Monday Morning Coffee

April 3, 2023

I don’t ever recall the NBA being like this. The level of play between the 12th best team in the Western Conference and the 1st place is tighter than a Kim Kardashian jump suit. At the moment, there’s probably 6-10 teams that could win an NBA championship this year. The Lakers are now one of them, assuming they can stay healthy, which is always a big question with them. After last night’s win against Houston, if the Lakers win their last 4 games, believe it or not they can get the 5th seed. What’s most impressive though is the fact that they can take control of a game with their defense over any given stretch. That’s exactly what they did on Friday against the Wolves, and yesterday against the Rockets. You guys can bitch and complain all you want about Anthony Davis, but when he’s healthy, he’s one of the best players in the league. Also, Dennis “The Menace” Schroeder has been and is going to continue to be a huge catalyst for this team. I’d prefer the Laker get the 6th seed and play the Kings in the 1st round, avoiding the Suns and Nuggets in the 1st round. However, I don’t think the Lakers care and feel they can beat anybody in the league right now.

Then there’s the Clippers. They suddenly find themselves struggling to not only stay in the top 5 of the West, but they could even slip back into the play-in tournament. In fact, that game against the Lakers on Wednesday, might even be for 6th place when we get there. Kawhi is playing phenomenal, and Russell Westbrook is putting up numbers, but there hasn’t been much of a reliable force on offense besides those two since Paul George went down. They are also struggling to defend consistently, which frankly, hasn’t exactly been one of Russ’s strengths the last few years. If you’re the Clippers or the Lakers though, would you rather be in the play-in or would you rather face the Suns in the first round? If I’m either of them, I’d rather be in the play-in and face the Suns later on.



Listen guys, when I say this, it’s no shade at San Diego but it’s true. That buzzer beating shot by Lamont Butler on Saturday is easily the greatest moment in San Diego sports history. It sent SDSU to the National Championship Game, where they will take on UCONN tonight. I have a soft spot for the Aztec Basketball program, as I used to host their pregame and post game radio shows in the early 2000s. If you know any FAU fans I can assure you that they probably won’t be speaking to you for at least the next 3-5 business days. Too bad the UCONN Miami game wasn’t all that competitive. The TV ratings and the ticket prices weren’t exactly what they’ve been in the past but rightfully so. It’s criminal to make people pay outrageous prices to see a basketball game in a football stadium.

https://twitter.com/NevadaSportsNet/status/1642324291206410240?s=20

To baseball, where it was a mixed bag for the Dodgers over the weekend, and a lot of frustration. They split their first four games with the Diamondbacks, despite dominating for stretches. The good news is that all four starting pitchers were sharp: Julio Urias, Dustin May, Clayton Kershaw, as well as Noah Syndergaard. That feels very on brand for this team. The bad news though is that the offense had its ups and downs. It was really good to see Trayce Thompson and JD Martinez swinging the bat well, despite having awful spring trainings. However, the situational hitting is still poor at times, with a total of 20 runners left on base in the two losses. Chris Taylor also continues to struggle, which has been a problem for over a year now. Ultimately, it’s the likes of Taylor, Max Muncy, and James Outman, and Miguel Vargas that are going to determine just how good the Dodgers really are this year, because we know Betts-Freeman-Smith are a trio that will produce at the top of the lineup.

Dodgers starting pitcher Noah Syndergaard delivers during the first inning.

As for the Angels, they handled business against the A’s, taking two out of three games. It seemed very odd that there was no game on Friday after starting the season on Thursday. However, you know there was some nerdy analytics guy in Oakland who convinced everybody that the data shows fans ,won’t come to games on Friday, or that the team might be paying too much in electricity on a Friday night in April, so better to not have the game. In any case, the offense looked good for most of the series, the lineup appears to have more depth, while Trout and Ohtani looked like the stars they are. As for Anthony Rendon’s altercation with a fan, both the fan and Rendon are wrong here. If you’re a fan, you can’t just say whatever you want because you buy a ticket. There’s a line and you can’t cross it. You can say a guy sucks, but you can’t get personal. That guy shouldn’t be allowed to come to an A’s game. For Rendon though, you can never put your hands on a fan, and he should know that by now. It’s a suspendable offense, even handed out by a guy like Rob Manfred, who has no idea what he’s doing. Then again Rendon would probably welcome a suspension since he seems to love his time off during the season to go along with his fat paycheck.

Angels' Shohei Ohtani throws against the Oakland Athletics in the second inning of an opening day game in Oakland.

Finally, the LA Kings are headed back to the playoffs which is great to see for their loyal fans. However, it once looked like they were going to finish 1st in the West, but now they’ll be lucky if they can get home ice advantage in the 1st round. That 1st round will likely be against the Edmonton Oilers, who were a thorn in the Kings side last year, and if you watched Kings hockey in the 80’s and 90’s, you know how much of a pain the Oilers have been historically in the early rounds for the Kings. The last few weeks the Kings have looked dominant offensively, but since this road trip started, they’ve been struggling to score. Some of that has to do with injuries, but there’s not much time to get health. It’s like they are giving you a taste of how they could suddenly disappoint in the playoffs. All I need to do is watch the game in colorful clothing, see the Kings lose, and I’m back in the 90’s all over again.

Kings forward Arthur Kaliyev, right, celebrates with teammates after scoring.

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