They gave the Dude a sponsor…
I was bummed to hear from longtime OB member Ray Donley that COVID-19 led to the close of the WYLD GALLERY brick and mortar in downtown Austin. If you never stopped in, you missed out. However, I was pleased to hear, and then see, Ray’s vibrant gallery of fine Native American art has expanded online, and this week’s column is brought to you by WYLD GALLERY. And if anyone lives in the Austin area and would like to see some of the paintings in person, Ray would be happy to try to work that out or even bring them to you. E-mail or PM me and I’ll connect you with Ray.
WYLD GALLERY is a gallery featuring traditional and contemporary fine art by Native American Artists. The gallery is the part-time retirement gig for Ray Donley, an Austin attorney who has been a lurker on OB since 2002. Ray has been collecting Native American art since the 1980s. He has made friends with a number of Oklahoma Native American Artists, and enjoys ribbing them for their fanatical support of a football team that honors the land thieves who took their land.
You’ll find many affordable options including some as cheap as $50. Seriously. See for yourself at the bottom of this column. That’s an outstanding deal, especially considering many of these artists have been featured at some of the top Native American galleries in the world.
Contemporary Native American paintings are bold, bright, and never boring. And they will look great on the walls of your office or home. Many of the artists in the gallery have pieces in the permanent collections of museums, including the Smithsonian.
Please check out these unique, vibrant paintings at WYLD.GALLERY. Treat yourself to some cool art to add some character to your house/office or snag that unique Christmas gift you’re always looking for.
Alright, the writing…
1) Daryl Morey, the Houston Rockets and the Texas Longhorns…
There’s a place in the NBA worse than any other. It’s a place where an organization can and often does sneak into the playoffs. But that fan base, and even the organization deep down, knows it can do no better than tiptoeing into the postseason before being bounced in the first round. Okay, there might be a surprising series win that ignites a fan base, but reality eventually wins. And reality reminds those wearing the colors this is the best you can do; while you won’t tank for draft picks and will win enough games, you won’t go up either.
That, folks, is basketball purgatory.
Once upon a time, the Houston Rockets were in that depressing place. The calendar turned to 2000 and the Rockets either missed the playoffs or were eliminated in the first round 14 of the next 15 seasons. Save it, Mavs and Spurs fans. Yes, the Rockets had their one series win when they upset the Blazers in 2009, and the previous season they won 22-straight games only to lose in the first round because of some bad injury luck.
As the Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady era began to fade, an intelligent, aggressive general manager ahead of the curve began to meticulously, and through a mountain of various moves, stock his organization with assets and promising young players. All of it was aimed to continue pushing the organization forward. But really, it was about acquiring a superstar. After 74 moves, some good, bad, and most largely forgotten for their perceived insignificance, Daryl Morey acquired his superstar – James Harden. I’ll get to the honey buns and Prada later. Let’s stay the course.
Morey is in Philadelphia now calculating his next move to do what he couldn’t in Houston – win a championship. However, I’ll forever be a fan of Morey. A lot can be said about the Rockets during his time. What can’t be said is Houston didn’t win because its general manager didn’t try. He pulled Houston out of basketball purgatory and came agonizingly close to a NBA Finals appearance.
He inherited an organization stuck in a perpetual state of above average and never, ever settled. Once Morey acquired his superstar, he kept pushing for another. Once he acquired another, he kept trying to add championship pieces around his stars all while ushering in a unique, landscape-changing analytical approach to offensive efficiency. Morey wasn’t just trying to acquire players. He was constantly evolving, pushing the envelope in the name of success and unafraid to challenge basketball’s norms. Simply accepting a situation and remaining stagnant was never, ever an option.
So, yeah, this guy will forever admire and appreciate Morey. In the face of the Warriors being one of the greatest teams ever, many teams in the Western Conference threw in the towel and waived white flags from their tanks hundreds of miles from the battlefield. Morey didn’t. He went for it and tried to take his best swing at the giant every single time. No excuses.
A plan B? Morey had plans through the entire damn alphabet. That’s what great leaders and decision-makers in sports do. They live for those moments when they can implement plans they feverishly and constantly think about. Billy Beane didn’t say “grow comfortable with just winning,” in Moneyball. He said, “adapt or die.”
If you haven’t snagged the assist out of midair already, you’re asking what this has to do with Texas. The Longhorns are smack dab in the middle of college football’s version of purgatory.
They’re pretty good. The last few years, they’ve rated, according to F/+, 25th, 22nd and now 21st, undoubtedly a step forward from the Charlie Strong disaster. Under Tom Herman, they played for a conference championship once and won a nice bowl game once too. The Longhorns are never really bad, but they’re never great either. They’re just… there. They’re hanging out in the very bottom of the top 25 and in reach of playing for conference titles consistently; good enough to suck people into believing but bad enough to deliver cruel reminders, like losses to storied giants like Iowa State, they’re not truly capable of winning championships.
But here’s the larger issue: the majority of the believing died after the final scenes in the Cotton Bowl. Now, recruiting is reflecting a stagnant program supported by an increasingly apathetic fan base smart enough to grasp its program’s ceiling and issues, and intelligent enough to see the elite prospects aren't arriving anytime soon; many of them are heading just north of the border to Oklahoma. Everyone knows the Longhorns aren’t improving. And unlike Morey and the Rockets, the Longhorns aren’t in the NBA’s Western Conference. They’re in the wimpy Big 12, which is as inviting for the Longhorns as ever.
If Morey would have accepted defeat and never acquired his Harden, the Rockets would still be in purgatory and he probably wouldn’t have lasted long. Texas decision-makers tried to acquire their Harden. Hell, they tried to acquire their Harden and Russ/CP3. They missed. And now they’d entertain the idea of driving their burnt orange tank away with its white flag raised after just one pursuit to get out of purgatory? Pitiful.
In college football, if a program is stuck in this spot and isn’t getting better, it’s getting worse because recruiting doesn’t just impact one season. It impacts many. And if a program like Texas has timid, unimaginative leadership willing to accept college football’s version of purgatory, it’ll deservedly keep sinking in a football and financial hole it won’t escape until someone like a Morey shows up.
2) Some of this stuff doesn’t make any damn sense…
For a moment, let’s ask some simple questions and consider the optics Texas is known to preoccupy itself with:
The optics, currently, are Texas pursued Urban Meyer and he said no. Why he said no is, for the sake of this conversation, irrelevant. More importantly, how does Texas answer in recruiting it pursued another coach before bringing the current one back? Big-name programs consistently battling with Texas in recruiting are probably laughing and salivating at the idea of even easier recruiting battles.
How would Texas sell to its fan base, a fan base it needs to get back into its stadium following a demoralizing global pandemic that’s undoubtedly changed the way people consume sports, it tried to hire someone else, failed, and stopped there?
And how would Texas explain to its rich fan base, the one Chris Del Conte asks for money, it should continue to invest in the program, build facilities, buy suites, etc.?
On the surface, none of this makes any damn sense when you ask yourself simple questions about the future of the program now that the Urban Meyer cat is out of the bag. A fan revolt, significant loss in donations and revenue, and recruiting plunge seem to be easily predictable. So, I suppose the best suggestion, because I’m not naïve enough to believe y’all will actually oblige, is to exercise patience.
This is common sense, right? I can’t recall a program trying to reel in another head coach only to keep the same one it has probably because… it doesn’t make any damn sense. The program has already admitted through its other pursuit its current guy isn’t the guy.
3) Why the idea of lacking proven plans is inexcusable…
Lincoln Riley – Oklahoma
Kirby Smart – Georgia
Jimbo Fisher – FSU
Dabo Swinney – Clemson
Ryan Day – Ohio State
Chip Kelly – Oregon
Gary Patterson – TCU
Bob Stoops – Oklahoma
Butch Davis – Miami
All coordinators – or in the case of Swinney, a position coach – with zero head coaching experience before being handed the keys to the program. Does the amount of risk associated with a head coach candidate increase when you move down from an established, experienced coach with a resume in the ballpark of Meyer? Sure. However, the idea there aren’t other viable plans available to explore is inexcusable. Some of the most successful programs of this era hired coaches with no head coaching experience. Hell, Manny Diaz is currently 8-1 at Miami with a good, homegrown recruiting class and it took him one season to improve (43rd to 14th in F/+) more than Texas has the previous... I don't even know it's been really long.
4) Big 12 and college football…
--- Updated F/+ overall rankings at FootballOutsiders.com rank Texas at No. 23 (no change) overall.
S&P+ offense: 22nd
S&P+ defense: 39th
FEI offense: 28th
FEI defense: 36th
(note: main difference between the two is S&P+ is play-by-play efficiency while FEI is drive-based. So, it would make sense the Texas defense rates better from a drive standpoint than a play-by-play standpoint right now.)
--- Big 12 F/+ rankings:
No. 7 – Oklahoma
No. 11 – Iowa State
No. 21 – Texas
No. 28 – Oklahoma State
No. 40 – West Virginia
No. 43 – TCU
No. 58 – Baylor
No. 79 – Kansas State
No. 84 – Texas Tech
No. 121 – Kansas
--- Even during a shortened season, Mike Gundy found a way to lose at least three games for the ninth-straight season. We talked about college football purgatory earlier, and he might be the best example anywhere. Everything stays the same, and there’s no sign it’ll get better or worse.
--- Feels like Kansas came very close to forcing Texas Tech to eat a ton of money and fire Matt Wells. But the Red Raiders escaped with a 16-13 win at home. Texas Tech is the kind of school that could flip people the bird and hire someone like Hugh Freeze.
--- Here’s the issue with Texas A&M’s playoff candidacy: on a neutral field, Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, BYU, Notre Dame, Florida, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Georgia and Cincinnati would all be favored, according to F/+. Iowa and Iowa State would probably be close to a pick ‘em.
--- UCLA’s F/+ ratings since Chip Kelly was hired: 86, 78, 33. UCLA’s losses this season are 48-42 at Colorado and 38-35 at Oregon without starting quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson. Kelly has a great opportunity to shake up the Pac-12 race this weekend against crosstown rival USC. Regardless, UCLA is making massive improvement in year three.
--- Very unusual year, but I can’t recall a recent national champion that fell off a cliff faster than LSU. The Tigers are all the way down at No. 47 in F/+ also meaning they’d be an underdog against Ole Miss.
5) Texas Basketball…
Obviously, we’re just five games into the season. So, it’s still early and tough to put much into very small sample sizes. That said, Kai Jones, according to Basketball Reference, leads Texas with a 151.7 offensive rating. The next closest player is Royce Hamm at 121.9 followed closely by Matt Coleman at 120.4. Defensively, Jones’s rating is a very strong 88.4, which only trails team-leader Hamm (80.7), Greg Brown (83.5) and Jericho Sims (86.3). The more Jones Texas can play, the better.
But Jones has played just 50% of the available minutes. Meanwhile, Brown has played just 47.5%. It’s not a coincidence both lead the team in fouls committed per 40 minutes with the latter at 8.0 and the former at 7.6. No other Texas player is above 6.5. Yesterday, Shaka Smart indirectly admitted, while also pointing out how strong Hamm has played, the starting lineup is very much under evaluation, and Texas talks daily about lineups while evaluating the numbers. We know the players in the rotation, but Texas doesn’t yet know the best blend. The more Jones is able to stay on the floor, the easier that assignment becomes.
6) Texas Baseball…
Earlier this week, D1Baseball.com updated its 2021 MLB Draft rankings for college prospects. Texas right-hander Ty Madden ranked No. 3 overall.
To say people across baseball, both college and professional, are excited about Madden is a gigantic understatement. I’ve heard from scouts employed by teams picking in the backend of the first round who think Madden will never make it to them and scouts in the front of the draft who think a strong performance could make him a realistic option.
Madden’s makeup is almost as big of a boost right now as his stuff. People can’t stop raving about the way he approaches his baseball work and his leadership qualities. And if he can throw a third pitch for a strike this season and consistently compete in the zone with his dominant fastball-slider combo, look out.
7) Scanning the rest of the sports globe…
--- The schedule, thanks to other NFL teams failing to adhere to COVID-19 protocols, injuries to big-time starters, and predictably one-dimensional offense were going to catch up to the Steelers at some point. Finding any way to win is all that matters in the NFL, but if the Steelers want to actually contend for a championship, their offense has to improve.
--- It was just a press conference and there’s a long list of coaches winning press conferences and failing to win where it actually matters. However, I came away extremely impressed with the straightforward way new Rockets head coach Stephen Silas answered questions about James Harden’s mini-holdout. It’s obvious Silas is going to need to provide a lot of leadership if Harden hangs around because we know the superstar isn’t. The best hope for the Rockets is they land the type of massive trade return they’re seeking for Harden because it’s past time to move on.
While Russell Westbrook showed up hours early to his first practice with the Wizards, Harden was delivering Prada bags full of honey buns in another city. Harden isn’t the first superstar to request a trade and then try to hammer his point home through his actions and the press. But he can’t step-back and shoot his way out of this one.
--- Earlier this week, the Rangers traded right-hander Lance Lynn to the White Sox for right-hander Dane Dunning and left-handed starting pitching prospect Avery Weems. It’s a fair trade. The White Sox acquired a proven workhorse with two years remaining on his contract, and the Rangers acquired a good, MLB-ready prospect with some MLB success and another interesting prospect. Dunning’s secondary stuff ticked up this season, his first since 2018, and at worst he’s probably a solid No. 4-type starter with upside to reach higher.
--- A great thing about 2020: turning on soccer’s biggest international matches and seeing young Americans thriving. I never thought I’d see it.
--- I’ve probably watched this 50 times already. The Dominican Professional Baseball League is the most entertaining sports league no one ever talks about, and there are some big names currently playing like Vladdy, Jr.
8) Anything and everything…
--- After finishing Parks and Recreation and the first season of Ted Lasso, my wife and I wanted to begin another short (30-minute episodes so we can fly through it once the little man goes to sleep) comedy series we hadn’t seen. We gave The Good Place a try, and immediately went back to the Netflix search for something else after episode one. The storyline was too ridiculous by the end of a single episode. We tried Community, and we’re in. Abed and Troy’s chemistry on screen, especially at the end of episodes, is extremely impressive.
--- The boys of the house hanging out with Jack’s giant sloth, and receiver if he loses his sitting balance, hang out a lot with the toys.
We make sure we keep Willie warm during the winter.
--- Merry Christmas to me. I’m picking out a new monitor to use with my laptop, and also use on my patio when I set it up as a TV to watch sports outside. Looking for something big enough but not too crazy expensive (under $500). Any suggestions?
---
--- We all have Christmas movies we bond with as children. Christmas Vacation will forever be that one for me, but each time the calendar flips to December, I always find myself listening to both Home Alone soundtracks.
9) The best thing I read this week… is from the New York Times: The Social Life of Forests
***********
THIS WEEK'S FEATURED ART FROM WYLD GALLERY
"Crow Indian Waiting to Hot Dance"
"Desperado"
I was bummed to hear from longtime OB member Ray Donley that COVID-19 led to the close of the WYLD GALLERY brick and mortar in downtown Austin. If you never stopped in, you missed out. However, I was pleased to hear, and then see, Ray’s vibrant gallery of fine Native American art has expanded online, and this week’s column is brought to you by WYLD GALLERY. And if anyone lives in the Austin area and would like to see some of the paintings in person, Ray would be happy to try to work that out or even bring them to you. E-mail or PM me and I’ll connect you with Ray.
WYLD GALLERY is a gallery featuring traditional and contemporary fine art by Native American Artists. The gallery is the part-time retirement gig for Ray Donley, an Austin attorney who has been a lurker on OB since 2002. Ray has been collecting Native American art since the 1980s. He has made friends with a number of Oklahoma Native American Artists, and enjoys ribbing them for their fanatical support of a football team that honors the land thieves who took their land.
You’ll find many affordable options including some as cheap as $50. Seriously. See for yourself at the bottom of this column. That’s an outstanding deal, especially considering many of these artists have been featured at some of the top Native American galleries in the world.
Contemporary Native American paintings are bold, bright, and never boring. And they will look great on the walls of your office or home. Many of the artists in the gallery have pieces in the permanent collections of museums, including the Smithsonian.
Please check out these unique, vibrant paintings at WYLD.GALLERY. Treat yourself to some cool art to add some character to your house/office or snag that unique Christmas gift you’re always looking for.
Alright, the writing…
1) Daryl Morey, the Houston Rockets and the Texas Longhorns…
There’s a place in the NBA worse than any other. It’s a place where an organization can and often does sneak into the playoffs. But that fan base, and even the organization deep down, knows it can do no better than tiptoeing into the postseason before being bounced in the first round. Okay, there might be a surprising series win that ignites a fan base, but reality eventually wins. And reality reminds those wearing the colors this is the best you can do; while you won’t tank for draft picks and will win enough games, you won’t go up either.
That, folks, is basketball purgatory.
Once upon a time, the Houston Rockets were in that depressing place. The calendar turned to 2000 and the Rockets either missed the playoffs or were eliminated in the first round 14 of the next 15 seasons. Save it, Mavs and Spurs fans. Yes, the Rockets had their one series win when they upset the Blazers in 2009, and the previous season they won 22-straight games only to lose in the first round because of some bad injury luck.
As the Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady era began to fade, an intelligent, aggressive general manager ahead of the curve began to meticulously, and through a mountain of various moves, stock his organization with assets and promising young players. All of it was aimed to continue pushing the organization forward. But really, it was about acquiring a superstar. After 74 moves, some good, bad, and most largely forgotten for their perceived insignificance, Daryl Morey acquired his superstar – James Harden. I’ll get to the honey buns and Prada later. Let’s stay the course.
Morey is in Philadelphia now calculating his next move to do what he couldn’t in Houston – win a championship. However, I’ll forever be a fan of Morey. A lot can be said about the Rockets during his time. What can’t be said is Houston didn’t win because its general manager didn’t try. He pulled Houston out of basketball purgatory and came agonizingly close to a NBA Finals appearance.
He inherited an organization stuck in a perpetual state of above average and never, ever settled. Once Morey acquired his superstar, he kept pushing for another. Once he acquired another, he kept trying to add championship pieces around his stars all while ushering in a unique, landscape-changing analytical approach to offensive efficiency. Morey wasn’t just trying to acquire players. He was constantly evolving, pushing the envelope in the name of success and unafraid to challenge basketball’s norms. Simply accepting a situation and remaining stagnant was never, ever an option.
So, yeah, this guy will forever admire and appreciate Morey. In the face of the Warriors being one of the greatest teams ever, many teams in the Western Conference threw in the towel and waived white flags from their tanks hundreds of miles from the battlefield. Morey didn’t. He went for it and tried to take his best swing at the giant every single time. No excuses.
A plan B? Morey had plans through the entire damn alphabet. That’s what great leaders and decision-makers in sports do. They live for those moments when they can implement plans they feverishly and constantly think about. Billy Beane didn’t say “grow comfortable with just winning,” in Moneyball. He said, “adapt or die.”
If you haven’t snagged the assist out of midair already, you’re asking what this has to do with Texas. The Longhorns are smack dab in the middle of college football’s version of purgatory.
They’re pretty good. The last few years, they’ve rated, according to F/+, 25th, 22nd and now 21st, undoubtedly a step forward from the Charlie Strong disaster. Under Tom Herman, they played for a conference championship once and won a nice bowl game once too. The Longhorns are never really bad, but they’re never great either. They’re just… there. They’re hanging out in the very bottom of the top 25 and in reach of playing for conference titles consistently; good enough to suck people into believing but bad enough to deliver cruel reminders, like losses to storied giants like Iowa State, they’re not truly capable of winning championships.
But here’s the larger issue: the majority of the believing died after the final scenes in the Cotton Bowl. Now, recruiting is reflecting a stagnant program supported by an increasingly apathetic fan base smart enough to grasp its program’s ceiling and issues, and intelligent enough to see the elite prospects aren't arriving anytime soon; many of them are heading just north of the border to Oklahoma. Everyone knows the Longhorns aren’t improving. And unlike Morey and the Rockets, the Longhorns aren’t in the NBA’s Western Conference. They’re in the wimpy Big 12, which is as inviting for the Longhorns as ever.
If Morey would have accepted defeat and never acquired his Harden, the Rockets would still be in purgatory and he probably wouldn’t have lasted long. Texas decision-makers tried to acquire their Harden. Hell, they tried to acquire their Harden and Russ/CP3. They missed. And now they’d entertain the idea of driving their burnt orange tank away with its white flag raised after just one pursuit to get out of purgatory? Pitiful.
In college football, if a program is stuck in this spot and isn’t getting better, it’s getting worse because recruiting doesn’t just impact one season. It impacts many. And if a program like Texas has timid, unimaginative leadership willing to accept college football’s version of purgatory, it’ll deservedly keep sinking in a football and financial hole it won’t escape until someone like a Morey shows up.
2) Some of this stuff doesn’t make any damn sense…
For a moment, let’s ask some simple questions and consider the optics Texas is known to preoccupy itself with:
The optics, currently, are Texas pursued Urban Meyer and he said no. Why he said no is, for the sake of this conversation, irrelevant. More importantly, how does Texas answer in recruiting it pursued another coach before bringing the current one back? Big-name programs consistently battling with Texas in recruiting are probably laughing and salivating at the idea of even easier recruiting battles.
How would Texas sell to its fan base, a fan base it needs to get back into its stadium following a demoralizing global pandemic that’s undoubtedly changed the way people consume sports, it tried to hire someone else, failed, and stopped there?
And how would Texas explain to its rich fan base, the one Chris Del Conte asks for money, it should continue to invest in the program, build facilities, buy suites, etc.?
On the surface, none of this makes any damn sense when you ask yourself simple questions about the future of the program now that the Urban Meyer cat is out of the bag. A fan revolt, significant loss in donations and revenue, and recruiting plunge seem to be easily predictable. So, I suppose the best suggestion, because I’m not naïve enough to believe y’all will actually oblige, is to exercise patience.
This is common sense, right? I can’t recall a program trying to reel in another head coach only to keep the same one it has probably because… it doesn’t make any damn sense. The program has already admitted through its other pursuit its current guy isn’t the guy.
3) Why the idea of lacking proven plans is inexcusable…
Lincoln Riley – Oklahoma
Kirby Smart – Georgia
Jimbo Fisher – FSU
Dabo Swinney – Clemson
Ryan Day – Ohio State
Chip Kelly – Oregon
Gary Patterson – TCU
Bob Stoops – Oklahoma
Butch Davis – Miami
All coordinators – or in the case of Swinney, a position coach – with zero head coaching experience before being handed the keys to the program. Does the amount of risk associated with a head coach candidate increase when you move down from an established, experienced coach with a resume in the ballpark of Meyer? Sure. However, the idea there aren’t other viable plans available to explore is inexcusable. Some of the most successful programs of this era hired coaches with no head coaching experience. Hell, Manny Diaz is currently 8-1 at Miami with a good, homegrown recruiting class and it took him one season to improve (43rd to 14th in F/+) more than Texas has the previous... I don't even know it's been really long.
4) Big 12 and college football…
--- Updated F/+ overall rankings at FootballOutsiders.com rank Texas at No. 23 (no change) overall.
S&P+ offense: 22nd
S&P+ defense: 39th
FEI offense: 28th
FEI defense: 36th
(note: main difference between the two is S&P+ is play-by-play efficiency while FEI is drive-based. So, it would make sense the Texas defense rates better from a drive standpoint than a play-by-play standpoint right now.)
--- Big 12 F/+ rankings:
No. 7 – Oklahoma
No. 11 – Iowa State
No. 21 – Texas
No. 28 – Oklahoma State
No. 40 – West Virginia
No. 43 – TCU
No. 58 – Baylor
No. 79 – Kansas State
No. 84 – Texas Tech
No. 121 – Kansas
--- Even during a shortened season, Mike Gundy found a way to lose at least three games for the ninth-straight season. We talked about college football purgatory earlier, and he might be the best example anywhere. Everything stays the same, and there’s no sign it’ll get better or worse.
--- Feels like Kansas came very close to forcing Texas Tech to eat a ton of money and fire Matt Wells. But the Red Raiders escaped with a 16-13 win at home. Texas Tech is the kind of school that could flip people the bird and hire someone like Hugh Freeze.
--- Here’s the issue with Texas A&M’s playoff candidacy: on a neutral field, Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, BYU, Notre Dame, Florida, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Georgia and Cincinnati would all be favored, according to F/+. Iowa and Iowa State would probably be close to a pick ‘em.
--- UCLA’s F/+ ratings since Chip Kelly was hired: 86, 78, 33. UCLA’s losses this season are 48-42 at Colorado and 38-35 at Oregon without starting quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson. Kelly has a great opportunity to shake up the Pac-12 race this weekend against crosstown rival USC. Regardless, UCLA is making massive improvement in year three.
--- Very unusual year, but I can’t recall a recent national champion that fell off a cliff faster than LSU. The Tigers are all the way down at No. 47 in F/+ also meaning they’d be an underdog against Ole Miss.
5) Texas Basketball…
Obviously, we’re just five games into the season. So, it’s still early and tough to put much into very small sample sizes. That said, Kai Jones, according to Basketball Reference, leads Texas with a 151.7 offensive rating. The next closest player is Royce Hamm at 121.9 followed closely by Matt Coleman at 120.4. Defensively, Jones’s rating is a very strong 88.4, which only trails team-leader Hamm (80.7), Greg Brown (83.5) and Jericho Sims (86.3). The more Jones Texas can play, the better.
But Jones has played just 50% of the available minutes. Meanwhile, Brown has played just 47.5%. It’s not a coincidence both lead the team in fouls committed per 40 minutes with the latter at 8.0 and the former at 7.6. No other Texas player is above 6.5. Yesterday, Shaka Smart indirectly admitted, while also pointing out how strong Hamm has played, the starting lineup is very much under evaluation, and Texas talks daily about lineups while evaluating the numbers. We know the players in the rotation, but Texas doesn’t yet know the best blend. The more Jones is able to stay on the floor, the easier that assignment becomes.
6) Texas Baseball…
Earlier this week, D1Baseball.com updated its 2021 MLB Draft rankings for college prospects. Texas right-hander Ty Madden ranked No. 3 overall.
To say people across baseball, both college and professional, are excited about Madden is a gigantic understatement. I’ve heard from scouts employed by teams picking in the backend of the first round who think Madden will never make it to them and scouts in the front of the draft who think a strong performance could make him a realistic option.
Madden’s makeup is almost as big of a boost right now as his stuff. People can’t stop raving about the way he approaches his baseball work and his leadership qualities. And if he can throw a third pitch for a strike this season and consistently compete in the zone with his dominant fastball-slider combo, look out.
7) Scanning the rest of the sports globe…
--- The schedule, thanks to other NFL teams failing to adhere to COVID-19 protocols, injuries to big-time starters, and predictably one-dimensional offense were going to catch up to the Steelers at some point. Finding any way to win is all that matters in the NFL, but if the Steelers want to actually contend for a championship, their offense has to improve.
--- It was just a press conference and there’s a long list of coaches winning press conferences and failing to win where it actually matters. However, I came away extremely impressed with the straightforward way new Rockets head coach Stephen Silas answered questions about James Harden’s mini-holdout. It’s obvious Silas is going to need to provide a lot of leadership if Harden hangs around because we know the superstar isn’t. The best hope for the Rockets is they land the type of massive trade return they’re seeking for Harden because it’s past time to move on.
While Russell Westbrook showed up hours early to his first practice with the Wizards, Harden was delivering Prada bags full of honey buns in another city. Harden isn’t the first superstar to request a trade and then try to hammer his point home through his actions and the press. But he can’t step-back and shoot his way out of this one.
--- Earlier this week, the Rangers traded right-hander Lance Lynn to the White Sox for right-hander Dane Dunning and left-handed starting pitching prospect Avery Weems. It’s a fair trade. The White Sox acquired a proven workhorse with two years remaining on his contract, and the Rangers acquired a good, MLB-ready prospect with some MLB success and another interesting prospect. Dunning’s secondary stuff ticked up this season, his first since 2018, and at worst he’s probably a solid No. 4-type starter with upside to reach higher.
--- A great thing about 2020: turning on soccer’s biggest international matches and seeing young Americans thriving. I never thought I’d see it.
--- I’ve probably watched this 50 times already. The Dominican Professional Baseball League is the most entertaining sports league no one ever talks about, and there are some big names currently playing like Vladdy, Jr.
8) Anything and everything…
--- After finishing Parks and Recreation and the first season of Ted Lasso, my wife and I wanted to begin another short (30-minute episodes so we can fly through it once the little man goes to sleep) comedy series we hadn’t seen. We gave The Good Place a try, and immediately went back to the Netflix search for something else after episode one. The storyline was too ridiculous by the end of a single episode. We tried Community, and we’re in. Abed and Troy’s chemistry on screen, especially at the end of episodes, is extremely impressive.
--- The boys of the house hanging out with Jack’s giant sloth, and receiver if he loses his sitting balance, hang out a lot with the toys.
We make sure we keep Willie warm during the winter.
--- Merry Christmas to me. I’m picking out a new monitor to use with my laptop, and also use on my patio when I set it up as a TV to watch sports outside. Looking for something big enough but not too crazy expensive (under $500). Any suggestions?
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--- We all have Christmas movies we bond with as children. Christmas Vacation will forever be that one for me, but each time the calendar flips to December, I always find myself listening to both Home Alone soundtracks.
9) The best thing I read this week… is from the New York Times: The Social Life of Forests
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THIS WEEK'S FEATURED ART FROM WYLD GALLERY
"Crow Indian Waiting to Hot Dance"
"Desperado"
