Illini Outlook

First of all, it's official. I just won my 2nd meaningless fantasy football league of the year. Somehow, I'm still bitter over winning these two leagues, and not the UPL league. I think that it's because I'm watching the players on my UPL league all put up big numbers this week, almost as if they were mocking me. Still, if I was a reasonable person, two wins and a runner-up would be a good season. But, I have some sort of mental disorder, so somehow I'm still annoyed. Oh well.

In any case I want to have a little discussion about our Illini hoops squad this year. Right now we're 8-5 with a couple of nice wins over Arizona St. and Mizzou. We've had 2 tough losses to Maryland and Arizona, and two terrible home losses to Miami (OH) and Tennessee St. Really, any of those could have been W's. Our only legit loss was to a pretty good Duke team. Even being optimistic, we're looking at something like 19-10 in the regular season. If we can get a win in the Big Ten tourney, we'd be 20-11, and firmly on the bubble for another trip to the big dance. I have a suspicion that it would take 11-5, and 2 wins in the Big Ten tourney to lock up a trip, which will be a tough task.

There are some things that are good about this squad. First of all, we're good on defense. We're not dominating, but if you're a bad team that only has 1 or 2 legit ball handlers, we'll tear you up. We'll talk more about our defense later. And I love the effort that we play with on both sides of the ball. We work hard, scrapping away, getting loose balls, and fighting on the boards. Shaun Pruitt is an adequate rebounder for his size, and Chester Frazier is the best rebounder on our team, and one of the best I've ever seen, pound for pound. We're also athletic. In addition to Brian Randle, we also have Mike Davis and Rodney Alexander as 6'8", wing guys that can fly.
Of course, if you've watched any of our games, you also know that we're flawed on offense, perhaps fatally so. Obviously, there are problems with shooting. We don't have much as far as consistent shooting goes. Pruitt is a rock down low, but you see some flaws that will keep him from being drafted (barring improvement). He's sort of flipping the ball at the hoop, rather than elevating and shooting it. He won't get away with that at the next level. He's picked up a little hook shot to go with his drop stop and his step through, which makes him legitimate in the low block. However, his lack of explosiveness keeps him from being dominant. One thing that he's improved on this year is putting the ball on the floor for 1 or 2 dribbles, and creating a little more on his own. Also, he's had a number of assists from the high post to open cutters, primarily Randle. So, he's improved, but it's been an incremental improvement, rather than a quantum leap. He may get a look from some NBA folks just from his size, but will need a lot of work to get drafted at all. But he is still one of the better offensive options in the Big Ten.

The rest of the squad is less inspiring. Two players that have done alright are Trent and Randle. Trent needs to have someone else make a play so that he's open. He's absolutely deadly against bad defenses, but struggles getting open shots against good ones. Randle has improved his outside shooting, but it's still only adequate, and not a n offensive strength, as he has not been actively taking the ball to the hole. One thing that I would like to see is for us to trigger a screen and roll with Randle as the handler and another big as the screener. That would make for a much tougher switch for most teams that the big/little screen and roll that most teams use. This doesn't require excellent ball handling, and can get Randle a lot more looks going to the hoop. Remember, with a big/little pick and roll, teams either double or fight through. If we had good penetrators, that becomes advantageous, but we're not great off the bounce with our guards. However, with a big/big pick and roll, most teams will switch. You also don't see teams double the big/big, because it's easier for bigs to pass over the top from doubles, and teams hate it when their bigs get fouls 20' from the hoop. If you fight through, you end up with an easy roll to the hoop for Pruitt. Off of the switch, you get Randle against a 5, creating a mismatch against most lineups.

I'd say that Calvin Brock has improved a bit on offense. He's hitting some clutch shots, but misses a lot of easy shots over the course of the game. It would be better if he was creating, since he's like Trent in that he requires someone else to get him an open shot, but has a little more versatility in how he can score.

After that it gets ugly. Rodney is about the same as Randle, only he gets lost more on offense (and defense, too). Right now, he's a bit in Bruce's doghouse, and seems to only score off of hustle (though you can say the same thing for the entire team). I think that Chester looks better shooting than he did last year, but he's still a liability out there as a shooter. However, his form looks to be alright, and it wouldn't shock me if he were to improve quite a bit between now and when he graduates. As far as the newcomers go, there are some worth talking about.

Dimitri is a little streaky, and probably is still used to being the lead scorer, and has to adapt. However, he's getting to handle the rock more, so maybe his offense will pick up. I like his game, though. He's sort of a power guard, in the Deron Williams mold. He moves his feet quickly enough to be a solid defender (can't tell if he can be shut down defender, yet). His outside shooting is a bit streaky, but the fundamentals are there, though from what I recall, his shot is a bit long. He's also able to get to the middle of the court consistently for a mid-range J (which is what I loved about Deron, even when he was shooting poorly as a freshman). What I haven't seen is his court vision, but in our offense, that's one of the hardest things to pick up.

Early in the season, I commented that if this team was going to do well, Dimitri would have to emerge as the 2nd best guard on this team. So far that hasn't happened, but I still believe that the rotation at guard needs to have both Chester and Dimitri in there if we want to get effective movement on offense. Trent doesn't make mistakes, but doesn't make the people around him better. Calvin is pretty much a liability on offense until he gets the ball in his hands.

One player who I could see getting more run down the stretch is Bill Cole, as his outside shot looks to be legit. He also has a solid hoops IQ/court awareness. He seems to move in the motion offense naturally (while many of his teammates still look like they need a GPS out there), and consistently makes the solid pass. I have a suspicion that he's our best option in the high post against the zone. Of course, he's a bit slow to play against a lot of 3's, and not quite strong enough against 4's.

Mike Tisdale has been the first center off of the bench, and has been very solid defensively, despite not being strong enough to really play. You can also tell that he has some very good fundamental offensive skills (a hook shot and a drop step down low), but isn't strong enough to get them working, yet. He also has a reasonable outside shot, ala Nick "Chainsaw" Smith. In fact, I think that we heard some "Chainsaw" chants from Krush earlier in the season. In 3 years, I think that he'll be awfully good, but right now, he's just not there. That said, he competes on defense very well, moves well for a 7-footer, and seems to be a pretty good shot blocker. He draws fouls because he's not strong enough to keep his man from getting the initial contact on him, so he fouls as he's pushed back.

Oddly enough, I think that of all of our big men, Davis already has the most refined offensive game. He's a solid finisher, and has a mid-range jumper, and a little hook down low that is efficient. I actually like his upside quite a bit, with him reminding me a bit of Brian Cook on the offensive end. Cookie was bigger and could get some easier buckets because of his size. But Davis' offensive game is at least as developed as Cook's was during his freshman year, minus the cheap interior buckets. Cook also became a pretty good defender and rebounder as he developed. I think that with effort, Davis could do the same. He's hampered by having narrow shoulders, otherwise his ceiling would be as a legit NBA prospect. But, he can still get stronger and become a very good Big Ten player.

And, our free throw shooting has been atrocious. It all starts with Shaun Pruitt, because he gets fouled so often in the low block. He's shortened up his motion, which helps reduce the number of things that can go wrong, but there's still a bad hitch in there. I'm guessing that there will be a little improvement from last year, but 60% would be considered a success. Our other players all have problems on the line, but without the obvious mechanical problems. As a team, we're giving away about 5 points a game on the line, and I think that we'd only have 1 or 2 losses, at most, if we were an average or better free throw shooting team.

Perhaps our biggest weakness that no one recognizes is our lack of ball-handling/passing. Really, we only have two legitimate ball handlers on our team, Chester and Dimitri. Trent is not a ball handler against legitimate defenses. Calvin is not a ball handler under any circumstance. So even when we're running a 3-guard offense, our ball handling is sub-par, unless we have Chester and Dimitri in the ball game. Our forwards don't help the cause. Brian Randle has been very limited, even considering he's a forward. Same goes for Rodney Alexander. And our centers, Shaun Pruitt and Mike Tisdale are average, at best. When we play against teams that like to pressure, we struggle getting into our offense.

The other thing is our execution on offense. We are bad at setting and running off of screens. Against Arizona, we had Chester and Randle throwing the ball around the perimeter, while Shaun, Calvin, and Trent were running around in circles. Calvin was setting terrible screens, and Shaun wasn't running off of them properly, and Trent just couldn't get open. It was bad. Rodney gets lost on offense, as do Calvin, Davis, and just about everyone else playing the 2/3/4 for us. Our centers have a pretty easy job, and our point guards do pretty well in the flow of our motion. It gets ugly after that.

So, with more problems than solutions, we're going to be flawed on offense. My best guess is that we need to get more minutes for Dimitri, and keep the minutes that Calvin and Trent are on the floor together at a minimum. When you have those two in there together as the 2nd and 3rd ball handlers, our team ball handling is pretty much terrible. Unfortunately, Calvin and Trent are our two best non-Pruitt scoring options right now. Trent kills bad defenses, and Calvin has been hitting clutch shots. Unfortunately, they kill the half-court offense. Perhaps playing Dimitri and Trent together is our best option, because Dimitri gets penetration the most consistently, which would open up Trent's shooting. Either that, or get our 3's the ball in the high post, and force doubles. One thing that we could do to get some more points is to get more aggressive off our in-bounds plays, particularly off of the baseline. We aren't just surrendering and lobbing high like we did a lot last year, but we're still not getting enough out of it. That's on the coach, both with X's and O's, as well as team execution on set plays.

Our offense has struggled against teams that switch up defenses. We still have problems with zones, and more recently, we've struggled against the press. Teams will mix up their press, disguising it will full-court man at times. Either one works against us, because we'll eat up 10 seconds getting it into the frontcourt, and spend another 5 seconds starting things up. We don't make teams pay for pressuring the ball in the backcourt. If I was coaching against us, I'd show press the entire game, and fall back to full-court man 75% of the time. This effectively dares us to create a shot in the half court in 20 seconds, which we struggle with mightily.

Defensively, you have some similar issues. Trent can't stop the ball against good ball handlers, and Calvin has this nasty habit of not playing defense until his guys gets the ball. Most of the time that's OK, but every once in a while it's way too late (see the easy layups that Arizona got by curling Chase Budinger into the free throw line, followed by a pass down low for a layup/dunk). And in any case, it keeps Calvin from becoming an advantage on defense. If he would make the effort to shut his guy down for the entire possession, he would be a scary defender. But given that he's sort of neutral to slightly positive on defense, it's really hard to make a case to keep him on the floor. So, it's tough to keep them together on the floor against teams with two ball handlers.

Chester is a phenomenal defender, as he's strong, works incredibly hard, and move his feet well. he also competes like crazy on the boards, so he's the lynchpin of our defense. He's our only legit stopper against opposing ball handlers. We'll see with Dimitri. He's got the footwork to play even, and competes well, but doesn't disrupt, yet. Randle can be dominant at times, but often, he's like Calvin, not playing D until his guy gets the ball. This results in some reaching fouls that could be avoided by improved footwork and positioning. But that said, he can guard guys on the wing, and down low, and can be an awesome presence. I think that one of the main reasons that we haven't seen more of Rodney is because he gets lost on D. Not Calvin-lost, but he'll lose guys after a switch or make a soft double that allows the ball to get kicked back out to his guy. Davis is also a little bit passive on D, though he does block shots from the weakside. He needs to get stronger, and keep working on getting low and moving his feet on D. In the interior, Pruitt has improved his D immensely. He works down low without picking up the cheap fouls that plagued him his first 2 seasons. He's not a great shot blocker, but makes shots tougher for the opposition. Ditto for his main sub, Tisdale.

Overall, our scheme on D has been reasonable. You'd like to see more effort from Calvin and Randle, but we're a solid defensive team overall, and can be excellent at times (when Calvin and Randle are dialed in). We can be attacked by teams with a 2nd ball handler if Trent is on the floor. And we can be attacked by players who can run off of screens if Calvin is on the floor. Our interior defense is solid, and we rebound pretty well. The problem is that we are so flawed on offense that we need our defense to create points. We can't do that. We can play teams even if we aren't scoring because our half-court defense is solid, but we don't create turnovers and cheap buckets on the other end. I would say that one way to pick up 2 fast-break buckets a game is to have Chester leak out, rather than go for the rebound, but the risk is that we don't have our best rebounder going after the ball. In any case, we need to find ways to create points off of our defense. One thing that we've been doing more in the last couple games is to double the high screens, particularly if it's Chester's man going into Pruitt. I think that this was the recipe from a few seasons ago, but becomes useless if Calvin and Randle aren't trying to get steals.

I still have apprehensions about Weber's in-game calls. I'm not sure why we're sticking with this safe, but solid, man-to-man. It wears us out, and we're not creating points off of this defense. It's one thing to try for turnovers off of a solid man, but if we're going to be passive, and try to play the other team even on defense, I would almost rather see us go 1-3-1, and have our big wings disrupt things, and keep our guys from being so gassed that they're off on their free throws. The motion offense is growing on me, but the set plays that we run when we come out of a time out are still shaky. I think that any team that struggles as much as we do adapting to defensive changes has coaching issues.

On the offensive end, we're not the most talented bunch, but our execution has some fundamental flaws. We have improved on taking an extra dribble toward the baseline to open up passes into the low block (the failure of which was the main reason Dee Brown wasn't a 1st round pick with guaranteed cash). However, we still forget that the high post is a very advantageous position for an offense. For someone like Randle catching the ball at the free throw line, it's almost too easy. You have options to drive, shoot an easy J, or pass into the low block either with a lob over a seal, or with a cutter coming from the wing against a doubler. Arizona won the game with 3 cheap lay-ups passing from the high-post down to a low-block screener. We've gotten some easy buckets with Pruitt serving the same role.

We need to force that option more, particularly against zones. The classic zone breaker is to go wing, high, and low, and force a double somewhere, and either shoot them out of the zone, or pound them out if you can get the ball into the high or low post with a 1-on-1 situation. This requires good timing from your post players, winning the spot a split second before the wing gets the ball. In turn, this requires solid screens from your bigs when they exchange high and low. Done correctly, this allows for the quick pass from the wing, since the double is likely going to hit the wing from a 2-3 zone. Unfortunately, our execution is flawed, so we are bad against the zone. This comes from the coaching, I believe.

With regard to recruiting, I'm actually OK with the kids we've brought in. I see a lot of potential in both Tisdale and Davis as forwards. Carlwell still needs to be willing to get stronger and to own the low block, but has time. Semrau has been invisible this year, but showed a knack for getting his hands on the ball last year. I have no idea what's going on with those two, with regard to eligibility. Bill Cole needs to develop the strength, but his upside is very high, given this high basketball IQ and the shooting ability. I like Dimitri quite a bit. We still need a 2 guard, though I think that Eric Gordon will fit into that role eventually. In all seriousness, we'll see how this Alex Legion transfer pans out next year. Hopefully Jerrance will help with recruiting, and maybe we can get some legit offensive players in here.

As far as this year goes, always being always the optimist, I think that we get our rotation figured out, and get Dimitri more run. I think that we get things figured out and become a scary team in the dance, like we should have been last year (honestly, we gave that game away to VT, and would have drilled Southern Illinois). No one wants to play teams that will beat you up, and make your offense ugly. That's what we do. If we can just figure out how to score a few easy buckets, whether it's on the line or off of turnovers, we have a shot at the Sweet 16. If not, we may have a shot at the Sweet 16 of the NIT.

-Chairman

The Worst Day of the Year

Nope. It's not Christmas Eve, on a general level. And you've already heard me rant on how overrated Christmas is. But I just had pretty much the worst day of the year today.

Yep. I lost in the UPL Football finals. It's like when Doyle Brunson says that the worst day of the year is the day you lose at the World Series of Poker. For me in the UPL, the worst day of the year is when you lose the chance at the Roland Slam. Sometimes it comes early, if you lose in baseball or football. This year it came on Christmas Eve. Bah humbug. Of course, the worst day of 2008 may come in the spring, if I don't get my act together in basketball.

The funny part, was that CJ (who actually won UPL Football this year, in his first attempt) and I did our 2nd Annual Bad Decisions in St. Louis weekend. We drove down to the Braggin' Rights game on Saturday, caught dinner and watched the game, and then went out on the Landing until the bars closed. One thing that we did do was get some food after the game at The Drunken Fish (sushi lounge on the landing), instead of going right over to the Morgan St. Brewery. Of course, after we got done at 2am, we promptly drove back to Champaign, pulling into TFS right at 5 in the morning. Last year, after we did this, I was sick in bed for about a week afterwards, and not really right until February. Of course, last year, I had a flight to catch the next day, and was miserable for 7 hours of travel back to my parent's place in SC. Of course, I was well enough to go out one of those nights, and meet an interesting character, so it may have been worth it. But this year, a late afternoon feeding at the new Chinese Buffet made things better.

I think that this is going to be a ritual for at least another year. That is, the Braggin' Rights game, followed by closing out the Morgan St. Brewery, followed by a drive back to Champaign, and not losing in the finals of UPL Football... though this is 2 years running... maybe it will be a part of the tradition, as well.

I still owe you guys a posting on the Illini basketball team. I like some things about this squad, but we're fatally flawed in some areas, I think. That will come soon - maybe tomorrow or Wednesday.

-Chairman

Catching Up

A whole bunch of random thoughts, since I haven't posted in 2 months.

First, after 16 weeks, I'm still alive in all three of my fantasy football leagues. Heading into the finals in the two important leagues - the UPL league where I'm gunning for the second "Roland Slam," where I win all three sports, and my first ever cash league (albeit only $30 to enter), where I'm already up $55, with a $30 swing riding on the game. My other league was a bit of an afterthought, but I'm looking alright heading into the semis. The funny part is, if I had to choose one to win, it's not the $30, but it's the UPL league that's always for bragging rights.

In fact, we have a new UPL Baseball trophy, courtesy of the C-Lauff Dollar that I won from my now-famous bet that I would finish ahead of C-Lauff in baseball this past year (note, when I made the bet, I was in 10th place, and C-Lauff was in 1st, so there was a decent chance that my mouth was writing a check my fantasy team couldn't cash). And we recently have won, but have not yet acquired, a Curran Dollar, which will becomes the new UPL Football trophy. What's awesome is that I made C-Lauff sign the dollar, and he was kind enough to write the inscription that you see below. This is much like Greg Camarillo's idea from this week's Dolphins win over the Ravens, only we've had this baby made for a week now.




I like the trophy. It's got a Stanley Cup feel to it. We'll have a lot of room to add the names of champions for the next decade or so before we have to expand it, maybe add an extra tier.

I still haven't written up my Illini Basketball preview, but will do so soon. Many of the regular readers already know my thoughts, after that awful 2nd half in the Illini-Arizona game up in Chicago.

I think that I'm going to pass on going to the Rose Bowl. Not only would it be sort of pricey, but spending those 5 days on the road would be bad for the dissertation (not that I'm getting much done here, but I could, in theory).

The weather got cold here, and we got some snow. I like the snow, but people become idiots who forget how to park when the snow hits the ground. Though, people on the roads to slow down, so oddly enough, it seems a bit safer. But what the heck happened to global warming?

Apparently we're having presidential debates and stuff. And apparently none of the Don King-Louis Farrakhan-Al Sharpton troika is running. I still think that a Don King/Suge Knight ticket would be hot. I mentioned something about candidates needing to have "it" to win a while ago in the comments of an IJAB posting. But we're seeing Obama, Hillary, and Edwards in a close race on the Democrat side. Those three all have "it" to varying degrees. But let's be serious. I'm not voting for any of those people. Obama bores me. Edwards bores me and seems shady. Hillary angers me and seems shadier.

On the GOP side, we're seeing a mess between Giulani, Romney, Fred Thompson, and Mike Huckabee, and maybe even Ron Paul.

Giulani's got a bunch of dirt on him, which would make for an ugly process. Romney's got that Mormon thing going, which along with being from New England makes for a tougher road in carrying the South. Fred Thompson's got the Law and Order thing going. Unfortunately, when someone told me that an actor from Law and Order was running for president, I just assumed that it would be Ice-T. But Fred Thompson's cool. These guys all have varying degrees of "it." Romney seems like a boring person. Giulani may be a little too interesting. And his name's hard to spell. Fred Thompson has the TV thing going for him, and his name even sounds like a presidential name. In fact, it's right up there with John Edwards as being the most presidential name in the race. This is crucial, trust me.

I'm not down with Ron Paul. Isolationism has never worked in the history of man. China and Japan were overrun by foreign technology when they tried this. The U.S. policy of isolationism helped fascism blossom in Eastern Europe in the early 20th century. This had to be discarded twice in 25 years. Plus, he seems stiff whenever I see him on TV. And most importantly, I don't trust people with two syllable names that aren't wrestlers (see Gore, Al).

I decided that I liked Mike Huckabee a while ago when he was on CNBC some random afternoon talking about his "fair tax" proposal. I like him even more now that Chuck Norris and Ric Flair (see? two syllable names have "it" in wrestling, much like Bret Hart or The Rock, of course I may have to reevaluate things in 2020 when Will Smith runs for president, though I may have to allow for a little bonus effect if DJ Jazzy Jeff runs for VP) have offered their endorsements. But even beyond that, he seems likable. Of course, people are wondering about his funding. Maybe he's actually running for VP? If you pair up one of the Northeastern guys with Huckabee to help with the Evangelical/South, you may have a winner. On the other hand, the Demcrats tried this with Kerry/Edwards last time around, which was a bit of a fiasco.

Of course, I'm still probably not voting, so I guess that it doesn't matter who I like. But if push came to shove, I'd vote for Mike Huckabee, based on the advice of Ric Flair. Of course, if Hulk Hogan endorses a different candidate, I may change my mind.

I'm sure that there's a bunch of random stuff going on that I'll write about over break. Maybe my renewed poker career or whatever random things pop into my head.

-Chairman

I Have an Idea...

... remember that time when that Pheidippides dude ran all the way to Sparta and back?

Yeah, dude, that was awesome. We should do it, too.

Didn't he collapse and die?

I think so. It'll be awesome.

Dude, you're on. Last one there's buying the Old Style.

So, let's recap. Great story. Some Greek dude runs 26 miles, and collapses. Then idiots everywhere decide that it's cool to follow suit, paying $80 for the privilege to run themselves into exhaustion, delirium, and if they're lucky, death. After all, you gotta get your money's worth. So, this New York Times article is pretty funny, actually. Some of the highlights include:

“I had no faculties whatsoever,” said Dawn Dowell, who was among the injured, having blacked out at Mile 19.

Sweet. She sounds like most of the people I've talked to this weekend.

...doctors saw runners with core body temperatures as high as 107 degrees. At those temperatures, Dr. Lucenti said, people are stuttering and mumbling, unable to answer simple questions.

I wonder if a lot of people I meet have 107 degree body temperatures, because I see a lot of stuttering, mumbling, and the inability to answer simple questions. Of course, I teach an undergrad class. Maybe the thermostat's up too high in the classroom.

Brain cells may start to be destroyed when body temperatures are raised too high.

Perhaps this is an epidemic, because I think that I've seen a lot of folks with damaged brain cells lately.

Others, especially those who had trained for months and flown to town for the event, said they were angry, and kept running. Some recognized Mr. Pinkowski, the director, and yelled at him as he walked away from the central race area downtown, he said.

I think that continuing the race should have been mandatory. But there's nothing like yelling at someone who just shattered your hopes and dreams of being a world champion marathon runner... wait... nevermind. If you hadn't made it halfway when they called it, you weren't going to win anything, other than maybe your pride. Apparently, it takes a t-shirt to fulfill some of these marathon runners.

And to top it all off, in the women's race, apparently some chick pulled a Leon Lett:

Adriana Pirtea, a 27-year-old Romanian running in her first marathon, was waving her arms in triumph when, with 10 yards to go, the race favorite, defending champion Berhane Adere, a 34-year-old Ethiopian, caught her and flashed by.

How cool is that? Maybe I'll start watching more marathons. Of course, I'll be sure to have plenty of Gatorade. It can get pretty warm sitting there in the sun for so long. In fact, I may just go to the bar to have a couple beers and watch it on TV with the rest of the fans.

Or not.

-Chairman

Strange Sensations

It sort of feels funny. It's like you've been there before, but it was so long ago that you forgot what it feels like. It's comforting, and strangely exciting. And you're openly happy about it. Though apt, I'm not talking about breastfeeding. I'm talking about Illini football.

Top 20.

No kidding.

The big thing is that we run the ball well, and we can play a little D. The Lou Tepper era was characterized by us running the ball for 2 yards, running the ball for a yard, and then throwing an incompletion, followed by punting. The D was pretty good, so we would lose a bunch of 17-3 games. The Ron Turner era was characterized by us running the ball for 7 yards on 1st down, and then throwing two incompletions and punting. The D wasn't as good, so we lost a bunch of 38-17 games. That's not to say that parts of the Ron Zook era didn't look bad early on. But oddly enough, the funky shotgun spread can be a power running formation. And this year, we're sticking with the run. A lot of that is because Juice Williams hasn't really improved as a passer (though in fairness, he's been banged up pretty good this year).

Some problems have always been game management. Ron Turner's teams looked like Mike Martz teams crossed with the old Oakland Raiders - sloppy with the time management and lots of penalties. We'd be giving away timeouts early in the 3rd quarters because we couldn't get plays in there. We'd take bad roughing the passer calls at the worst possible times. The Ron Zook teams have not been much better, though this last game was looking pretty good. We only had 3 penalties (plus an offsetting personal foul), and one of those was a shady roughing the passer call, where the ref's angle made a hit look worse than it was (from the side, a shoulder and a helmet lead are awfully similar). More interestingly, we didn't use any timeouts, which means that we were communicating well.

From here on out, you figure that we should beat Minnesota, Ball St., and Northwestern. We'll have a good shot at Iowa, but winning on the road is always tough. Ohio St. and Michigan are always problematic. If this trend of good game management continues, we're likely looking at a very nice 9-3 type of season and a bowl game in a nice city. Who knows? Alamo Bowl seems like a reasonable option. Being optimistic, maybe even a Florida game in January?

In any case, it'll be fun to see how this seasons unfolds.

-Chairman

Jacked Up

You'd figure that I would learn my lesson by now. Every year, I schedule flag football games late on Sunday, and every year, I have trouble sleeping on Sunday night. This year, we play at 10. So, basically, I've got my blood flowing hard from about 9 until 11, and then I come home, and try to go to bed. Bad idea. The best part is that I'm actually going out to breakfast at 8 with some of the doctoral students and one of our job candidates. I'm not usually a morning person, but going on 4 hours of sleep (assuming I can hit the sack by 4 - it's 3:10 now) should be interesting. Nothing like representing your program and your school by being a zombie at breakfast. Let's just say that I'll be ordering coffee at breakfast. Happily after breakfast, I can just go back to bed until I have to teach at 3. Of course, it'll be fun to see how I can improvise on what the lecture slides have to say in class. Happily, we won't have any cameras rolling.

This flag football season has not been a memorable one. In retrospect, I shouldn't have tried to put together a team myself this year. I should've just rolled with The Judge and the psych folks, maybe bringing a couple guys over with me. I thought that we had enough manpower to put up a very strong version of 13th Tribe, but some of my regular receivers couldn't play this year. And our recruiting efforts have been down. We haven't had a sub at any of our 3 games, and one game we actually played a man down. Not good times. The sick part of it all is that I may be putting together my best season at QB this year. I'm making some money throws, I've figured out some good route combinations, and am doing a pretty decent job of moving the rock around the field.

So tonight's game was a tough 18-13 loss. We got a little shell shocked in the first half when they just marched down the field and scored on us. We opened up with me getting a little confused by the defense. They didn't really rush me all out, instead having two tall rushers just stand in the passing lanes and try to bat the ball down. I got a ball batted, and on the next play I got overaggressive and threw a pick. Quick slant route where I tried to force it in, and the linebacker jumped in there. A couple plays later, we were down 12-0. Not good. We put together a couple passes, but turned the ball over on downs and they scored again to make it 18-0. We did manage to put together a couple nice passes to close out the first half, which actually helped things out, got me some confidence.

We came out in the 2nd half, and completed a couple short ones, working the ball around to everyone. I also mixed up the rushers with a couple pump fakes and a couple rollout plays. We got a first down, and then, we took a shot deep. Boom. 45 yard bomb down to the 6. Funny story here. One of the refs actually saw that we were down a player, and asked if he could play with us, since he was done working for the night. He was a former player, so he was confident, begging for the deep ball. If there's one thing I can do it's launch that 40-40 ball. 40 yards deep, 40 feet high. He hauled it in, but couldn't stay on his feet, so we took over. They rushed a little harder and almost sacked me, so we switched it over to our fast QB. Incomplete on 3rd, but on 4th, he rolled out right. I stayed in the middle of the field, and saw that he wasn't finding space to run or an open receiver on the strong side, so I yelled, "weak side." He heard me and launched a ball back across the field in my direction. I actually adjusted to the ball and jumped up and took it away from my teammate (who I didn't realize was my teammate until after the play). This was my first TD catch since the year I played with an I-Life team that had Jared as the QB. Let's just say that this doesn't happen often. I throw for plenty. I'll punch one in there on the run everyone once in a while. But I hardly ever catch TD's. If I was thinking more, I would've had a better celebration planned out.

We came out on D, and their QB, maybe feeling a little frisky, decides to launch a deep bomb, as well. Bad idea for them. Great for us. We pick that guy off, and get the ball back pretty quickly. We get a couple short passes, and have the ball just inside our 30 or so. Once again, our new player is begging for that deep ball. So, I send him on that route. I was looking to my short routes first, but the blocking opened up a nice area for me to step up, and as I was stepping up, I saw that the safeties stayed sort of short. My guy was behind everyone. Boom. 50 yards in the air into the endzone. Pretty hot. We get the conversion on a little quick hitter, and were down 18-13 with a little over 2 minutes left to go, needing a stop. We didn't get it until too late. They actually got the ball down to our 2 yard line, but we managed to stop them on 4th down, but with only 15 seconds left. We got the ball out to the 25 with a quick completion, but couldn't get enough laterals together to get into the endzone on the last play of the game. This was the second week in a row where we had a bad first half, but adjusted and played a good 2nd half, and had the game come down to the very end. The sick part is that if we got the ball back with 1:15, instead of just 15 seconds, I really liked our chances with them in prevent.

Oh well. Basically, the story of the game was that our defense didn't wake up until the 2nd half, and our QB (me) was an idiot until the 3rd drive, at which point, we were already down 18-0. So, this puts me at 0-3 for the first time ever. But the thing is, playing w/out subs, and down a man, and keeping every game close has been a pretty satisfying feeling. Don't get me wrong. I hate losing, especially when I have a team that should win. But man, playing with a patchwork team, and doing some good things on the field is a neat feeling. The best part is that the legs are holding up just fine. I'm pretty sore after the games, but that's from being out of shape. The knees feel just fine once I've gotten warmed up. And I actually jumped like a foot in the air to catch that ball, so that's encouraging.

In any case, we have one more game. Hopefully, we can put together some offense and have our defense come out aggressive this time and get a W on the board to close out the career (unless they somehow talk me into coming back for one more season :-) ).

Anyway, I'm off to get a glass of water and try to get a couple hours of sleep before I have to wake up and do breakfast. Uggh.

-Chairman

Heroes

So, I have a new star crush. Who is it? Well, it's actually no longer Erin eSurance, though I will always treasure the great times we had. I've moved on emotionally. On to a much more refined fellow. He's a little quirky. He says some incredible things. And he seems to have a great time doing it. For that I admire him. Who is he? I'll give you three guesses. And the first two don't count.

Give up?

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran.

This dude is pretty much awesome. I think that every morning he wakes up and says, "Dammit. I'll believe whatever I want to believe, but I'll try to explain it all very rationally. And I'll come out looking a lot smarter than all of the folks who wanted to ask loaded questions." All I know is that I'm guessing that I'll never be asked to speak at Columbia. Especially if any from Columbia ever reads this blog entry.

I don't need to be complimented by the President of Columbia to know that I'm awesome. But it was still pretty awesome.

Brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated? Thank you. Either way, that makes me awesome. Basically, I'm just that darned compelling that all you intellectual elites simply have to listen to me, whether you like me or not. Sort of like Howard Stern. If only I could hire his agent to work out a better package for my next contract. $100 million a year for 5 years? Really? Man. He makes A-Rod look like a bargain. I should probably also start looking around for movie deals. Private Parts was pretty good, but I think that my life story could make half a billion, globally.

Executing criminals? Well, in the under-18 age group, we're #1 in the world. George W's from Texas. He knows what I'm talking about. Besides, I just don't really like kids. You know what I mean. Kids these days. Most of them are punks. I don't know how it's gotten this way. When I was a kid, we had respect for our elders. Now kids just run around listening to their rap music and watching TRL, oblivious to the world.

The Baha'i faith? Come on. Get real. Have you seen these guys? They're worse than the Mormons. They're not even a real religion. They don't believe in anything. It's just a bunch of people going around saying, "I'm OK, you're OK." It's like watching a bunch of hippies, only instead of being atheist, they believe that everything's holy. Lame. You can't really fault me on this one. Who wants to keep getting these damned invitations to their potlucks? Maybe if they had better food, you could get some people to show up. Now those Southern Baptists. Those ladies cook a mean potluck dinner.

Gays? Nope. Sorry. I don't know what's in the water here in the U.S., but we don't have any gays over in Iran. Allah wouldn't allow that to happen. Don't get me wrong. I love me some Queer Eye, but I watch it more for the grooming tips, not because I'm supporting gay people.

Women? I'm reminded of Method Man and Redman in the classic movie, "How High." When Redman saw that he had failed a Women's Studies course, he lamented, "How didI fail Women's Studies? I love bitches." Yes, in Iran, we love bitches, too. In fact, in the words of American hero Isiah Thomas, "Bitch, I don't give a fuck about these white people." Amen, my brother.

Holocaust? Sure, it happened. But we should check the numbers. Six million Jews dead sounds awfully high. I've seen some studies that suggest that 37 is actually a more accurate number. So, until we see some other research, I'll go with 37 Jews dead at the hands of Hitler. But it was still a tragic event.

Israel? Don't get me wrong. I love the Jews. We've got all sorts of Jews here in Iran. I also like the Palestinians. We've uprooted 5 million of those guys for this Israel. Which is a lot more than the 37 Jews that died in concentration camps. Shouldn't we just give the Jews some land in eastern Germany?

In conclusion, thank you for hosting me at your great university. Now if you excuse me, I'll be visiting Ground Zero to offer my sympathies.

Yep. My hero.

-Chairman

Spoilers

I'm just happy that the Reds rolled over the Cards, basically ending their playoff hopes. That was sweet. Now, we get 3 more with the Brewers, and 6 more with the Cubs. If we could only end all of their playoff hopes, then that would be awesome. Unfortunately, someone has to win the NL Central. The Reds would have to go 14-2, and get a lot of help. So that's not going to happen. And frankly, I don't know if it matters. Of course, it wouldn't shock me if whoever comes out of the NL Central goes on to win a couple rounds, but let's face it. No one cares. These teams all suck. A strange stat. Since July 1st, the Reds are 8 games over .500. If we had been simply bad, rather than absolutely dreadful, at the start of the season, we'd be in the race. Go figure.

Going back to football, I've been thinking about the stealing of signs. And my basic instinct is, "so what?" Teams intercept other teams' calls all the time, and have been trying to do so forever. I still remember former Pro Bowl strong safety David Fulcher (a Bengals stalwart) talking about how he had read the lips from the 49er's sideline on the last play of the 49er's last drive during Super Bowl back in 1989. Basically, he read the lips of the coach calling in the play, and knew that it was going to be that slant to John Taylor. So, he slid over a few steps to the outside, jumped the route, and picked off the ball, taking it back to the 40, before he slid as time expired and the Bengals won their first, and to date, only Super Bowl.

Wait. No, he didn't. He still had responsibility to cover his spot, to he didn't slide over, to start, and was a step slow, as Taylor caught the touchdown, Joe Montana cemented his status as the best ever, and the 49er's completed their dominance of the 1980's, and the Bengals were sent into a downward spiral that was the 1990's.

Having knowledge assists in placing players in the right spot, but you still have to make the plays. If someone is on to your calls or your plays, change them up. How much game film is available now? How much time do the cameras spend on the sidelines now? The information is all out there. It's one thing to have spies infiltrate closed door meetings. But once you're out there on the field, and the whole world can see? That's not "spying." That's just observation of what's out there for the world to see, basically the same as figuring out the footwork that, say, Marvin Harrison uses on those goal-to-go slants that he and Peyton do so well.

I think that this is just an issue that people are worrying too much about. Shouldn't we be talking about dog fighting, or something?

-Chairman

Junkies Getting a Fix

So I have a bit of a crush right now. And no, it's not with the hot cartoon chick on the eSurance commercials. Well. Okay, maybe it is. But she's hot, she's wonderful, and I love her, and I don't care what anyone says. Quote, Buy, Print, dammit. We're going to have beautiful, black and pink haired, 2.5-dimensional children. Quote, Buy, Print.

In all seriousness, thank God football is back. I feel like an alcoholic with a cold beer right now. Like A1, yeah, it's that good. I think that I've spent more time watching football over the last 2 weeks than I have out of the apartment. I'm awesome. And I also promised a football preview after my fantasy draft. Of course, I lost my first game in my important league, so I don't know if my thoughts are worth anything (though I did get high score, and won a few bucks in my cash league). However, I will say that in my baseball preview, I actually did pretty well. It's sick. Who in the world would call Arizona as the NL West champs? And the Indians as the AL central champs was another surprisingly good call. Of course, there were a couple misses (I think that I was too lazy to edit out the A's after I copied and pasted from the previous year). But I think that C-Lauff is still upset about the whole Erik Bedard thing from last year and this year.

So, without further ado, my NFL picks:

AFC Division Champs and Wild Cards: New England, Indy, Denver, Cincy, Baltimore, San Deigo.
AFC Champion: New England over Indy
NFC Division Champs and Wild Cards: Chicago, Carolina, Philly, Seattle, New Orleans, Dallas.
NFC Champion: Carolina over Seattle
Super Bowl Winner: New England

NFL MVP: Tom Brady
NFL Offensive POY: Peyton Manning
NFL Defensive POY: Ray Lewis
Top 3 RB's: LT, LJ, Shaun Alexander
Apologies to: Run/catch threats Brian Westbrook and Steven Jackson
Under the radar RB's: Edgerrin James, Adrian Peterson,
Overrated: The rest of the U's backs (Gore, McGahee, Portis)

Top 3 WR's: TO, Steve Smith, Randy Moss
Apologies to: Bengals, Colts, and Rams corps
Under the radar WR's: Arnaz Battle, Santonio Holmes, Javon Walker
Overrated: Seahawks and Saints corps

Top 3 QB's: Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Carson Palmer
Apologies to: Big Ben, Vince Young
Under the radar QB's: Eli's time to shine, Cutler and Campbell making believers.
Overrated: Drew Brees and Matt Hasselback

AFC items of note:
There are a number of freaks at TE; the Tony Scheffler and Daniel Graham combo will outperform most of them.
The Broncos match up well will the Chargers, and will be able t0 use 8 in the box to stop LT.
The Broncos can run on any team that's devoting 2 defenders to Javon Walker.
The play of Jonathan Ogden and Levi Jones will probably decide the AFC North.
The Jags may not regret dropping Leftwich, but they're not making the playoffs with Dave Garrard.
The Steelers will be tough, but are in the wrong division.
The Jets are looking at a long season.
A team that has a strange attraction for me is the Titans.

NFC items of note:
The Panthers defense will step up, and they'll get just enough big plays on offense to make a run.
I want to pick against the Bears, but the rest of the NFC North is so bad that I can't justify it.
I want to pick against the Saints, but the rest of of the NFC is so bad, that I can't justify it.
The popular sleeper picks (49ers, Cardinals, Rams, etc.) are generally lame.
Joey Harrington is still Joey Harrington.
Alex Smith and Matt Leinart will become legit NFL QB's.
The Eagles drafted a QB because they're a good organization.

Of course, I'm an idiot, so definitely ignore anything that I have written down here.

-Chairman

Circles

So, I've just kicked off my latest year out here in the cornfields of Illinois. And this time, the first day of class was a little different. Let's just say that the other side of the table is a little more work on the first day. But there were some similarities to my days taking class. I got there a little later than I was planning. I didn't really want to be there, but was curious to see who else was going to be there. I got bored about halfway through class and zoned out. And then I played basketball at IMPE afterwards. I suppose that some things never change.

But there was a little 15 minute stretch after class finished up that things sort of hit me. I realized that I was starting my last year in my 20's. The first day of class had a very different meaning for me this time. I know that I taught this past summer, but this was my first full semester classroom. This means that I'm an adult, sort of. After everyone left, I just sat down in the very familiar classroom. I had taken at least one course in that room back in my days as an engineer. Nondestructive Evaluation, if I recall correctly. I took a seat in the front row, on the very left, where I used to always sit. My logic was that I'd be less likely to doze off if I sat in the front row. Of course, it made it that much more embarrassing when I did doze off. And now, I'm trying to figure out ways to keep my kids from dozing off. It was an interesting experience, just sitting there, remembering what it felt like to be just a student. I think that I was a little sad that the relatively simpler times had gone by.

I wonder if I'm become more sentimental in my old age. Earlier in the summer, I drove through Louisville, KY when it hit me that it was almost a full decade ago when I had my little 8 month co-op stint with General Electric. As I drove by the exits that I still vaguely remembered, I was thinking about all of the great people that I met down there. I have very little clue where most of the folks are. I keep in sporadic touch with some of them. Some of been lost to me, possibly forever. But that was a great time in my life. I lived by myself for those 8 months, and really grew up from that experience. Perhaps most importantly, I discovered that I didn't want to be an engineer when I grew up. But I also learned how to manage a home, how to take care of myself, and how to make friends so as to not die from boredom. I've got another chance to live by myself for the next couple years. It will be nice to recapture some of those old habits. It was fun thinking about the good times I had down in Louisville, as I drove through.

Perhaps what triggered my memories from last week was a visitor that I had come by last Monday. Capt. Matt came through town. He had some paperwork to take care of at the DMV. We went out and goofed around, staying out way too long, and then shot the shit for way too long afterwards. It was a great time, remembering all of the old stories that really helped us define who we've since become. We talked about the old crew that we used to play ball with and hang out with. Perhaps it was fitting that Matt came by. He was my first roommate ever here at school. I suppose that it's right that he was here when I was planning out my first week here as a real teacher.

We had an interesting conversation, just talking about where all of our friends are or will be soon. Matt was getting his Masters with the Air Force, and was going career. Conversations about multi-million dollar budgets and managing multiple levels of subordinates had made their way into our normal conversations, which used to be almost exclusively about sports. We went down the list of everyone who we were friends with - mostly all with nicely developed career arcs, lots of marriages with a handful of kids on the way. It was sort of cool. We took a look a few years down for ourselves. Major Matt, and then probably Lt. Col. Matt, and maybe even Col. Matt by the time he hit his 20 and was looking to retire. On my end, we'd be looking at Dr. and Prof. Chairman soon, as well. Becoming a professor in 2 years. Getting tenure 6 years after that, if I was lucky. Having my own little army of doctoral students and undergrad assistants. It was a fun little indulgence.

Flash forward a couple days to earlier yesterday. I was at our annual kickoff retreat, where we got a nice lunch over at Allerton, and the faculty told us about whatever changes were being put in place this coming year. What was funny was that it felt completely like old hat. It was a far cry from coming into the program 3 years ago, and being completely lost. This time, I got to be embarrassed as during our discussion of RA/TA responsibilities, one of the professors just went on and on about how well I did for her last year. But the intention of the session was to sort of scare the doctoral students by telling us how well-qualified all of the applicants were this year. The professors were talking about how on our CV (curriculum vita = fancy word for resume), we should be allocating 5 lines for the different papers that we were supposed to have published or under review by the time we hit the job market. And the funny part was that my advisor, who was sitting next to me, just starts writing down a list on his notepad:

JMM
JRet
JPPM
JIBS
? - Memory

I looked over, and saw that he was writing down the journals we were publishing in for my 5 lines of the CV. I just laughed, and remembered that I needed to get him the latest version of the Memory paper, so I just wrote down "next week" and circled "Memory." Once we get the last two papers polished enough to send out, I'll have my 5 papers, with at the possibility of 1 or 2 more still on the way this year that were brand new, in addition to my dissertation. It was crazy, but the more I look at it, the more I'm realizing that I actually belong in this field. My dissertation needs work, so do the 2 other projects, and I'm sure that we'll get all sorts of feedback for the pieces under review. But we're getting there.

-Chairman

Provoking Thought: Blowing Sunshine

It's interesting. We're supposed to be civil in how we deal with other people. Some modern arguments for evolution with group goals (rather than individual goals) suggests that these are evolutionary traits that have survived the test of time. However, we also have instances where people are a little too nice. A little creepy, maybe, like they have a hidden agenda when they're so nice. It could be the guy trying to smooth talk his way into some gal's pants, or the guy trying to close a sale, or even the telemarketer trying to be your friend before you realize that he's a telemarketer. In any case, there's something there.

Kelley Main, Darren Dahl, and Peter Darke study what they call a "Sinister Attribution Error," where essentially, people become suspicious and think that others have a sinister intention when they are a little too complimentary, particularly when the person being complimented doesn't believe that it's deserved (Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2007, 17 (1), p.59-70).

I think that the lesson here is to not to blow too much sunshine up someone's ass. A little sunshine may be okay, but I'm not taking any chances.

-Chairman

Provoking Thought: Intuition

I just had an interesting idea pop up in my head. I think that I'm going to add a new aspect to this blog, "Provoking Thoughts." I've never been good at being brief, but I'm going to try to post more often, just a quick hit about something that I find interesting from my research or the research that I come across. I think that some of the things that academics work on never really get out into the world at-large. Maybe you guys can see some interesting links into the random things that I find cool/amusing and what you do in your fields. Plus, it makes me read a little more if I'm expecting to post something interesting on a regular basis.

Today's thought: One of my buds has a theory-based paper that talks about intuition. (Dane and Pratt, 2007 - Academy of Management Review, 32 (1), 33-54, if you've got access to these academic journals). Essentially, it boils down the notion of intuition into being, "affectively charged judgments that arise through rapid, nonconscious, and holistic associations. They further suggest that intuition works best when done by those with some level of expertise in a given area, and that it's most appropriate for tasks that require judgment (not the synthesis of existing facts).

It's interesting if you get a chance to look at the paper to see how they conceptualize intuition. Their definition is appealing for smart folks who want to pat themselves on the back, for sure. I'm not sure how appropriate it is for more everyday tasks. I don't necessarily agree about the things that they suggest comprise expertise, nor am I in accord with the relatively limiting definition of judgment that they use. However, I do like very much how they put together expertise and judgment tasks together to describe intuition. Much of what they study is geared towards managerial tasks, and not for everyday people. However, they've positioned this as a rather general paper, so naturally, you have gaps.

Do you guys have places where you (or a colleague) seem to have a knack for having the right intuition in complex environments? Please explain in a comment.

-RG

Where's My PR Person?

See below. My people need to do a better job getting my name out there. As an aside, I also enjoyed it when La Parka was in WCW hitting people over the head with a chair and calling himself the "Chairman of WCW." That was pretty sweet. The Sports Guy not recognizing my nickname? Sad.

Q: I know it's pretty obvious, but Yi Jianlian's nickname has to be "The Chairman," right?
--M. Filion, Montreal

SG: Has to be. There hasn't been a more effective nickname in years. Not only does it sound like the right nickname for him ("Chairman Yi"), but the joke-trapped-inside-the-joke (during ESPN's lottery show, there was video of Yi posting up actual chairs and spinning around them for layups) will never stop being funny. And when you think about it, we haven't been able to call anyone "The Chairman" since Sinatra died. So it's done -- we're calling Yi "The Chairman." This meeting is adjourned.

edit: And just for the record, "Chairman Yao" would have been a far superior nickname. Almost on par with Chairman Gau. Leave it to a Canadian to butcher things.

-Chairman

That Time Of Year

Yep. Football season's right around the corner. How do I know this? Because TMQ is back. I have to say that TMQ is pretty much required reading for folks who like football, but are also curious about other happenings around the world. Essentially, I get my current events entire from Gregg Easterbrook and The Daily Show. As an aside, I wonder what Craig Kilborn is doing nowadays, other than being self-satisfied.

At some point, I'll have to give my 2007 NFL predictions. Probably after my fantasy football drafts, just so that I don't give away any trade secrets. Of course, I'm not very good with football predictions. But that doesn't keep me from being pretentious enough to believe that everyone in my fantasy league is scouring my blog to pick up little hints for the upcoming season. You hear that, C-Lauff? Greg? Westy? Nothing for you until after the draft. Just like my Erik Bedard prediction this year :-)

The fun part is that like a couple times in the past, I'm entering the football season on the precipice of something great: The Roland Slam. Essentially, this is what I have dubbed the achievement of winning all three fantasy sport seasons in a row (basketball, baseball, and football). I've only done this once (in a magical season we now know as "2003"). No one else has come close to this in the past. So, lacking any form of modesty, I've seen fit to name this accomplishment after myself.

We have a little group of guys who always play fantasy sports, called the UPL. We're a bunch of guys who all met back in college, and includes a few new folks that we've met along the way. I don't know how true this is for everyone else, but at least a couple of the guys (including myself) actually care more about his league (which we play solely for bragging rights) than they do for the leagues that they have money riding on. And it makes sense. We're all still relatively close, despite not really seeing each other that often in real-life. But, we always stay in touch at least a few times a year during our league drafts, and of course when we throw trash talk around the message boards in our league. It's sort of funny how much our fantasy sports persona have taken hold over time. One of the funniest things that has evolved is what we call "Westy's Pawn Shop." I can't remember if it was me of C-Lauff that come up with this, but one of our buds always lowballs people with trade offers, sometimes to the point where people refuse to deal with him. I don't know if it's actually true or not, but I always mock C-Lauff for being afraid to trade with me, even when the trade is fair and that he's more worried about not giving a player that wins me the league than trying to win the league himself. Greg is usually very competitive in the league, and offers some hilarious posts on a variety of subjects. One of the guys, Rupert is usually not very competitive (except for a mystifying 2006 baseball season when he rode a number of career years to the title), very opinionated, and doesn't use much evidence to back up his arguments, much to my amusement. One of the guys, Schultzie, commented to me a couple months ago that he loves playing fantasy football with us, but he's amazed at how competitive his teams are, yet have never made the playoffs (bear in mind, we typically have a 12 team league, in which 8 teams make the playoffs). Olthoff is very up and down in football, having had some teams that were scary good (but just fell short in the playoffs) and some teams that were scary bad. Mikey is more or less a silent football savant, having won 4 out of 5 seasons in which he's played, and not hardly ever saying anything on the message boards. Me? I'm sort of a smartass, though I use an intriguing mix of pompus and self-deprecating humor. I typically have some sarcastic comment for whatever's posted on the board, whether or not I was the original target. But over the years, just like with everyone else, I've become a caricature of myself.

Which is what makes this fun. We jive with these images, and have fun with other people in the league based on their images. I think that this is a nice little way to get away from our real-life stresses, and be able to talk some smack and be competitive with our friends from the life-imposed distance that exists.

This year, I pretty much dominated the basketball league to the point that I declared victory around halfway through the season, and pretty much everyone agreed with me. Baseball's been much more interesting, with my team currently in 1st, but in the middle of a 3-team battle down the stretch, along with Greg and C-Lauff. The fun part of this one is that I was actually in 10th (out of 11) teams as late as early May, but was still trash talking as though I was in first, telling anyone who would listen (and some who tried to not hear) that I was going to win this league, going so far as trying to bet (albeit, only a single dollar) anyone in the league that I would finish ahead of them. Only C-Lauff was foolish enough to take the offer, and he's a little behind in 3rd. Of course, I think that he was in 1st at that point, and I was in 10th, so it really wasn't that bad of a bet for him to take. But after a couple months, I'm awfully close to setting the stage for my 2nd Roland Slam.

Which would make football awfully intriguing. Because we're ready to talk some more trash.

-Chairman

That's Hot.

Yeah. It's not just Paris Hilton saying that. It's seemingly everyone across the US. Last week, I drove from Illinois out to SC, and just about every temperature reading I saw was in the 90's. The entire week out in SC was in the 90's, as well. And sure enough, after one day cooling off into the mid-80's, it's back into the 90's for the next few days. That's hot. And muggy, too. Oh well.

I've spent a lot of time in the air conditioned comfort of my car the last week or so. 650 mile drive out to Greenville, SC. Then another 220 miles from Greenville to Charleston, SC. Then 220 miles back to Greenville. Then another 650 miles back to Urbana. Then another 150 up to Naperville. And another 150 back to Urbana. That's a lot of miles. Roughly 2000 miles in the past 8 days. I'll be perfectly content to just putz around town for the foreseeable future.

I suppose now's a good time to work on my dissertation.

Overall, we're getting there. I'm pretty much prepped for my first month of class. Still need to edit a few more sets of lecture slides, but I think that we're getting things there. My professor was kind enough to let me have his lecture slides, so I have something to start with. I've been doing a lot of editing, and I'm going to teach a slightly different course than he did, but it's great that I've got a proven template. I have a suspicion that students won't particularly love every minute of my class (since I'm going to work them relatively hard), but hopefully it'll be good for them when they're interviewing. For my work, I need to have a couple solid weeks of work before classes start up. I'd like to get a couple chapters written up and sent out to my advisor for review, so I can really get into designing stuff for the actual data collection. In any case, it's time to get stuff done.

The body's held up alright the last couple weeks. I actually shot a round of golf and played tennis twice over the last couple weeks. The tennis was okay, though I couldn't do the things that I used to with my serve - that will come if I actually start playing regularly. I'm still lousy at golf, though I think that with my current incarnation of game, I can become a guy who legitimately shoots around 100 pretty easily. I think that I have to re-tool my swing if I ever want to hit woods well, but my swing seems to be built well for long irons. I think that if I can figure out how to hit that 30-75 yard shot with a sand wedge (which I used to do reasonably well), I'll be enjoying myself a lot more out there.

In any case, I've got a visitor for the next week, so I finally got the guest bedroom/future studio cleaned up and set up roughly how I want it.

Update - NBA Ref

I'm reconsidering my thoughts on the ref's potential impact on the game. Bill Simmons makes an interesting point when he talks about how refs can much more relatively easily the over/under. Systematically calling more fouls can lead to more points. So, if you call more fouls evenly, then you've got a legit edge in the over bet. Hadn't considered the over/under when they mentioned that a ref was fixing games. And upon further review, perhaps the easiest way to adjust scoring is with technical fouls, actually. Put up an extra T twice a game, both on the same team, and you just swung the spread by about 1.5 points. And I forgot about the human factor.

Imagine this scenario - Donaghy's doing a Knicks/Bulls game and has the orders to make sure that the Knicks cover the 5.5 points that they're getting, and that the teams should score over 184.5 points. Knicks go into halftime down 7. The refs go into their locker room, and start discussing the game. Depending on how charismatic he is, Donaghy could be able to influence the others.

"Man, we've gotta get control down there - Wallace is getting really reach happy down there."
"Really? I hadn't noticed."
"Yeah, he and Curry are getting chippy."
"Yeah? I'll take an extra peek in there. We'll get things settled down early in the quarter."

And sure enough, the refs go out there, and see the hand fighting and positioning battles a little differently than they did in the first half. Wallace gets a couple fouls, and gets T'd up. Skiles goes nuts and gets T'd up, as well. Donaghy didn't even make the technical foul calls. Wallace has to head to the bench. Net effect - Knicks score more. Total points increase. But the Bulls are the better team, and manage to squeeze out a 97-92 win. Everyone goes home thinking about how well Gordon played down the stretch or how David Lee needs more playing time. They don't notice that the teams combined for 53 points in the 3rd or how the Knicks turned a 7 point deficit into a 2 point lead by the end of the quarter, both of which would likely be statistical aberrations.

I don't know - what I said about how referee crews get together to talk about things to make sure that they get the right call is true. But if a crooked ref is an assertive, confident, influential person, then maybe what he says (or even does) becomes influential. I'm still thinking that it's hard to change the outcome of a game, but if you have the perfect storm, then you can definitely shift the tides over time, like I had originally thought.

-Chairman

Good Sports

This is late, but congrats to Roger Federer for beng one of the two most dominant athletes in individual sports, alongside Tiger Woods., and winning another Wimbledon. Strange to think that w/out Rafael Nadal, Federer may well have a Grand Slam. Of course, the same may be true of Nadal, if Federer were not around.

NBA officials shaving points? Good in theory, but it seems rather hard to do. You have 3-man crews. Officials have improved over the past few years about getting together to get calls right. You have a lot of scrutiny from TV replay, and the consistent evaluation of refs by the league, not to mention columns by folks like Bill Simmons or rants by Mark Cuban. It wouldn't shock me if this Tim Donaghy guy actually erased debts for agreeing to shave a few points. It would surprise me if you could statistically prove that he influenced games more than a point or two. of course, given that the lines in NBA games are often only 5 or 6 points, that point or two shift can be a lot over time. So, if you actually wanted to make money, you'd have to bet the line on Donaghy games over a long period of time. This probably isn't like the point shaving stuff that you saw at Arizona St., or in Blue Chips, where you'd see egregious offenses for a given game. This would probably be more like Vegas slipping 4 aces out of a 6-deck shoe to shift the odds from 51-49 to 54-46.

Evidently there's some bike race going on in France right now. Some dude hit a dog and bit it. Hard. That's pretty cool. Speaking of dogs...

Too bad the Falcons don't play in Cleveland this year. I was looking forward to the "Vick Destroys Dawg Pound" headlines. In all seriousness, I think that this is dumb. We're making a much bigger deal about something that's to some extent cultural (animal fighting has poor, rural roots, and is more recently a characteristic of the hip-hop culture). I think that there are undertones of wealth and class here - when people become too rich they can start complaining about things that other folks do. Judgments are passed on what other people "should" be doing. Some of these things are useful in creating a harmonious society. Others are just a waste of time. Folks at PETA need to get real jobs. Animals are there for us to eat. Some can become companion animals, but really, they're there to manage the eco-system and for us to eat. Let's spend our time and money on figuring out how to help people in need, instead of these animals.

My Reds are finally playing better baseball. But that recent hot streak has only got them to the "very bad" level, up from the "embarrassinge" level which they were previously at. The biggest killers? Arroyo has been awful this year. He's got a 4+ ERA since the 2nd half of last season. He's probably been about 6 games off in his contribution to the Reds this year. Of course, even if he were 10-4 instead of 4-10, we'd still be 2 games under .500 and barely in the wild card race. An even bigger problem is our bullpen. We only really have 1 reliable guy, and that's Dave Weathers. Time after time, you see the Reds leave the starter in one inning too many (or you see them leave relievers in a little too long, as well). We stopped trusting the bullpen back in May (for good reason), but that's killed our team. With a bullpen ERA of almost 5, not only do we let games slip away that we should win, we don't give ourselves a chance to steal games where we're down by a run or 2. Put this together, and that makes for a team that's staring at a 70 win season. The bright side is that we're done with Eric Milton, who has been a disastrous signing. Over $10 million in salary space opens up. Which suggests to me that we should work on signing Adam Dunn long term, rather than trading him for half-value. We've got time to see who the real Arroyo is, so we can let him pitch out his contract (which is actually reasonable), and then see where we stand.

About 3 weeks ago, I made the bold claim to some friends that the Yanks were still going to win the AL East. Obviously, I was told that I was nuts. I'm going to reiterate my bold statement and outrageous claim that the Yanks will win the AL East and the World Series. I just believe that talent rises, particularly in a sport like baseball where you have so many opportunities for luck to even out.

On ESPN's "Who's Now" segment, two of the panelists are Chuck James and Jessica Biel. If this segment wasn't already a mockery, it's become one. My reaction was that Jessica Biel seemed a little smarter when she was on 7th Heaven, at least the early episodes.

In any case, let's see how everything pans out.

-RG

Still Afloat

Not much writing of late. Really, it's been a pretty normal, relatively boring little stretch. The most amusing thing? I went to see a musical. Not just that, I went to see a small-town musical production. Oklahoma - it's more than a state. I was actually really, really amused by the whole thing. I don't think that it was supposed to be as funny as I thought it was, though. But that's alright.

Overall, the summer's gone alright. I taught my first marketing course during Session I. It went reasonably well, and the students seemed to enjoy it, so that's a little notch on the belt. We resubmitted two journal articles, one of which should be accepted pretty quickly, and another which will probably get another round of revisions. In any case, it's good to have two more pieces turned around. But of course, it doesn't stop. By the end of the summer, there will probably be 2 more journal submissions out the door, as well as a conference submission. And we're supposed to get some data back that we've been waiting on for a couple years, so that means that the fall will have at least one paper. Eventually, that conference submission should become a journal submission, as well. So that probably means this fall, too. So, in total, we're looking at 2 articles under 2nd review, 2 articles under 1st review, and 2 articles ready to go out the door. Which makes for a nice little progression.

Now, the downside. I'm teaching this fall, so I won't have quite as much time as I'd like. But that should be pretty manageable. What I'm not liking is that my dissertation is nowhere near where it needs to be. I need to defend my proposal by the end of the fall semester, otherwise I'm getting yelled at by my advisor, my department head, and everyone else. I really need to get churning on the dissertation this summer so that I can have a reasonable expectation to defend in the fall. If I can pull that off, then I'm running experiments in the spring, and hitting the job market with a defended proposal, some data, and good looking portfolio. The problem is, if I don't pull it off, I'm a donkey.

Work stuff aside, I'm needing to get some rest mentally and get aggressive physically. Really, more than anything else, I think that my future success depends on building healthy physical habits. As I look back on the last 15 years of my life, when I'm physically good, everything else flows easily. When I'm not, everything's an uphill climb. I haven't slept well the last couple weeks, so I need to get that straightened out. And very related to that, I haven't lifted or played ball in a couple weeks, either. My knees were slowly getting better, so I was able to play basketball and not be in serious pain the next couple days, so things were promising. But being sluggish sort of puts a damper on things. In any case, I think that I can actually start doing some of the old agility drills, and try to get into shape. I used to have an attitude of being willing to outwork people (well, physically, anyway). I'm hoping to recapture that. Let's see if I can make it happen.

-Chairman

Thoughts That May Or May Not Count

I'm intrigued by how seemingly irrational people are, generally speaking. One of the biggest movements that we're seeing right now is with "good" marketing. It's done under a few different labels - green marketing, sustainability, corporate social responsibility, etc. And some of the stuff that we're seeing is genuinely helpful. At the very least, these movements are helping raise awareness of a lot of issues, and giving a bit of a voice to the well-intentioned, but often foolishly guided, fringe groups that have been trying to save the earth for years. The New York Times has an interesting little article that's talking about how people are planting trees so that they feel good about driving SUV's and flying around the world. Some folks, myself included, think that it's pretty silly for people to justify their continued poor behavior by doing some good to offset it.

While it's sort of silly to delude yourself into thinking that planting a tree will offset that Dell computer that you bought, or that vacation to Tahiti, it's more or less done at an individual level, and I'm not all that concerned about that. What I'm much more afraid of is foolish policy. One current trend that we're seeing is the ethanol boom, in particular with corn. While it's good that we're looking at ways to wean ourselves from the dependence on petroleum, most folks in the know think that the use of corn is a political move, rather than a scientific one. Corn is expensive to grow. And the corn that is grown has established purposes - specifically as food for both humans and livestock. So, when corn is taken out of the food supply chain, and converted over to the energy supply chain, you end up increasing the price of food, not just nationally, but to some extent globally. So, while E-85 is probably a good thing, using corn for E-85 may not be so good. Many people prefer the use of grasses for this, though grasses just don't produce enough of the starches that are needed to convert grains into fuel. Perhaps more efficient processing can make grasses viable.

Unfortunately, much of our national policy has been focused on corn, likely for the support of states that are ag heavy. It just seems that we're letting a little bit of technology come into play, but we're still at the mercy of our very inefficient political system. Interestingly, the countries that seem to be in a good position for this shift may be countries like Brazil, who produce a lot of sugar cane, which is much more efficient in the conversion process. This could eventually evolve into a modern day Triangle Trade, where sugar is converted not into rum, but fuel, and instead of slaves... well, the analogy isn't perfect.

Interestingly, at the policy level, I'm generally laissez-faire. I like the idea of letting the market sort itself out. However, at some levels, agency theory has to kick in. Different parties will have different goals. As such, incentive structures (i.e. policy at large) have to be adjusted so that goals of multiple parties are aligned enough to make change meaningful. In that sense, you can't just let the market decide because markets aren't frictionless. And even beyond that, there is inertia in the system - people have a preference for the status quo. There has to be some level of intervention in the system. Unfortunately, these visions are often left to people who are in bed with an inefficient system. So, our alternative to address the principal-agent problem is subject to a principal-agent problem.

Ultimately, I don't think that we can ever correct many of these problems. However, many of the problems can be made moot. Certain things can change the rules of the game. The one that comes to the forefront is technology. And after that is the grass-roots change in behavior that pushes up from the masses. Technology can make many of the questions irrelevant by making the topic not worthy of debate. And grass-roots change can make the questions irrelevant by mandating a de facto change in the system.

-Chairman

The Path Less Traveled

If you're a fan of sports and/or human behavior, you should read the latest ESPN.com article on Floyd Mayweather, Jr. Possibly my favorite excerpt in a while:

"As he sat there looking at men who aspire to be him, he reflected on his fortune. This was not a there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-go-I moment; Mayweather's not built like that. Instead, he felt the weight of the cash in his pockets, considered his abundance of wealth and said to himself, "God love me, and I'm a hell of a fighter." It might as well serve as his mantra."

This is my kind of dude.

Which makes for an interesting thought. Now, most of us who have some sort of ability or have been blessed with success almost live despite of it. We shrug it off in the hopes of acting "humble." We give others credit for our success. We downplay things. Not Floyd. He knows where his bread is buttered. God loves him. And he does very at what he does. From now on, I'm taking compliments with more of a matter-of-factness. I think that my standard response will be, "Yep. God loves me, and I'm pretty awesome."

This weekend, I'm rooting for Mayweather. Normally, I'd root for Oscar de la Hoya, but not this time. I'm a fan of excellence. Normally Oscar is the personification of excellence. But I think that Mayweather is the better boxer. And I don't like underdogs.

The idea of rooting for underdogs goes against just about every fiber of my being. Here's the thing. When people talk about David and Goliath, they use it inappropriately. David was God's anointed. He knew it. God knew it. Just everyone else, didn't, yet. That doesn't come through in rooting for a 15 over a 2 seed in the 1st round. The 15 isn't going to win the championship. They're just looking to get lucky once. That's crap. Rooting for David is more like rooting for Tom Brady. He'll win the big one when you don't expect it, but then he follows it up by continuing to win. Rooting for underdogs is more like rooting for Pharoah, when his magicians are able to replicate Moses's actions. It worked out well then, but wouldn't work out in the long run.

Of course, I sort of like rooting for Goliath, myself. But that's another posting.

Back to the point, what do we have against excellence? Why don't we like seeing the best team do their thing, and show everyone how things are supposed to be done? I don't know, but I don't like it. So here's to Yankees Baseball, Patriots Football, Duke Basketball (and Lacrosse), and Floyd Mayweather, Jr.

-Chairman

Deny Everything

While I am still angry at the outcome of the 1st round game from the NCAA tourney, I will state that I am nowhere near Blacksburg, VA.

edit 4/17: Smart money would have been a crazy ex-military white dude. But you know how tricky those little South Korean dudes are. Plus, given their history of violence, it all makes sense.

Personally, I'm blaming the Duke Lacrosse team.

edit 4/17: Rumor has it that the Duke Lacrosse team once recruited a South Korean dude who looked like the shooter. The Duke Lacrosse team is still not exonerated.

Incidentally, I wonder how this will affect their U.S. News and World Reports college rankings.

edit 5/20: I'm not sure about the college's academic rankings, but one top 100 basketball recruit, Augustus Gilchrist, has backed off of his commitment to VT, citing the shootings. I'm probably happier about this than I should be.

-Chairman

A Look Ahead

Baseball, baby. It's back. Really, what I'm looking for most is Barry chasing Hank. I'm already giddy thinking about the media response and fans booing. I for one want him to catch Hank and pull a Ricky Henderson type response.

I'm curious to see how the Reds follow up their decent '06 campaign. The offense was solid, the starting pitching actually held up alright, but the bullpen was awful. We panicked and made a terrible trade with the Nationals to get some bullpen help, but I don't know how much it will actually help this year. We'll see. I think that we could be anywhere from a 72 to 88 win team.

Looking back, my predictions weren't terrible last year. My predictions for the year are remarkably similar to last year's predictions, with a few additions:

AL Division Winners (and wild card): Yankees, Indians, A's, and Red Sox
NL Division Winners (and wild card): Mets, Cards, D-Backs, and Phillies
Teams that will just miss: Red Sox, Tigers, Angels, Braves, Cubs, Giants
Teams that will make a run early and fade by August: Orioles, Reds
AL Pennant: Yankees
NL Pennant: Mets
World Series Champ: Yankees
AL Cy Young and MVP: Johan Santana and Alex Rodriguez
2 other AL Cy Young candidates: Roy Halladay, C.C. Sabathia
2 other AL MVP candidates: Travis Hafner, Manny Ramirez
NL Cy Young and MVP: Roy Oswalt and Albert Pujols
2 other NL Cy Young candidates: Carlos Zambrano, Jake Peavy
2 other NL MVP candidates: Carlos Beltran, Chase Utley
Hitters ready to blow up (that no one's talking about): Edwin Encarnacion, Kevin Youkilis
Under the radar AL Cy Young and MVP candidates: Erik Bedard and Gary Sheffield
Under the radar NL Cy Young and MVP candidates: Tim Hudson and Josh McCann
Intriguing young AL bats and arms: Alex Gordon/Delmon Young and Justin Verlander
Intriguing young NL bats and arms: Prince Fielder and Anibal Sanchez/Mike Olson

Anyway, let's see if my Reds can keep me from becoming a Yankees fan for a while :-)

-Chairman

A Look Back

So, it's April. No April Fool's here.

Goodbye to Warren, Richie, and Marcus. Boy, I would have loved to have seen Warren redshirt that freshman year, and come back next year. But he did improve quite a bit in his time here. Richie never lived up to the hype, mainly because he never developed the handle. His shooting was as good as advertised, but was reliant on others to set it up. And Marcus? Never played as well as he did against us his freshman year at Illinois St. Oh well.

As far as the game goes, I don't know if I can anything that hasn't already been said. We struggled on offense, and we were dumb with the ball. We were really good for 32 minutes. Sort of blah for the next four. And the last few minutes of the game made me sick. We'd break the press, and then just watch one of our seniors throw the ball to the fans. And the thing is, we still had a chance to tie the game with only seconds left, when Randle got to the line for a 1 and 1. Next year, we've got to make free throws. I think that if we look back, if we were a 75% FT team, at least 3 of our L's turn into W's. And we're actually a decent seed, rather than on the bubble.

I think that one of the issues that we'll see with Bruce Weber's teams is that it's too much like Gene Keady. As good as Purdue was over the years, they never got to the Final Four. I think that the root cause is the reliance on the system. Aside from Glenn Robinson, I can't really recall many true stars out in Purdue. Now, having a rigid system in place will keep you from having disastrous years (and for the most part disastrous games). But the problem is that when you get deep in a tourney, you're running into a team that's hot. When hot teams play, the team that wins is the one that has the best individual performances, and system largely goes out the window.

In a the dance, you need to win 6 games in a row. It's one thing to win 8 out of 10 (which is a very good success rate). It's another to win 6 in a row. The pure stats are against you. Let's say that you're a 1 seed. You're 100% to beat the 16. Say you're 90% to beat the 8 seed. And 80% to beat a 4 seed. And 70% to beat the 2 seed. This may be a bit generous, but just to get to the final 4, you're only 50%. Then, let's say that you run into two more 1 seeds. And you're favored a bit, say 60% for both games. That still only leaves you at 18% to win it all. And this if you're really good.

The problem is that when you're a team that relies on system, over stars, your picture isn't as rosy. If you rely on system over stars, then you may end up with a slightly higher overall level of performance (statistically, a higher mean), and you end up with a more predictable outcome (statistically, a lower variance). So what does that mean? The possible outcomes for a large number of events fit a normal distribution (a bell curve). Put each of two competing teams on their own bell curve, sharing the same horizontal axis. You'll see something interesting. While the team with the higher mean (the steeper hill in the graph below) will win most of the time, if you restrict the examination to only the right handside of the curves, the team with the higher variance actually is favored quite often.


The odds of you running into a hot team are just that much more. So, now, let's say that both teams are hot. You can simulate this if you add the restriction that both teams are operating at some level, say, their own 95th percentile. This scenario would actually show that that the team that has the lower overall performance, but the higher upside, is favored. Bizarre, but true.

A similar example come to mind quickly. You may remember Michael Chang, a really good tennis player back in the 90's. There was a stretch where he was the #2 player in the world. But, he only one a single major championship, back before the got that good. How Chang played was very methodical. Very consistent. Ran down a lot of shots. Stayed in points, and grinded it out. He got to a lot of tournament semifinals and finals. But in the big tournaments, he never put it together again. Why? He would often run into a very hot player who had a higher upside.

Consistency will keep you in games, and get you into the playoffs. But quite often, it's hot teams with upside that win. Teams that do well tend to be teams that have a system, but have flexibility to use the parts that it has when needed. Last night, you saw this with Florida. Their gameplan is to pound it inside. UCLA thwarted this by doubling down low. Florida's second option was for their big men to pass because they are good enough passers that they can usually find cutters for layups. UCLA thwarted this by dropping a guard into the middle of the lane. Now, teams often just got confused against UCLA, and had their offense sink. You saw this with Kansas in the 2nd half. You saw this in earlier rounds, as well. But not Florida. Donovan was able to change things up, and have their big men kick out a skip pass and you saw Brewer bust open the game with a number of outside shots in the first half. Eventually, you get to the point where even a good defense can't cover every option. But it takes flexibility to get to that point.

I don't know if I've seen the flexibility from Weber, particularly on the offensive end. We saw our defense actually adjust a bit this year and play a little zone after the injuries and suspensions killed our depth. But the offense never really figured out how to attack faster or differently. Making these adjustments and forcing mismatches is one of the hallmarks of the greats - Coach K, Dean Smith, etc. Even Bobby Knight, known as a stubborn son of a bitch, was able to make adjustments when needed. And I think that's what makes things different. I don't know if we'll ever get there. But at Illinois, the bar has been raised. I don't think that we'll be happy with anything less than having a program where we're in the dance every year and legimately competing for the Final Four at least once every few years.

I actually like where our team stands right now, going into next year. Pruitt, Carlwell, and Semrau will give us a nice balance on the inside. Randle can't go anywhere but up, and will give us options at the 3. I actually like Chester Frazier's game, particularly with how he started shooting in the Big Ten tourney and even in the loss to VT. Meachem is a nice guy to bring off the bench, and Jamar may finally get his game together (if he's not in jail). And Calvin's court presence can only increase. This gives us 8 players to work with, and we'll have a similar result as we did this year, if this is all we have.

To improve, we'll definitely need to have one more guy step in on the inside, whether it be one of the frosh, or CJ Jackson. And really, we need one of two of the freshmen to step in and play. Quinton Watkins or Demetri McCarney are the most obvious choice to get minutes, as both come as top 100 recruits (as high as the 60's for McCarney). Watkins comes from the west coast, and has a reputation as a penetrator, which is key for us. Of course, he hasn't officially signed his letter. Maybe Sampson will swoop in on him, too. McCarney is a Chicago kid who may push Chester for minutes at point. Both are 6'2" or 6'3", which makes them a bit small at SG, but just fine at point. Unfortunately, neither come with a reputation for great shooting. Our other incoming frosh are a couple tall white kids. Both seem a bit skinny. One of them committed to the Illini early (Bill Cole), and is a part of that Peoria pipeline. I hope that he's one of the good ones, not one of the ones that you have to sign so that you stay on good terms with the coaches and AAU mavens out there. Rumor is that he's got a nice outside touch. Which would be nice. We'll see if he's more Mike Dunleavy or Nick Smith. Or if he can play any defense at all. The other, Mike Tisdale, is 6'11", only 200, and sounds like an extreme project. When you hear a coach say something like, "He has worked hard and his coaches have done a nice job putting in extra time with him on individual improvement, helping him gain coordination and explosiveness," you tend to translate that as, "He's not very good. Sort of goofy. But he's tall. And white. And our fans love white players." I don't like to speculate on freshmen until I actually see them, but I have a suspicion that Tisdale will redshirt, Cole may see some minutes at the 3/4, and get some minutes because of our extreme lack of shooting.

We'll see how everyone looks in the fall.

-Chairman