April 7, 2025

The Lakers have had their ups and downs the last couple of weeks, but they completely dismantled OKC yesterday on the road. It may have been their most impressive win of the season, and was a reminder that they can in fact play with anybody in the Association after trading for Luka Doncic. Getting to the #2 seed is probably out of reach right now, but if they can find a way to win 3 of the next 4 games, I think they can secure the #3 seed. Matchups are everything at this point, and that would put them in line to avoid OKC and Golden State until the conference finals, who are the two most dangerous teams right now. The Lakers would probably love to see the Grizzlies in the 1st round as well, and have Denver and the Clippers on the other side of the bracket. The irony is after the trade deadline, the Lakers might matchup way better with OKC and Denver, but worse with a team like Golden State, which was the complete opposite before the flurry of deals at the deadline. Austin Reaves has got to be the best #3 option in the NBA. He’s also in the running for Most Improved Player, but it’s unlikely he will actually win it.

As for the Clippers, they have been on quite a run in the last month, along with the Timberwolves. Ironically though, they might still end up in the Play-In Tournament. 3 of their last 4 games will be against teams doing everything they can to win: San Antonio, Houston, Sacramento, and Golden State. The Clippers rise has obviously coincided with Kawhi Leonard’s ability to suddenly play more minutes and even starting to play back-to-back games. The problem for the Clips is that they don’t own the tie breaker with Minnesota, but they do own it over Memphis. It’s truly a rubix cube to figure out where they might finish, but with another back-to-back coming this week, they will need Kawhi if the plan to stay out of the Play In Tournament.

That was a tough weekend series for the Dodgers against the Phillies. They lost 2 of 3, but lost both games by a combined 2 runs. Friday the Dodgers just couldn’t really get the bats going, and yesterday, Tyler Glasnow and the bullpen had their struggles in wet conditions. The Phillies are a great team, but just made a few more plays. Nevertheless, what you can feel good about is the fact Yoshinobu Yamamoto continues to look elite, Roki Sasaki is slowly gaining more confidence as a pitcher, and this team does not quit. The bad news is that Blake Snell is going on the IL with shoulder inflammation, and like I told you, there was no way all these guys were going to stay healthy. Tony Gonsolin and Clayton Kershaw are still a few weeks away from coming back, so the Boys in Blue will have to patch it together with Matt Sauer, Landon Knack, and Justin Wrebleski. In any case, 9-2 to start the season is nothing to complain about.

As for the Angels, they are off to a surprising start at 6-3 after taking 2 of 3 from the Guardians. I don’t want to make too much out of it so far, but the most promising pieces of this are that Mike Trout is hitting with power, and Logan O’Hoppe looks legit too. I can’t say I’m terribly impressed with the pitching, which is in the bottom 3rd of the league, which is pretty much where I expected them to be in terms of ERA. The Angels get the Rays next on the road, so we’ll find out soon enough just how real this team is.

I can remember when I was 12 years old, I recorded on VHS the game where Wayne Gretzky broke Gordie Howe’s all-time goal scoring record vs the Vancouver Canucks. Gretzky was my guy as a kid, and I thought there was no way that record would ever be broken. Well sure enough, it was broken yesterday by Alex Ovechkin. It took someone playing for 20 years and averaging 50 goals a season to do it. The man is amazing to be scoring 40 goals a season at almost 40 years old. Even more impressive is the fact he is doing this in a year where the Capitals are the best team in the Eastern Conference. Look, Gretzky is the Greatest NHL Player of All-Time, and is universally recognized as that. We probably don’t have hockey in Southern California like we do today without Gretzky. However, Ovi is an incredible player in his own right and for sure one of the all-time greats.

Speaking of hockey, the LA Kings quietly clinched a playoff spot over the weekend. More importantly though, with their win over Edmonton this weekend, the Kings have likely secured home ice advantage in the 1st round. I’m still very skeptical of them winning any matchup with the Oilers. However, having home ice advantage is a very good place to start to improve their chances. It doesn’t matter though if they are going to get smoked in 5 games or 6 games like the last couple of years. If for some reason the Kings don’t play the Oilers in round 1 and lose, that would be an even bigger indictment on Rob Blake and Luc Robitaille as executives. Who are we kidding though, they are going to play the Oilers again!

Those were two great Final Four Games we got over the weekend! Walter Clayton Jr is amazing. Does anybody realize this kid averaged just 7 points per game two years ago at Iona? Now he’s projected to be a lottery pick. He is an elite shot maker as a 6’2 guard, and he is the reason Florida defeated Auburn and is in the Championship game tonight. Meanwhile, you can love America, and you can love Duke, but you can’t love both. Cooper Flag is a hell of a player, but Houston is relentless, and deserve all the credit in the world for rallying in that game. Why should we be surprised though? White Lotus predicted this!

Speaking of White Lotus, we have to talk about the Season Finale, which went down last night. Spoiler alert for those of you who have yet to see it, so read no further if you plan on watching it later. Overall, I have to say I’m pretty disappointed with it compared to the last 2 seasons. The biggest issue is that the characters were not nearly as interesting as the first two seasons, when Tanya and Armon made the entire show. Their deaths were extremely dramatic and a big deal. In the case of this season, the deaths of Rick and Chelsea were not nearly that big of a deal, because there just wasn’t enough character development with them. Ok, I get it…..Chelsea foreshadowed that her fate was tied to Rick, which is exactly how it played out in the end. However, the way it went down was laughable. Rick finding out that Jim is his father? Come on really? Like he didn’t have time to tell him that when he had a gun pointed at him. Also stupid of Rick to just go back to the White Lotus like Jim was never going to find him. We never even saw the actual bodies floating the river that Belinda’s son saw at the beginning, but can only assume it was one of the guards. I’m sure this is not the last time Belinda and her son will see Gary, but the irony of her escape is that it’s actually worse than what Tanya did to her in season 1. All that lady friendship was ridiculous. It was still the worst girls trip ever, no matter how hard they tried to patch up their fake friendship in the end. It was also totally gutless of Mike White to not kill Lochlan. Tim should have suffered for all the stupid things he did, and accidentally killing Lochlan would have been the ultimate price to pay, but apparently it was just too much for even this show. Lochlan’s miraculous recovery? Come on!!! Hope next season is better.