Henry to Kansas

July 2nd, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

A week of nervousness pervaded the Kansas grasslands this week. Lawrence, Kansas, was particularly nervous, as they found that many people were interested in the question of whether Xavier Henry was going to come to Kansas or not. The soap opera lasted most of the week, after an interview in which his father said there would be a family meeting discussing where his two boys would be going. Henry put out a text last night to a local radio show that he would indeed be headed to Kansas. The question had arisen because the two boys had planned to go to Memphis. But when coach John Calipari left to come to Kansas, they announced that they would be headed to KU. Anyway, it seems pretty clear that the Henrys are headed to Kansas.

NCAA 10

June 29th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

The cover of NCAA 10 for the XBox was announced last week. Blake Griffin, from Oklahoma, will be on the cover as the most prominent player. This comes on the heels of a few controversial months where the NCAA has been accused of using the images of players for profit, while the players don’t get anything. Commercial purposes and advertisements for games regularly show current players, who aren’t allowed to earn anything and apparently have no control over their images and pictures. At the same time, Griffin doesn’t mind, because it makes his stock go up for his NBA career and it’s always kind of cool to get your face on the front of a video game, book or something else that anyone can buy.

One and Done

June 26th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

There is a growing chorus of people talking about the one-and-done rule in NCAA basketball, where a player that hopes to go to the NBA must play at least one year in college. Many of the coaches are coming out now to say that this rule is bad for the players and for the college teams. That is makes a college education seem bad and almost like some kind of punishment. Meanwhile, during the second semester, they don’t actually have to get to class regularly. All they actually have to do is attend basketball and that’s it, unless the team has an attendance policy. Other teams have no attendance policy and therefore are much more lax about such things. This is a rule that should be looked at, but it might just need some adjustment.

NBA Draft Very Soon

June 23rd, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

The best players in the NCAA will probably be heading to some of the most struggling teams in the NBA during this week’s NBA Draft. The Toronto Raptors, OKC Thunder and Los Angeles Clippers seem to be the teams that are first in line for some of these players, like the very talented player from Oklahoma. That player might actually head over to the Los Angeles Clippers, who have declared that they’re taking him, no matter what. They’ve even been showing him off to the media over the last several weeks. Why talk about the draft? It’s on Thursday. This means that we’ll be seeing where everyone will be going, where their careers will be starting. We wish them the best luck and will enjoy watching them “in the majors”.

NBA Draft

June 19th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

There will be a lot of different NCAA players headed to the draft this year. Many of the best players already declared earlier in the spring, and a few more are expected to leave soon too. As I think I mentioned a few weeks ago, it’s always hard for college basketball teams at this time of year, because they have to give up their best players to the big leagues. But that’s, of course, part of the deal, so we can’t complain too much. And it’s always great to see players with great promise move on with their careers and to see where they will end up. It’s like watching someone graduate. This year, we will see some extra talented players take on the mantle of prospective Rookie of the Year. That’s why Damion James has dropped out of the draft, because there are so many other good possibilities.

Texas James

June 16th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Damion James has un-declared himself for this year’s NBA draft. With the Texas Longhorns he has become one of the best-known players in the college basketball world. The trick right now is that he is also not quite up to the level that the NBA is hoping for, it seems. He didn’t hire an agent when he declared for the draft a few months ago, so he is able to pull himself out now that he and the scouts suspect he wont go in the first round. Instead, he will return to the Texas court next year and try to improve his game. It’s been a good learning experience for him and now he’ll know how to work the system a little bit more. He also knows what kinds of skills the league is looking for, so it will be interesting to see what he tries to do this year.

Floyd Out

June 11th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Tim Floyd has resigned as coach of the USC Trojans following a protracted scandal about whether he had funneled money to a man who, in turn, got OJ Mayo, a former player, to come to USC. He’s in a bit of trouble, but he decided it wasn’t worth the fight after all. His four year stint at USC generally quite successful and was a lot of fun for a lot of people. Now he will have to hunt out other coaching opportunities. He seems to have lost a lot of his interest in the job due to this problematic situation and he decided it would be better to leave than to stick around such a difficult situation. It will be interesting to see who they get to replace him and how it works out in the next few seasons.

Wise’s Wise Decision

June 8th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Nic Wise has decided not to stand for the NBA draft this season, because he will be staying at Arizona for another season. Wise was expected to be a 2nd round pick or perhaps fully undrafted. Staying for a little while longer gives him the chance to prove himself further, which will allow him to perhaps lead his team deep into the tournament. Meanwhile, the coach of the team will be happy to have a veteran player to help the younger players and to serve as an example and leader on the team. Wise will probably enter the draft after next season, but it seems like he made the right decision this time around. Watch Arizona this year as the dark-horse team that could go far this coming year.

Memphis Part 2

June 4th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

 

There are some interesting events going on in the NCAA Basketball world. A representative for a Tennessee congressional district publicly suggested that the NCAA should eliminate the age rule for those who enter the draft. Ok, this sounds legit. But suddenly you notice that he is in fact the representative for the Memphis university, where there is a big scandal going on. It turns out that they don’t have just Derrick Rose as a problem, but there is at least one other basketball player during the 07-08 season who had a possible fraudulent SAT score. This suggests several other issues going on and it seems that there need to be a few more people minding that all the info and documentation is in order. The chances are that there might be some kind of penalty for the mistakes/confusion/etc. namely, that they might well get deleted from the record books for that year.

NBA Star Caught Up

June 1st, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Derrick Rose, the strong rookie with the Chicago Bulls went to the University of Memphis during his one year in the desert between high school and the draft. The rule is that a prospect must spend at least a year between high school and the draft. But the new allegations suggest that Rose was put into his NBA career without regard to his grades or academic ability. This wouldn’t be such a problem, because such things aren’t unknown. But the difficulty comes with the fraudulent SAT score that went to Memphis which is believed to be that of Rose. It’s not clear if he’s really in trouble, but they seem to be working hard to make sure that none of the dirt actually gets on him. But the NCAA will be looking at it carefully.

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