Billy Paultz Reconsidered

So Tim Donaghy says relationships among NBA players, coaches and officials have “affected the outcome of games.” This after every radio talk-show host in the (ratings) book has been proclaiming that the league wants a Celtics-Lakers final and presumably the refs will help make that happen.
And now the draft lottery is won by a […]

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The Barnstormers’ season-opening win was impressive for a number of reasons. Two of them: 1. They scored 10 runs while getting nothing from cleanup hitter Matt LeCroy, late of the Minnesota Twins; and, 2. Without overextending starter Zack Parker, who went six innings, they used only three pitchers, all of them effective and none of […]

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I have never seen what others seem to in Don Nelson, the longtime NBA coach regarded by many basketball people as an eccentric near-genius. When Nelson took over the Golden State Warriors last season  and oversaw a modest turnaround and then an impressive defeat of Dallas in the first round of the playoffs, I thought […]

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Occasionally someone asks who I think I’m writing for, what I consider my audience to be. OK, very occasionally, but it has happened. The answer is a person who’s interested in sport for its own sake, not because they went to Penn State or their nephew plays for McCaskey, a person who wants to know, honestly, what the […]

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When Payton Manning played brilliantly but couldn’t get his team over the top in big games, the rap was that individual stuff means nothing, wins are the only thing that matters.
When Eli Manning’s team wins three straight road playoff games to get to the Super Bowl, now the wins don’t validate, and everybody wants to […]

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The Sixers just got their first win of 2008, and yeah it was against dysfunctional, T-Mac-less Houston, but still. And now - what are the odds? - I’m watching the transcendent, “I’m into Nuggets y’all, I’m into Nuggets y’all..”
Now if they’d won at Denver, that would have been perfect. Think about it.
In other news…
*The question […]

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So the Patriots got caught cheating three months ago, and their reaction - their coaches’ reaction in particular - was to turn this season into a crusade to stick it to the world and show everybody. This has led to the unsavory spectacle of guys ecstatically spiking the ball after touchdowns that put their team […]

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… that halfway through this sporting summer, Pac Man Jones would look, comparatively, like Desmond Tutu?
… that the commissioner having the relatively stress- free summer would be the guy who runs the NHL?
Observations:
Every time you watch a game people bet on, there’s a chance the betting is impacting the integrity of the outcome. A very […]

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7:01 p.m. - We are underway from the WAMU (no, I don’t know what that means) Theatre at Madison Square Garden. A few notes while the idiotic video montage runs….
1. The Sunday News’ Eric Stark will call in from time to time from the Sixers’ draft party at the Wachovia Center. Starkie reported a while […]

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The Jockstrap Chronicles NBA draft live blogfest begins tonight at 7 p.m., featuring a cast of several, including correspondents at NBA draft HQ in New York and at the Sixers’ soiree for season-ticket holders in Philly.
Live e-mail dialogue (mgross@lnpnews.com) encouraged, even if you’re not a draft nut. We’ll be talking about the league in general, […]

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