Armadillo: Monday's six-pack
-- Fifteen lined D-I games Sunday; Oregon was the only road team that won.
-- Paul Casey, Ian Poulter are tied for first at the rain-delayed Honda Classic, which resumes early Monday morning.
-- Resume-damaging losses Sunday for Pitt, Stanford; they'll both have to win their conference tournament to make the NCAAs.
-- Phillies lost an exhibition game to a D-II college team, which doesn't matter but is not going to help season ticket sales any.
-- Memphis lost its best player, Austin Nichols, to an ankle injury, which cripples their chance to make a run in the C-USA tournament next week.
-- Watched the movie Hurricane Season on VH1 last night; excellent true story about a high school team that won the state championship after Hurricane Katrina.
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Armadillo: Monday's List of 13: Wrapping up a sports weekend.........
13) Everyone has bad days, even Lebron James, who went 3-11 from the foul line in an OT loss in Houston. Cavaliers are 37-24, right now the #4 seed in the east- that would pit them against #1 seed Atlanta in the second round.
12) NBA office once vetoed a Kevin Garnett/DeAndre Jordan trade, maybe the best move the Clippers never made. Jordan had 26 rebounds Sunday in Chicago.
11) Speaking of Garnett, he bought 1,000 tickets for tonight's game with the Clippers and gave them away-- thats a pretty expensive gift. .
10) Watched the Jerry Tarkanian memorial on the Internet yesterday; UNLV did a really nice job, with one segment video appearances by John Calipari, Dick Vitale, Tom Thibodeau, Bob Huggins and Mike Krzyzewski.
ESPN's Kenny Mayne was the emcee; he is a former backup QB for the Rebels.
9) Hard to believe the NFL hasn't had a team in LA or Anaheim since 1994, but it looks like they'll have at least one therre fairly soon. I've been a Ram fan since the mid-60's; they weren't supported that well in the Coliseum, which is why they moved to Anaheim. Part of the reason they moved out of the Big A is that then-owner Georgia Frontiere was from St Louis-- really wasn't a great move for the franchise.
8) Tired of people bashing current Rams owner Stan Kroenke as being difficult to deal with; its not that hard to meet him. I live in upstate NY and I've met the guy. Saw him at the NBA Summer League in Vegas few years ago, talked to him about the Rams for 10 minutes. Good guy, was very polite and answered some questions. He's a business guy; he'll do what is best for his wallet, which is how rich people get rich. Would any of us do any differently?
7) When James Hahn won the LA Open last week, he was 297th in World Golf Ranking; this week, Padraig Harrington was 297th and now he is contending at Doral, only four shots out of the lead, thats how competitve golf has become, guys barely in the top 300 are winning or contending to win.
6) If you shoot a basketball and it wedges between the backboard and the rim, that should not be ruled a held ball, the defense should get the ball. No way should the offense benefit from a shot like that- those are bad shots.
5) Want to feel old? Ron Howard (Richie Cummingham on Happy Days, Opie on the Andy Griffith Show) turned 61 Sunday.
4) Saturday night, UTEP blew a 15-point halftime lead and lost at lowly Southern Miss 63-60; thats what happens when your head coach is suspended for a game. Tim Floyd was ejected at Louisiana Tech in the Miners' previous game and got suspended for that, so in effect, he got thrown out of two games for the same act.
3) Did you know the voting age is Japan is 20? Me either.
2) Oregon 73, Stanford 70-- 11 ties, 17 lead changes as the Ducks stay hot; tough loss for Stanford, which now probably needs to win the Pac-12 tournament or else they'll be on ESPN losing an NIT home game in a couple weeks.
1) Let me get this straight; the 76ers have two young prospects they drafted who have never played for the team, then they traded for JaVale McGee and just cut him, possibly because he doesn't always try hard. My question is this: Is the 76er brass trying hard to win? How are they any different from McGee?