Tied in the West, Tied in the East

Another day another exciting 9th inning at the Ravine. Powered by jacks from some guy named Manny and Andre Ethier, plus a clutch two-out, two-run double by Jeff Kent the Dodgers erased an early deficit and set the stage for Nomar’s walk-off number. Apparently the Mets aren’t the only NL East club with Exploding Bullpen Syndrome. And again (I swear this will be the last time I bring this up), can we all just agree to play Andre Ethier every day? I’m pretty sure winning is positively correlated to putting your best players onto the field whenever possible (possible exception: Ben Gordon and the Bulls). How concerned should we be about Brad Penny? The Phils hit a lot of bombs so there’s no shame in giving up a few blasts but Penny had the look of a man who knew something was wrong during his three ugly innings.

Is anybody really surprised that the Chinese are under suspicion of sneaking an under-aged gymnast into the Olympics? It would be more shocking if they didn’t try to pull a fast one, wouldn’t it? This is the country that has done their best to kill off or imprison just about every single person who has ever opposed the status quo; seeing as how they have essentially made every single major player from the Tiananmen Square massacre disappear getting a 5th grader into the Olympics should be a walk in the park.

2 Years of Bliss

Last night was me and the girlfriend’s two-year anniversary (which is really meaningless if you’re not married but that’s beside the point). We celebrated with a nice dinner at Opal (easily the best restaurant in town) and followed that up an exciting Dodger victory. Or, at least I followed it up with a Dodger victory; Marsh took an early exit to the showers and bed. As I danced around the living room after Russ Mart skidded across home just ahead of Taguchi’s strong throw from left I again wondered why in the holy hell JT isn’t playing The Beefcake every day. The Beefcake plays better D than the perpetually miffed Juan Pierre and he can, you know, hit the ball out of the infield, which is a nice skill set to have. Also I’ve looked at all the pics online and I don’t see JP in the scrum surrounding Ethier after the game—anybody catch him out there?

Speaking of the girlfriend, she gave me my favorite Olympic moment so far last night—transcript below:
Jess: Why are they doing all this swimming?
BG: They do the swimming stuff first week, track and field the second week.
Jess: When do they do the shock put?
BG: The what?
Jess: Shock put? Is that not it? Shot puck? Pook shut?
BG: Are you kidding me? “Pook shut”? That is what you are coming with? Unreal.

Olympic Hype Could be Fool's Gold

If you’ve read anything about Team USA’s training camp in Las Vegas this week, you’d think it’s a forgone conclusion the Americans will win gold at the Beijing Olympics (see screenshot from today’s ESPN.com).
But as I mentioned earlier, there are plenty of holes in this year’s U.S. squad – particularly its lack of size (Dwight Howard is the lone center) and health (not only is Dwyane Wade coming off injury, but LeBron James went down in Tuesday's practice).
While this is a pretty darn good team (thanks to the addition of Kobe Bryant and depth at point – not that Kirk Hinrich isn’t a gold-medal PG), we’ve said this before about American squads that ended up flopping on the national stage (see 2004 and 2006).
We’ll find out just how good this team can be starting Friday when it hosts Canada at UNLV. But don’t expect it to be much of a contest since Steve Nash and Samuel Dalembert won’t be involved.
The Americans will then compete in the USA Basketball International Challenge in Shanghai, China, Aug. 3-5, but “the experts” believe the real test won’t come until later in the tournament when they face Greece on Aug. 10 and then Argentina after the preliminary round wraps up.
Greece doesn’t have any NBAers but beat the U.S. two years ago and just breezed through its qualifying tournament behind European hotshot Theo Papaloukas.
Argentina, for those who stopped watching after the Americans flamed out four years ago, took home the last Olympic gold and is expected to suit up four NBA players this summer in Manu Ginobili, Andres Nocioni, Fabricio Oberto and Luis Scola.
But Aug. 16 is the date you’re going to want to circle on your West Coast Bias calendar.
That's when the Americans face what could be their biggest challenge of the tournament in Pau Gasol and Spain.
The winners of the 2006 FIBA World Championship have four NBA players on their roster, including Gasol’s brother, Marc, who is better than most think, Jose Calderon and Rudy Fernandez.
Wouldn’t it be ironic if the player who nearly put Kobe’s Lakers over the top this season knocks Team USA out of gold medal contention?
Other teams to look out for in the tournament include Yao and Yi’s boys from China, who open against the U.S. on Aug. 10, along with Bogut’s Bunch from Australia and Dirk and Caveman Kaman’s Crew from Germany.
Let the Games begin.

Bring on the Olympics

Talk about the dog days of summer.
No more NBA, NFL, NCAA, even the NHL was fun to watch there for a second.
Luckily the Olympics are little over a month away and there will be plenty of NBA players on display when the Games tip off (Aug. 8-24).
The U.S. squad has already been announced and is currently training in Las Vegas, taking on Canada at UNLV on July 25.
The team also competes in the USA Basketball International Challenge in Shanghai, China, Aug. 3-5, where it will face Russia and Andrew Bogut’s boys from Australia.
For those planning out their summer, the Olympic quarterfinals are Aug. 20, followed by the semifinals Aug. 22 and the medal games Aug. 24.
Hopefully Coach K and the Americans can drudge up a little more support than the A.I. & Melo squad, which went a disappointing 5-3 and settled for the bronze four years ago.
While this year’s team should get a better backing after the Celtics and the West Coast teams breathed new life into the NBA in 2008, the U.S. squad still has a ways to go and has some obvious holes in its 12-man roster.
The main concern is at center, where the Americans have just one true big man in Dwight Howard. Sure, few foreign teams will have a dominant big man, but the few that do have legitimate post play will put a lot of pressure on guys like Chris Bosh, Carlos Boozer and '04 team "leader" Carmelo Anthony (especially if Howard gets into foul trouble against the Boguts and Yao Mings of the world, on Ming’s turf where the refs won’t exactly be giving the Americans any breaks).
Then there is the chemistry concern. Chemistry, passion and defense are what led the Celtics over the Lakers in the NBA Finals. But this team doesn’t have a Celtic and has only one player who reached the '08 Finals in Kobe Bryant, who didn’t exactly will his team to victory in that series.
Another concern would be health and age when talking about Dwyane Wade (who will be rusty after failing to finish the season because of injury) and 2000 gold medalist Jason Kidd (who didn’t exactly turn the Mavs into contender this year and could be preparing for the Senior Olympics).
Then there’s the rest of the roster, which is decent but untested when it comes big-game experience. Chris Paul, Michael Redd and Deron Williams are up-and-comers in the league, but they haven’t won the big one.
Luckily for the Americans, they have Coach K, MVPs like Kobe and LeBron James and recent NBA champions like Wade and Tayshaun Prince to bring in that championship mentality.