This really is one of the best sports days of the year, the culmination of The Madness plus real Opening Day for baseball.
I say real Opening Day because of what an abomination it is that ESPN messes things up by pushing a game to Sunday. This is the day you call in sick (if you work Mondays), watch baseball all day and than slide right into hoops at night, and this should be the day baseball really begins.
In 1993, when I was working for the Harrisburg Patriot, I was offered a talk-radio hosting side gig, and the offer was accepted and formalized just a couple of days before Monday, March 31, which was Phillies’ opening day and the day of the North Carolina-Michigan NCAA final, the one where Chris Weber called the time-out he didn’t have.
I knew the show had to debut that day, even though it’d be sloppy because I hadn’t had time to learn how things worked in the studio. You may remember the Phillies were pretty successful, and entertaining, that year, and this was a Phils’ network station. The show found an audience pretty quick.
I’ll try to blog throughout the evening, but observations for now…
What you saw from the Phillies last night, I’m afraid, you can expect to see a lot- the middle of the order being cut down in the late innings by a lefty reliever. Ryan Howard vs. lefties the last three seasons: .231/.314/.471. That’s practically a platoon player, which is one reason why Gary Sheffield would have been a nice addition. (Presumably the Phils tried with Sheffield, but he signed with the Mets for the MLB minimum, so I’m guessing they didn’t try real hard).
Anyway, there will be late-inning, game-on-the-line RBI situations this year when the percentage play will be to pinch-hit for the NL RBI leader. That’s just a fact. But if Chuckles makes that move and the pinch-hitter doesn’t come through (every hitter in baseball history has failed more often than not), they’ll be calling him a moron and claiming this wouldn’t have happened if Jimy Williams was still here in the stands and in the press box and on WIP and maybe even in the clubhouse.
Sheffield and even Pat Burrell would have partly addressed that problem. Raul Ibanez exacerbates it.
The serious stat crowd isn’t real bullish on the Phils’ chances to repeat. This projection is typical of the sims I’ve seen. Pfans will howl about it, but it has the Phils finishing a close third in in the NL runs scored (behind the Cubs and park-aided Rockies) but dropping to the middle of the pack in runs allowed, and thus dropping five wins from last year. If you think that’s unreasonable, you’re either not objective or not paying attention.
I almost forgot the other big thing about today- the glorious aftermath of Wrestlemania. Congratulations to all the big winners, your Undertaker, your John Cena, your Triple-H. On the negative side, Mickey Rourke does not appear to be handling his resurgence-induced fame real well.
NCAA final pick: Villanova’s Jay Wright is a great defensive coach (although I don’t always understand what he’s thinking on the other end of the floor). Villanova ostensibly plays man-to-man, but they do so many opponent-specific things - funneling the ball here, doubling there, trapping and helping all over the place - that it often doesn’t look like what people think of as man-to-man.
(I know, Nova isn’t playing tonight. Stay with me.)
My point is, those kind of coaching tweaks work when there are specific strengths and weaknesses to attack. UCLA, despite being UCLA, only had a couple guys who could score. Duke, despite being Duke, only had a couple ways to score. Working with that, you saw what Nova did to those teams.
But you also saw what happened to them against the Tar Heels. Carolina is the only team in its sport, maybe the only team in the recent history of its sport, that usually has five guys on the floor who can score, and can score every way possible, inside and out, fast and slow, etc. I think that kind of offensive versatility, to an extent, nulifies coaching. You have to just straight-up guard every Tar Heel, or try to.
Now, Tom Izzo might be the best coach in this sport, and he’s definitely an opponent-specific game-planner. But he got help in the Spartans’ upsets of Louisville and UConn from lousy guard play from those respective teams. UConn’s A.J. Price, in particular, came up small. He was clearly instructed to pound the ball to Thabeet or Adrien in the post and, when that didn’t work, he was out of ideas, settling for jumpers off the dribble whether or not he was open. Price thus shot 5-for-20 and, as mentioned Saturday, Stanley Robinson, the Huskies’ fine forward, got exactly six shots at the basket, a couple of those stick-backs. Robinson shot 5-for-6 and had 15 points and 13 rebounds in 30 minutes. It was ridiculous, and decisive, that his teammates didn’t find him more.
Anyway, it’s hard to imagine Izzo doing that to Ty Lawson. The Heels’ point guard was talked about so much all season that at one point I actually suspected he was a bit overrated. He isn’t. He’s the best in the game at getting the ball were he wants it. If Izzo can take that away, and the Spartans rebound the way they usually do, they’ll cut down nets. But I don’t think he can. Lawson is just too good, too tough, too strong with the ball.
UNC wins, let’s say by 87-80.
Should be fun.
More later.
