1. SEC Co-Defensive Player of the Year, Missouri DE, Michael Sam came out as homosexual this weekend, what do you think it means for him and his hopes to get drafted and for the NFL as a whole?
Spencer-
For Michael Sam himself I think it just shows how courageous he is as a person to be open about being a homosexual knowing the judgement that can come with it. He broke the barrier and in a way, like Jason Collins was for the NBA has become an activist for being open about your sexuality no matter who you are or what you do. I sincerely hope he is judged by NFL scouts for his athletic ability and skill as a football player and not for anything else other than that. Obviously the media is going to make a bigger deal out of a potential NFL player being gay than what should be made in today's day and age, but that shouldn't deter a team from drafting him. When they look at Sam and his athletic resume they should decide to draft him or not draft him because they feel he is going to contribute to their team's success or not. Obviously I don't have control over that but his sexuality or the unnecessary attention that comes with drafting him shouldn't be reasons for not taking him in the draft.
Ty-
Honestly I don't know. I believe that this shouldn't be a big deal at all. Openly homosexual people have become more accepted in our community, as they should have. So my hope would be that it wont affect his draft status at all. But I will say that just because we like to believe that in 2014 homosexual people are universally accepted than we would be wrong. There is still a lot of discrimination and hate in the world. Although I don't think he will go through anything that a Jackie Robinson will go through I'm sure that he will go through his own hardship and he is a brave person to be the first openly homosexual in the NFL. But we won't know how this affects him until draft day. Mel Kiper has Sam graded as a 4th rounder. If he shows well in the combine but slips more than 2 rounds in the draft than I think that tell us all we need to know about how ready NFL teams are to draft a homosexual player. I do think that people aren't giving football players enough credit. I played football in high school with a lot of guys who are very open minded. The best thing about this is that although it seems a little late for this to happen, all you need is one person to make this no longer a problem or a big deal. This will be great for athletes who feel they have to hide who they are in order to realize a dream of theirs.
2. The Dunk Contest has a new format. Do you like it? Do you think that it will make the contest better?Ty-
The Dunk Contest format has changed quite a bit. Now instead of head to head there will be two teams, East and West. There will be a freestyle portion where people just continue to dunk for 90 seconds non-stop and the judges decide which team wins. The winnng team decides who goes first in the second round which is a head to head portion where one dunker from one conference goes up against another from the other conference. The judges will decide each head to head matchup until one conference has won 3 matches. Each match loser is eliminated, so you could have a situation where one player has to win 3 head to head matchups in a row to win for his team. After the winning conference is crowned then fans get to vote on who the "Dunker of the Night" was.
I think that I really like the format change. I'm excited to see how well it works and if it adds more intrigue to the final event. It also helps that for the first time since the 80's there are 3 All-Star players (Paul George, John Wall, Damien Lillard) in the dunk contest. Sure it's not LeBron but I also feel like LeBron is more of a great in game dunker than he would be in a competition like this.
Spencer-
I do like the changes. I think before the NBA was having problems getting stars into it, the dunks were getting less and less impressive, this was a creative change that allowed for more of a "team" feel but still come competitiveness with people coming up with creative ways to dunk the ball. I think the togetherness or team aspect of it now promotes some of the bigger names to do it cause they all get to play as together, be creative together and do less dunks individually. Can't argue with the NBA trying to bring in a positive change to it to bring back its popularity. If not for anything people will at least check it out to see this new format.
Spencer-
Personally, I'm most excited for the Hockey and I enjoy watching some other events like Curling cause it's just so different and the strategy to it is pretty cool, the Bobsled cause who doesn't like a sled going down a ice slide at 90 mph, and then some of the skiing/snowboarding stuff is pretty cool too. I think Americans should try to watch as many events as they can cause whether you believe it or not the Olympics is a cool way to unite people in each country around the world by showing some competitiveness but advertising togetherness as well. That being said though I think the Hockey will be the most watched. After 2010 in Vancouver when the U.S. nearly beat Canada for the gold medal in one of the best hockey games of all time I think people will be anticipating that again. I still remember all the tweets hating on Canada after that game so I know everyone wants a rematch with that team for gold this year.
Ty-
I think most people are going to tune in for the hockey portion. Specially if you are a NHL fan because they have put the season on pause for the olympics. I like watching most of the events because they are so fascinating to me. Alpine Skiing is crazy.Luge looks like it's fun to do. Bobsled, shout out to Jamaica! "Sanka, you dead?" "Yah man". Yes I just quoted cool runnings! You also can't forget about figure skating and my personal favorite, Curling. They just slide a thing on ice and the team sweeps in front of it to control where it goes! I think that it's just simply amazing that somebody though of that as a sport.
4. There are only 2 undefeated teams in men's college basketball
Ty-
I think that it is almost a little crazy that these two teams are even undefeated but Wichita State has a better chance. Syracuse is really good but they do have weaknesses. One weakness is that besides Cooney, they aren't a very good shooting team. But they find ways to win with their great front line and defense. It just doesn't seem like the Orange are a dominant team. Which is fine because they keep finding ways to win. They are coming up on a rough stretch though, going on the road to face Duke, Pitt and Virginia in 3 of the next 6 games. I wouldn't be surprised if they won all of those games but they have benefited from playing some of their harder opponents at home. Wichita State has a great team that has continued the momentum from it's run in the tournament last year but they aren't as good a Syracuse. They just benefit from being in a conference that might only get one tournament bid.
Although I hope my Orange pull off the undefeated season I think it is very unlikely given their tough schedule down the stretch, so I got to go with Wichita. Syracuse plays in the ACC and even though the have made the transition to the conference very well (out to a 10-0 start), they still play games with quality opponents in their eight remaining games including #25 Pittsburgh, a highly anticipated rematch at #8 Duke and #17 Virginia. It's not going to be easy to sweep those games. With that in mind I take a look at Wichita who is a well deserving to ranked team, and I see a schedule that bodes well for them going undefeated. They only have six games remaining, all against non-ranked Missouri Valley Conference foes. Enough said. Great team in a week conference could mean undefeated.
5. What did we learn this week in sports?
Look I love going to games live and in person and cheering for my teams, but there is a line that shouldn't be crossed. I think we saw that line being crossed during the incident at the Texas Tech, Oklahoma State game when Marcus Smart shoved a fan who insulted him when he fell out of bounds into the stands. Now we don't know exactly what was said but it may have been racial, and even if it wasn't I just can't accept this as a culture. Look boo all you want, disagree with a call and express your anger, but when you insult a person or label them with judgements and fallacies it's crossing the line in my opinion.
Do I agree that Smart should of shoved the guy? No, keep your composure man that's part of your job. But it's also part of a fan's job to show some respect for the game and the players playing it. People forget that sports are there for our entertainment pleasure, which means the people playing them are their for our entertainment too. Whether or not they are on your team shouldn't matter, they are still playing a childs game that we love to watch. If you're going to be obnoxious watch from your house so you can scream at the TV and your family won't judge you. But it isn't a free for all for fans just cause you bought a ticket to the game. Also if the n-word was thrown out there that is even more ridiculous cause now while Smart serves a suspension and the fan who brought race wrongly into it gets to come back next week. We expect our beloved athletes to show some character, well why don't we as fans show some damn character? Stop embarrassing yourself, and the members of your fan base.
Ty- (Editor/Side note: Does anybody believe that this guy only said "Piece of crap"? Either the Orr guy is a little kid and preceded to call Smart a "Doo doo head dumbie" and Smart is really short tempered. Or this Orr guy is lying about what he said.)
The Pistons recently fired their head coach Mo Cheeks after the team started 21-29 in an already disappointing eastern conference.
The Pistons are the east bizarro-esqu version of the New Orleans Pelicans. Both teams added tons of talent in the offseason, but they added talent that was redundent to their roster. The Pelicans added too many guards when they traded for Tyreke Evans and Jrue Holiday, which resulted in poor defense and a poor record.
The Pistons did the same thing but with front court players. They added Josh Smith and forced him to play as a small forward when he has always played better as a power forward. This meant a lineup of Josh Smith, Greg Monroe and Andre Drummond. This resulted in bad defense, bad offense, and a poor record. Josh Smith is too slow footed to cover quicker small forwards and Greg Monroe continues to be to slow of foot to guard well ever. Meanwhile the Pistons score below the league average for points per game.
Joe Dumars was praised for putting together the Pistons team that won a championship in 2004 but maybe it is time that he is let go. He has now possibly botched two free agent periods where the Pistons had ample amount of cap space. Maybe another coach can come in there and make them a better team either for the rest of the season or next year but right now the Josh Smith signing is looking like a failure. It also hurts that the Pistons are on the verge of missing the playoffs in a conference where the number 3 seed is only 2 games over .500.
Spencer: Fan's think buying a ticket to the game is a free pass to be as ignorant as they want.
Look I love going to games live and in person and cheering for my teams, but there is a line that shouldn't be crossed. I think we saw that line being crossed during the incident at the Texas Tech, Oklahoma State game when Marcus Smart shoved a fan who insulted him when he fell out of bounds into the stands. Now we don't know exactly what was said but it may have been racial, and even if it wasn't I just can't accept this as a culture. Look boo all you want, disagree with a call and express your anger, but when you insult a person or label them with judgements and fallacies it's crossing the line in my opinion.
Do I agree that Smart should of shoved the guy? No, keep your composure man that's part of your job. But it's also part of a fan's job to show some respect for the game and the players playing it. People forget that sports are there for our entertainment pleasure, which means the people playing them are their for our entertainment too. Whether or not they are on your team shouldn't matter, they are still playing a childs game that we love to watch. If you're going to be obnoxious watch from your house so you can scream at the TV and your family won't judge you. But it isn't a free for all for fans just cause you bought a ticket to the game. Also if the n-word was thrown out there that is even more ridiculous cause now while Smart serves a suspension and the fan who brought race wrongly into it gets to come back next week. We expect our beloved athletes to show some character, well why don't we as fans show some damn character? Stop embarrassing yourself, and the members of your fan base.
Ty- (Editor/Side note: Does anybody believe that this guy only said "Piece of crap"? Either the Orr guy is a little kid and preceded to call Smart a "Doo doo head dumbie" and Smart is really short tempered. Or this Orr guy is lying about what he said.)
The Detroit Pistons don't realize their problems stem from signing Josh Smith and not Maurice Cheeks.
The Pistons recently fired their head coach Mo Cheeks after the team started 21-29 in an already disappointing eastern conference.
The Pistons are the east bizarro-esqu version of the New Orleans Pelicans. Both teams added tons of talent in the offseason, but they added talent that was redundent to their roster. The Pelicans added too many guards when they traded for Tyreke Evans and Jrue Holiday, which resulted in poor defense and a poor record.
The Pistons did the same thing but with front court players. They added Josh Smith and forced him to play as a small forward when he has always played better as a power forward. This meant a lineup of Josh Smith, Greg Monroe and Andre Drummond. This resulted in bad defense, bad offense, and a poor record. Josh Smith is too slow footed to cover quicker small forwards and Greg Monroe continues to be to slow of foot to guard well ever. Meanwhile the Pistons score below the league average for points per game.
Joe Dumars was praised for putting together the Pistons team that won a championship in 2004 but maybe it is time that he is let go. He has now possibly botched two free agent periods where the Pistons had ample amount of cap space. Maybe another coach can come in there and make them a better team either for the rest of the season or next year but right now the Josh Smith signing is looking like a failure. It also hurts that the Pistons are on the verge of missing the playoffs in a conference where the number 3 seed is only 2 games over .500.
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