Oh Hi, March

Take a look at the blog archives on the lower right side of the page and you'll notice a pretty dramatic decline in the frequency of posting between this point last year and now. A year ago we were producing more than an item a day, many of them of considerable length and even more considerable depth. As Kevin pointed out last month, much has changed in the past 6-8 months for the blog's three operators. We've all moved and now live at least an hour apart from each other (as opposed to the 20-minute diameter that had enclosed us a year ago), we've all taken on new jobs or new, unprecedented levels of responsibility at our current jobs, and we're also in the midst of seeing some of the most important people in our lives start to get engaged and married (not actually any one of us yet, though, rest assured). As an unfortunate result, the blog has taken a bit of a backseat. But I guess you can just call that another element of getting older.

On the other hand, I am enjoying some of the things that seem to never change from year to year. As someone whose Winter Dldrums got an early start when Tony Romo broke his collarbone two months before Christmas, there are few nicer phrases right now than "February is over." The Big East Tournament is underway, and for the first time since October, I am feeling interest in a sporting event for reasons other than gambling or spite. Selection Sunday is 4 days away. The Tournament is 8 days away (depending if you count the round of 68 or not), and soon enough will be providing us the 2011 versions of overnight household names Bryce Drew and Ali Farokhmanesh, or maybe another unfathomable run like George Mason in '06, Davidson in '08, or Butler just last year. And once we've seemingly had our fill of the NCAA on CBS theme music, camps will break in Arizona and Florida, and our baseball teams will head north to play games that count once again. Shortly thereafter, the Feel Good Event of the Year will be upon us to erase any doubt that the shitty winter of 2010-2011 is gone.

The only thing that will keep you sane in life is having things to look forward to on a regular basis. It doesn't have to be huge, it just has to be on the horizon. Kevin's piece below about life after college ties right in to this thinking. Simply put, it sucks sometimes. It really does. And we all know that. But we also have to be able to find those openings, those breaks in the monotony that remind us, "hey, it's not all so terrible." For me and probably for John and Kevin as well, one of those ripples of light comes every mid-March. Followers of the blog who have an embarrassing amount of time on their hands may remember that I put that very same Andy Dufresne picture you see above on a post from last year that said some very similar things. But hey, any day that the Shawshank picture goes up on the blog can't be too bad of a day.

The End is Here

In 12 hours, we can say goodbye to the Winter Doldrums for another year. Yes, NCAA Tournament time has come again, and it is here to hold our hands right up through the remainder of March into the beginning of April, Opening Day, and The Masters. And if we've been at all good this year we will get a few weeks later a watchable set of playoffs in basketball and hockey to go with the NFL Draft and the onslaught of consistently decent weather. By lunchtime on Thursday, we will be reminded of all that once was good, and could be again.

The Mike Mamula Olympics

Here's hoping you don't watch NFL Network this weekend, because if you do, you are going to be in for it. The otherwise great channel is once again dedicating this weekend to wall-to-wall coverage of the Scouting Combine. For a few days around this time each year, hundreds of the nation's top college football players descend upon Indianapolis to impress NFL decision-makers at (among other things) repping 225 on bench, cone drills, the vertical jump, and of course the 40 and the Wunderlic test. It's the world's largest group job interview, and we're all invited. Forgive me for remaining seated as I try to contain my ravenous excitement.

I've decided to bestow the Combine with the moniker "The Mike Mamula Olympics" in honor of one of the first in the long line of players whose draft statuses were grossly inflated by a head-turning performance in the dome. Back in 1995, Mamula was a respectable pro prospect, earning All-Big East honors as a defensive end for Boston College. He trained specifically for the Combine events and blew scouts away with his strength and mobility, impressing the Eagles so much that they traded the 12th overall pick and two 2nd round picks in the 1995 Draft to move up to take him 7th overall, ahead of players such as Warren Sapp, Ty Law, and Derrick Brooks.

Suffice it to say, Mamula's NFL career was relatively underwhelming. He wasn't a bad NFL player, but he rarely showed himself to be the game-changer that is expected out of a 7th overall pick. I don't want to say that the Combine is total garbage, because the drills are a very good snapshot of what a encompasses a player's skill set, and if a team is going to throw eight figures at a guy, it's only prudent to meet him face-to-face and see exactly what they may be investing in. Plenty of players have used a good Combine performance (Joe Flacco, for example) to compensate for a relative lack of exposure at the college level and parlay that into success on Sundays.

But let us all calm down on valuing football players based on what they can do in shorts in a controlled atmosphere. You know how you see kickers nail field goals from 55+ yards in pregame and then shank 28-yard gimmes once the crowd is roaring and the pressure is on? It's the same premise. Football is the hardest game to simulate among any of the major sports. It's great if my cornerback runs a 4.4 and has a 40 inch vert, but none of that will do me any good if his coverage instincts are bad and he bites on double moves all the time. It's true that the 18-yard-back-to-15-yard out is the most telling throw on whether a quarterback has an NFL arm or not, but can I see the guy throw that pass with shoulder pads on, outdoors, and while his back is killing him because he's been sacked 4 times already today? And is this guy someone who is going to quit on his teammates, or get rabbit ears anytime something negative is written or spoken about him? That's the kind of stuff I want to know. That's really where you separate Ryan Leaf from Peyton Manning.

What I don't understand is anyone who actually watches this thing. These guys aren't even on anyone's team yet and people set aside time for this? Plus, the same people that jump for joy when their team drafts a 4.3-40 receiver or a lineman that threw 225 up 38 times are the ones crooning over how they wasted a pick on a "workout warrior" when their guy is getting trucked come September. It's no coincidence that the teams who consistently make sound personnel decisions, i.e. Pittsburgh, are the ones who put less stock in the Combine than most others do. Call me old-fashioned, but I think 3-4 years of game tape are more substantial than a few jumps and shuttle runs.

I don't want to indict the millions of football fans out there, because as a nation we have come to thirst for all things NFL year-round. And that's why the Combine has become a monster of its own: in the sports desert of late winter, the Combine is a canteen of murky water, and many people will take a swig of it, out of what they feel is pure necessity. If it gets you by until come upon the beautiful unmuddied lake of baseball season in April, then fine. But just know that you can't live on the stuff, because it will leave you with a bad stomach lining - or a Vernon Gholston.

Saturated

This week we plunged deeper into the doldrums of winter with only the faux hope of "Pitchers and Catchers!" on our tray. Great, pitchers and catchers reported, that gets you excited for about 15 minutes before you realize it's still 25 degrees outside up here and the real season is still 6 weeks away. The Winter Olympics hold my attention for about 76 seconds a day. With nothing going on, there's nothing to talk about, which brings radio hosts, newspaper columnists, hood rats drinking MGD in a dive bar, and everyone else with an opinion and a forum back to the same tired, beaten-to-death-and-back topics that I just cannot take anymore.

I'm saturated. There is nothing more to absorb. Or I'm like those stain-defender Dockers where the grape juice just bounces right off the pants in the commercial. Either way, hearing or reading any discussion on these issues are an immediate trigger to the tune-out button.

(Speaking of which, how great would an actual tune-out button be in real life? You get buried in a boring conversation or pointless meeting at work, and you can just hit a button and in one ear you get to hear music from your iPod, or some George Carlin stand-up, or whatever you want to actually be listening to? When we all have computer chips in our brains someday I hope this gets invented pronto.)

I digress, but that's why parentheses exist. The following is a list of subjects more tired than Forrest Gump after running across the country 4 times.

-Tiger Woods
-Steroids
-Brett Favre
-Joba Chamberlain - starter or reliever? (Reliever. If you want 2,000 words on why, I do take individual requests)
-The annual "Donovan McNabb -trade him or keep him?" debate
-Sarah Palin
-Tim Tebow's draft status
-Which team "might offer Johnny Damon a contract this week" (EDIT: Enjoy Detroit, Johnny.)
-The price of gas
-Snow
-Any and all celebrity couples
-The movie Avatar

And coming soon:
-NCAA tournament bubble teams
-Stats and scores from spring training games
-The NFL's impending labor fiasco

The moral of the story is, just let these subjects play themselves out. Brain-piercing repetitive discussion has no impact on anything. But it does give me an excuse to channel Marlo Stanfield's first spoken line in The Wire - "Do it or don't. But I got someplace to be."

The NBA's Biggest Star? It's Not Who You Think

Venture some guesses as to who is the biggest star in the NBA right now. LeBron James? Nope. Kobe Bryant? Nope. Dwyane Wade? Uh-uh. Chris Paul, Kevin Durant, Dirk Nowitki, or Steve Nash? No, no, no, and no (and no, it's not T-Mac either for those of you trying to take a hint from the picture. This isn't 2002.). Alas, my brothers, the biggest star in the NBA right now has neither a name nor a face. The biggest star in the NBA these days is The Expiring Contract.

Pay any attention to non-Olympic sports coverage this week and I'm sure you've been awash in Tracy McGrady trade talk. T-Mac used to be one of the best players in the Association despite never winning a playoff series. But these days McGrady is on the wrong side of 30, has not played close to a full season in three years, and this year has spent about 46 more minutes in an NBA game than yours truly has. Why, do you ask, has he become relevant again for purposes besides those of the tongue-in-cheek variety? Because his Texas-sized contract, which pays him about $22.8 million this year, will be up at season's end. In layman's terms, whichever team holds him at that point wakes up to find $22 million shiny new dollars of salary cap space under its pillow. And with an A+ free agent class coming this summer (LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh are the headliners), teams are in a mad race to free up as much money under the cap as they can.

The Houston Rockets drew more suitors for T-Mac's contract than Elin Woods after depositing the alimony check. As events have turned out, the New York Knickerbockers have paid a handsome bounty of players and draft picks for the honor of saying bye-bye to T-Mac come April. The move has been so lauded by New York media and fans that you'd half expect playoff tickets to be printed up soon - for the 2010-2011 season. The Knicks couldn't care less what McGrady does for them on the court. It probably doesn't even matter to them if he shows up or not. His expiring contract now gives them the financial leeway to sign not just one, but two of the big three free agents. The Knicks have been targeting this coming offseason for over two years. July 1, 2010 will be LeBrondependence Day.

This scenario is Exhibit 1A of how FUBAR'd the NBA is presently. The combination of guaranteed contracts (with buyout clauses that vary on an individual basis, unlike in hockey) and the salary cap leave franchises zero room for error when it comes to signing players to long-term deals. The Knicks are still trying to dig themselves out of the hole of bad contracts 9 years after a ridiculous extension for Allan Houston set them on the wrong track. The Sixers are presently handcuffed by the garish Elton Brand pact signed before the 2008-2009 season. There are countless other examples. Too many things can go wrong - injury, subpar play, feuds with coaches or teammates, etc. - during a player's time with any team in any sport, which is why guaranteeing nearly every dime in a contract is a hefty liability. A big contract gone bad is not as crippling in the NFL (annual salaries are not guaranteed) and Major League Baseball (no salary cap) as it is in the NBA.

It gets worse. The draft is now littered with one-and-done college players and foreign-league imports, many of whom are supremely talented but woefully underpolished. Building through the draft is a crapshoot. Building a team through trades is equally tough, because there is just not enough league-wide talent to make for quality trades. That leaves free agency as the one timely savior of a floundering NBA franchise. Since we already know the risk with big free agent contracts, it puts even more of a premium on the sure-thing free agents of 2010, 2011 (Carmelo Anthony), and 2012 (Kevin Durant, Derrick Rose).

The end result is a cash-strapped league with about 10 teams good enough to actually warrant charging United States Dollars for tickets, and about 5-6 teams within that subset with a legitimate chance to win a championship. In two-thirds of NBA cities, you could give someone free tickets to a game and whether they'd go or not would depend largely on who the visiting team is that night. Oft-injured and underperforming players become hot trade commodities. My basketball fandom pales mightily in comparison to my following of baseball and football, but I can still remember many nights watching big NBA games in the Jordan era and even into the first half of this decade. I cared then. Everyone who watched cared then. The NBA Playoffs still get good TV ratings, so people still watch. But how many actually care?