(Not Quite All the Way) Live Bloggin'

So I'm sitting here, wife at a trade show, McCormick's gin and frozen pizza at the ready, thinking why the heck don't I start a post about the second half of this here Nuggets - Lakers contest?

I know better than to ignore my conscience, so here we go. Hit me with comments. I'll just keep updating, in an ever-more-drunken fashion, on this likely ref-assisted* Laker victory.

*Even if that happens, I won't actually complain, because whining about the Refs is for Chargers fans and (unindicted) rapists.


Second half hasn't started. Jeff Van Gundy sounds like a d-bag.

Ok, here it is. 59-56 Denver.

Offensive board! Fuck yes. Keep missing shots, LA.

Loose ball foul, Dahntay. Of course. Trevor Ariza (ex-UCLA) is coming into his own this series. Kenyon for two, then fouls Gasol. Again, of course.

Bynum, keep on fouling, please. I just realized this whole concept is not going to make much sense at a later read.

Who knew Kenyon could make a jumper? 67-62 Denver.

Bullshit foul. Nice acting job, Ariza.

So maybe I won't be able to update after every shot? Drugs will help.

Ahhh...'Melo and one. Dig it.

4th personal on Bynum!

4th block for noted thug Chris Andersen, whose name adorns the very first basketball jersey I've ever owned--and before any Lone Readers start droppin' that bandwagon talk, my first Bronco jersey only happened last year. I'd been unfamiliar with your mid-American habit of collecting such athletic togs, but now I might as well be eating barbecue whilst I piss.

71-66 halfway through the third, advantage Denver. Come on now.

I hate this Progressive commercial with the "Dave Aisle." Fuck Dave in his Dave-hole.

Back, and now three straight turnovers? Fuck. Lamar Odom hits a three to tie it. And so a seven-point lead becomes a tie, just like that.

I just thought I'd take this commercial break, with the teams tied at 73, to state that I have never, ever, liked the Los Angeles Lakers. Screw Magic "I'm a part owner of the team and still am expected to give honest analysis" Johnson. Screw A.C. "I'ma Virgin" Green. Screw James "I Don't Really Have a Nickname" Worthy. I even still have Stormin' Norm Nixon's basketball card somewhere, and I'm honestly starting to dislike it a little.

Christ, J.R. Make one of these 3s, already.
FUCK! What I just said, but plus.

Wow, this second "A Night at the Museum" movie smells like a sack of rotting red potatoes.

OK, back in. Fuck Lamar Odom, you highly drafted chunk of worthless.

Offensive foul. Nice. Carmelo on the bench, Lakers with their biggest lead...and Nene gets a tech? Naturally. If they let this snowball, the refs will be more than happy to help.

This is the part of the game that scares me. The Lakers are showing life, it's the 4th quarter, we have our best player sitting. George Karl, you have a reputation of Coachsuckery to disprove, and this ain't the way to go about it. I know there are more than 9 minutes left, but come on.

They are getting good looks, but nothing. This has the makings of 3-2 LA written all over it.

Van Gundy blowing Kobe. What a sooprise.

Wow. This is getting ugly. 87-76 LA.

I dunno. Screw this. Linas with a 3, much needed. Imaginary foul on the greasy Spaniard Gasol, maybe the ugliest man in sports.

Oh, woo, woo, we love the Lakers, says the crowd of botoxed robots. Fuck all of you people. You root for success. When the Lakers sucked a few years back, they could hardly give tickets away. Go yell at your gardeners.

So, it's not too early to say that this game is likely over. The Nugs are showing nothing and the Lakers are on a tear--so we have to win in Denver to force a 7th back here. F. Double F.

Fuck. With an open 3 like that, Linas...and then Nene misses a layup. Fuck me.

OK, entertain yourselves for a minute. I have to go curse. We could have just made that lead disappear.

Linas, make your free throws. It's still in reach. Only 4:47 left.

Melo with the transition jam!

Wow, a blocking foul? Because Gasol sat in his lap? Bullsheeeeiit. And now the Brazilian has fouled out. LAME.

93-89 after Melo's free shots.

Doesn't matter, though, because the Lakers just drive to the hoop and GET FOULED.

Speaking of the totally non-mafia owned NBA refs, anyone who doesn't believe in the star system should be watching this game. Except, of course, if the star is Carmelo, who gets less love than any comparable talent in the game. Fuck, Trevor Ariza is getting more in this series.

Jeff Van Gundy loves watching people foul relentlessly and not get called. That's because he's a proponent of caveman ball. Dear Jeff, please go coach in Europe and stop talking to us.

I should mention, again, that bitching about the refs is loser talk.

You get the D, you have numbers, and then J.R. jacks up a brick.

This game is ov-ah. Nuggets deserve to lose. You can't miss shots like they have on the road and even have a hope. Now it's just fouling and making the gamblers happy.

Lamar Odom had a good game, Pau Gasol couldn't miss early, Derek Fisher re-discovered his range. Plus, the Nuggets never found an offensive rhythm and seemed to miss every big shot. Back to Denver on Friday for what we a Mile High are hoping is a chance to stretch this to seven games. Sigh. 104-93 L.A.



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I'd Rather Drink Pepsi Than Eat Staples

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A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Finals

I'm not trying to usurp Cecil's pozish as the HoG's lead NBA analyst, and I'm certainly not going to try and break down last night's sweet beatdown of the overmatched and classless Mavericks. I've never pretended to be a big hoops fan, and I don't watch a whole lot of NBA ball.

I am, however, a Nuggets fan, and I have been my whole life. Back when I was a kid I went ape shit over the run-and-gun teams of Doug Moe, Alex English and Fat Lever. I've always followed the Nuggets, and of course I was fired up when they landed the No. 3 pick in 2003 and landed Carmelo. Denver has steadily improved since then--adding the parts necessary to build an elite team. They've taken hotheaded, me-first thugs (Cuban's word, not mine) like J.R. Smith and Kenyon Martin and coaxed them into playing vital supporting parts. They've added role players like Birdman and Anthony Carter. And most important they brought The Chauncey home where he belongs, to make the whole thing work.

But I am not, again, here to analyze the X's and O's of this particular playoff run. I just want to tell a story about a stranger and a T-shirt.

I threw on a Nuggets shirt yesterday and went to work. I'd planned on meeting some friends later to watch the game, and I wasn't sure if I'd have a chance to make it home to change before tip-off. All day I had folks saying "Go Nugs" and stopping to talk about the game, Dirk and Cuban, The Chauncey, the Lakers, the whatever. I must have had ten interactions based on my choice of wardrobe.

It occurred to me last night that in my entire life this had never happened even once. I have never had a random conversation about the Nuggets with anyone, ever. Now I live in the hinterlands of Colorado, and I'm sure that Nuggets fandom runs stronger the closer one gravitates toward the City of Denver. I'll bet Cecil has these kinds of chats at the coffee shop or the lingerie store all the time. I just never had, before yesterday.

I've talked to approximately every resident of this state about the Denver Broncos on Monday Mornings and Friday afternoons. I've talked about CU football, Avalanche hockey and Kobe rape. These are just the kinds of things that come up between two random dudes who need something to rap about before the porn store opens. It would be great if the Denver Nuggets became a casual topic of conversation around here, instead of a reason to cover your eyes in the winter.

It's hard to say what a Nuggets championship would mean here. I'll be the first to admit, we're spoiled as Colorado sports fans. We've witnessed two Super Bowl wins in the last dozen years, as well as four other title games in my lifetime. The Avs have been around less than 15 years and have two Stanley Cups. My alma mater, the CSU Rams, captured three Mountain West titles under Sonny Lubick. Our hated rivals, the CU Buffs, won a fake national championship in 1990.

Hell, the Colorado Rockies went to a World Series less than two years ago. I attended a World Series game in the state of Colorado. That is, frankly, insane. Present that fact to a long-suffering fan from any of a dozen cities in this country and I'm sure they'd want to punch me in the nuts.

For these reasons, seeing George Karl and these Nuggets hoist the Larry O'Brien Trophy in June would be really, really neat but not life-changing. Not like This One's For John. Not even like that first Avalanche Cup (because it was our first title that did not involve a fifth-down play, and we got to get drunk and have a parade).

Part of me--a very tiny little part--would rather have Cleveland win it, just so they could win something. But I'll be watching, casual half-bandwagon fair-weather non-basketball fan that I am, and praying for that victory. Because fuck everybody else, that's why. And Jesus hates Cleveland.
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Nugs, Mavs, For At Least One More Game

Hell of a game last night. The Nuggets dominated pretty much all the way through only to let it slip away in the end--it happens. I would have been surprised if they'd won, suspected they wouldn't and am thus not upset that the two teams are coming back to Denver on Wednesday.

Not having Birdman in there was a big problem. Nowitzki had a ton of open looks, and he's just too long for most everyone else on the squad to guard. Carmelo played a fantastic game, but the Nugs missed too many open shots in the 4th quarter when they could have put it away for good.

Eh, no worries. My feeling is that this next game isn't going to be very close. As in, Denver will win by 20-30. I could be wrong...but after douchebag Dallas fans decided to act like their crybaby puss of an owner and harass Kenyon's family and Carmelo's wife to the point where security got involved, I have a small suspicion that, by the end of this upcoming contest, the Mavericks are going to be looking at the big hole in their collective stomachs where their entrails used to be.

Cuban, by the way, won't be at Game 5. What. A. Shock.

And here is the rest of it. Read more

Nugs/Mavs Recap, Two Days Late Just Like You All Asked For

By now, the sportiverse has thoroughly assassinated the ref who didn't call the foul on Carmelo before his game-winning three. I'm not going to chime in with some longwinded breakdown of what happened, or didn't happen or should have happened.

Just these few things:

1. Rick Carlisle started complaining about the refs after the first game, a contest that his team lost by 14 and wouldn't have won if Carmelo had decided to take a nap in the fourth quarter. So spare me this "woe, woe are we Mavericks, so ill-treated by the Powers" bullshit. The refs had Denver on lockdown that whole game--and it can be convincingly argued that the reason they *didn't* call that last foul was to give Dallas some home sizzle, because an off-balance 3 is hardly automatic and, if 'Melo had missed it, the game would have been over. This whole song-and-dance about cultivating the refs is for loser teams like the Charmin-soft Mavericks and their whinebag fans.

2. Mark Cuban is a fucking tool. Talking smack to Kenyon Martin's mom? Really? Dude, I know you're rich and full of yourself, but perhaps you'd like to take a step back and think about that one. It ain't Kenyon's fault that your team is staffed by a bunch of simpering flop-divas. Nope, it's yours. Wear it, Cubes.

3. 3-0. I imagine Dallas will win tonight and then we'll scrub 'em off the floor in Denver. Bring on the Rockets (please)!


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Those Sweet Nugs

Time for yet another analysis-free post on the sudden playoff domination of the Denver Nuggets, currently holding a 2-0 series lead on a baffled group of Mavericks that's already whining and making excuses.

It's hard to get my head wrapped around this team. Used to be that a good regular season--which by itself hasn't happened too often, honestly--was followed by a quick first-round beatdown. Usually by the Spurs and Balki, but also by the Lakers and, embarassingly, Clippers. God that Clips series sucked.

But this year, 50 + wins have proved to actually mean something; unlike, say, what that number meant to last season's 50 win team, which couldn't have been more dysfunctional if it featured the brothers from Oasis at both guard positions and more inflexible in crunch time if it had been coached by a boxing nun puppet.

The difference? You know what's coming. But follow down below anyway. It's what the cool kids are doing.


That's right. The number on reason that the Nuggets have marble-mouthed drunk Charles Barkley picking them to win the NBA title: the pride of George Washington High School, the King of Park Hill, Denver's new No. 7. The Chauncey.

I'm obviously not the first person to write that--by my rough estimation, that's actually somewhere around the 149,367th time this year that someone's ascribed the Nugs' revitalization to Billups--but shit, it's the truth. In retrospect, how crazy was that trade? I love AI as a player but he and Carmelo couldn't co-exist basketball-wise. Both guys need the ball to be successful, and Melo was never going to learn to take a step back for the betterment of the team as a whole when he was constantly worried about getting touches. AI, unfortunately, has that effect. Because as good as he is, and he's one of the most amazing athletes I've ever watched--no matter what Jason Whitlock says--he sucks the life out of his teammates because they never see the rock.

*Also, quick aside: Whitlock is busy hammering Will Leitch at realclearsports via The Big Lead. I'm no big fan of Leitch's, but nearly every one of those criticisms could be just as easily turned around and applied to his barbecue-stained self. And his bagging of Selena Roberts is hilarious. What the hell does Whitlock know about real journalism? He's been writing the same misoygnistic, single-note column for 15 years and has expended no discernible effort in doing so. He's a sideshow, chattering teeth.

The Chauncey's arrival has done more for Carmelo's game than any coach has, but more importantly, it's destroyed the sense of fatalism that has been surrounding this team. Now, a 50 win season carries with it the promise of something actually interesting happening after. Like a Finals appearance.
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Smoking a Cuban

Right, yes, I've been neglecting my Nuggets playoff recaps. Whattya want? I'm unemployed and drunk. I sit around the house in filthy Hanes yelling at a picture of Dean Singleton. I ride my bike to the liquor store..good God, someone please hire me. I'm one shit-stained pair of dungarees away from standing at Broadway and Alameda with the "WHY LIE, NEED BEER" sign.

The last I checked in with some NBA goodness, the Nugs were still in the process of dismantling the New Charloklaorleanshoma City squad, which they completed in a tidy 5 games, the only loss by two points. That was expected. The New Charloklaorleanshoma Citians are basically only Chris Paul and the Dude Who Used to Be David West. So no real surprise.

Ah, but the Mavericks, our second-round matchup, that's a different story. One of the more dominant squads in recent memory, even if could never cash in on a title. Headed by likely the only highly drafted foreign transfer student who ever panned out, Dirk Nowitzki--don't be bringin' that Toni Kukoc up in this. Deep, deep, bench. Cagey veteran leadership in the form of wife-beater Jason Kidd. So the Nugs went 4-0 against 'em in the regular season, who really thought that would matter? The Mavs didn't have Jason Terry in any of those games. Playoff basketball is old hat in Dallas.

Plus, their owner is a huge fucking sideshow who browbeats refs and plays media mind games as well as anyone in major professional sports.

*Quick side note about Mark Cuban: back when he first bought the team, right after he sold his company for billions, before anyone knew who he was, my wife (then girlfriend), was at a tradeshow in Fort Worth. One of her clients--she's in sales--a nice old rich Texan, kept raving and raving to her about trying to hook her up with his friend, an internet geek who just sold his company.

She was all like, eh, have a boyfriend. But the dude kept coming back for every day of the tradeshow--he even recruited his wife to come sell her on going out with his buddy. 'You're his type,' they kept saying. 'He'll love you.' They even brought out the biggest gun of all: 'he owns the Mavericks!'

But she kept giving them the polite brush-off. Because she had no idea what the Mavericks were. When she came home and told me the story, she asked if I'd heard of them. I had. A few months later, Cuban married some corporate saleswoman. I, however, have never lived it down.*

But even with all of that, a funny thing happened in the opening matchup. The Nuggets pounded the playoff-ready Mavs by 14.

Sure, it's but one game. But all you really needed to see from this one was: Nene had 24 points. If Nene keeps on scoring at anywhere close to that level in this series, it might not get to 5 games.

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Your Denver Nuggets Playoff Update

Uh, they won by a lot of points last night. Let's celebrate!



Game 5 is like later this week or something.
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NBA Playoffs: Catching Up

I'd promised the Administrator that I'd blog the NBA playoffs, specifically after Nuggets games. Uh, can I have a do-over?

Well, late or not, the Nugs' series against the suddenly helpless Hornets deserves some copy. Which you will be able to locate south of here, past the cleverly disguided HTML tag.


This series marks the first time since '85 that the Nuggets have won two opening contests in the playoffs, which, not coincidentally, was also their longest postseason run as an NBA franchise. While on the surface a #2 seed like Denver shouldn't have much trouble with a #7 seed like New Charloklaorleanshoma City, prior to Game 1 there were plenty of folks out there wringing their hands with worry. The Hornets, after all, had CP3, the best young point in the game. They came within a hair's breadth of making the Finals last year. David West is an all-star, Byron Scott has a Championship appearance on his coaching resume and Peja Stojakovich is a Balkan war criminal. This, the conventional wisdom seemed to hold, was not your average #7.

And on the flip, the Nuggets are an eternal tease. They won 50 games last year with Iverson and then got washed in the opening round in a series that was painful to watch. Sure, The Chauncey arrived last fall and saved them from what promised to be an absolutely awful campaign, but people remember things like, you know, not winning a playoff series in 15 years. And even though they had a stellar season, the hoops cognoscenti was widely expecting them to stumble early.

Well, smarties, how does a 2-0 start sound? Which each victory coming by double figures? With The Chauncey going absolutely George Washington High School to the tune of a combined 67 points?

All is not perfect, of course. Carmelo couldn't find his shot in Game 1, and while he had a good night yesterday (22 points and 9 assists), his slow start could be reason for concern. J.R. Smith can soak a defender in gasoline and light him on fire one minute and then trip over his laces the next. No one expects New Charloklaorleanshoma City to simply roll over at their place. And even if (when) the Nugs move on, the effin' Lakers lurk in the distance.

But I tell you what it beats: every season they have had since the crazy run to the Conference Finals in 1994. For a team, and a city, that has been party to a whole lot of bad, uninspired basketball for more than a decade, this feels better than Aloe Vera on a nutsack sunburn.
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Re-Open the Debate of Two

Occasional reader The Lone Reader has long been on the thoroughly sweaty jock of the Human Sponsorship Reel, aka LeBron James. No problem with that--James is a hell of a player, maybe the best in the league since Jordan. But along the way he feels it somehow necessary to debase the Nuggets, specifically Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson. Who knows why. My guess is that Canada slowly makes you crazy.

I've gently taken his stupid fucking opinion to task over the last year as something of a public service. After all, no one else on this board is gonna do it. So I'd just like to say, as of right now, the Nuggets are thumping King James and his cast of nobody by 20. Nothing to read from that--just up by 20. That's all.
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Holy Fucking Shit

I don't know what you were watching last night, but there was a mind-blowing game on that you may have missed. It was a sport called basketball, and it is 100 per cent owned by this dude named LeBron. James. Man, he's really good. I'm not a stat guy but I think he scored over a thousand "points," as the announcers were calling them, many on moves called "dunks" and one "bat-shit crazy three-pointer."

Seriously, I might have to get back on board with the Association thanks to last night and young Mr. 23. Jesus. The Cleveland Cavaliers, outside of LeBron, might be the worst professional basketball team ever assembled. But last night King James could have taken the floor with the staff of the House of Georges and Urkel and won that game. He simply would not be denied. I loved the images of Tayshaun Prince, who's got a rep as a pretty damn good defender, repeatedly getting his forehead smothered by LeBron's balls on dominating dunks.

I've never been a LeBron guy until right now. He was overexposed in high school. He came into the league with Carmelo, who went to Syracuse (I'm from upstate NY) and ended up with the Nuggets (my NBA team), so I always wanted Melo to be better. He's not, but LeBron has struggled through a tough year. His attitude, commitment and desire have all been questioned this season, but he looks like someone on the brink of absolute dominating greatness. A ring would seal the deal.

I watched last night's game with extra interest due to our old buddy gambling. I have a friend who's in Vegas, and he called me yesterday asking how to bet the Pistons in the most profitable manner. We were both in agreeance that Detroit would not/could not lose. But the money line was something like minus-340, an absolutely preposterous number for a series that's been so closely contested. That got me thinking about the possibility of the Cavs pulling the upset, and I did a little reading on the subject. Simmons finally swayed me with his opinion (say what you will about the guy, but his playoff predictions have been pretty extraordinary). By the time I contacted my buddy again, he had already come to the same conclusion and laid two green benjamins on Cleveland at +170. So I felt personally invested in LeBron, even though it wasn't my money.

That wager took a roller-coaster ride through two epic overtime sessions, and for all I know my pal is dead in a gutter on the Strip. But if he survived, I'm going to have him investigate the odds on LeBron (and his sorry cast of extras) winning it all.

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Detritus

Signing in, your weekend correspondent. I tossed forth a few when the week was young but now I'm drinking vodka instead of something like this.

Greg Oden's going pro, the Sox and the Yanks are at it, the Nuggets and Spurs tip it tomorrow at 7, and Barbaro lives. Lotta stuff happening...you know, sorry for even mentioning the horse. That's really these guys' schtick. We'll stick to what we know: the big three sports (since there are only three and if there were a fourth someone would have told us about it) a note on soccer every four years and this stuff.

You might call we HoGers focused. You might call us specialists. You might call us specialistic focusaters, but if you did we'd totally make fun of you because that doesn't mean anything.

The NFL Draft happens next week. Our Administrator's team was predicted to win the AFC West by a chicken that picks stocks on public television. Picked it, the damn thing did, to go 11-5 and beat my beloved Denver Broncos not once but twice. Twice! In the same season, even, not consecutive ones. Chickens. What're you gonna do?

I've already addressed the future of my favorite footballing squad. You all, and by you all I mean our nonexistent readership, probably read it on this here site. To borrow a conceit from a fat man who loves John Elway and might be taking over for Don Imus on New York's WFAN, cut that shit out, put it on your refrigerator, refer to it constantly over the season. It's like peering into the future. You read that and you're a goddamn time traveler.

More to come when I refill. Read more

My Home is Colorado, with its Proud Mountains Tall

(Apologies to the estate of Townes Van Zandt for the title.)

The Coloradans at HoG--and we're a majority--dearly love to encounter like minded locals on this thing you call the electromagraphic data micro-delivery system...otherwise known as the internet. So how excited were we to find some fellows?

Very, very excited. Very excited indeed. Very.

Although I fear this juiced-up crotch rocket of a fan site might whip past us on the info superhighway like we were my mom in an NPR haze, I have to applaud them for their devotion to the finest teams, fans and venues in American sport. You go, Homers. Make us all proud.

Besides, anyone that uses Sam Perkins' name in the same sentence as Linas Kleiza's is OK in my book. Read more