Thursday, June 28, 2007

The rest of Round One

Don Nelson is lighting a cigarette right now

18. Golden State -- Marco Belinelli -- Another great shooter on the wing.
19. L.A. Lakers -- Javaris Crittenton -- Second point guard in as many years in the first round.
20. Miami -- Jason Smith -- Big reach for this big man, but he goes to Philly in a trade in return for their pick, the next one, Daequan Cook.

Moving past the lottery

15. Detroit -- Rodney Stuckey -- The Pistons get their man.
16. Washington -- Nick Young -- One more scorer -- dangerous!
17. New Jersey -- Sean Williams -- Reach!

Billy Knight takes a point guard!

Granted, it's not Chris Paul, like it should have been two years ago (as I screamed at the time!), but Acie Law will fill the bill. Not a pure point guard, he's a combo guard, so I guess Knight can't help himself altogether ...

Philly does the unexpected at #12, but I can't argue with it. Small forward Thaddeus Young, a high-upside youngster goes here. Props to this beat writer for at least having it on his radar.

Julian Wright instead of Nick Young to New Orleans at #13 was a surprise, as was Al Thornton to the Clips at #14. Hard to see how he fits with the existing pieces.

And that wraps up the lottery part of the draft.

More surprises

Brandon Wright to Charlotte at #8 where presumably he will play small forward, while Chicago takes the low-ceiling Noah with the ninth pick. Spencer Hawes went to Sacramento at #10, thereby prompting all of our "Nothing like drafting Brad Miller to play next to Brad Miller" jokes.

Hard to believe

Ray Allen supposedly to the Celtics in a package deal for the #5 pick. What seems strange is that Boston took Jeff Green with the #5 pick. A fine player, but is he the ideal sidekick to Kevin Durant?

The Bucks made a curveball pick at #6, going for the "twin towers" approach with Yi Jianlian, who presumably will play power forward alongside Andrew Bogut. Very few mock drafters saw that one coming. So the unexpected picks have begun early.

Minnesota gets a great value at #7 with Corey Brewer.

We start as anticipated ...

Oden #1 to Portland, Durant #2 to Seattle and Horford #3 to Atlanta. Somebody get Billy Knight in an "addicted to power forwards and frightened of point guards" diversion program. Memphis milked the entire clock to take Mike Conley. Somebody, ahem!, picked these first four right. No names, please!

Special NBA Draft FDH Insider tonight

In place of NORTHCOAST HOCKEY TONIGHT (6-7 PM EDT) and in place of the regular edition of THE FANTASYDRAFTHELP.COM INSIDER (9-11 PM EDT), we are bringing you special NBA Draft coverage (pre-draft and joined in progress) on SportsTalkCleveland.com. Check here also tonight for our liveblogging updates as well and check here for our draft guide, free through STC!

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Your 2007 FDH NBA Draft Guide

Available through our friends at SportsTalkCleveland.com for free download. Enjoy!

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

The eulogy that wasn't

24 hours ago, I was preparing a written tribute in this space for Chris Benoit and his family. In an admission that will admittedly brand me an internet smart mark, I will say that he was my favorite wrestler. The operative word here is "was."

My words were going to express the notion that my all-time favorite athlete, Steve Yzerman, retired almost a year ago and that I wrote a tribute to him. I was prepared to express how much harder it is to pay tribute to someone who's passed away than to someone who's retired ... until I learned the circumstances.

There are a million different perspectives out there about this tragedy, and I can respect all of them -- except for the immature clowns on message boards who either want to use the blood of innocents to bash pro wrestling fans, or, on the other extreme, to defend Benoit as "a good man who became sick at the end" and can't let go of the man they wanted to believe existed.

For those who only now know him as a tabloid headline, let me give you the meat of the tribute I was going to write for him. Chris Benoit was a man who said that he treated his profession as art, and many of us loved him for the way that he applied that philosophy to his matches. He almost never had a bad match, even with the least talented wrestlers in the industry. He could work any style in a believable manner. He gave us some of the greatest moments in wrestling history, whether it be the shocking standing ovation he was given at the end of the 2003 Royal Rumble, his Wrestlemania XX triumphant moment with the late, great Eddy Guerrero, his J-Cup highlights from Japan or any hundred other matches. He worked hard, set an example of how to be a professional for wrestlers coming up, and really shined with his leadership in that capacity.

Now for the parts I wasn't going to include ...

Because of what he did in the ring, the fact that his colleagues invariably cited him as one of the most respected wrestlers in the industry (the quintessential "wrestler's wrestler," if you will) and his quiet, humble nature, we all overlooked a few things. Like the fact that he got together with his current wife Nancy at the expense of her existing marriage (and his relationship with the mother of his other children) during the infamous "Kevin Sullivan booked his own divorce" period 11 years ago. And the obvious use of steroids, HGH, or any similar product to pack the unnatural amount of musculature on his relatively slight frame. Nobody's perfect, right?

Well, that's an obvious understatement right now.

In the end, Chris Benoit was all of those things, and that was all we knew at the time -- so it was valid to look at him with the great appreciation that we did. I don't begrudge myself the fun I had at the time from his efforts.

But now? Appreciating Chris Benoit for his work would be like appreciating Adolf Hitler for some paintings that he might have created. Benoit murdered his wife and child in cold blood before taking the coward's way out at the end of a rope. The details of last weekend, combined with confirmation of previous spousal abuse that was not publicly known until now, conspire to make this story keep getting more nauseating by the hour. He deserves none of the glory that many of us were ready to give him when we first learned of his demise prior to absorbing the gory details. He deserves ... well, exactly what he's getting right now and for eternity. Let's leave it at that.

We who appreciated Chris Benoit saw in him the good side of an industry plagued by repetitive and numbing premature death and general sleaze. We thought he stood for the positive side of what is admittedly a morally challenged industry. But in the end, he exemplified to the "nth degree" the open sewer that the business really is. It's a sad measure of how addictive the entertainment can be that so few of us (and I don't exempt myself from this) will abandon it in long-overdue outrage.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

FDH Insider returns in a big way tonight

We've been off for two weeks, but THE FANTASYDRAFTHELP.COM INSIDER (9-11 PM EDT on SportsTalkCleveland.com) returns in a huge way tonight as we cover all the bases in the world of fantasy sports:

9 PM EDT: We begin a new chapter in our coverage of fantasy baseball as we introduce our new BaseballGuys.com segment with our good buddy Ray Flowers. Regular STC listeners will remember that Ray and I have long been affiliated, as we were each with the mothership Drafthelp.com and our friend Pat Luft back in the day. As this wild and crazy world has led us in different directions, Ray has still made appearances on STC and we have stayed friends looking for opportunities to work together. With Ray in the fold for regular appearances on our fantasy show, we are taking our fantasy sports coverage to our highest level yet. Ray is one of the most published writers in the fantasy sports industry, appearing in SI.com and countless other websites and publications. Now, with BaseballGuys.com, he has complete creative control and is proving what he can do at the helm of a respected operation. He is a great addition to our program and I am proud to have he and his website affiliated with the FDH family.

9:30 PM: Our standard deviation from the mean statistic, which sounds like quite a mouthful, is actually a very easy-to-understand concept which is scientifically proven and a large part of our foundation. We have crunched our numbers for the next football, basketball and hockey seasons and we will share our findings with you for these three sports, in addition to going over the concept with you again.

10:45 PM: We preview our coverage of next Thursday's NBA Draft.

Also, we would be remiss if we did not share an absolutely awesome dissection of the ESPN ethos, albeit from a wimpy worshipper of the hated Divealanche.

Sunday, June 17, 2007

FDH Lounge Show #10: June 17, 2007

EDIT: One more addition tonight: just prior to our FDH LOUNGE Movie Spotlight in Hour Two, we will examine the Sopranos finale and how it rates against other last episodes in TV history.

Happy Fathers' Day, everyone! The FDH LOUNGE on SportsTalkCleveland.com returns for its 10th show extravaganza tonight from 8-11 PM EDT with its usual soup-to-nuts assessment of what's going on in the world.

In Hour One, we cast an eye at the political question nobody is asking because of the sensitivity of it. If nominated for president, will Hillary Clinton be negatively affected by the strong probability that she would be serving with Nancy Pelosi as speaker for at least one more term? Supporters of these politicians call them strong women, opponents have harsher assessments, but most would agree that the American people view them in very similar terms. Is the notion of these two women at the helm of the American government a bridge too far? Also, we examine distressing events in the world of sports entertainment. In its latest desperate attempt to gain mainstream attention, the WWE is proceeding with an angle in which Vince McMahon was allegedly killed in an exploding limo. The WWE website has been full of coverage all week long about this idiotic storyline, while paying scant attention to the real-life passing this week of WWE Hall of Famer Sherri Martel (also known as "Sensational Sherri," "Queen Sherri," etc.). In an industry where people die prematurely at a sadly predictable rate, was the WWE asking for trouble by trying to push this angle?

This conversation will lead into Hour Two, which will also feature our FDH Movie Spotlight of the Week and our Conspiracy Theory segment of the week, which concerns ESPN's efforts to control every corner of the world of sports. Plus, in our News Nuggets segment, Paris goes back to the hole, Bob Barker endorses a successor and an Applebees takes underage drinking to a new extreme.

In Hour Three, we examine the on-court fallout from the NBA Finals as well as the ESPN/ABC attempts to milk the Tony Parker-Eva Longoria nuptuals for perceived ratings gold.

Join us for all this and more as the Dignitaries of THE FDH LOUNGE converge for the 10th time to break down anything and everything tonight at 8 PM EDT on SportsTalkCleveland.com!

Sunday, June 03, 2007

FDH Lounge Show #9: June 3, 2007

Tonight's ninth edition of THE FDH LOUNGE program on SportsTalkCleveland.com promises the usual assortment of everything you have come to expect.

In Hour One, we take a look at what happens to the Republicans in 2008 and beyond with George Bush's failed presidency poisoning everything it touches. Later, our panel examines a head-busting approach one major city is applying to the problem of chronic urban crime.

Hour Two features our movie coverage. Did our Dignitaries enjoy the new Pirates movie any more than Superman III? Also, the Conspiracy Theory segment covers a plot more fiendish than anything the Soviets ever dreamed up: the NBA lottery and we take our "halftime look" at tonight's WWE pay-per-view, One Night Stand.

In Hour Three, we preview the coming NBA Finals between your Cleveland Cavaliers (YAY -- editorial comment there) and the San Antonio Spurs and the various sub-plots that will be on display. Additionally, we'll look at the third consecutive Sun Belt vs. Canada matchup, aka The Stanley Cup. All that and much, much more as we come at you live and worldwide with THE FDH LOUNGE.