November 25th, 2013
It’s a story that’s gotten annoying. The Bruins are good, but not quite good enough. Saturday night at the Rose Bowl, we had to listen to this tiresome storyline after the Bruins lost to Arizona State 38-33. I don’t care that the Bruins outscored ASU 20-3 in the 2nd half and made a great comeback. I don’t care that their only three losses this season have come against quality top 25 opponents. Why has Brett Hundley not taken his game to an even higher level yet? Why does the UCLA offensive line get manhandled against good teams? And if Myles Jack was going to only play running back, then why didn’t he touch the ball 30 times? He probably could have been more useful on the defensive side, since the Bruins gave up 38 points. Jim Mora Jr. and his Bruins may show flashes of brilliance, but until they start meeting the moment, they will soon start looking more like underachievers than rising stars.
Then there’s the angry Trojan fans, who are furious that their cross-town rival couldn’t take care of ASU, which ended USC’s slim hopes of playing in the Rose Bowl. Of course, leave it to all the myopic USC fans to claim how “overrated” the Bruins are, and they’ll likely spend this upcoming rivalry week pretending like their team should be playing for the BCS Championship. Still, USC did beat up on lowly Colorado 47-29, which continued their feel good story under Ed Orgeron. The Trojans are now 6-1 under Coach O, but they’ll need to beat UCLA next week to give him any chance of retaining the job permanently. This a nice feel good story for the seniors, but if Orgeron were coaching this team one year from now, most Trojan fans would probably be feeling like morons for wanting him in the first place. On 2nd thought, most of the Trojan fans are sleezy morons, who aren’t even alums, that jumped on the bandwagon when they ditched their Raiders jackets for Trojan sweatshirts, which they bought at K-Mart. Expect another classic game between the Bruins and Trojans next week at the Coliseum!
Let’s talk baseball for a moment. The Angels made their first significant move of the off-season, trading outfielder Peter Bourjos, and touted prospect Randal Grichuk, to the Cardinals for 3rd baseman David Freese, and reliever Fernando Salas. For some reason, many Halo fans seem like they are ready to jump off the top of Space Mountain after hearing about this trade. Bourjos isn’t Fred Lynn or Jim Edmonds. He’s a nice player, but an expendable one. Grichuk may be a quality major leaguer, but his path to the big leagues was blocked by all the Angels expensive outfielders. The question for this team remains whether or not they can find decent starting pitching, which I have my doubts about.
Speaking of pitching, the Dodgers have signed pitcher Dan Haren to a one year deal for $10 million. Haren is a decent starter on a reasonable contract, but his addition should make fans lose hope in the Dodgers assembling a powerhouse starting rotation with David Price and Masahiro Tanaka.
A-Rod is unbelievable. He holds one press conference, in which he basically admits to doing performance enhancing drugs, and now when he’s about to get kicked out of the game, he goes on some NY radio station earlier this week, trying to convince us that he never did PED’s. I also like how he’s demanding a sit down with the commissioner, over brunch. I can just see it now: “I want Mimosa’s! And I want answers damn it!”
On to the NBA, where some interesting developments occurred in Laker land this past week. ESPN’s Stephen A Smith, or who I liked to call “Scream’in A Smith”, claimed that according to his sources, Carmelo Anthony, as of now “is gone. He’s going to LA to play with Kobe.” I know this is hardly official, but keep in mind, this is the same guy who reported that Lebron, Wade, and Bosh were going to join forces in Miami, well before it actually happened. Of course the problem with the Carmelo to the Lakers theory is that Mike D’Antoni is still their coach, and Carmelo had issues with him in New York. Since the Lakers are a miraculous 7-7 without Kobe, and have faced one of the toughest schedules in the NBA so far, D’Antoni seems to have overachieved and has a case for retaining his job at the moment. In fact, D’Antoni feels so good about his team so far, that he took shots at former Lakers Dwight Howard and Antawn Jamison in last night’s post game presser. “They don’t go grab a stat sheet,” when asked about the team sharing the ball, and “I don’t have to worry about a guy pouting because I didn’t put him in.” Here’s Stephen A on Carmelo…..
As for the Clippers, they pounded the Derek Rose-less Bulls yesterday at Staples. The 39 point win was the largest margin of victory in the NBA this season. The Clippers look good, but poor D-Rose. Now, he likely has to endure another 6 months of rehab in his other knee, which will probably cost him the rest of this season. Rose is one of the best players in the NBA when healthy, but his career is slowly starting to resemble that of Grant Hill’s, who could never stay healthy in his prime.
Let’s go to the ice. The Kings endured two disappointing overtime defeats in their last two games, but Ben Scrivens has been absolutely sensational. Jonathan Bernier has become that once hot ex-girlfriend that has become fat and ugly, while Scrivens, the man he was traded for, currently leads the NHL in goals against average, and is 2nd in save percentage. The Kings are banged up, but Scrivens is keeping them right in the thick of the Western Conference playoff race.
Meanwhile, Dustin “Pancakes” Penner scored two goals for the Ducks on Saturday, in their victory over the Coyotes. Kings fans are rolling their eyes right now, because Penner has already scored almost as many goals this season as he did in 3 seasons with the Kings! I guess it probably helps when Penner actually starts the season in shape, as opposed to playing his way into it.
Week 12 in the NFL is in the books, and it’s become clear now: Charger football simply defies logic. San Diego went on the road to shock the Chiefs to vault themselves into a 6-way tie for the final playoff spot in the AFC. The Bolts play 4 of their final 5 games at home, and those 4 are very winnable. Don’t worry though they won’t, because remember, Charger football defies logic. How did the Broncos blow that lead against the Patriots? Tom Brady remembered he was Tom Brady in the 2nd half. The Vikings and Packers played to a tie? Somewhere, Donovan McNabb is very confused.
Anybody watch the American Music Awards last night? I thought the show was relatively tame, without any wardrobe malfunctions, or scandalous performances. However, I thought if anything, Justin Timberlake should have hosted the show, instead of Pitbull. Pitbull wasn’t bad, but JT is simply the best the industry has to offer right now, and he probably would have had some better jokes. I was most curious to see how Miley Cyrus would be received after all her recent controversy. I suppose this went much better than the VMA’s, and her outfit wasn’t nearly as shocking. However, nobody seems to be sure why her performance included a giant cat floating above her, which was lip-synching and crying.
Finally, The Walking Dead returned last night with another episode. This episode was called “Dead Weight”, and spoiler alert for those of you who have yet to see it. Once again, this episode continued to focus exclusively on The Governor and his new family. However, now, The Governor has reverted back to his older murderous ways, and his “ends-justify-the-means” mentality. After joining Martinez’ new camp, he informs The Governor that he is in charge. This doesn’t last long though, as The Governor murders both Martinez, and the morally righteous Pete. Now, The Governor has reclaimed his status as the leader of a new camp, and they appear poised to attack the prison.
Interestingly enough, Lilly and Megan still don’t realize what kind of monster The Governor, or “Brian” as they call him, really is. They don’t know what kind of transformation he has gone through, which ultimately puts targets on their heads. The Governor is probably going to do everything he can to protect them, but that just means they are probably more likely to die, just like his previous family. I guess in the end, the characters are who they are. Just as Rick reverted back to his position of leadership, The Governor is reverting back to his monstrousness. Looking forward to the fall finale!