectic breathing of those around me. The upper sections shook. It was special.

After the Rangers' third goal, which came seven seconds after their second, the Garden popped. We chanted "Can You Hear Us?" We slapped hands. We hugged. We forgot these were the Rangers.

Washington came out with a charge, scoring less than three minutes into the third period. They scored again about a minute later. A three-goal lead was suddenly down to one. A few minutes later, Marcus Johannson deflected in the equalizing goal. The game had lost its fun, and the crowd had lost its voice.

For the rest of the game, now nothing more than perfunctory, the Caps circled the Rangers zone. They were like sharks, and the vulnerable Rangers their chum.

"I think we got tight," Chris Drury said after the game. "In between the second and third periods, we talked about staying with our game. We just got away from it. We weren't making plays, we got tight and we were on our heels."

Twelve minutes into the second overtime, Jason Chimera poked one past Henrik Lundqvist after Marian Gaborik, the Garden's scapegoat-in-residence, misplayed the puck. This after Lundqvist, who saved 49 shots, stoned Alex Ovechkin on an overtime breakaway. "It's tough," Lundqvist said. "So, so tough."

"We got beat," Rangers coach John Tortorella said, "by a nothing goal."

A nothing play, a bad loss, a night ruined.

NBA Playoffs

2011-04-16T11:36:00.004-04:00

I shouldn't do this, especially after my atrocious showing in March, but I can't help myself. Playoff predictions are a particular itch I can't help but scratch. And scratch I will.

Out West, I like the Spurs to beat the Grizzlies in a surprisingly tight series, and the Lakers to make quick work of the hobbling Hornets. Incidentally, I like Phil Jackson to take a quarter or two off each game, just to mess with Hornets first-year coach Monty Williams. "Why won't he call time out," Williams will wonder. "He knows he's losing, right?"

Meanwhile, in what's sure to be the most entertaining first-round series, the Thunder will edge out the Nuggets and their roster of former Knickerbockers (Raymond Felton, Wilson Chandler, Danilo Gallinari and Al Harington.) Six games sounds about right, with an overtime thriller thrown in for good measure.

The Mavericks should get by the pesky Trailblazers, who will stay in every game but won't be able to get over the hump. I say, Mavs in five. Like my friend John, I can't figure out why most experts are picking the Blazers.

Here in the East, I like the Bulls over the Pacers, and the Heat over Philly. These two series will end in four and five, respectively.

The Magic will get by the Hawks, but it won't be easy. I love Atlanta's front line, but almost nothing else about Atlanta.

Finally, I have to go with the Celtics over my Knickerbockers. I wish this were different. I wish the Knicks were deeper, and better defensively. But they're not. (Ironically, the Knicks' chances would have greatly improved, I believe, with Cory Brewer, the defensive-oriented wingman they released a few days after acquiring him from the Minnesota Timberwolves as part of the 10-player Carmelo Anthony trade. C'est la vie. )

Despite the Knicks' best efforts, the Celtics will advance, primarily because the 34-year-old Chauncey Billups won't be able to keep Rajon Rondo in front of him. And Paul Pierce just kills the Knicks. While my heart says Knicks in six, my head says Celts in five. I just don't like this match up. If they were facing the Heat in the first round, I would have picked the Knicks in five, yes, five, but the Celtics, with Pierce, Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, Rondo, Glen Davis and Jeff Green, are too deep, too experienced and--oh, how I hate this term--battle-tested for the Knicks to beat in a seven game series.

In this last instance, and this last instance alone, I truly hope I'm wrong.

The Faa

2011-04-13T17:16:00.006-04:00

Ed Ford, the longtime superintendent of recreation in Jersey City known throughout Hudson County simply as the Faa, died Tuesday. He was 65. The Star-Ledger's Steve Politi measures the Faa's legacy:

He was, officially, superintendent of recreation in Jersey City and a longtime baseball scout, but stopping there would be like calling P.T. Barnum a man who worked in a tent. The Faa was the ultimate Jersey City character, a golf-cart-driving, Buddha-shaped needler who would wear a Hudson Catholic T-shirt to a St. Peter’s Prep practice just to bust the coach’s chops.

He was a muck-raking columnist for the Jersey Journal, setting the agenda in the Hudson County sports scene for three decades — and always referring to himself in the third person. “Just another football game?” he once wrote the week of a big game. “The Faa thinks not!”

He was the kind of guy who had friends in high places and low places, from janitors to pro scouts to legends. Dean Smith, the Hall of Fame basketball coach at North Carolina, became close to the Faa when he came to Jersey City to recruit high school star Mike O’Koren. “Let me ask you a question,” Smith once asked the Faa. “Is everyone in Jersey City like you?”

But this, above anything else, is how the Faa should be remembered: He helped people. They were usually inner-city high school baseball players with problems at home, kids who had nowhere else to turn or needed a second chance from someone who’d be tough on them when they needed it.

I never met the Faa. I only occassionally brushed up against his legend. I briefly worked at the "Jersey Journal," but the Faa submitted his columns, if I remember correctly, over the phone, probably from his cluttered trailer in Caven Point, just on the marsh side of the Liberty Science Center. He was like that, a character straight out of a Joseph Mitchell story.

Around Hudson County, stories of the Faa's exploits were as common as political indictments and potholes. There was the time the Faa tossed a hectoring nun out of a gym, back when he was still refereeing basketball games for Jersey City. He also, I learned recently, once threw out Bobby Hurley's wife from a St. Anthony's game. When she told him he couldn't throw her out because her baby son--Danny--was with her, the Faa threw Danny out too.

My favorite Faa story occurred, I believe, in the summer of my sophomore and junior years of high school. A classmate lived across the street from the Faa in downtown Jersey City. Because my friend was a talented baseball player, he and the Faa forged a pretty close relationship. And by relationship, I mean the Faa would drag my friend to the batting cage or ball field at all hours. He would wrap on my friend's bedroom window and holler, "Grab your stuff." My friend came to expect his visits. One morning, the Faa came knocking early, a little after sunrise. The Faa asked my friend to open the trunk of his car. Inside was the Stanley Cup, just another morning in the Faa's Jersey City.

(Photo: Ed Ford in his trailer at Caven Point, June 2, 2007, by Mia Song, The Star-Ledger)

Baseball Photos by Leslie Jones

2011-04-11T21:25:00.003-04:00

The shadows, the arms, the spikes in the air: One of many images captured by Leslie Jones, a staff cameraman for the Boston Herald-Traveler between 1915 to 1956. Recently, the Boston Public Library digitized more than 36,000 of Jones' photographs. This one of an unidentified Chicago Cub sliding into home against the Boston Braves. For more images from the collection, which the library is still curating, click here.

Knicks Beat Sixers, Reclaim Sixth Seed

2011-04-07T08:00:00.003-04:00

With two more wins, the Knickerbockers will secure the franchise's first winning record since the 2000-2001 season, Jeff Van Gundy's final full year as coach. This really was a lost decade, wasn't it?

UConn Wins Ugly

2011-04-05T09:31:00.006-04:00

SI's Luke Winn explains how the Huskies held Butler to an ugly 18.8 field percentage, throwing out of whack the Bulldogs' precision offense:

Once UConn coaches realized — and realized quickly — that Lamb could handle Mack one-on-one, they made a key alteration to the defensive plan, calling off the “red” double-team on ball-screens. The ripple effect, according to Blaney, “is that then, they’re not able to get the ball ahead of you to the open man. That’s what you give up when you trap.”

Instead of throwing ahead to Matt Howard or Andrew Smith for good looks in the paint, the Bulldogs were forced to rotate the ball elsewhere, and unusual shooting candidates such as Chase Stigall became their primary long-range options. Stigall had scored five points in the whole tournament, but attempted 11 shots (and scored nine points) against UConn. “We thought, ‘If he’s taking those shots, we’re good to go,’” Napier said of Stigall. “Because if Mack takes those shots, we’re through.”

While Lamb was locking up Mack, Napier was serving as the pressure man on Butler’s point guards in the second half, picking them up early and throwing their halfcourt sets out of whack. Calhoun told Napier at halftime, “This teams runs on you,” and assistant Andre LaFleur said the freshman guard got them off to a “gritty start” after the break. Blaney credited Napier’s extended pressure with keeping the Bulldogs pushed off of the three-point line, where they couldn’t get clear looks or high-quality post feeds to Howard.

UConn's defense uglied up the game, but Butler's shooting damn near made it impossible to watch. The game was unsightly, busted-up and bloodied, the worst-looking championship in my lifetime. UConn goes home victorious, a pretty girl with a broken nose.

Butler Highlights

2011-04-04T15:24:00.002-04:00

It's impossible to stay mad at the Butler Bulldogs, even if they did indecorously dispatch my Elite Eight and Final Four picks. The Bulldogs play with a brutal efficiency; theirs is a game of dangerous fundamentals, a Smith & Wesson revolver.

The Madness of the Final Four

2011-03-28T07:27:00.009-04:00

"Houston, we have a problem." These joyful words, shouted by an unidentified member of the Final Four-bound Rams of Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), echoed throughout the half-empty Alamo Dome, in San Antonio, after the 11th-seeded Rams upset the No. 1-seed Kansas Jayhawks in the Southwest regional finals. (The unnamed VCU player is not geographically challenged; Houston is host to this year's Final Four.)

The problem, of course, being VCU was never supposed to make it to San Antonio, let alone Houston.

Before the tournament, ESPN analysts Dick Vitale, Jay Bilas, Digger Phelps and Hubert Davis eviscerated the NCAA Selection Committee for including VCU in the annual tournament. All four proclaimed the Rams, who finished fourth in the mid-major Colonial Athletic Association, had no business competing against the other 67 teams.

While I had no problem with VCU's participation, I failed to pick the Rams, like at all, deciding Georgetown would knock off in the second round either USC or VCU, who would play in the tournament's inaugural play-in round, the First Four.

Writing on his Five Thirty Eight Blog, Nate Silver pegged VCU as an 832:1 longshot to advance to the Final Four. And Ken Pomeroy buried VCU in his rankings, about three or four full mouse scrolls down the page.

How unlikey was VCU's run to Houston? After the Rams knocked off the overall No. 1 Kansas Jayhawks in San Antonio, the Alamao Dome's jumbotron barely squeezed in the school's 30 letters across its giant screen.

Nobody was ready for this. No one saw this coming. Statistically speaking, it should never have happened. It doesn't make any sense. Sports Illustrated's Luke Winn tries to make sense of it.

I've long been of the belief that there’s such a thing as a “Final Four Statistical Profile,” mainly because no Final Four team in the previous seven years kenpom.com has been charting stats has finished outside the top 50 in adjusted offensive efficiency, and — more importantly — outside the top 30 in adjusted defensive efficiency. And yet, let’s present the pre-tournament profile of VCU:

• The Rams ranked 84th in overall efficiency according to kenpom’s Pythagorean formula. The five teams just ahead of them, in ascending order, were Iowa (11-20 record), College of Charleston (NIT), Missouri State (NIT), Marshall (CIT) and Indiana (12-20).

• The Rams’ offense was OK, at 59th overall, but their defense was atrocious, ranking 143rd, allowing an adjusted 1.008 PPP. The five teams just ahead of them in the ADE standings were Mississippi (NIT), Oregon State (11-20), Fresno State (14-17), Northern Colorado (a No. 15 seed) and Northwestern (NIT). And yet … VCU went out and shut down Kansas in a more forceful fashion than anyone but Texas did all season.

How does this happen? You’d like to say you saw the Rams coming, but there were no statistical indicators for this Final Four run. They’re playing out of their minds. Clearly, the formula of “NIT Efficiency Profile + Hyperswag = Overnight Juggernaut” needs to be considered for future pre-tournament evaluations.

As a First Four team, the Rams had to win five games to get to Houston, while their table mates--Kentucky, UConn and Butler--only needed four. Along the way, VCU bounced teams from the five major conferences--the Pac-10 (USC), the Big East (Georgetown), the Big 10 (Purdue), the ACC (Florida State) and, most impressively, the Big 12 (Kansas).

VCU's run, then, is improbable. It is unexplainable. It is historic. It is madness.

But there was a method to VCU's madness. There was sound strategy behind the team's 40-minute helter-skelter brand of attacking basketball.

"If you watch closely, their players were tugging on their shorts for much of the game," VCU head coach Shaka Smart said after his Rams downed the Jayhawks. "When you don't have your legs, it's hard to make outside shots. That's why we play the way we play."

The Rams were ready. Shaka Smart was ready. "Those people (the doubters) don't matter," he said. "The only people that matter is the 14 guys on our team, and they never stopped believing.

Smart and his Rams teach us that the madness in college basketball is really only found in the fans and analysts and armchair bracketologists, who assume, through the neatness of our brackets, that we can determine ahead a time which teams will advance and which will be sent home, disappointed. Every March, we assume we can put a cap on the tournament, that we can somehow predict the unpredictable. And every March, we are proven wrong.

Win or lose, the 2011 NCAA Tournament belongs to VCU. From the First Four to the Final Four, the Rams dominated the competition and the headlines, forcing the narrative to fit their improbable story. In the process, they upended mathematical formulas, gut-feelings and statistical evidence, and reminded college basketball fans everywhere that madness still reigns in March.

Video: Ohio State-Kentucky Finish

2011-03-26T11:11:00.003-04:00

Brutus, the despondent big-headed Buckeye mascot, tells the story: The Kentucky Wildcats, behind Brandon Knight's jumper with 5.4 seconds to play, beat the No.1-seed Ohio State Buckeyes, another upset in a tournament full of upsets.

Ken Pomeroy, Basketball's Go-To Guy

2011-03-23T16:42:00.003-04:00

Pete Thamel examines the growing influence of Ken Pomeroy's KenPom.com around college basketball.

As the N.C.A.A. tournament enters its Round of 16, coaches are scurrying for the slightest edge. And it is becoming increasingly common for coaches to rely on Pomeroy’s statistics for scouting.

While they have not been universally embraced — programs like Connecticut and Richmond do not use them at all — advanced analytics have emerged as valuable preparation tools. Stevens uses Pomeroy’s numbers to seek trends in losses and to identify teams’ strengths and weaknesses. It is all part of trying to crack the code of the opposition.

“That’s one of the most fun things for me, personally,” [Brad] Stevens said. “Trying to see if you can solve a puzzle.”

I find a small level of satisfaction in knowing Brad Stevens, coach of Butler, used the same website to figure out the strengths and weaknesses of Old Dominion as I did to pick Old Dominion over Butler and Pittsburgh.

Craig Robinson, OSU

2011-03-21T21:21:00.003-04:00

University of Chicago Magazine, the university's excellent bimonthly alumni magazine, checks in on Craig Robinson, a 1991 alumnus and current head basketball coach of the Oregon State Beavers three years into the program's rebuilding phase:

As practice grinds on, the players begin to wonder—though they dare not ask—when it will end. Looming at midcourt, his jaw set and his arms crossed, he watches them run through their zone defense again and again during furious, 30-second scrimmages meant to simulate Arizona’s half-court offense. The players keep missing their spots, failing to block out, losing control of rebounds. They’re perpetually half a step behind. Robinson cajoles them, berates them, flings sarcastic rebukes that are sometimes funny but never mirthful. The players absorb his lashes in silence. “You need a blow?” he challenges one forward caught flat-footed while an opposing player speeds past. “You tired? Your legs hurt? Then WORK HARDER!”

Some of Robinson’s exasperation is for show—after all, he planned for a difficult day—but the longer practice wears on, the more real it gets. At one point he halts the play and says, “Maybe I’m being too quiet. Is that what it is? You need me to make a spectacle of myself? All right then, let’s go!” Then he’s everywhere, rushing at his players as they rotate the ball from one corner to the other. “Move!” he shouts. “Block out! Go!” After the play, he’s all over them: “Who’d you block out? Who’d you block out?”

At 10:30 p.m., he sends his players home, after three-and-a-half hours of practice. It’s New Year’s Eve. He tells them to be back at 10 the next morning for an extra practice—there’s already one planned for 6 p.m. “We’re lucky we have an extra day to work,” he says as they file into the locker room.

Robinson is, of course, President Obama's brother-in-law. He's won 43 games in three years in a competitive Pac-10 Conference. Robinson's Beavers are hardly world beaters, but, as he mentions in the alumni profile, he's more concerned with establishing a culture of winning than one or two good seasons. “When you’re rebuilding a program,” Robinson said, “you have to take all the right steps; otherwise you end up having to start over again.”

To wit: In a move that would make Norman Dale proud, Robinson benched five players--three starters--in the team's final regular season game against Arizona State, because they reportedly missed curfew. Running only six deep, the Beavers ran out of steam late against the Sun Devils, losing by 14. But Robinson made an important point, one that could carry over into next season. It's his team, and it's on the floor.

NCAA Tournament Picks

2011-03-16T17:06:00.003-04:00

I turned in my bracket this evening. For the first time since high school, I believe, I only filled out one. This is not from a lack of interest. Hardly. I thought long and hard about my selections. I was deliberate, perhaps maniacal. I like my picks; they're solid, a fine patchwork of caution, calculated risk, blind faith, arrogance and stones.

My picks might not pan out, but I'm now wedded to them, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer. This year, there will be no hedging of picks between different pools. I'm all in.

Here, then, for your consideration, are my picks, starting with the East. As you'll find out, I followed all my lessons save one. I trust it won't come back to haunt me.

EAST
1 Ohio State over 16 Texas-San Antonio
8 George Mason over 9 Villanova
5 West Virginia over 12 Clemson
4 Kentucky over 13 Princeton
6 Xavier over 11 Marquette
3 Syracuse over 14 Indiana State
7 Washington over 10 Georgia
2 North Carolina over 15 UC Santa Barbara

1 Ohio State over 8 George Mason
4 Kentucky over 5 West Virginia
3 Syracuse over 6 Xavier
7 Washington over 2 North Carolina

Sweet 16
1 Ohio State over 4 Kentucky
7 Washington over 3 Syracuse

Elite Eight
1 Ohio State over 7 Washington

WEST
1 Duke over 16 Hampton
8 Michigan over 9 Tennessee
5 Arizona over 12 Memphis
13 Oakland over 4 Texas
11 Missouri over 6 Cincinnati
3 Connecticut over 14 Bucknell
7 Temple over 10 Penn State
2 San Diego State over 10 Northern Colorado

1 Duke over 8 Michigan
5 Arizona over 13 Oakland
3 Connecticut over 11 Missouri
2 San Diego State over 7 Temple

SWEET 16
1 Duke over 5 Arizona
2 San Diego State over 3 Connecticut

Elite Eight
1 Duke over 2 San Diego State

SOUTHWEST
1 Kansas over 16 Boston U.
8 UNLV over 9 Illinois
12 Richmond over 5 Vanderbilt
4 Louisville over 13 Morehead State
6 Georgetown over 11 USC/VCU
3 Purdue over 14 St. Peter's
7 Texas A&M over 10 Florida State
2 Notre Dame over 15 Akron

1 Kansas over 8 UNLV
4 Louisville over 12 Richmond
3 Purdue over 6 Georgetown
2 Notre Dame over 7 Texas A&M

Sweet 16
1 Kansas over 4 Louisville
3 Purdue over 2 Notre Dame

Elite Eight
1 Kansas over 3 Purdue

SOUTHEAST
1 Pittsburgh over 16 UNC-Asheville
9 Old Dominion over 8 Butler
12 Utah State over 5 Kansas State
13 Belmont over 4 Wisconsin
11 Gonzaga over 6 St. John's
3 BYU over 14 Wofford
10 Michigan State over 7 UCLA
2 Florida over 15 UC Santa Barbara

9 Old Dominion over 1 Pittsburgh
12 Utah State over 13 Belmont
11 Gonzaga over 3 BYU
2 Florida over 10 Michigan State

Sweet 16
12 Utah State over 9 Old Dominion
2 Florida over 3 BYU

Elite Eight
2 Florida over 12 Utah State

Final Four
Ohio State over Duke
Kansas over Florida

Chamionship
Kansas over Ohio State

NCAA Tournament

2011-03-14T20:06:00.002-04:00

Last year, I codified a few lessons about the NCAA Tournament. Now seems like a good time to share them again.

Don't Mess With Texas
Seriously, the Long Horns barely show up for the Tournament. Rick Barnes, UT's coach, recently admitted as much. "We would love to win a national championship," he said before this year's NCAA Tournament, "but we're not obsessed with it because we're obsessed with these guys trying to live their NBA dream. What's happened to Kevin Durant, LaMarcus Aldridge, T.J. Ford - I'd give up a national title for all our guys to be able to live their dream."

It's worth wondering if Coach Barnes is more concerned with the stock profiles of Jordan Hamilton and Tristan Thompson than the interior games of Keith Benson and Derrick Williams.

Pick Pitt At Your Peril
Before penciling in No. 1 Pitt for the Final Four, ask yourself this: When was the last time the Panthers came through for you?

The Big East Helps the Least
Every year, the Big East sends a bunch of teams to the Tournament. And, every year, they make graceless, early exits. Avoid the middle-of-the-pack teams from the conference. They aren't as good as you think, and they certainly aren't as good as the top teams from the other major or mid-major conferences.

There are 11 Big East teams in this year's Tournament. Eleven teams out of 68. That's about 16 percent of the entire field. How many, do you think, will advance to the second round? No good can come from loading up on teams from the nation's most overrated conference. The East Coast Bias is real.

11 Over 6 Is a Winning Pick
In 2006, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee knocked off Oklahoma, and George Mason upset Michigan State. The following year, Winthrop topped Notre Dame (See Above), and VCU smacked around Duke. In 2008, Kansas State knocked off USC, while Dayton beat West Virginia (See Above) in 2009. Last year, Washington had its way with Marquette (See Above) and Old Dominion sent Notre Dame home early (See Above).

Take a closer look at this year's 11-6 contests: USC or VCU/Georgtown (!); Marquette/Xavier; Missouri/Cincinnatti (1); Gonzaga/St. John's (!). Notice a pattern?

Michigan State Equals the Elite Eight
In 13 NCAA Tournament appearances under Tom Izzo, the Spartans have reached the Elite Eight seven times. What's more, they've reached the Sweet 16 nine times. Michigan State is about as safe a bet to win three games in the Tournament as any school in the country. You might as well start your bracket with them in the Elite Eight.

I admit, this final lesson is the hardest to heed. The Spartans have been very non-Spartan-like this year. Injuries, expulsion and all-around poor play have dulled some of Izzo's annual shine. The Elite Eight is a stretch. Consider, though, State's first opponent, the up-and-down UCLA Bruins. Would you bet against the Spartans? If not, would you then lay the house on Florida against them? What about St. John's, Gonzaga, BYU (sans Davies) or Wofford, all of whom would stand in the way of Michigan State and another trip to the Elite Eight?

It's more interesting than you thought, isn't it?

March Madness: A Number's Game

2011-03-13T16:27:00.019-04:00

The brackets are out. Amateur bracketologists everywhere are scrambling to find the perfect formula to pick this year's winners. Some pencil in their favorite conferences. Others back successful coaches, or favor guard play over team defense. A few friends target Jesuit schools.

Personally, I like Ken Pomeroy's efficiency margin (EM), the difference between a team's offensive and defensive efficiency, per 100 hundred possessions. Because Pomeroy's metric is adjusted for competition, it provides an accurate snapshot of a team's true worth. It measures teams uniformly, or as close to uniform as statistically possible, and is an invaluable tool for finding possible upsets.

This is what's so great about March Madness: Any team can beat any other team on any given night. What we hope for, then, while filling out our brackets, is a favorable match up, one that will reduce the odds of the game to as close to even as possible. A heads-or-tails proposition: That's all one really has the right to hope--or ask--for.

And here's why Pomeroy's metric is so useful. To wit: The 14-seed Belmont Bruins, with an EM of 22, is an upset waiting to happen. The Bruins, winners of the Atlantic Sun Conference, are on equal statistical footing with the Florida Gators (EM 23.4), the Southeast Region's No. 2 seed. The difference between the two teams is, at most, one or two possessions. If the Gators can win the region, why can't the Bruins?

In the first round, for instance, the Bruins take on the No. 4 seed Wisconsin Badgers (EM 28.1). With an EM difference of only 4.7, the Bruins would only need two or three extra stops, or two extra buckets, to steal a first-round win, a promising proposition for a team with a stifling defense and a lethal proficiency behind the arc.

Even more interesting is the Southeast Region's 12-5 match up between the Utah State Aggies and the Kansas State Cougars. Pomeroy ranks Utah State (17) above Kansas State (29), with a 21.9-to-18.6 EM advantage.

Based on these rankings, it's entirely possible Belmont and Utah State will meet up in the second round, with a very good chance to reach the Sweet 16. Since 2003, when Pomeroy started measuring efficiency, no team has ever reached the third round of the NCAA Tournament with an EM below 15.4, which should raise red flags this week for teams like Tennessee (EM 14.1), Old Dominion (EM 15), UCLA (EM 14.4), and Memphis (EM 7.9), among others. They might win one game, but two wins seems at odds with history.

To show how reliable Pomeroy's efficiency margin is as a baseline for success in the tournament, let's take a look at the first two rounds of Davidson and George Mason, two of the most memorable Cinderella teams in recent years.

In 2006, the Patriots, an out-of-nowhere team, put up an EM of 20, more efficient than Bradley (EM 18.6), Gonzaga (EM 17.5) and Wichita State (17.4), three other Sweet 16 teams that year. In the first round, George Mason "upset" Michigan State, a team with a lower efficiency margin (EM 17.6), and, in the second round, defending champions North Carolina (EM 26.4). Informed by Pomeroy's metric, then, George Mason's first two wins no longer seem improbable. The Patriots were a better team than most people gave them credit for, while the Spartans and Tar Heels weren't as good, or as efficient, as one might remember.

Davidson is a more interesting case. In 2008, Davidson's 26.4 efficiency margin was better than the those of fellow Sweet 16ers Villanova (EM 18.5) and Western Kentucky (EM 16.4), and essentially equal to West Virginia's (EM 26.3) and Xavier's (EM 26.7), who reached the Elite Eight. En route to the Sweet 16, the 10-seed Wild Cats knocked off the 7-seed Gonzaga Bulldogs (EM 22.6), hardly an upset, and, in the second round, the Georgetown Hoyas (EM 30.8).

Like George Mason, it appears Davidson was a much better team--or more up for the challenge--than fans realized at the time.

Of course, this isn't academic. A thousand different things can influence the outcome of a game--all the more reason why I turn to Pomeroy for something, no matter how tenuous, to hold onto as the vagaries of a 40-minute basketball game threaten to bust apart my brackets.

The Perfect Body

2011-03-11T10:17:00.004-05:00

Is there such a thing? In their portraits of Olympic athletes, photographers Howard Schartz and Beverly Ornstein remind us that the human body, even at its physical peak, is a varied, beautiful thing.

Video: Rutgers/St. John's Ending

2011-03-09T17:02:00.005-05:00

College games often end on bad calls or non-calls. That's basketball. But I have never seen a game end on such an egregious non-call as the Rutgers-St. John's game this afternoon at the Garden.

Down by two points, Rutgers inbounded the ball with 4.5 seconds left. St. John's tipped the ball and Justin Brownlee gained possession. In the ensuing celebration, Brownlee carried the ball out of bounds, while traveling, with about two seconds left. Rutgers coach Mike Rice, apoplectic about a perceived foul, didn't notice Brownlee walking out of bounds. Only Robert Lumpkins, a senior forward, seemed to notice Brownlee's violation. Watch Lumpkins argue with a Big East official immediately after Brownlee threw away the ball. Then watch as the official simply walked away.

There's no way around it: The officials blew it. They missed the call and failed to review the play, an indefensible act of horrible officiating that brings to mind the 1972 Olympic gold medal basketball game. It should be Rutgers ball, down two, with 1.8 seconds left, a chance to tie the game.

Ali-Frazier: The Fight of the Century

2011-03-08T11:31:00.005-05:00

Forty years ago today, Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier squared off at Madison Square Garden in one of the most anticipated fights in boxing history. Both men earned $2.5 million, an unprecedented purse.

The media, frothing at the mouth, dubbed it the Fight of the Century. Every celebrity attended, however they could. Burt Lancaster broadcast the fight on closed-circuit television. Frank Sinatra assisted Life magazine photographer John Shearer. Hubert Humphries, the Democratic party's recent candidate for vice president, sat in the cheap seats. It was an event.

I've written about this before. Frazier beat Ali, but Ali won the 1974 rematch and the third-- and final-- fight, the "Thrilla in Manila."

The Art of the NBA Nap

2011-03-07T09:16:00.002-05:00

Jonathan Abrams pulls back the sheets on the NBA's best kept secret: Player naps.

Some N.B.A. teams have received an education in the art of napping from Dr. Charles Czeisler, the director of the Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School and chief of the sleep medicine division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

Czeisler, known in the N.B.A. as the sleep doctor, has consulted with the Boston Celtics, the Portland Trail Blazers and the Minnesota Timberwolves about the virtues of receiving enough sleep. Napping was a significant piece of the tutorial.

Czeisler said he thought that N.B.A. players needed more sleep than the average person, about nine hours a day. Typical N.B.A. games end about 10 p.m., and with showering, eating, interviews and unwinding factored in, many players do not get to sleep until much later. If they are traveling to the next city after a game, they may arrive at their hotels after 3 a.m. There may then be a morning shootaround that requires getting up by 9 a.m. or earlier. Who wouldn’t want a nap?

Among the leagues most habitual nappers: Grant Hill, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and the 37-year-old Steve Nash, who credited his afternoon siestas with keeping him young. “If you nap every game day," Nash said, "all those hours add up and it allows you to get through the season better. I want to improve at that, so by the end of the year, I feel better."

McSweeney's English Major Basketball Teams

2011-03-03T10:44:00.005-05:00

Alex Watt comes through in the clutch:

The Slaughterhouse 5

Jane Air
A Sixth Man is Hard to Find
Dunkle Tom's Jammin'
Nineteen Eighty-Score
Kobe-Dick
The Shot-chucker's Guide to the Half-Court Three
The Satanic Converses
Infinite Press
Gulliver's Travels

To these, I'd add A Confederacy of Dunkers, At Swim-Two-Points, Their Eyes Were Watching the Ball, Portnoy's Time Out, Weakside Revisited, Go Down, Moses Malone, and the Power and the Glory.

Video: Green Eggs and Ham

2011-03-02T12:31:00.004-05:00

Born on this day 107 years ago was Theodor Seuss Geisel, more commonly known as Dr. Seuss. While I try to get my legs back under me after a long weekend in California, enjoy an animated version of his celebrated "Green Eggs and Ham," presumably one of every child's earliest books.

How many children, I wonder, learned to read through Dr. Seuss?

It's Gone: Los Angeles

2011-02-28T15:28:00.008-05:00

I'm in Los Angeles for a few days, enjoying in full the sunshine and the East Coast bias. I watched the Knicks beat the Heat, and the Oscars broadcast in Santa Monica, two or three hundred yards from the Pacific Ocean. Believe me, there are worst ways to spend an evening.

It occurred to me last night, a few moments after Toy Story 3 won an Oscar, I am now romantically linked to an Academy Award winner, or at least that's what I'm telling people. Not bad for my first 96 hours in Los Angeles.

Mike Vaccaro Destroys Wilpons, Mets

2011-02-26T12:12:00.004-05:00

The Post's Mike Vaccaro, the city's best sports columnist, lays into Mets owner Fred Wilpon. The Mets, caught up in a lawsuit filed by the trustee of the victims of Bernard Madoff's billion dollard Ponzi scheme, recently asked for and received a $25-million loan from Major League Baseball, despite Wilpon's repeated claims of financial solvency.

It's time to be completely forthright, completely forthcoming, to admit once and for all that he has been less than truthful these last two years, ever since Bernie Madoff's fraud was revealed to the world. It's time to admit that the Mets are a financial calamity, that they have been irresponsible to the millions of fans who support the team -- with their hearts and with their wallets. It's time to stop acting as if they are the victim of some complicated conspiracy that involves just about everyone except the other tabloid in town, which continues to serve as their personal town crier.

Vaccaro is exactly right. The air of uncertainty surrounding the Mets is bad business and bad for baseball in New York. The sooner they can clear it up, the better.

Knicks Trade For Melo, Get Isiah

2011-02-21T23:58:00.016-05:00

(UPDATED BELOW)

If you want to spook a Knick fan, mention Isiah Thomas. His name causes fans to cross themselves, lock the doors and check under the bed for boogeymen. He casts long shadows, and his involvement, in any capacity, usually darkens all Knickerbocker-related news.

Which is why many of us today can't find the rays of lights in the the Knicks snagging Carmelo Anthony from the Denver Nuggets in a complicated three-team, 13-player deal that sent away Danilo Gallinari, Raymond Felton, Wilson Chandler and Timofey Mozgov, along with a 2014 first-round pick and two second-round picks. (The Knicks also traded Anthony Randolph, Eddy Curry and $3 million to Minnesota for Corey Brewer.)

From a basketball perspective, it's hard not to like this deal. With Amar'e and Melo, two top-10 talents, the Knicks have their best on-court tandem since Frazier and Monroe. Their presence, SI's Chris Mannix said last night, makes Madison Square Garden a premier attraction for future free agents, like Deron Williams, Chris Paul and Dwight Howard. Bill Simmons labelled the trade a no-brainer. Zach Lowe endorsed the trade. Mike Vaccaro said Melo is worth the steep price. And the Knicks held on to Landry Fields, an overlooked aspect of the trade.

I understand--and agree with--all of this. But I can't shake the shadows.

This was an Isiah trade, pure and simple: Half the current roster and three future picks is a Zeke special. Sadly, Donnie Walsh, the man brought in specifically to clean up Isiah's mess, was overruled by team owner James Dolan in favor of Isiah.

A Walsh associate last night told Adrian Wojnarowski the deal was "all Dolan. All Isiah. All [Worldwide] Wes and Leon Rose." Peter Vecsey, among others, confirms Isiah's involvement.

If there were any lingering doubt, this trade announces loud and clear that Isiah's voice, once thought silenced, remains the most influential in the Knicks' front office. Isiah, not Walsh, has James Dolan's ear. With his contract up at the end of the season, Walsh, a respected executive who deserves better, is on his way out.

This is ominous. Walsh practiced patience and responsibility; Isiah practiced recklessness and harassment. Walsh's way was working, slowly but surely. Isiah's way, as we know too well, scorched the earth.

In getting Melo, the Knicks swapped one way for the other, Walsh for Isiah, order for chaos. And that has to be weighed, too, when considering the long-term ramifications of the deal.

Many Knick fans are celebrating this morning. I appreciate their excitement, but I still fear what his arrival portends.

A WELCOME UPDATE:

I just listened to Donnie Walsh on the WFAN. I'm starting to believe reports of his demise, including my own, have been greatly exaggerated. Walsh seems to be in complete control, secure enough in his position even to poke fun at Isiah's reported level of involvement in the trade negotiations and his terrible Florida International University basketball team. "I have no idea," he said. "I'm assuming Isiah is getting ready for the NCAA tournament." And with that, I can start to find some comfort in Melo's arrival, instead of worrying about who or what lurks unseen in the shadows.

Al From Dadeville

2011-02-17T15:35:00.006-05:00

On Jan. 27, a man phoned in to "The Paul Finebaum Show," a nationally syndicated sports talk radio show out of Birmingham, Alabama. The caller, identified as Al from Dadeville, was a regular on the show. Finebaum's audience knew Al. Or at least they knew the two things Al wanted them to know. They knew he loved Alabama football. And they knew he hated Auburn.

This time Al told Finebaum he had poisoned two oak trees at Auburn's Toomer's Corner, a focal point for Auburn victory celebrations. "The weekend after the Iron Bowl," he started, a slight quiver in his voice, "I went to Auburn, Alabama, because I live thirty miles away, and I poisoned the two Toomer's trees. I put Spike 80DF in them."

Finebaum asked if the trees had died. "They have not died yet, but they will die." Al then ended the call, as he usually did, with Alabama's battle cry, "Roll Damn Tide."

Today, Auburn police arrested a 62-year-old unemployed man named named Harvey Almorn Updyke in connection to the poisoning. He is charged with one count of first-degree criminal mischief. He faces up to 10 years in prison.

It is believed Updyke is Al from Dadeville.

"We're from Alabama -- you can't make this shit up," said former Auburn basketball star Charles Barkley. "Some things just happen there, and people want to know why we rank 48th in education. It's just sad. I would have felt better about it if it was a young kid. But an old man who has nothing better to do? That's just sad."

Why We Watch: Wade to LeBron

2011-02-16T06:42:00.008-05:00

It all came together so suddenly. Just like that, in an instant. Dwyane Wade turned and saw LeBron James streaking down the court, two or three strides ahead of his defenders. Wade fired a 90-foot overhand pass. LeBron went up for it, his eyes on the ball, the rim just an unseen presence somewhere around him. "I’m running out of room," LeBron thought to himself. "I’m running out of room."

He didn't. He caught Wade's pass, and in one quiet motion, laid the ball gently off the backboard. The ball barely had time enough to find his fingers before it passed through nylon. "I've never seen that before,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said later. "I don’t think I’ve seen that before in this league.”

That's the thing about sports: you never know when something spectacular is going to happen. It could be at any moment. Turn away and you miss it. Turn away and you're left only with the rising buzz of the crowd, the clamorous yawp of the announcer, the histrionics of the bench. See it unfold and you come away with an uncomplicated kind of joy.

As Wade's pass shot across the length of the court, we forget about The Decision. We forgot about the Heatles. We forgot about a season-full of arrogance, immaturity and stupidity. We had only Wade to LeBron, pure and simple. It happened in a flash. It was unexpected. It was exquisite. It was an improbable thing of beauty. It was why we watch.

Sound Check: The Grammys

2011-02-14T11:55:00.006-05:00

Arcade Fire won Album of the Year at last night's Grammy Awards. The band beat out, to the delight of rock fans everywhere, Eminem ("Recovery"), Lady Antebellum ("Need You Now"), Lady Gaga ("The Fame Monster") and Katy Perry ("Teenage Dream"). "What the hell," asked a delighted and confused Win Butler, who accepted the statute on behalf of the band.

It was a pleasant surprise, though hardly the night's biggest. That would belong to Esperanza Spalding, a jazz bassist and vocalist who won Best New Artist. She bested Drake, Mumford & Sons, Florence and the Machine and, to the delight of everyone over the age of 15, uber-star Justin Bieber, the teenage sensation-cum-deity who is about a hundred Facebook friends away from starting his own religion.

There were a few other surprises: Solid performances by Mick Jagger and Eminem, and a jaunty appearance by a frog-throated Bob Dylan, who croaked his way through "Maggie's Farm" in sneakers and a smile, backed by Mumford & Sons and the Avett Brothers.

The rest of the night's proceeding weren't nearly of fun. On the industry's biggest night, it seemed music always took a back seat to excess, celebrity and ego. It was a gross spectacle. This is nothing new, of course, but it never gets easier watching the industry try to swallow its own head.

Which is why Arcade Fire's win was so welcome. Compare the band's glee and closing number with Lady Gaga's arrival in a giant plastic egg. Their upset and double-barreled performance was a minor triumph of substance over spectacle, songwriting over schtick, and music over celebrity.

"We're going to play another song because we love music," Butler said. "So thank you to the Grammys and thank you everyone. We're so happy."

Video: Landry Fields Works at Modell's

2011-02-10T13:45:00.003-05:00

In his best Jim Halpert impression, Landry Fields, aka Leeroy Jenkins, employee of the month, tries to sell his Knicks jersey to unsuspecting customers at a local Modell's. "You want number six on your chest during the NBA playoffs."

Lesson Plans

2011-02-09T19:59:00.015-05:00

Shane Battier is one of the good guys. He plays hard. He is a selfless teammate and a dedicated student of the game. He married his high school girlfriend. He is the seventh smartest athlete in sports. He plays chess. He studies sabermetrics. He wears khakis.

Battier's reputation around the National Basketball Association, both as a player and a man, is exemplary, pressed and pleated.

It should come as little surprise, then, that he wants to teach when his NBA career is through. "I've always loved to teach,'' Battier told AOL FanHouse. "I could see myself as a teacher helping young people in some capacity. I've always thought about teaching a life skills class. There's so much common sense that kids never learn these days, like how to balance a checkbook, how to look over a mortgage agreement or an auto lease. Teach them skills that would really make a difference in their lives.''

This is hardly idle chatter. If he hadn't been drafted, Battier says, he would have pursued a career working with youth. "I would want to encourage and inspire a new generation of potential leaders through higher education and effective leadership skills."

Battier is serious about education, about as serious as his defensive assignments. A two-time academic All-American, Battier earned his bachelor's degree in religion at Duke, while leading the Blue Devils to two Final Fours and a national championship. He graduated in 2001 with 3.5 grade point average. In his senior year of high school, Battier, sporting a 3.96 GPA, was named the prestigious Country Day's outstanding student of the year.

Ball Don't Lie's Eric Freeman suggests Battier's teaching career is the first step to an inevitable life in public office, comparing him to former Knickerbocker and U.S. senator Bill Bradley. I think this overshoots the mark. One needs only look to Bradley's one-time teammate, Dick Barnett, for precedence.

Barnett completed his bachelor's degree as a member of the Los Angeles Lakers. He later earned his master’s degree in public administration at New York University and his doctoral degree in education at my alma mater in 1991, a year after the New York Knicks retired his number 12. Today, he runs the New York-based Athletic Role Model Educational Institute (ARM), a non-profit organization with a focus on education for at-risk students.

Like Barnett, Battier plans on eventually trying his luck in the classroom, with the full intention of improving the fortunes of his students, one lesson at a time.

Imported From Detroit

2011-02-07T09:46:00.021-05:00

Although the country is still abuzz about Volkswagon's clever Darth Vader ad, ("The Force") Chrysler's "Imported from Detroit" was, for my money, the night's best commercial, the Aaron Rodger's to VW's Ben Roethlisberger.

Executed with cinematic precision, Chrysler's "Imported from Detroit" ad is an inspired combination of imagery, music and message. "What does a town that's been to hell and back know about the finer things in life," asks an anonymous voice, as shots of Detroit's grey skyline flick across the screen. "I'll tell you: More than most. You see, it's the hottest fires that make the hardest steel. Add hard work and conviction and the know-how that runs generations deep in every last one of us."

Before the voice can finish the line, an unseen choir kicks in over the familiar riffs of Eminem's "Lose Yourself," as more promising shots of Detroit life--middle class houses; a high school football team; a figure skater; a young professional--fill the screen. "When it comes to luxury it's as much about where it's from as who it's for.”

Here’s where the copywriters bring it home, metaphorically annexing Detroit from the rest of the American map. “Now, we're from America, but this isn't New York City. Or the Windy City. Or Sin City. And we're certainly no one's Emerald City."

In the ad's penultimate scene, Eminem, now before the choir in Detroit's Fox Theater, delivers the 11 words that define Detroit, for better of for worse: "This is the Motor City, and this is what we do."

Then two final shots of the car. Above the first, the theater's marquee, which reads, "Keep Detroit Beautiful." After the second, the tagline appears: "The Chrysler 200 Has Arrived. Imported from Detroit."

This is nothing short of masterful; the ad is so much more than a perfunctory unveiling of a new car. It tells the story of a city, bowed but not broken, still proud of its history and resolute in its future. And it gives voice to an inchoate feeling of better days, which, we're told and the commercial implies, still stand before us.

After watching the commercial, James Fallows wrote the ad's "spillover spirit for the country" is exactly "the kind of tough-love nationalism we can use more of." I tend to agree. By it's conclusion, I not only wanted a Chrysler 200, I wanted to join a civic organization and register people to vote.

Pettitte Retires

2011-02-04T16:58:00.012-05:00

“My arm feels fine. My body feels fine. But my heart’s not where it needs to be.” And with that, Andy Pettitte, a key member of the most recent Yankees dynasty, announced his retirement from baseball after 16 seasons--a successful career that includes five World Series championships, 240 regular-season victories and a record 19 more in postseason play.

While hardly unexpected, Pettitte's quiet exit is a blow to the Yankees' already wobbly rotation and a body shot to a generation of Yankee fans' quickly fading youth.

One thinks first of an early defining moment. After getting shelled in Game 1 against the Atlanta Braves in the 1996 World Series, Pettitte, then just 24, took the ball again, this time on short rest, for a crucial Game 5, in Atlanta, with the series knotted at two games a piece. He pitched eight shutout innings, outlasting John Smoltz in a trying 1-0 Yankees victory. Two nights later, back in the Bronx, the Yankees closed out the series for the team's first World Series in 18 years, the first under Joe Torre.

One thinks, too, of another defining moment. In February 2008, after his name appeared in the Mitchell Report, Pettitte addressed the media for 55 minutes about his use of human growth hormone, a banned substance. "I felt like I need to come out, be forward with this," he said. "Whatever circumstances or repercussions come with it, I'll take and I'll take [them] like a man and I'll try to do my job."

Two very different moments, but two that reveal much about Pettitte. He was a grinder, a throw-back to a different era. He took the ball whenever called upon and gave it his all, even when he wasn't always at his best. And, when he lost or stumbled, he shouldered the blame.

Ultimately, it was his heart, and not just his arm, that defined Pettitte, both as a man and as a ballplayer.

“It’s tough when you can still do it physically,” he said yesterday. “It’s all I know. I’m a pitcher. It’s all I know how to do. It’s a tough decision, but I know it’s the right one.”

After 16 seasons, Pettitte's heart, once big enough to hold within it a team's heavy expectations and an entire city worth of fans, decided it had finally given enough.

Nigel Sylvester

2011-02-02T13:56:00.002-05:00

Chances are when one thinks of BMX, the first image that comes to mind is probably white kids in suburban lots, a thousand aspiring Dave Mirras. Or, if you're of a certain generation, maybe it's Nicole Kidman in "BMX Bandits." Whatever the image, it's almost certainly not a black kid from Queens. But that should change, because Nigel Sylvester, a 23-year-old street rider out of New York's fourth best borough, is the smiling face of the sport.

Discovered as a teen while riding underneath the Brooklyn Bridge, Sylvester caught national attention after producer Glenn Milligan, the Doc Ball of BMX, featured him in his popular videos. "Nigel is a true street rider," Milligan said. "He's able to take tricks he did when he was younger and link them up in ways that other people wouldn't necessarily have thought of doing. He has the unique ability to land a trick and explode right back into something else."

Today, Sylvester is a member of Dave Mirra's bicycle company and owns his own bike shop, Format NY. He's sponsored by Nike and Gatorade, though he rarely competes.

"If I didn't ride BMX, I don't know where I'd be right now," Sylvester told the Daily News. "Becoming a professional bike rider while growing up in Queens doesn't even sound realistic, but I'm living proof that it can happen."

Jehova's Fitness, Exercise and Etiquette

2011-01-31T17:17:00.016-05:00

A few years ago, two friends came up with an idea for a new gym franchise. In addition to free weights, treadmills, elliptical machines and stationary bikes, membership would include regular home visits from two gym representatives. These representatives would only visit if and when a member skipped his or her regular workouts. The idea was to guilt lapsed members back into the gym—their faces hot with shame. My friends called it Jehova’s Fitness, though, sadly, they never moved it past the initial planning stages.

I was reminded of their plan while reading about Gym-Pact, a Boston-based company that charges members for not working out. Started by two recent Harvard graduates, Yifan Zhang and Geoff Oberhofer, Gym-Pact offers discounts, in partnership with local vendors, to members in exchange for weekly workout commitments. If a customer sticks to his or her pre-arranged exercise regime, the monthly membership fee is reduced. If a customer slacks off, he or she incurs a fine, what Zhang and Oberhofer playfully call "motivational fees."

What caught my eye, in addition to the similarity between the two business plans, was Gym-Pact's early partnership with local Planet Fitness franchises. (Gym-Pact negotiated a group rate with Planet Fitness, then covered membership fees for participants, who committed to work out at number of times per week in exchange for a free membership.)

Planet Fitness, as their television ads brag, prides itself as a no-frills alternative to modern, tricked-out and costly health centers, which the New York Times recently described, somewhat inelegantly, "as stale as yesterday's sweat-soaked towels."

This is a fitness trend I can get behind, probably the only one I will ever support. Exorbitant-- and prohibitive-- gym memberships are an indefensible scam and, arguably, a self-defeating enterprise. Exercise is vital; expensive gyms are not.

Unfortunately, the two usually go hand-in-hand. If Northeast winters were less inclement, I'd never have to set foot in a gym. But this is not the case. So my feet, calloused, cracked and sore, are very much in the gym, sometimes as often as four times a week.

This is not entirely terrible.

My job grants me free use of a fitness center, very much a no-frills exercise room. I use a reliable, but creaky, treadmill and, on very rare occasions, a few dumbbells. That is all I require. Sometimes, while waiting for a discourteous patron to cede the corner treadmill, I survey the surrounding equipment and wonder if I should give them a go. Of course, if I could name any of these machines, I'd be more inclined to use them. Because I cannot, I don't.

I also wonder about gym etiquette. What, for instance, is the appropriate distance one needs to maintain while waiting for a free machine? Because my gym is small--slightly larger than a conference room--there really isn't an inconspicuous spot to stand. It's impossible not to feel like a fool, a creep, even, standing around people when they are mid-squat or mid-thrust or mid-stride. With no other option, I hover around a garbage can, pretending to read, because this is somehow less foolish or creepy.

Conversely, what's an appropriate length of time to continue using a machine when it's clear someone is waiting in line? Another 10 minutes? Another two miles? So many questions, so few answers. I do know two things: walking on a treadmill and talking on a cell phone are two unpardonable sins.

I wonder, too, while lacing up my sneakers, which department the person pedaling the stationary bike works in. Or if the paunchy middle-age man in the sweatsuit, recently resolved, will continue his trips to the gym past January. I wonder how many miles my knees have left.

Mostly, though, I think about nothing at all. I realize now this is what I enjoy most about exercise: periodic blocks of absent thought. The rest of it--the sweat, the shin splits, the sharing of equipment--is miserable. But those stretches of clear mindedness, combined with sudden bursts or endorphin, is restorative and addictive, often the best part of my day.

Sometimes it's enough to make me want to go door to door and share the good news with the world.

The Air of Uncertainty

2011-01-29T16:09:00.005-05:00

Even in baseball's offseason, when hope springs eternal, the perpetually gray New York Metropolitans find imaginative ways to lose. In this regard, they are unique among the rest of the city’s sports teams, save, perhaps, the moribund New York Islanders, whose very existence remains but a rumor beyond a handful of wood-paneled, joyless bars in Nassau County.

Their most recent example? Yesterday, Fred Wilpon, chairman and principal owner of the Mets, announced plans to sell a portion of the team, perhaps as much as 25 percent, in response to a "clawback" lawsuit filed this past December against Wilpon and his company, Sterling Equities, by the trustee of the victims of Bernard Madoff's multi-billion dollar Ponzi scheme. "To address the air of uncertainty created by this lawsuit,” Wilpon said, “and to provide additional assurance that the New York Mets will continue to have the necessary resources to fully compete and win, we are looking at a number of potential options including the addition of one or more strategic partners.”

The lawsuit, reports the New York Times, seeks to recover at least $300 million in “fictitious profits,” the difference between what Wilpon and his partner, Saul Katz, invested with Madoff and their final return—roughly $48 million, according to court filings. Some believe Irving Picard, the victims' trustee, could seek as much as $1 billion, or about $142 million more than what Forbes magazine last year estimated as the team's value.

In total, the Wilpons, who ignored numerous warnings about Madoff's suspicious operation, had more more than 20 investment accounts with Madoff, a longtime friend and business associate, including 92 percent of Sterling's 401(k) plans. (A widow of a former Sterling employee recently filed a separate lawsuit against the company, claiming a breach of fiduciary duties.)

What, then, does this mean for the Mets? While unclear, it's certainly not sunny. Here's what one does know: Faced with a potentially catastrophic lawsuit and a mountain of existing debt, Wilpon is in desperate need of cash. This is not incidental, and more than a little troubling for a franchise that falls short even when the coffers are full. Mets fans shouldn't expect any significant mid-season additions to the team this summer or, depending on the outcome of the civil suit, any future summers while the club remains in Wilpon's tenuous grasp.

"We will continue to control the franchise and govern its operations," Wilpon stressed yesterday. "Sterling will remain the principal ownership group of the Mets and continue to control and manage the team’s operations.”

Left unsaid, though, is for how long or to how great a detriment to the team. The air of uncertainty, indeed.

Past and Future Greatness: The NBA's Encouragement Commercials

2011-01-27T11:18:00.005-05:00

For your consideration: The NBA's new Encouragement commercials.

The 30-second spots, part of the league's arch Where Amazing Happens campaign, feature Kevin Durant, Amar'e Stoudemire, Steve Nash and Chris Paul before they were stars alongside an actor edited into original videos through green-screen technology. (A Stephen Curry ad is due to air soon.) In each commercial, the character, a person from the present day, divines each player's future. The effective is remarkable.

“Our goal is to really show our players’ passion for the game and that they’ve always been passionate,” Danny Meiseles, executive vice president and executive producer of production, programming and broadcasting for NBA Entertainment, recently told Dime magazine. “We communicate that these guys just don’t roll out of bed and become the best—it takes years of dedication, desire and passion.”

It matters not a lick these videos show Durant, Stoudemire, Paul and Nash when they were already well on their way. These videos exist for a reason; there was already evident in all four something special, some great, though still unknown, promise a friend, coach or family member thought worthy of documenting.

Paul’s video, for instance, is from 2003, the same year he was selected a McDonald’s All-American and crowned North Carolina’s Mr. Basketball. Durant, a senior at Montrose Christian when he appeared in his video, had already captured multiple national Amateur Athletic Union national championships, playing alongside Michael Beasley, and was then widely considered the best high school player in the country, behind only Greg Oden. Stoudemire, 17 in 2000, was a Nike Summer League MVP and two short years removed from the Phoenix Suns picking him ninth overall in the 2002 NBA Draft. His future Suns teammate, Steve Nash, though he hardly looked the part, was even closer to the NBA; the Suns drafted him in 1996, a few scant months after his video was shot.

But this makes little difference. What these ads manage to capture is each player's vulnerability and quiet hunger. None are yet fully formed, and the feeling one gets while watching them is akin to seeing old photographs of parents or grandparents. The future is still in front of them, waiting to be earned. These ads, then, creative and inspired, are worthy of their growing esteem, fine examples of sterling execution and subtle emotion.

The Gentleman's Directory

2011-01-26T09:56:00.005-05:00

A fun story in today's Times about "The Gentleman's Directory," a 19th-century pocket guide book for men of leisure:

[T]his palm-sized book, published in 1870 and long hidden away at the New-York Historical Society, did not confine its anonymous critique to the quality of wines or the ambiance of the 150 establishments listed between its covers. Rather, it defined its role as delivering “insight into the character and doings of people whose deeds are carefully screened from public view.”

One of the entries, the Times reports, reads, “'an hour cannot be spent more pleasantly' than at Harry Hill’s place on 25 East Houston Street." Time Out New York this was most definitely not.

Rex Ryan's Jets

2011-01-24T19:33:00.014-05:00

A game of two halves: Same Old Jets, Rex Ryan's Jets.

First the disheartening, all-too-familiar tales of woe. An apparent three-and-out for the Jets defense negated by a penalty on Antonio Cromartie, a player purposely brought in during the offseason to defend the pass. Then Mendenhall, a rumbling block of granite, for eight. Then six. Then nine. The Jets defense, usually stout against the run, couldn't bring him down. Nor could they ground Roethlisberger, who scrambled for nine easy yards on a critical third and long. A few plays later, touchdown Steelers, a drive of 76 that chewed up eight minutes of game time, close to 40 minutes in real time. Total domination.

The second quarter, I admit, is just a blur of Black and Yellow. Steelers fans, emergent from the dark corners of my Brooklyn neighborhood, threatened to engulf me. They cheered like rowdy Appalachians. One wore hipster frames. I thought, surely, I'd meet my demise, just as surely as the Jets would soon meet theirs. A late, merciful field goal cut the Steelers lead to three touchdowns. 24-3 at the half. This was troubling. This was bad. This was the Mud Bowl. This was the Spike Game. This was 45-3. Same Old Jets.

But Rex Ryan's Jets battled back. Five plays into the second half, a lightening quick touchdown, Sanchez to Holmes, 45 yards. Then, a Jets interception. Game decidedly back on. The bar, still more Black and Yellow than Green and White, hummed with an uneasy quiet. Here, at last, was the team I'd devoted the past 19 weeks, if you can believe it, as a seat-cushion supplicant to the Gang Green.

A muscular drive stalled, though, at the goal line after a series of curious, amateurish play calls and even worse execution. The Same Old Jets reappeared, but only for a moment. A Steelers fumble on the goal line, swallowed up by Roethlisberger in the end zone. Safety. 24-12 Steelers with 7 minutes to go. Down, but not out. Four minutes later, touchdown, Sanchez to Cotchery. Jets within five.

It was then I found peace. I knew the Jets would run out of time; the game was out of reach. Sure, I was disappointed, wrought with emotion, but I was proud of their effort. The Same Old Jets would have rolled over. Rex Ryan's Jets, as if their devotees needed further proof, simply would not. Their fight is something to behold. It's become, in two short years, their new identity.

Though not enough to overcome the Steelers in frozen, unfriendly Pittsburgh, the Jets' characteristic fight shook loose the threadbare label of Same Old Jets. In its place, Ryan's early, risible, call to arms, "Play like a Jet," which now means something, if not yet a Super Bowl trip and streams of Green and White confetti.

Twenty-four hours later, I remain at peace, firm in my belief in Rex Ryan and his Jets.

Sports and Superstition

2011-01-23T12:06:00.009-05:00

An old Irish joke: Touring Western Ireland, an American anthropologist interviews an Irish farmer. The discussion turns to the farmer's neighbor, who, he explains, is a bit of a loon. "He leaves hats on the posts of his fence," he said, "to please the fairies. He actually believes they watch over his farm." The anthropologist then asks if he believes in fairies. "Of course I don't believe in fairies," the farmer screamed. "I'd be a right idiot if I did, wouldn't I? They're there, they are, but surely I don't believe in 'em!"

When it comes to sports and superstitions, I side with the farmer. Last week, before the Jets knocked around the Patriots, my friend and I recreated our pregame ritual from last year's playoffs. First a drink at Washington Commons--Bloody Mary for me; domestic brew for him. We discuss briefly the upcoming game and then dismiss the predictions and analysis of the chattering classes. After our first--and only--round, we head over to Half Court, an unremarkable dive bar across the street, where he and I take advantage of the bar's game day special of three beers for $10. This is where it gets complicated. The buyer of each round gets the extra beer, but the next round must be purchased before the third beer is touched.

Otherwise, bad things tend to happen. Folk's missed field goal followed an early, inexcusable moment of miscommunication. Later, with the Jets off to a quick start, our mutual friend informed us, via text, he was running late. I suggested he stay home, lest his arrival upset the bar's delicate karmic balance. He did.

Throughout the rest of the game, unbeknownst to my friend, I counted in my head backwards from 10 before the Jets snapped the ball and to 10 with Brady under center. It worked, or so I told myself, and continued to mumble like Rain Man for nearly three hours, until Shonn Greene rumbled into the Patriots' end zone, essentially ensuring a win for the Jets.

Why do I perform these esoteric rituals? Intellectually, I know there is nothing I can do to influence the outcome of a game played hundreds of miles away by a bunch of grown men I have never met. But without these rituals, I am untethered; the game, especially when it involves the Jets, slips through my fingers. I perform these rituals, sure, but I don't believe in them. I'd be a right idiot if I did. They matter, though, and are as real as Irish fairies.

Lance Armstrong As Bill Clinton

2011-01-19T22:52:00.014-05:00

A new year, a new round of Lance Armstrong doping allegations.

Sports Illustrated reports: A federal grand jury is investigating whether Armstrong, as a member of the U.S. Postal Cycling Team, took part in a criminal conspiracy to purchase performance-enhancing drugs between 1999 and 2004, the apex of his career. "If a court finds that Armstrong won his titles while taking performance-enhancing drugs," writes SI scribes Selena Roberts and David Epstein, "his entourage may come to be known as the domestiques of the saddest deception in sports history."

Three startling revealations:

In the late 1990s, according to a source with knowledge of the government's investigation of Armstrong, the Texan gained access to a drug, in clinical trial, called HemAssist, developed by Baxter Healthcare Corp. HemAssist was to be used for cases of extreme blood loss. In animal studies, it had been shown to boost the blood's oxygen-carrying capacity, without as many risks as EPO.

In 2003, Swiss custom officials, according to the defrocked Floyd Landis, found in Armstrong's bag syringes and drugs with labels written in Spanish, though officials, told the drugs were legally prescribed, waved through Armstrong and the team.

This past November, Italian police and customs officials raided the home of Yarolslav Popovych, Armstrong's teammate, and found documents and PEDs as well as texts and e-mails linking Armstrong and his team to controversial Italian physician Michele Ferrari as recently as 2009, though Armstrong told the world he'd ditched Ferrari in 2004.

Though Armstrong dismissed SI's report, Roberts and Epstein explain, in no uncertain terms, why he should be concerned. "Because government sponsorship is involved, if evidence suggests that Armstrong was directing illegal doping activity, the inquiry could result in charges against him of conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering, racketeering, drug trafficking and defrauding the U.S. government."

This is serious, and, unlike past rumors of Armstrong cheating, which produced a whole lot of smoke but little fire, the government's case against Armstrong, as reported Roberts and Epstein, seems ablaze.

Cycling's Joe Lindsey, underlining the previously unreported HemAssist allegation, says Armstrong has a "Very Big Problem."

[O]ne of the most famous sportsmen of the last half-century stands accused of buying stocks of a tightly controlled investigational drug – manufactured by an American pharmaceutical company and intended for use only in clinical trial settings under the regulation of the FDA or its European counterparts and which is illegal to use for any other purpose, or even for a private citizen to possess, much less transport internationally – to pull off a monumental sporting fraud.

If true, what, then, do these allegations and the ongoing grand jury investigation mean to Armstrong's legacy?

Buster Olney, who covered the Yankees during the Joe Torre years, draws a straight line between Lance Armstrong and Roger Clemens.

Of all the cases of the baseball players, Armstrong’s most resembles that of Clemens — in the face of a lot of evidence, Armstrong, like Clemens, has angrily denied use of performance-enhancing drugs, while attacking the credibility of his accusers. If Clemens and Armstrong have been lying, they are bald-faced, unrepentant lies.

And while Clemens has never had the warm and fuzzy image that Armstrong has, as the cyclist has helped lead the fight against cancer, the pitcher — like Armstrong — has done a whole lot of philanthropic work.

Craig Calcaterra, another baseball reporter, disagrees:

In light of that, if the PED allegations against him pan out, I would guess that Armstrong gets some pretty rough treatment, especially in the cycling world (France will probably issue a shoot-to-kill order). But I also guess that all of his anti-cancer work and the fact that he has transcended the relative backwater that is international cycling, mainstream America will view him as a flawed but still-worthy figure. He’ll get smacked around a whole hell of a lot, but he won’t be demonized like Clemens and Bonds have been.

I'm with Calcaterra on this. Since Mark McGwire introduced Androstenedione into the average sports fan's lexicon, we've come to expect, by and large, our athletes to cut corners in the pursuit of excellence. Armstrong, dogged by doping rumors throughout his career, was no different. But we pardoned his sins, real or imagined, because he inspired. He beat cancer, then led the fight against the disease. To date, his LIVESTRONG foundation, previously known as the Lance Armstrong Foundation, has raised $325 million, and probably helped saved the lives of thousands.

Many still regard Armstrong as a kind of secular god.* In this regard, contra Olney, Armstrong's most appropriate corollary isn’t Roger Clemens or Barry Bonds, two bloated paradigms of hubris. Oddly enough, it’s Bill Clinton. Regardless of what either man does, it seems, their supporters--a large swath of fiercely devoted supplicants--will continue to ignore the transgressions of their idols, major and minor, and point instead to the tremendous good they have done.

*Daniel Coyle described Armstrong as a secular saint in his wonderful Lance Armstrong's War, which, I'm proud to say, I helped bring to life, albeit in a very minor role.

Video: Bart Scott's Rant, In LEGO Form

2011-01-19T16:48:00.005-05:00

I've been looking for an excuse to post video of Bart Scott's Sunday night postgame interview with ESPN's Sal Paolantonio, because, frankly, it's all over the Internet. Turns out, I just needed to wait a few days until someone animated Scott's rant in LEGO form.

Trevor Pryce, Scott's teammate, aptly described the rant as “epic ungodly awesomeness,” and the august New York Times was so impressed with (frightened by, more likely) Scott's performance, they reached out to his mother for comment. “If that wasn’t my son," she told Greg Bishop, "I would I have been scared of him, too.”

What I appreciate most about Scott's rant is his kicker. Lost in the moment, Scott still managed to say what, under normal circumstances, would have been an appropriate, cliched way to wrap up an interview, though, here, it sounds ominous, threatening: "Can't Wait!" The only way this could have played better is if Scott had screamed, "Thank You For Asking!" or "My Pleasure!" or "Pittsburgh Is Lovely This Time of Year!"

Between us girls, never in my life did I imagine I would derive so much pleasure from a Jets' victory.

(Via)

Jets-Pats Reactions

2011-01-17T14:09:00.004-05:00

Lots of scribes, lots of ink, lots to like.

Gary Myers:

Sanchez, who had eight turnovers in two regular-season games on the road against the Pats with the Jets being outscored 76-17, played a near perfect game this time. He threw for 194 yards and three touchdowns and didn't turn the ball over. "He had only a 127.3 rating," Rex Ryan said. "I'll take it. The thing is with this young man, he's just getting better. He's only in year two. He's won a bunch of playoff games. It might be a record for most road wins or close to it. I mentioned last year that one day he's not going to be looked at as a weakness of the team. He'll be looked at as a strength and I think you are seeing that right now."

Peter King:

You are what your record says you are. In two years, Ryan is 24-13. That includes a 4-1 record in the playoffs, with postseason wins at a No. 1 seed (New England, 2010), at a 2 seed (San Diego, 2009), at a 3 seed (Indianapolis, 2010) and at a 4 seed (Cincinnati, 2009), all in the last 54 weeks. And it now includes two consecutive conference-championship game appearances, the first time in the 50-year history of the franchise that's happened. Since Ryan has taken over as coach, the Jets and their arch-rivals, New England, each have 24 wins. Playoff wins in the last two seasons: Ryan 4, Bill Belichick 0.

Don Banks:

Maybe that's what we've been missing about Rex Ryan and his chatty Jets for most of the past two years. It's not their mouths that make their game. It's their game that makes their mouths. What's that they say about it not being bragging if you can back it up? The Jets just backed it up. Every last juicy word of it. Ryan talked about outcoaching Bill Belichick all week, and then he went out and did it.
[...]

Ryan's Jets played for him on Sunday in New England. As well as they ever have. They did more than just talk their talk. They walked the walk. Maybe it's time we all stop paying quite so much attention to what the Jets say, and more to what they do. The Patriots probably wish they had, but now it's too late for New England. The Jets are off to Pittsburgh, and if they can back up their bold words for one more week, Ryan and his collection of big talkers will find soon themselves on the NFL's biggest stage.

Mike Lupica:

It wasn't a Super Bowl on the line or even a trip to the Super Bowl. This was still one of the great upset playoff victories a New York football team has ever had. In the interview room the coach of the Jets, who won't stop talking and keeps the whole sport talking about him and his players, said, "This isn't the first time we've played a good game on defense."

Bob Ryan:

What do you say when you are whipped, fair and square? What do you say when there are no freaky happenings, when there are no loose ends, when there are no overtly bad calls, when the other team makes the big plays when it has to and stops you when you need to make some of your own?

What do you say when the other team does exactly what it wants to do and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it? What do you say when the other coach runs his mouth and his team backs him up? What do you say when a verbose rival gets to keep playing and you must pack up and go home, beaten, 28-21, on the field where you hadn’t lost a game all season?

Greg Bishop:

The Jets do not love to talk so much as they live for it, live by it. All week, they trafficked in hyperbole and lobbed insults at New England, as if convincing themselves they stood a chance. But by Sunday night, after the Jets followed bark with bite, it seemed they knew what everyone else missed.

Dan Shaughnessy:

This was not your garden variety postseason elimination. Losing to the Jets is worse than losing to the Lakers. It might even be worse than losing to the Yankees and that is because of the lack of class demonstrated by the Jets in the days and months leading up to yesterday’s epic showdown. The Jets are all about smack talk. They hurled insults at New England for a week. Then they came to Foxborough and backed it up. This game was not as close as the score would lead you to believe. It was 28-14 before the Patriots scored a hollow touchdown in an empty stadium with 24 seconds left.

Andrew Weiss, The Jets Blog:

As it happened, Belichick didn’t have the horses. Eschewing talented first rounders draft after draft, and letting proven Pro Bowlers leave for other clubs, Belichick was determined to make it happen with his squad of no-names. In the end, no names helped him win. As for the Jets, it was the playmakers who made the plays, like Sean Ellis, Braylon Edwards, and Holmes, and important contributions, too, from the lunch pail guys like Cotchery and Eric Smith and Pool. You need both, and Belichick has forgotten that.

Tony Massarotti:

Hate the Jets, if you’d like. Mock them. Frown upon their tactless and boorish behavior. You have every right. But do not dismiss them, not anymore, not after their coach and their quarterback outperformed each of yours on the once-sacred turf at Gillette Stadium, where the Pats are 16-0 over the last two regular seasons and 0-2 during the last two Januarys.

28-21

2011-01-17T09:46:00.008-05:00

If life is but a sport and a pastime, then victories, however fleeting, are its just rewards. Few are more satisfying than yesterday’s Jets win over the Patriots, a thorough undressing that more than makes up for December’s 45-3 drubbing. This was a special victory, joyous, edifying. Rex Ryan answered his critics. So did Mark Sanchez. The Jets defense, behind five sacks, unnerved Tom Brady, who played, in a win-or-go-home playoff game against his hated rival, like he was still at Michigan. It was a glorious sight.

A more powerful image: Dennis Byrd, a former Jet who broke his vertebra in 1992, presenting the team with his No. 90 jersey, the same game jersey doctors cut from his lifeless, broken body, a remarkable symbol of hope, resiliency and will. “Last night," Byrd told reporters Sunday afternoon about his pre-game pep talk, "was about understanding the nuances of athletics, competition, what this moment is, capturing this moment, not letting it slip through your fingers.” The Jets, moved to tears, hung Byrd's torn jersey in their locker room, where it awaited news of victory and, at last, just rewards.

On Rex Ryan

2011-01-16T21:27:00.003-05:00

As far as introductory press conferences go, it’s hard to beat Rex Ryan’s first stand as head coach of the New York Jets. By word thirty, he’d already promised set upon Jets fan a long-sought-after championship. “First off,” Ryan pronounced to much ballyhoo, “with all the cameras I was looking for our new president back there. I think we'll get to meet him in the next couple of years anyway.”

A few months later, more chum for the Green and White waters. “I never came here to kiss Bill Belichick's rings,” Ryan said in June 2009. "I came here to win. I'm certainly not intimidated by New England or anybody else."

Ravenous Jets fan, starved for success, ate it up and hungered for more. Adam Gopnik, one of the ravenous, saw in Ryan's rhetoric a prescription for an emotionally wracked fan base:

The point of his braggadocio is not that he utters it because he believes it, but because he doesn’t. He recognizes that the Jets are a long-beleaguered franchise with a losing tradition, and that saying they are a great team with a noble past—“play like a Jet” ought to be a laugh line, but he made it something else—is sound psychology.

Like Gopnick, I think Ryan's talk is inspired. Others consider it obnoxious; some, inappropriate. With Ryan, there is no in between. You either love him or hate him, root for him or against him. Whatever your allegiance, however, one thing is clear: The man knows what he's doing. His 20 regular season victories and three road playoff wins, most recently against Peyton Manning's Indianapolis Colts, Ryan's personal bete noir, are immutable, impressive as any in the National Football League. In two season, Ryan's managed to breathe life into a moribund franchise and inspire its downtrodden fan base.

To anyone who questions his abilities, as many have done this week, his success is his answer.

Still left unanswered though is the very real question of who the Jets are. Are they, as Ryan promised, a Super Bowl team? Or are they just a talented, yet flawed, playoff team, a tier or two below Ryan’s lofty projections and the NFL's best? A win on Sunday against the hated Patriots, long the standard of success and stability, will help make more clear who the Jets are, or, if the score doesn't end in their favor, who they are not.

(Because Blogger was down, I posted this 12 hours later than I intended. That is all.)

I am Jack's Calvin and Hobbes

2011-01-12T13:01:00.002-05:00

A brilliant, disturbing re-imagining of an old favorite.

(Via Via)

Mike Francesa

2011-01-10T19:04:00.018-05:00

I am a simple man, with simple pleasures. A sharp IPA, for instance, paired with a Knickerbocker game, is usually enough to do the trick. But very few things please me, in the simplest sense, as Mike Francesa, WFAN's afternoon sports talk radio host.

Francesa first came to my attention in 1989, when he and his then-partner, Chris "Mad Dog" Russo, debuted their show, "Mike and the Mad Dog," on the FAN. I remember a billboard, positioned near the merger of New Jersey Routes 46 and 3, with caricatures of Don Imus, the station's new morning host, and Mike and the Mad Dog. Imus, drawn with a cowboy hat and matching scowl, held a baseball, I believe, Russo, a baseball and Francessa, a football. The ad's tagline, roughly the size of a Winnebago, read: "We Got New York Sports By the Balls." Subtlety, I realize now, was never the station's intent. Truth be told, it took me some time to figure out I wasn't supposed to take these guys seriously, like at all, and certainly not as seriously as they took themselves.

"Mike and The Mad Dog" worked. Russo's manic energy complimented Francesa's saturnine disposition. Believe me when I write the show was an institution. It ran, uninterrupted, for 19 years, until 2008. Bill Simmons, who thought enough of the show to live blog a 2006 broadcast, described its charm.

For five hours every day, you feel like you're listening to two guys arguing at a sports bar.... With Mike and the Dog, radio doesn't feel contrived or forced, you don't have to listen to guys screaming and fake-laughing at each other's jokes, and they will absolutely not pander to the "hot button" subjects of the day. They're just [talking] for five hours.

Here is a typical Russo and Francesa exchange, simulcast on the YES Network in the days after the Mets, a regular Francesa and Russo target, fired manager Willie Randolph on the West Coast, in the middle of the night, on Father's Day weekend. Russo gets worked up and Mike chimes in with his immutable laws of termination and decorum, something the Mets, in their infinite stupidity, failed to take into account. A bad job by them, in Russo's parlance.

And here's a clip of the duo, lost amidst the drifts of the February sports season, discussing the Oscars, radio at its best.

Sadly, the show is no more. Disgruntled over his contract negotiations with the FAN, Russo took his ball and went over to Sirius, Howard Stern's backyard. Francesa still broadcasts his own five-hour show on the FAN, five days a week, plus one three-hour show Sunday mornings during football season. That's basically 30 hours a week monologuing about New York sports, true yeoman's work. I listen to about 14 of those, and in that time, I've come to anticipate Francesa's overreactions and idiosyncrasies, which are legion and more pronounced in Dog's absence. He sometimes forgets, for instance, he's the only voice in the booth.

I don't mean to be ungenerous. I admire his craft, no matter how unpolished it sometimes is. Sports talk radio is predicated on getting a rise out of listeners, and nobody does this better, or as effortlessly, as Francesa. The way he works over Mets and Jets fans, the majority of the station's callers, is nothing short of masterful. Rex Ryan, and his classless Jets, are arguably the best thing to happen to Francesa since Chris Russo.

What I like best, though, are Francesa's arcane, often dubious, ruminations on such subjects as fungibility, Shake Shack, vacation days, "da witchin' hour," Mickey Mantle, and Lady Gloria Stewart. Also of note is his impatience, near disdain, for the majority of his callers, in particular Mike in Montclair, a constant thorn in his side.

All of this is, of course, silly, probably juvenile, but Francesa's show continues to reward me with the simplest of pleasures.

Marshawn Lynch's TD, The Nintendo Remix

2011-01-09T15:42:00.002-05:00

The most dynamic play of yesterday's Wild Card match ups, re-imagined as a Super Mario underworld adventure.

(Via)

Vote Early, And Often

2011-01-09T15:17:00.002-05:00

I appreciate the kid's enthusiasm and power dunk. Vote here.

Burn the Boats, Then A Snack

2011-01-07T20:35:00.005-05:00

Rex Ryan, while no Winston Churchill, does have a way with words:

Late on Dec. 18, mired in a two-game losing streak, his season on the brink of collapse, Rex Ryan gathered the Jets at their hotel in Pittsburgh. He spoke for roughly nine minutes. Anger colored his face crimson. Passion produced tears. His speech centered on respect. Not respect from opponents, or from teammates, both of which he considered fleeting. But self-respect, earned only by potential realized.

Ryan ended with the story of Hernán Cortés, the Spanish conquistador who went to Mexico in 1519 and, despite being outnumbered, ordered his charges to burn the boats they had arrived on. As Ryan reached the climax of the story, his voice boomed. “They burned their boats!” he shouted. “I’m only asking you to give me seven weeks!”

[...] Tied, 10-10, at halftime against the Steelers, [the players] turned to one another and said, “Burn the boats.”

There are, without question, better coaches and strategists in the National Football League, though I doubt many can match Ryan's charisma or ability to rally his troops. After watching the below clip, famously aired on HBO's "Hard Knocks," I was ready to offer Ryan my services as a ballboy, or ask him to be my father.

UPDATE: The Jets, when all seemed lost, beat the Colts 17-16, a game Gang Green's lost hundreds of times before. New England, and the anti-Ryan, awaits.

Goat on a Cow

2011-01-07T14:29:00.003-05:00

Some background. About four years ago, Radio Lab producer Laura Starecheski told a complicated, weird and moving story about a box of old letters, a Manhattan middle school teacher, homesick WWII soldiers, California’s Route 101, an estranged wife and mother forgotten by history, and a goat standing on a cow. Listen here.

Recently, dance students at Pace University's Performance Lab interpreted the radio broadcast. It was directed and choreographed by Andrew Palermo, with Taye Diggs. Though lengthy, the entire performance is worth a look. Robert Krulwich, co-host of Radiolab, told the New York Times earlier this month the students' performance moved him. “It was beautiful, really beautiful, in a completely new [medium]. And it was so wonderful I started to cry."

The Dunk Contest

2011-01-05T13:34:00.004-05:00

Bethlehem Shoals' weighs in on this year's Dunk Contest, which includes Brandon Jennings, JaVale McGee, Serge Ibaka and, um, Blake Griffin.

There's so much more to look forward to than the annual letdown, or the increasingly tired debate over whether in-game dunking has outmoded the contest, or the contest outmoded itself. There's Griffin, who is dunking personified this season; McGee, a constant source of amusement, amazement, and confusion; Ibaka's good vibrations; and Jennings, even if he just ends up playing hype-man, or sidekick, to all the bombast. This year, for the first time in a while, the dunk contest really will be must-watch television.

Let's be honest, here: Griffin, really, is the draw. His power and athleticism, prerequisites for any good Dunk Contest, are unmatched. He's like a hybrid Dominique Wilkins and Dwight Howard. The contest, his to lose, will showcase his skills to a national audience and do for him what it did for Howard in 2008.

A Picture From Life's Other Side

2011-01-04T11:57:00.015-05:00

In the 1930's, the federal government dispatched photographers across the country to document the effects of the Great Depression and the progress of its New Deal programs. Under the direction of Roy Emerson Stryker, photographers such as Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Gordon Parks and Russell Lee, snapped a series of iconic black and white pictures, arguably the most recognized photos in the country's history.

Less known are the color photos taken between 1939 and 1945, widely believed to be the only extant color photographs of this era.

Perhaps because these photos are still new to me, there is an immediacy to them. While the black and white shots are powerful, their lack of color keeps them somewhat at arm's length, as if the men and women and children captured in each shot exist only in a long-ago period. In color, though, they are somehow more real, somehow more like us, standing at our side.

The yellow and blue and green of the women's apron, her chipped red nail polish, the sun splash of peach fuzz, the brown earth caked on the wood barrel and the recently harvested spuds.

View the entire collection-- 160,000 black and white and 1,600 color photographs--here.

R.E.M.: It Happened Today

2011-01-04T10:32:00.002-05:00

Michael Stipe turns 51 today, and, in a few months, his band will release its 15th album, "Collapse Into Now." Eddie Vedder, who, along with Mike Mills, backs up Stipe on the track, turned 46 this past December. We're all getting old, I suppose, you, me, and the rest of the world. Every last one of us.

Pete Postlethwaite

2011-01-03T17:04:00.004-05:00

Pete Postlethwaite, the Academy Award-nominated actor who died yesterday at the age of 64, led with his face. He could do with it whatever he wished. It was sometimes handsome and open, as in "Among Giants" and "Between Strangers"; more often, though, in films like "The Usual Suspects" or Baz Luhrmann's "Romeo + Juliet," it was savage and uneven. His appearance varied from role to role, dictated by physiognomy: Imperious, for instance, throughout "In the Name of the Father," menacing in last year’s "The Town." (Perched behind an undersized table, his hands shearing long stem roses, Postlethwaite was more imposing than Ben Affleck’s and Jeremy Renner’s arsenal of oversized machine guns, pecs and fake Boston accents.)

An actor’s actor, Postlethwaite won the respect of his industry. Steven Spielberg, who cast Postlethwaite as Roland Tembo, the great white hunter, in "Jurassic Park," once called him the best actor in the world. “Pos was the one," said Daniel Day Lewis, Postlethwaite's co-star in "The Last of the Mohicans" and "In the Name of the Father." "As students, it was him we went to see on stage time and time again. It was him we wanted to be like; wild and true; lion hearted; unselfconscious and deliciously irreverent.”

For his part, Postlethwaite had this to say about his craft: "At the end of the day, acting is all about telling lies. We are professional imposters and the audience accepts that. We've made this deal that we tell you a tale and a pack of lies, but there will be a truth in it. You may enjoy it, or it will disturb you."

World Series of Beer Pong

2011-01-03T14:47:00.006-05:00

This week, thousands of back-hatted young men and women, a feral, wandering pack of hormones and alcohol-fueled ambition, will pack the Vegas Strip for the sixth annual World Series of Beer Pong, which promises a prize of $50,000 for sinking the most ping pong balls in quarter-beer-filled plastic cups.

The three-day tournament, organized by BPong.com, includes teams like the Naked Ninja Warriors, the Mile High Circumcision Club, Hung Like Jesus, Vandelay Industries, and, last but not least, two-time defending champions, Smashing Time, the dynamic duo of Ron Hamilton and Mike Popielarski, respectively described as charging rhino and quiet riot. As if that weren't enough, Bruce Buffer, the "Voice of the MMA" and half-brother of Michael, will announce the final game.

Bonus video: Here's the trailer for "Last Cup: Road to the World Series of Beer Pong," which was released in 2008. "It's a sport. It's a sport. It just happens to involve alcohol."

Allen Iverson in Turkey

2011-01-03T13:33:00.002-05:00

Philadelphia Magazine's Robert Huber tracks down Allen Iverson in Turkey, where former basketball gods go to die.

I go up to a young woman in a tank top and impossibly tight jeans and three-inch shiny black heels, who’s having a drink with another woman and a man. She is dark and beautiful. I ask her if she speaks English. Yes. I tell her I’m in Istanbul to write about Allen Iverson. She smiles a bit of a devilish smile. “I met him last night.” The hottest girl in the hottest club, 24 years old. Allen Iverson has already met her. [...]

Along with her friend, the silent Turk to my right, she went to Iverson’s first game in Istanbul the night before, in a home arena so tiny — it seats 3,200 — she could easily find Iverson’s manager, Gary Moore, and tell him how she studied at Georgetown. Iverson’s school! So Moore naturally invited her to join Iverson and his crew at their post-game haunt, the place where he’s been hanging out with his slightly downsized America-to-Istanbul posse, in this lovely ancient city: T.G.I. Friday’s. That’s where Iverson lands every night, for all of his first week in Istanbul. Friday’s.

If You Can't Beat the Jets, Wait Til Next Year

2010-12-31T10:31:00.003-05:00

A strange but true fact heard recently on the radio: Since 1966, no team--AFC or NFC-- has ever lost to the Jets and won the Super Bowl in the same season.

Sorry, New England and Pittsburgh. Better luck next year.

Video: Amar'e Dunks On LeBron

2010-12-29T10:26:00.001-05:00

Enjoy, before the King confiscates the evidence.

National Film Registry, Shirley

2010-12-28T19:05:00.003-05:00

Each year, the National Film Registry selects 25 films, deemed "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant," for preservation in the Library of Congress. This year's movies include such classics as "All the President's Men," "Malcolm X," "The Pink Panther," and, in a nice surprise, "Airplane!" Here is the registry's explanation of why it added the Jim Abrahams and Zucker brothers film to its library, which now houses 550 films:

Characterized by a freewheeling style reminiscent of comedies of the 1920s, ‘Airplane!’ introduced a much needed deflating assessment of the tendency of theatrical film producers to push successful formulaic movie conventions beyond the point of logic.

How to Date Natalie Portman

2010-12-28T13:55:00.005-05:00

Dance, dance dance, according to Men's Health:

The fact is, Portman’s engagement appears (on the surface, anyway) to be further proof of the power that a man who can dance—or hell, a man who is willing to dance—can hold.

[snip]

Researchers at Northumbria University and the University of Gottigen in Germany found that women were more attracted to men who performed “flamboyant,” over-the-top dance moves. “It’s all about body movement and variation,” study author David Neave told the Telegraph. “Tilting forward, backwards, left and right and twisting around. What it shows is strength, suppleness and creativity, all of which shows you are a good catch."

Dunk-O-Meter

2010-12-27T11:54:00.006-05:00

Blake Griffin, to the surprise of no one, tops CBSSports.com's list, with 72 dunks. His 72 dunks, according to TrueHoop, exceed the total dunks of six NBA teams--the Houston Rockets, the Milwaukee Bucks, the Detroit Pistons, the San Antonio Spurs, the New Orleans Hornets, and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The website should just rename its list in his honor.

Bettye LaVette

2010-12-27T10:24:00.004-05:00

After reading Alec Wilkinson's New Yorker profile of Bettye LaVette, I finally learned a few things about the mystery singer who, in 2008, wowed Pete Townshend and Roger Daltry (and Babs!) at the Kennedy Center Honors. Among others: She didn't want to sing "Love Reign O'er Me"; she was raised Catholic; and she currently resides in West Orange, N.J., about three of four miles from where I grew up. Imagine that. Under different circumstances, I could today be shoveling her front walk.

Instead, I'll make due with this clip of my former neighbor singing Led Zeppelin's "All of My Love" in her self-described "very harsh and very gruff" voice, transforming the rock classic into something entirely different, something entirely her own.

Check out, too, LaVette's most recent album "Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook." May the Moody Blues never be so lucky again.

Pearl Jam: Someday At Christmas

2010-12-24T10:18:00.001-05:00

"Someday at Christmas men won't be boys."

Run DMC: Christmas in Holis

2010-12-24T10:15:00.001-05:00

"But each and every year we bust Christmas carols."

The Sonics: Don't Believe in Christmas

2010-12-24T10:11:00.001-05:00

"The reason that his nose shine, Santa gave him moonshine."

Jackson 5: Santa Claus Is Coming to Town

2010-12-24T10:06:00.004-05:00

"Elephants, boats and kiddie cars too."

The Kinks: Father Christmas

2010-12-24T10:01:00.004-05:00

"Father Christmas, give us some money."

The Octothorpe

2010-12-22T13:05:00.002-05:00

Tim Dowling re-considers the octothorpe, Twitter's ubiqutous hash tag:

The term octothorpe was coined by engineers at Bell Laboratories in the early 1960s, who wanted a name for one of two non-number function symbols on the first touch-tone keypads (the other was the *, which they called a sextile). It didn't catch on, and the # key became famous as an ineffectual way of interacting with the robots who work at your bank.

Until, that is, Twitter came along. The octothorpe is the essential symbol in the formation of a hashtag, a marker that allows 140-character tweets to be grouped together by subject (#boringtypographystories, for example).

It is today a near-universally recognized symbol, like the dollar sign or the Golden Arches. Strange, isn't it, what things catch fire?

Video: Blake Griffin's Layup

2010-12-20T11:42:00.005-05:00

Impressive enough to excite the baseline official, an impartial observer. Amar'e, as always, approves.

30 For 30: One-Sentence Reviews

2010-12-17T15:09:00.002-05:00

The awesomely named Hellafied Gangsta Lean runs through all 30 of ESPN's 30 for 30 documentaries.

15. June 17, 1994: You picked the wrongest day ever to be away from the television.
16. The Two Escobars: You picked the wrongest era ever to be from Columbia.
17. The Birth of Big Air: Most of us learn how to ride a bike by the age of seven, but then we go on to other things while others stay seven forever.
18. Jordan Rides the Bus: The elixir of ego, compulsion, addiction and entitlement is as powerful as meth but less corrosive to dental work.
19. Little Big Men: Sometimes your life peaks in grade school.
20. One Night in Vegas: “Can’t C Me” was a great song but factually inaccurate.

(Via)

A League of Their Own

2010-12-16T07:00:00.006-05:00

Streaks, individual or collective, are a part of sports. This past month, for instance, has been full of them. Last night, the Knicks, winners of eight straight, took on the Boston Celtics, winners of their last 10. A major subplot of the game was Amar'e Stoudemire's personal streak of eight consecutive 30-point games, a new Knicks' record. (Unfortunately, only the Celtics' and Amar'e's streaks remain extant.)

Also last night, the Heat, now more comfortable under their new black hats, vanquished, for the second time in as many weeks, LeBron's former flame, the Cleveland Cavaliers, for their 10th straight win. The Cavs' loss, though significantly closer than their margin of defeat at LeBron's homecoming, was their ninth straight. The Chicago Bulls and San Antonio Spurs won, too, bringing their respective streaks to seven and six.

What to make of these all streaks? Are they reflective of these teams' talent, or just a product of scheduling or luck? Or perhaps the sample size is too small to make a difference one way or another? It could be one of these things, or all of them, or, if one wanted to entertain such thoughts, none at all. I don't know. But I do know a streak is a precious thing, a phenomenon not to be trifled with. “A player on a streak,” Crash Davis tells us, “has to respect the streak.” Sage advice, really, for any sport, or in any arena. What Mr. Davis doesn’t impart, though, is when a streak, in this case consecutive wins, transforms from a simple series of victories strung together, one by one, in a neat little row into something more substantial. At what shimmering point does the simple act of winning become the norm? When does winning--not 24 out of 25, but every game-- become expected?

To answer this, one need look no further than the University of Connecticut's women's basketball team. The most remarkable, and, sadly, least remarked upon, streak belongs to the Huskies, winners of 87 straight. A victory Sunday against Ohio State would equal the all-time Division I record established more than 3o years ago by John Wooden and his all-everything Bruins of UCLA. Between 1971 and 1974, Wooden's teams, featuring, at one time or another, Bill Walton, Henry Bibby, and Jamal Wilkes, won 88 straight games. It is the benchmark for success, a historic, once untouchable, achievement, suddenly within the reach of the Huskies.

“We’re the only ones in position to be able to do something that everybody thinks is pretty significant," UCONN coach Geno Auriemma, architect of the vaunted program, recently told the Times. "No one else has and no one else can right now. So now that we’re here, let’s get it done. Let’s win.”

To put UCONN's streak into perspective, consider these other historic milestones. The 1971-1972 Los Angles Lakers, anchored by Wilt Chamberlain, won 33 straight, the most consecutive wins in the history of the NBA. Fifty-six years earlier, the Giants, still residents of Manhattan, won 26 games in a row, between August 25 and September 6, still an MLB best. More recently, the Pittsburgh Penguins, one of the most talented teams in the history of the National Hockey League, put together a record 17 straight wins during the 1992-1993 season, while the New England Patriots, to my dismay, reeled off 21 straight, over the course of two seasons, between 2003 and 2004. (The Democrats, it should be noted, once controlled the House of Representatives for 40 straight years, but that's neither here nor there.)

None come close to UCLA's or, with a win on Sunday, UCONN's. Eighty-eight straight is so much more than a mere streak. It is a standard of greatness, for any league.

The Master and Margarita Animated Trailer

2010-12-15T11:39:00.004-05:00

An animated Russian adaptation, as weird, playful and beautiful, it seems, as Mikhails Bulgakov's novel.

(Via via)

Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti

2010-12-14T10:43:00.003-05:00

The band's "Round and Round" is Pitchfork's best track of 2010.

This is music that gets over on its astonishing level of craftsmanship, which is something no casual Ariel Pink fan accustomed to his blown-out home recorded lo-fi output over the last decade would have expected from him in a million years. In 2010, Ariel Pink was the strange kid who fucked around all semester and developed a reputation as a hopeless loser who then proceeded to blow everyone's minds at the talent show. And in the end, "Round and Round" succeeds brilliantly for the same reason great Burt Bacharach songs work-- because every chord change and turnaround and melodic leap is in exactly the right place. "We'll dazzle them all," goes one line, and it's no idle boast; another goes, "Write the songs that say, 'I like that!'." Done and done.

Hell if I know. Pitchfork, like most every other publication about music, is beyond me. I'm very much out of the circle, though I do take some measure of satisfaction in track No. 9, Arcade Fire's "Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)." I've been pushing that song for months. "Ready to Start" comes in at No. 36.

Wilson Chandler: Role Player

2010-12-13T16:39:00.008-05:00

Rob Mahoney breaks down Wilson Chandler's more efficient game.

The structure of a quality basketball team demands symbiosis. It’s not good enough to put together a collection of talent with a mutual interest in winning; instead, the most effective squads are assembled in a way that allows each component to benefit from being a part of the comprehensive whole. It’s from that truism that Chandler’s efficient campaign was born. He’s a productive player when left to his own devices, but Chandler has transformed into a steady hub of efficient scoring by attacking defenses oriented to stop Stoudemire and Felton.

Chandler isn’t a radically different player than he was a year ago, but by spending some quality time with his jumper and subtly altering his playing style, he has been able to increase his shot efficiency while reducing his turnovers.

This, for me, is the key to the Knicks' early success. The starting five all have clearly defined roles and responsibilities. Because Stoudemire and Felton, the lynchpins of D'Antoni's system, are playing so effectively, the rest of the squad can take advantage of their opportunities. Last year, in comparison, Chandler, a good player, probably had to produce more because the offense, then run by Chris Duhon, broke down more often than not. As a result, he often forced some bad shots, often trying to play above his head. It wasn't always pretty.

This year, though, Chandler's playing within a structured, and better run, system as a third or fourth option with Danilo Gallinari. And both Chandler and Gallinari, averaging 17 and 15 points, respectively, are turning into steady hubs of efficient scoring, while Stoudemire and Felton take care of the rest. It's all about individual roles.

Video: Metrodome Roof Collapse

2010-12-12T13:39:00.002-05:00

Mother Nature: 1. Metrodome: 0

Thin Lizzy and Grandma

2010-12-10T15:17:00.003-05:00

In 1982, May Booker, a 70-year-old grandmother from England, wrote producers at the BBC. The subject of her letter was her favorite band, Thin Lizzy, hard rock’s biggest act at the time. “How nice it would be,” she wrote, “to play with them.”

Recognizing a golden opportunity, producers reached out to the band. Lead singer Phil Lynott, raised by his paternal grandmother in Crumlin, Dublin, agreed to share the stage with Booker, who “played” an Oberheim OB-X synthesizer on the band’s pre-recorded performance of “Hollywood."

Teen Mathletes

2010-12-10T13:22:00.003-05:00

Jason Fagone examines the competitive world of coding through its two biggest stars, the American Neal Wu and his rival, Gennady Korotkevich, the so-called Boy Wonder of Belarus:

Wu, a smallish kid with black hair that is less unkempt than that of your ordinary nerd, cranes his neck and glances around the gym, taking in the scene: kids from 83 countries, their desks arranged in cloverleaf clusters of four, looking—despite their races and nationalities—like members of the same tribe. Many are wearing the black Google T-shirt that was stuffed into their IOI schwag bag, and most of the rest are decked out in team-issue polos or T-shirts from prior competitions. (Notable exceptions: the three young women in head scarves representing Team Libya.) Korotkevich is out there somewhere, a mysterious wraith in a blue pullover. Wu has no idea how well his rival is doing—during each competition period, the kids can see only their own scores—but the contest organizers certainly know. They’re up in the gym balcony, tracking the live scoreboard on their laptops. And it looks pretty bad.

Wu is not even on the board yet. This is a slaughter in the making.

And then, 70 minutes into the competition, Wu places his fingers on the keyboard.

Fagone's entertaining piece is worth the read. Check it out.

(Via)

Bouncing, Praying

2010-12-09T12:15:00.006-05:00

"It was bouncing and I was praying, praying, praying," Raymond Felton said after the Knicks bested the Raptors last night in the Garden. Felton's soft bounce, his quiet prayer, coupled with the squad's muscular, inspired play of late is a revelation, a come-to-Jesus moment for the people who don't want to believe, won't let themselves believe, in this Knicks team.

In the years since the Knicks traded Patrick Ewing, the franchise's most conspicuous stroke of luck, the ball has rarely, if at all, bounced in the Knicks' favor. A decade of futility and ignominy, on and off the court, seems to have been the going rate for two-plus decades of good fortune.

But a new season, a new decade, brings new luck, new chances. And this Knicks squad, led by Amar'e Stoudemire and Raymond Felton, is making the most of them. Winners of six straight and 11 of their last 12, the Knicks are suddenly surging, evolving ex nihilo into a looming offensive juggernaut and a bona fide playoff contender, good enough, it seems, to compete every night, regardless of how the ball bounces.

Bowled Over

2010-12-08T11:40:00.004-05:00

Stewart Mandel breaks down the 35 scheduled bowl games, which kick off December 18 with the New Mexico Bowl and conclude, three weeks later, with the Tostitos BCS National Championship Game, on January 10.

Sure, your eyes may glaze over as you read the following 35 nuggets on the varying levels of prestige, quality of teams and awkwardness of sponsor names for each bowl. But on Dec. 18, you'll find yourself strangely invested in the Fresno State-Northern Illinois game, shouting at the TV when a receiver drops a pass. If UCF and Georgia played on regular-season Saturday, you'd never watch, but on the afternoon of Dec. 31, you'll be loving the fact that there's football on in the middle of the day.

All told, the 35 games adds up to 2,100 minutes of football, basically a day-and-a-half fans will never get back.

Rivaling the overwhelming number of games, as Mandel points out, is the ridiculousness of their names. Curiously named bowls include the uDrove Humanitarian Bowl, which pits, in a fight to the death, Northern Illinois against Fresno State, and the Louisville/Southern Mississippi slop in the Beef "O" Brady's St. Petersburg Bowl. There's also the Kraft Fight Hunger (Boston College v. Nevada), a good cause, if not a particularly good game, and the Franklin American Mortgage Music City Bowls, an arrhythmic mouthful to which either North Carolina and Tennessee, two proud institutions of higher education, will, unfortunately, have to attach its name. Even the Rose Bowl, the "Granddaddy of Them All," my favorite bowl game, has attached an corporate addendum to its illustrious tradition--"Presented by Vizio"-- an ugly and unnecessary appendage, a third limb.

Top Dog/Underdog

2010-12-07T12:33:00.006-05:00

45-3. Twist and turn it around in your mouth. You'll taste nothing as bitter the rest of the day. My New York Jets, once the prohibitive favorites to win the AFC, headed up to Foxborough for a Monday night game against the hated, and equally matched, New England Patriots. Some argued this was the most important regular season game in the history of the Jets franchise. Some argued it was a game that would, at long last, put an end to the Patriots' decades-long supremacy.

45-3. It wasn't a game; it was a disaster, an embarrassing, thorough, drubbing, live, in color, on national TV. "We stunk up the game on defense," Rex Ryan said after midnight, shifting through the wreckage. "We stunk up the game on offense. We got outcoached and outplayed."

45-3. The Jets, forever the underdog.

Bush League

2010-12-06T16:33:00.008-05:00

Enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame are 203 former major league players, 26 executives, 35 Negro League legends, 19 managers and nine umpires. A slim total of 292 elected members. The Hall of Fame, the website awkwardly tells us, is “home to the greatest stars and the history of the game.” Its hallways and corridors are populated with polished plaques and dusty shoes, relics of men who've contributed, in manners both great and small, to the game's popularity and lore.

And yet its custodians continue to refuse entry to Marvin Miller, the original chief of the players' association. Today, the Expansion Era Committee, a revamped version of the Veterans Committee, again barred Miller from the door. It was the fifth time Miller, 93, was on the ballot, and the fifth time he was denied. Because of house rules, he won't be eligible again until 2013, when the committee votes next. Sadly, Miller will most likely never see his induction. Entrance, one yay removed, will be granted posthumously. Though the pugnacious Miller, always up for a fight, sounded the bell one last time.

A long time ago, it became apparent that the Hall sought to bury me long before my time, as a metaphor for burying the union and eradicating its real influence. Its failure is exemplified by the fact that I and the union of players have received far more support, publicity, and appreciation from countless fans, former players, writers, scholars, experts in labor management relations, than if the Hall had not embarked on its futile and fraudulent attempt to rewrite history. It is an amusing anomaly that the Hall of Fame has made me famous by keeping me out.

Miller's exclusion is a shame, and largely anti-labor. The collective bargaining agreement, arbitration, and free agency were all products of his indomitable will. Miller, as head of the players' association from 1966 to 1982, increased the average annual salary from $19,000 to $241,000, much to the dismay of baseball's ruling class. The modern game is as much his as Reggie's or Catfish's or A-Rod's. A Hall of Fame, then, without Miller, writes Sports Illustrated's Joe Posnanski, is like Hamlet without "the melancholy Dane."

Nobody in the last 50 years has had a bigger impact than Miller, who as baseball's labor leader helped organize the players, eliminate the reserve clause, create free agency and, in the words of longtime labor lawyer Steve Fehr, "lead a group that had virtually no rights for 100 years and, within 10 years, establish a system under which players could receive fair market value."

Miller's influence on the game is no secret. Years ago the announcer Red Barber said that Miller -- along with Babe Ruth and Jackie Robinson -- was one of the three most important figures in baseball history. [Bill] James says that if you add baseball executive Branch Rickey (who invented the farm system and signed Robinson), you would have baseball's Mount Rushmore. It's a great image. Leaving Miller out of the Baseball Hall of Fame is like leaving Lincoln out of the Presidents Hall of Fame.

FIFA's Expanding Empire

2010-12-03T15:29:00.016-05:00

“We go to new lands,” FIFA President Sepp Blatter declared after soccer’s governing body awarded the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, respectively, to Russia and Qatar. Expeditions into virgin territories, history tells us, tend to get a little messy, and usually involve a fair share of controversy and rankled feathers. FIFA’s forays into Russia and Qatar, two oil-rich but soccer-poor countries, are no exception.

The final round of voting, according to The New York Times, came amid accusations of corruption involving 6 of the 24 members of FIFA’s executive committee. Two members were barred from voting. The United Kingdom's Independent went so far as to claim the fix was in, reporting English officials were informed 24 hours before the official announcement that Russia would host the World Cup in 2018. (A BBC broadcast critical of FIFA's opaque modus operandi three days earlier probably didn't help the UK's chances.)

England's early exit had officials in a tizzy. The chief executive of England’s bid, Andy Anson, threatened to sit out future bids unless FIFA overhauls the entire process. I can't say I blame him. England's presentation was unanimously characterized as top drawer, while the best that can be said about the Russian presentation was that it allayed, to some unquantifiable degree, serious concerns about the country's poor infrastructure and tight travel restrictions for foreigners. Anson's England, inventor of the game, managed a mere two votes in the first round, one of which belonged to their own delegate. A single vote after five years of detailed planning and an 18-month, £15m campaign, an embarrassing finish rivaled only by the Three Lions’ recent failures on the pitch.

Russia's upset over England, though, was mild in comparison to the selection of the high-risk Qatar as host of the 2022 World Cup. How, many wondered, did a country the size of Connecticut and a population smaller than Brooklyn, beat out the United States and the Americans' well-received pitch of record ticket sales and a treasure trove of corporate sponsorships and English- and Spanish-language television rights? Qatar's surprise win left many scratching their head, including none other than Nate Silver. Yet the Qatari delegation somehow managed to overcome legitimate concerns about sweltering summer heat and an abysmal human rights record with a dizzying $50 billion budget and breathtaking plans for 12 beautifully rendered air conditioned stadiums.

Perhaps the magnitude of both upsets influenced the early, though largely unfounded, cries of impropriety that echoed through the Baur au Lac hotel, FIFA's de facto headquarters during the selection process. Sports Illustrated’s Grant Wahl points out, perhaps not unkindly, that if FIFA wanted to avoid even a whiff of corruption, the organization should have stayed clear of Russia and Qatar, especially since at least three countries—the United States, England, and Australia—presented better bids. And Australia, for those scoring at home, has never hosted a World Cup. FIFA, as is its wont, met such criticism with a shrug.

Which brings us back to Sepp Blatter. FIFA's number one guy has a thing for firsts. South Africa 2010 was the first World Cup played in Africa. Russia 2018 follows suit. Qatar 2022 bags him two firsts of note: The first World Cup played in an Arab nation and the first World Cup played in a Muslim country. Contra Wahl, SI's Gabriele Marcotti argues Blatter's oft-articulated plans for introducing soccer to new lands should have tipped us off:

Which, evidently, is what matters most to him. And, while he is not omnipotent within FIFA (in fact, he didn't even have a vote, except for a tiebreaking one, if necessary), his preference was pretty much an open secret. And there are enough people on the Executive Committee who either share his world view, fear him personally or are happy to do his bidding to stay in his good graces. That, ladies and gentleman, is why we'll be going to Russia and Qatar.

Which is perhaps why Blatter also pronounced himself a "happy president" when he announced, to the chagrin of many, FIFA's latest ventures into new lands.

Westwind Prep Warriors

2010-12-01T16:56:00.002-05:00

Highschoolhoop.com asks a good question: Is Arizona's Westwind Prep the most athletic high school basketball team in the country? This highlight reel below, put together by head coach Bobby Bossman, makes a pretty good case in his team's favor.

Of all the players, point guard Kiwi Gardner stands out. Here he is with his summer team, the Drew Gooden Oakland Soldiers, in Las Vegas.

Find more videos like this on BALL IS LIFE

Cleveland Rocks

2010-12-01T16:47:00.006-05:00

A taste of what awaits LeBron James tomorrow night.

12:00-6:00 3rd Quarter
Scott-ie Pip-pen (Clap, Clap, Clap-Clap-Clap)

[...]

12:00-6:00 4th Quarter
De-Lon-Te! De-Lon-Te!

6:00-0:00 4th Quarter
Cleve-land Rocks!
Cleve-land Rocks!

Well played, Cleveland, well played.

LeBron's return to the city he abandoned and embarrassed on national television is a big story, on a number of different beats, for a number of different reasons. But I think only sports fans, the men and women who, season after season, live and die with one team, good or bad, grasp in full the real significance, the emotional heft, however temporary, of tomorrow night's game. Win or lose, tomorrow's game against LeBron is the closest Cleveland, as a fan base, as a city, even, might ever come to anything even remotely resembling closure.

The rest, as they say, is just opera.

For the definitive account of Cleveland, post-Decision, read Wright Thompson's moving piece for ESPN, Believeland:

Cleveland is trying to turn the corner, looking to the future. There is hope. There is a generation of Clevelanders invested in something. There is a lot of New Orleans here; one resident described what has befallen Cleveland as a slow, 50-year Katrina. There is a dream of regaining lost purpose. There is love here. There is fight. There are pierogies and dim sum and Sunday gravy and Polish Boys and Lithuanian moonshine that tastes like honey-flavored gasoline. All of these things are true, and if you get someone to take you into the hidden places of Cleveland, you will see all of it.

It is a complicated city with a common ethos.

NBA Hall of Fame Nominees

2010-11-30T14:16:00.003-05:00

Reggie Miller tops this year's list. It pains me to write this, but Miller probably deserves induction. As do Dennis Rodman and Don Nelson, the Association's all-time winningest coach. Chris Mullin, I think, will fall short again. Mark Jackson and Bernard King don't belong in Springfield, for vastly different reasons. Injuries robbed King of greatness. Talent did the same to Jackson.

A bit further down is Tex Winter, architect of the Triangle Offense. It's hard to imagine the NBA without Winter's offense, which is responsible for 11 NBA championships. Already a member of the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, Winter's rightful place is in Springfield.

Finalists will be announced All-Star weekend.

NBA Brawls

2010-11-29T14:18:00.005-05:00

Dime lists their five most memorable, 60 percent of which involve New York, if you count Charles Oakley as a Knickerbocker. And, really, why wouldn't you? Under Oakley and Patrick Ewing, the Knicks required a jump shot, defensive intensity and a left hook. That's about it. (See McDaniel, Xavier.) During the 1990s, fights were legion and, in one case, legendary.

Their biennial punch up with the Miami Heat stands out, but the fight that best illuminates the team's clenched-fist approach to the Beautiful Game is this donnybrook against the Phoenix Suns, a shocking omission by Dime. How do you sleep on a 9-minute fight featuring the future general manager and coach of the Boston Celtics, the mayor of Sacramento, Pat Riley, Charles Barkly, and Greg Anthony's shirt?

Note the pattern that would define New York's casus belli over the next decade: Provocation met with censure, followed by escalation and, finally, the nuclear option.

Leftovers

2010-11-29T12:31:00.002-05:00

After a weekend of turkey innards and stuffing, I’m back at the office, sweating butter, marrow and grease. My cubicle smells like a frying pan or a down-market abattoir. My muscles, still lathered with grizzle and rendered lard, continue to cry out for a post-prandial run, now five days in the making, and a sustained period of detoxification. All in good time, fellas, all in good time.

Feast

2010-11-24T21:41:00.004-05:00

The Museum of the Moving Image gives thanks for food in film. Project editor and film critic Matt Zoller Seitz explains the project.

Images of food ... unite viewers who might otherwise have nothing in common; they plug directly into the primal craving for transitory pleasure, the desire not just to admire and then consume inventively prepared food, but also to serve (and be served by) people who love us.

"Feast" is a tribute to such images... an appetizer intended to stimulate appreciation of the films that are included and enthusiastic citation of all the ones that weren't.

Enjoy the short film and the long, gluttonous Thanksgiving holiday.

Manny Banuelos

2010-11-24T19:25:00.002-05:00

While the Yankees and Derek Jeter continue to negotiate through the press, RAB's Mike Axisa scouts left-handed prospect Manny Banuelos, Man-Ban.

Banuelos earns praise for three things. First is his simple and deceptive delivery and the way the ball explodes out of his hand. His fastball jumps on hitters and often leads to ugly swings, allowing him to pitch upstairs consistently. Second is his control and command, which is already major league average and continuously improving. Third is the tremendous poise and mound presence he exhibits, which is what caught the Yankees’ attention in the first place. ...[He's] a front-of-the-rotation package thanks to progress he’s made during the last three seasons.

The Yankees are always going to throw money at players, and I'm fine with that. It's nice, though, the organization also continues to develop young talent. For every Teixeira, a Cano; a Hughes for every CC.

No Shamrocks for the Irish

2010-11-23T14:29:00.005-05:00

The Financial Times' Brian Groom tries to buoy the spirits of the beleaguered Irish, my people, forever on the dole.

1. A country that got through the famine and a civil war can survive this. W.B. Yeats thought the Irishman had an “abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy”. (Yeats gets quoted quite a lot just now.)

2. Perhaps this would be a good time for Ireland to follow Nicolas Sarkozy and David Cameron in measuring happiness. From a low base, one hopes the only way would be up.

3. Could Bono not bail out Ireland, in spite of U2 having moved its publishing business to the Netherlands to save tax?

4. The Irish Times asked Twitterers to name the things they love about Ireland. One said: “Your mother’s conversations that start with ‘Do you know who’s dead?’” Another said: “People going to amazing lengths to help each other. Never ceases to amaze me.”

5. With writers such as Brian Friel, Colm Tóibín, Seamus Heaney, John Banville and Anne Enright, there is no recession in Irish culture. Also, a new generation of musicians, actors, authors and directors is emerging.

6. Property developers have been warned by the National Asset Management Agency that they will be forced to sell their jets, yachts and Bentleys to pay debts. Better late than never.

7. Ireland’s labour force is among the best educated in the world. More 25- to 34-year-olds have higher education qualifications than in the US, UK or the OECD average.

8. Multinational investors have helped Ireland build strong high-technology clusters. It has some vibrant home-grown businesses too: half the medical technology companies are Irish. Exports are up.

9. Ireland’s rugby team lost to the All Blacks, but in hurling and Gaelic football the country has two of the great surviving amateur sports.

10. Ireland can escape royal wedding fever – a boon or a curse, depending on your view. And Mary Byrne, a former Tesco checkout worker from Dublin, could win X Factor.

To Groom's list, I'd like to add the return of the Pogues. Austerity Ireland is, when all is said and done, the band's rightful place. Shane MacGowan, and the rest of his countrymen and women, just couldn't keep beat with the Celtic Tiger.

Flip Flop Fly Ball

2010-11-23T11:44:00.003-05:00

Craig Robinson, the proprietor of the baseball inforgraphics website Flip Flop Fly Ball, describes the blood, sweat and tears behind the cover of his new book, which Bloomsbury will publish in the spring.

I immersed myself in baseball in the German winter, through the Torontonian spring and summer, and finished it up in the Mexican autumn. And now, it’s completely finished. And I’m allowed to show you what the cover is like. Here it is. Of all the graphics in the book, this one took the longest to do. Mostly because it has to be different things to different people. It should speak immediately to those people who’ve already seen my work as “that English dude’s infographics book,” and it should speak to people who’ve never seen my site, and just happen to be sauntering through the sports section of Barnes and Noble.

Like all of his designs, Robinson's cover is clean, expressive, and charming. For more graphs, click here.

The Best Advice for Writers

2010-11-22T17:02:00.002-05:00

The Rumpus' Dear Sugar helps the medicine go down.

The unifying theme is resilience and faith. The unifying theme is being a warrior and a motherfucker. It is not fragility. It’s strength. It’s nerve. And “if your Nerve, deny you –,” as Emily Dickinson wrote, “go above your Nerve.” Writing is hard for every last one of us—straight white men included. Coal mining is harder. Do you think miners stand around all day talking about how hard it is to mine for coal? They do not. They simply dig.

So write, Elissa Bassist. Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Write like a motherfucker.

Raymond Felton and the Pick and Roll

2010-11-22T12:27:00.005-05:00

Sebastian Pruiti breaks down Raymond Felton’s problems running the pick and roll, a staple of Mike D’Antoni’s offense.

The biggest problem I have seen in Felton when he runs the pick-and-roll is his decision making. Coming off of that screen Felton just seems to make the wrong decision (in terms of hitting the roll man or attacking himself), and these poor decisions lead to turnovers (Felton has turned it over on 14.9 percent of his pick-and-roll possessions). It is almost as if he predetermines what he is going to do before even coming off the screen.

Pruiti concludes the Knicks either need to work one-on-one with Felton or start running plays more suitable to his talents as a point guard. Obviously, the latter is in the team’s best interests. But I'm actually not all that concerned. As Pruiti points out, even with their early struggles, the Knicks still run the pick and roll at efficient clip (1.15 points per possession), fifth highest in the league. The Knicks have lots of problems; Felton's early pick and roll play, while admittedly frustrating, isn't the most glaring.

Arcade Fire Fridays

2010-11-19T17:10:00.002-05:00

"The Suburbs," a short film by Spike Jonze.

Canada's Host With the Most, Ay

2010-11-19T16:24:00.007-05:00

Hamilton, Ontario’s hometown newspaper, The Hamilton Spectator, profiles Dave “Big Dave” Kelly, the event supervisor at the Copps Coliseum, who’s rubbed elbows with some of the biggest stars of sports and entertainment.

If the entertainment and sports world in this city had a Ground Zero, this former first aid room just to the right of the Zamboni entrance in the basement of the arena is it. The home of the arena's event supervisor has been a way station for hundreds of the world's biggest stars. The autographed photos papering the walls in his small corner of the world tell his story and the story of the place.

He's chatted with 50 Cent, watched Luciano Pavarotti get examined by a doctor before cancelling his first appearance and stood in a pre-concert prayer circle with Metallica, of all bands. He's greeted Prince Charles, had a few moments with Billy Graham, shook hands with Lech Walesa and loaned his office to Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux and Eric Lindros so they could have a quiet pre-Canada Cup chat.

One time a guy walked into his office, introduced himself as Eddie, and asked if he could look at the pictures. Big Dave said yes. He always does. Even though he had no idea who the guy was.

“Twenty minutes later, he was on stage,” he says, kicking himself that he didn't recognize Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam.

In recognition of the Coss' 25th anniversary, the paper also published an interesting profile of the arena, the venue for 266 major concert events in its history. (Corey Hart, believe it or not, was its first sell out. Oh, Canada.)

Check it out for an interesting look into the economics of the concert business.

The Greatest Rock Feuds of All Time

2010-11-19T11:07:00.007-05:00

Rock is filled with writing partners who just couldn't get along. Rolling Stone counts down the 11 most contentious, bracketing their list with Mick and Keith, and Axl and Slash. In between are Simon and Garfunkel, Pete Townshend and Roger Daltry, Lennon and McCartney, and the Gallagher brothers, to name a few.

The Kinks' Ray and Dave Davies come in at number five.

Ray and Dave Davies have been blasting each other in the press ever since they formed the Kinks in the early sixties, but in recent years their conflict has gotten especiallly nasty. "Ray's an asshole," Dave recently told the Daily Mail. "You've heard of vampires, well, Ray sucks me dry of ideas, emotions and creativity. It's toxic for me to be with him. He's a control freak." The brothers haven't performed together since 1996, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon.

It's a combustible thing, rock. Conflict, big and small, is often its most potent fuel.

Time Lapse: Yankee Stadium Converted

2010-11-18T15:57:00.002-05:00

Save for the terrible score, this is a cool video of Yankee Stadium workers transforming the diamond into a gridiron in preparation for this weekend's Notre Dame/Army game.

Breaking sports news video. MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL highlights and more.

The Euro Step

2010-11-17T20:43:00.004-05:00

Jonathan Abrams breaks downs the Euro Step, a hard, lateral cut off the pivot foot, against the defense.

He is not alone. Players in the N.B.A. now often showcase the Euro step, a move in which a player drives past a defender by stepping one way and then quickly taking a big lateral step in the other direction. The move is a crafty way to distribute the two steps allocated to a player after he stops dribbling, and it goes right to the edge of being a traveling violation.

The move, a borderline travel violation, works, but it's not as pretty, or as deadly, as the crossover, the best move in basketball.

When Teachers Attack

2010-11-17T16:02:00.003-05:00

In high school, I had a history/political science teacher who demanded only one thing of his students: Do not fall asleep. Heavy eyelids, so common amongst 16-year-olds on winter mornings, made him apoplectic. Most of the time, he let us do as we pleased, as long as we at least pretended to heed his arcane pontifications on libertarianism and The Power Game, what he referred to, in dock siders sans socks, as “the only revered text in Washington.” He was insufferable, and his classes were interminable. A student nodded off once or twice a month, probably more, although his catch rate wasn’t nearly as high. When a student closed his eyes, even for a second, he’d slip over to the student’s desk, throw his books to the floor and order him to “get the hell out of his classroom.”

His outbursts were violent and intimidating. After each explosion, he’d spend five or 10 minutes reminding those of us still in captivity how falling asleep unnerved him, comparing the minor act of insubordination, if I remember correctly, to entering his family room and pissing on his leather ottoman.

When I saw this video of a senior lecturer at Cornell’s School of Hotel Administration getting all worked up about an overly demonstrative expression of sleepiness, I immediately thought back to my old history teacher, who I know is probably somewhere in Central Jersey caning a minor, railing on the off-stroke about personal liberties and the tax code.

Enjoy.

Ghosts of Knickerbocker Past

2010-11-16T17:38:00.010-05:00

As the Knicks tip off a critical four-game swing through the Western Conference, the young season, once so full of bounce, has suddenly gone flat. Ten games in, the team sits four games under .500, with five consecutive losses, each one more dispiriting than the last.

First came a home loss to division rival 76ers, a clunker of a game right on the well-shined heels of a nationally televised dismantling of the Chicago Bulls and an empathic, though less impressive, take down of the Washington Wizards.

Then came a 27-point road drubbing by the Milwaukee Bucks, led by Brandon Jennings, the high-octane point guard General Manager Donnie Walsh admits he should have picked in the 2009 draft.

Injury added insult next when erstwhile Knickerbocker David Lee, in his lone Madison Square Garden appearance, knocked toothless Wilson Chandler and matched, shot-for-shot and rebound-for-rebound, Amar’e Stoudemire, the man signed to big bucks to replace him.

The death rattle, silent, but distinct, sounded in Minnesota, of all places, where the Knicks let Kevin Love put up the NBA’s first 30-30 game since Moses Malone en route to blowing a 21-point, second-half lead to the lottery-bound Timberwolves.

Sunday’s poor showing against the undermanned Houston Rockets, proprietors of the team's next two draft picks, capped off the week of futility, as the Knicks fell short in the kind of sad, lackluster effort fans have come to expect. Scattered boos echoed throughout the arena, scattered, mind you, only because most of the crowd had fled the building in disgust before things really got out of hand.

Seven days, five loses. Hardly the quick start Amar’e promised when he declared, upon signing his max contract, that the Knicks are back.

Yet here we are. Ten games in, and fans (myself included, in my more vulnerable moments) are already calling for Mike D’Antoni’s head. The chorus, rising in number, has grown so resonant Donnie Walsh, prior to undergoing hip surgery, denied his coach was in any peril. Still, it's hard to believe D'Antoni's short- and long-term future with the team isn't tied, like a noose, to his team's present West Coast swing, the most important four games of his tenure at the Garden. Anything less than two wins would probably seal his fate, if not with Walsh, then with his players and his city.

Meanwhile, ghosts of Knickerbocker past are stirring, at home and abroad. Al Harrington, whose new team, the Denver Nuggets, take on the Knicks tonight in Denver, told the Daily News that D'Antoni never gave him a chance to succeed in New York. Charles Oakley, a perennial fan favorite, claims Walsh owes him an apology for misrepresenting Oakley’s relationship with his former team, while China-bound Stephon Marbury, forever Ying to Oakley’s Yang, bragged to the Post how D’Antoni, one of his many former foes, has whatever’s coming to him.

None of which would normally matter, of course, but as is often the case with ghosts, once one stirs, they all do. It's only a matter of time before Isiah Thomas commences with his annual rattling of the lights. A frightening specter once thought exorcised just seven short days ago.