Attention gift givers
If you're giving money as a gift, please consider the following:
1) The person getting the cash doesn't care if the money is new.
2) The person getting the cash will be just as happy getting 5 twenties as they would getting a $100 bill.
The next person that bitches at me because they can't get new bills or a $100 bill is getting told off.
Have a nice day.
Heathcote weighs in on Davis
Jud Heathcote has some
opinions on Paul Davis and the MSU basketball team.
While I do agree that too much pressure has been placed on Davis' narrow shoulders, I also think part of the problem is the position he is asked to play.
I would like to see Davis play power forward, because it's pretty clear at this point that he not only is not a center, but doesn't want to be one either. He rarely takes the ball hard to the basket and loves shooting jumpers. Hey, some guys just aren't meant to be post players, even if they are tall. Adrian Dantley was 6'4", but he posted up all the time.
So if Davis doesn't play center, who does? My vote is for Delco Rowley. Granted, Rowley is still learning and fouls way too much. But I really despise all the multiple-guard lineups MSU has used the last two years. To be honest, I think Tom Izzo does too, but I just don't think he trusts Rowley yet. In addition, as stated here previously, Drew Naymick is borderline useless.
But I believe Rowley and Naymick would benefit from being on the floor at the same time as Davis. It's worth a try, because we saw last year that going small just doesn't work long term.
MSU football - final grades
MSU lost over the weekend to Hawaii 41-38, marking the second straight year the Spartans have lost to a WAC school. I could just leave things at that, but instead here's grades for the 2004 season.
OFFENSE: Drew Stanton is the player MSU can build their program around. When he plays and is healthy, the Spartans can beat just about anyone. When Stanton wasn't able to go this year, Damon Dowdell and Stephen Reaves were mostly horrible. Reaves is a freshman and gets a pass; Dowdell is a senior who never developed into anything more than a below-average backup. The running backs were pretty good. Jason Teague ran hard and caught the ball well out of the backfield, but probably cost MSU the game against Notre Dame when he was stripped and the ball was returned by the Irish for a TD. Jehuu Calcrick is a bull and will be fun to watch for the next three years. DeAndra Cobb should have played much more. The offense's grade is lowered considerably by the wide receivers, who again dropped a ton of balls and made few big plays. Matt Trannon came on at the end of the year. Jerramy Scott started well and then played very poorly down the stretch. Eric Knott is a highly coveted TE by NFL scouts. They can have him. The offensive line was very underrated, giving up few sacks and negative running plays. Against elite-level competition like Michigan, Ohio State, and Wisconsin, the o-line dominated at times.
GRADE: B
DEFENSE: It was a very Jekyll and Hyde type year for the D. Up front, Kevin Vickerson and Brandon McKinney played the run very well at times. Clifton Ryan was inconsistent in getting to the quarterback off the edge. Most of the other defensive linemen were complete non-factors. At linebacker, MSU is in very bad shape. The LBs did a very poor job all season of getting off blocks and made very few impact plays. John L. Smith seems to favor quick, undersized LBs - not a very good fit for the Big Ten. MSU's secondary in 2004 was quite possibly the worst I have ever seen at the college level. Roderick Maples was the "shut down" corner, but he got beat for multiple big plays in almost every game. To be fair, Maples was very good against Minnesota and Wisconsin. Jaren Hayes is a converted RB, so I refuse to blame him for his struggles in 2004. I never once saw Hayes dog it, but he simply cannot play defensive back at this level. When I watched Ashton Watson during games, he looked serviceable and should have been given a bigger opportunity.
GRADE: D+
SPECIAL TEAMS: Without question, the strength of this football team. Dave Rayner wasn't as accurate kicking field goals as he had been in the past, but his kickoffs were usually unreturnable and you can expect to see him kicking on Sundays. Brandon Fields had a high gross average, but his kicks were often line drives that yielded big returns. DeAndra Cobb made many, many big plays for MSU and will be sorely missed. Cobb came very close to single-handedly winning the Michigan game before his defensive teammates and his coaching staff failed him. MSU allowed a kickoff return for a TD against Indiana, making that game closer than it should have been, but otherwise the coverage units were solid.
GRADE: A
COACHING: Once again, it is very difficult to look at the talent on this team and equate it with a 5-7 record. If you take four games - Rutgers, Notre Dame, Michigan, and Ohio State - that MSU lost and look closely, you'll see that those probably should have been wins. The coaches simply failed to make any adjustments on defense to cover the gross deficiencies at cornerback, inexplicably failed to give Cobb a bigger share of the load even though he made big play after big play all year, failed to get their team ready to play against Ohio State after losing a heartbreaker to Michigan, and most importantly, failed to get a talented team to a .500 record or a bowl game.
GRADE:
D
Meyer spurns Irish
Shocking. Not.
I have no idea who Notre Dame will go with now. I also don't care, because I hate Notre Dame and I'm overjoyed to see them lose, suffer, and lose some more.
How do you like those apples, Joseph?
Sunday's sure bets
I picked two games (flawlessly, I might add) last week, so I might as well pick two more this week. Remember, these are for fun. I do not advocate gambling (every day).
New England at Cleveland (7.5): I guess maybe the reason the Browns are getting so few points is because they've played some good teams tough at home this year. They lost by three to Philadelphia and the Jets, and beat Baltimore in their season opener.
That won't matter this weekend. I think it's entirely possible that the Browns will not score an offensive touchdown Sunday. Take the Patriots giving the 7.5.
Dallas at Seattle (-7.5): Everyone's down on the Seahawks, with good reason. They just don't seem to care at times. They lose to teams with inferior talent (see Buffalo last week). They don't run the ball at people, despite having one of the league's best running backs.
But this week they will not only win, they will blow out the Cowboys. Dallas is a terrible road team (losses on the road by 18 at Minnesota, 21 at Green Bay, 23 at Cincinnati (!) and 20 at Baltimore) and Vinny Testaverde is a sorry excuse for a NFL quarterback. Julius Jones won't run with nearly the same success he did last week - ignore what you saw from Willis McGahee against Seattle last Sunday.
Seattle covers the 7.5 with no trouble.
Duke 81, Michigan State 74
This is about how I expected the game to go. I had set my hopes high because I know Duke isn't what they were last year, but in reality teams with good guards are our nightmare.
It's been a while since I've seen a shooting display like the one J.J. Redick put on in the first half. The guy couldn't miss, and he was getting into the lane too. I was somewhat disappointed that Alan Anderson wasn't given a chance to guard him. MSU used a variety of players on Redick, and he pretty much abused them all - especially Drew Neitzel.
I said this at the beginning of the season, and I will repeat it now. I think MSU has a lot of the same problems as last season. There simply isn't a guard on the roster that is capable of creating offense for others consistently. Neitzel clearly will be that guy eventually, but that doesn't help us now. MSU is a jump shooting team, including their "center," Paul Davis. Rebounding will be a sore spot when we play teams that can go big, as Tom Izzo showed that Delco Rowley and Drew Naymick can expect to spend most of the night sitting when we play good teams. Lastly, our perimeter defense is still awful (led by Mr. Stone Feet, Chris Hill). I don't understand why we give up as many wide open three pointers as we do. Guys like Redick, Deron Williams, Dee Brown, Bracey Wright et al. will eat that up.
On the plus side, I thought MSU went into a very difficult environment and came out with a little fire in their eyes. The game couldn't have started much better, but the last 7-8 minutes of the first half put MSU in a hole they just couldn't dig out of. I thought Anderson was outstanding again, especially from a leadership standpoint. Shannon Brown could really be an unbelievable player someday.
In all likelihood, MSU will play Maryland in some sort of invitational tournament coming up. We REALLY need to beat a good team.
