Armadillo Sports
Wednesday’s 6-pack:
— Illinois 56, Michigan State 55— Spartans missed FT with chance to tie with 0:02 left.
— Clippers 116, Wizards 115— Washington blew a 35-point lead. Seriously.
— Auburn 55, Missouri 54— Tigers squeak thru their first-ever game as #1 in country.
— Kentucky 82, Mississippi State 74 OT— Wildcats blew 16-point lead in second half.
— UCSB 72, Cal-Northridge 45— Miles Norris was 9-10 behind the arc.
— UCLA 75, Arizona 59— Wildcats shot 31% from the floor.
Quote of the Day
“I don’t know what’s next. I’ve not spoken to anyone relative to doing TV … (but) I think I’d like to do that. I think I’d be pretty good at it … I’d like to try TV. I talked to Drew (Brees) a little bit about it last night. That’d be something that would interest me.”
Sean Payton
Wednesday’s quiz
When Sean Payton won his Super Bowl coaching the Saints, who did they beat?
Tuesday’s quiz
Patrick Mahomes was the 10th player taken in the 2017 NFL Draft; only one quarterback was taken ahead of him. Chicago took Mitch Trubisky, with the #2 pick.
Monday’s quiz
Butler made the Final Four in consecutive years under Brad Stevens (2010-11); they were in the Horizon League back then.
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Wednesday’s Den: Mid-week musings……..
13) Why some teams win, and some don’t. Here are the first 10 picks of the 2017 NFL Draft:
1) Cleveland- Myles Garrett, DE
2) Chicago- Mitch Trubisky, QB
3) San Francisco- Solomon Thomas, DE
4) Jacksonville- Leonard Fournette, RB
5) Tennessee- Corey Davis, WR
6) NJ Jets- Jamal Adams, S
7) Chargers- Mike Williams, WR
8) Carolina- Christian McCaffrey, RB
9) Cincinnati- John Ross, WR
10) Kansas City- Patrick Mahomes, QB
12) Houston- Deshaun Watson, QB
Ironically, the Chiefs acquired that #10 pick in a trade with Buffalo.
12) Sean Payton quit as coach of the Saints Monday, with three years left on his contract; the Saints not having a decent QB had to be a huge factor in that decision.
Right now, nine of the NFL’s 32 head coaching jobs are open.
11) Here are the first seven picks of the 2018 draft:
1) Cleveland- Baker Mayfield, QB
2) NJ Giants- Saquon Barkley, RB
3) NJ Jets- Sam Darnold, QB
4) Cleveland- Denzel Ward, CB
5) Denver- Bradley Chubb, LB
6) Indianapolis- Quentin Nelson, G
7) Buffalo- Josh Allen, QB
10) Scouting is incredibly important in football; I think it is actually underrated by media. Just look at this year’s Final Four in the NFL:
Rams— Cooper Kupp, Eastern Washington
49ers— Jimmy Garoppolo, Eastern Illinois
Bengals— Trey Hendrickson, Florida Atlantic
Chiefs— Tyreek Hill, West Alabama
9) Over the last 30 years, there have been six conference title games with division rivals
1992- Buffalo W29-10 @ Miami
1999- Tennessee W33-14 @ Jacksonville
2008- Pittsburgh W23-14 vs Baltimore
2010- Green Bay W21-14 @ Chicago
2013- Seattle W23-17 vs San Francisco
Packers were favored in 2010, so road teams are 3-2, favorites 3-2.
8) Over the last 30 years, there have been six conference title games with 2-seed hosting the 4-seed. Oddly, the 4-seed won five of those six games, a good trend for Cincinnati.
Over the last 30 years, Arizona’s 32-25 win over the Eagles in 2008 was the only conference title game between a #4 and a #6-seed, which is what 49ers-Rams is Sunday
7) As far as NFL overtime goes in the playoffs, I’d prefer that both teams get the ball once, just seems more fair. I’d be in favor of the home teams always getting the ball first instead of a coin flip. Home team is the higher seed, so they’ve earned the right.
6) In case you were wondering, in the last 14 Super Bowls, underdogs are 9-5 ATS.
5) Arizona State named former Ravens’ coach Brian Billick as an assistant coach; Billick coached Baltimore from 1999-2007, winning Super Bowl XXXV. He had worked for NFL Network since then. Billick is the third ex-NFL head coach on the ASU staff, joining Herm Edwards, Marvin Lewis.
4) People get paid to provide advice on fantasy baseball, so they’ve started doing rankings on podcasts for 2022, but a good deal of it is pointless.
— Is there going to be a universal DH? Would be good to know.
— Will shifts be banned? Makes spray hitters more attractive.
— There are still a dozen or so really good players who are free agents.
Owners/players need to compromise on their disagreements and start spring training on time, for their own good. It is possible to kill the golden goose.
Oh by the way, the 8-team USFL kicks off April 16; that combined with the NBA/NHL playoffs, and lot of people won’t notice if baseball doesn’t start on time.
3) Guy was talking on a fantasy baseball podcast about how he has teams in 3-4 different fantasy leagues; I don’t have the mental bandwidth for that. I just have one team; maybe I’d be better off with teams in multiple leagues.
2) Why, you ask? Pitcher named Burch Smith just signed with the Seibu Lions in Japan, but back on May 11, 2013, Smith was a Padres pitching prospect making his debut in Tampa Bay.
Why do I mention this? I was in Las Vegas that week, staying at the SunCoast Casino, whose sportsbook was right next to their movie theater, which sold Orville Redenbacher popcorn, which is tremendous.
Anyway, our fantasy league didn’t have a phone app yet, so if I wanted to add a player, had to be on my laptop. The pitching on my fantasy team was off to a rough start that year; I really, really needed some help. Burch Smith was an intriguing prospect.
If Smith pitched well that game in Tampa, then someone was going to scoop him up before I got back to my hotel room to get on the laptop- I had to decide before I went downstairs to watch the game. We only got four pickups a month back then.
Long story short, I picked Smith up, hustled downstairs, got some popcorn and watched Smith toss a scoreless first inning. Life was good; then he gave up six runs in the second inning, and the popcorn didn’t taste as good.
Some days you’re the hammer; other days, you’re the nail.
1) David Ortiz got elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame last night, which is fine, but it is baffling to me how you can vote for Ortiz, but not vote for Bonds, Clemens or Alex Rodriguez. How are they any different than Ortiz?
Ortiz hit .286 in his six years with Minnesota, with an .809 OPS; THEY RELEASED HIM.
Ortiz goes to Boston, plays 14 more years with a.956 OPS. He just suddenly got that much better? Hmmmmm
