A Momentous Occasion

Friday, April 22, 2005 marks the day of quite a momentous occasion. What would qualify as a momentous occasion for an avid Duke Blue Devils fan? A press conference announcing the departure of 3 UNC players of course!

UNC players Shawn May, Raymond Felton, and Marvin Williams all announced they were declaring for the NBA Draft, which has been the best news as of late in my book. They will join Rashad McCants to make up the nucleus of the 4-player UNC departure.

If 4 key Duke players left it would be a mutiny no matter how great they are, but nobody that has recently played for UNC has valued the good hard work of a FOUR YEAR degree nor have they honored their coach enough to stay all four years.

Let's take a look at the past 3 years of UNC basketball in realtion to player/coach relationships and the value players place (or the lack thereof) on their coach.

Matt Daughtery days:

McCants, May, and Felton were all three recruited by Matt Daughtery and were initially thought to be the best trio of UNC recruits in quite some time. They definitely had all the talent in the world and have up until today.

BUT, being the selfish players they are, they were unhappy that they didn't take over the world their freshman year and ended up moaning and groaning about their coach, Matt Daughtery. Reminds me of the days of little league basketball where kids cried because they didn't play the whole game. That really brought out the freshmen immaturity of all three (May, Felton, McCants). Eventually Daughtery was driven out under the pressure of these three 'boys' and their parents.

Also, while under Roy Williams for 2 seasons, UNC has flourished and become quite successful, at least for 1 season in which they won the National Championship.

Why do I think they didn't value Roy Williams and his legendary success as a coach in Division I NCAA Basketball?

BECAUSE, once they won the national championship these four players called it quits and want to move on to NBA "glory" because it will be another "challenge in life." These four UNC players felt as if their "days of college had come to an end."

In other words, they didn't value their coach nor UNC as an institution nor UNC heritage enough to stay and put another National Championship banner in the Dean Dome. Instead of staying one more measely year and making history as the best NCAA Basketball team ever, they want to move on to the NBA for a "new challenge."

"New challenge" is just coverup for "i want to bask in the millions of NBA dollars that couldn't wait another measely year.

THIS IS ALL FINE to me because I am a Duke fan. The loss of May, Felton, McCants, and Williams means the road is clear for another DUKE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP and another legacy achieved by legendary NCAA Men's Basketball Coach Mike Krzyzewski.

J.J. Redick, Shelden Williams, Shavlik Randolph, Sean Dockery, DeMarcus Nelson, David McClure, Patrick Davidson, Patrick Johnson, and inspiration leader Lee Melchionni are all returning as Duke's upper classmen.

This veteran nucleus of players plus Duke's 2005/2006 recruiting class of Greg Paulus, Josh McRoberts, Eric Boateng, Martynas Pocius, and Jamal Boykin will provide for quite a deep and talented team.

McRoberts, Boateng, and Paulus all competed in the McDonald's High School All-American game and showed why there were worthy of being recruited by Duke. McRoberts gathered up the MVP award for the McDonald's All-American game and Greg Paulus showed us why he is one of the top-ranked Point Guards in the country.

Here's to the 2005-2006 Duke team! Go grab another National Championship for Coach K!

Sin City Rocks!

Tonight I went to see Sin City in the big ole town of Farmville. Suprisingly, the ONLY movie theatre around this place was showing Sin City. There are a whopping 3 screens at the Longwood Village Cinema.

Anyway, Sin City was freakin' amazing and the special effects were beyond what I had expected. Can't say much more than "it was amazing." I thought at first the movie was a little overrated just because there was a cast full of stars, but no one star dominated the screen, which was good to see.

I have never read any of the graphic comics/novels written by Frank Miller for which the movie is based, but I think I might start after tonight -- just to make sure the movie was done as well as it should have been. Considering Frank Miller co-directed the movie, I imagine he approves of it, otherwise it wouldn't have hit the big screen.

If you haven't seen Sin City yet, get off your butt and go see it. Trust me, it's worth $6.50. I just saw it and I want the DVD already......

Viewer's Warning: Naked "broads" are in great supply and put the "sin" in Sin City......

P.S. Sorry to burst your bubble, but Jessica Alba does not have a nude shot fellas.

Duke looks better and better

This week has been a great week for ACC fans, unless of course you're a UNC or a Wake Forest fan. Why has this been such a great week for the ACC, according to me? I'll tell you why -- Duke is looking to be a stronger team more and more each week due to recent players declaring for the NBA draft or even having speculation of entering the NBA draft.

My message to these following players: Good riddance, we're better off without you. Two of the players I dislike most are leaving their respective ACC schools to enter the NBA draft, thank goodness because I've had enough of these two clowns.

1.) Rashad McCants, Junior, North Carolina

Hey bud, I know we've had some harsh feelings towards each other over the past 3 years, considering I am a DUKE fan and all, but I really do support you in this situation. I WANT you to leave and get the heck out of the ACC.

Some words of encouragement: You are overrated, Your ego gets in the way of potential talent, and you value money more than intellect -- most people who leave college early are the same.

Enjoy the NBA and enjoy the benefits of leaving college early, benefits like earning millions but having no idea how to count it out and make sure you got paid the right amount. I have a number of a CPA if you need it.......

Oh, and if you have a career ending injury (not life threatening) before any REAL games or in practice, you might want to reconsider going back to college so you just MIGHT be able to get a job .


2.) Chris Paul, Sophomore, Wake Forest

First of all, I do not support you in any way period, but it's great to see the most unsportsmanlike player in ACC history leave. I just really want to say YOU SUCK because you're a complete idiot. You COULD have earned my respect, but nobody who plays dirty deserves any respect from anyone.

You punch people in the nuts, you punch people in the face during loose balls, you run your mouth, and your ego is way bigger than you are. Yea, you are a great PG, but your attitude needs revamping, which I doubt will ever happen as soon as you see the dollar signs flashing before your eyes -- I guess your ego will skyrocket now.

I want to say again, YOU SUCK. I'm so glad you're leaving because now I can enjoy a Duke/Wake Forest game without wanting to drive to North Carolina and kick your butt myself for throwing cheap shots at everyone.

ACC and college basketball is better off without you. Too bad your coach, Skip, isn't leaving too because he's an idiot for putting up with your crap and never disciplining you. You must have treated him well in bed.......

EDIT: Oh, and you have eyebrows like Bert and Ernie.... fag!

Intramurals, Bob Sagget, Semester Closing Down, Summer

My team, INFERNO, had a game tonight and it sucked for many reasons, the main reason being that the other team had 2 formoer Longwood Men's Basketball players and they pretty much took over and showed us why we didn't play for Longwood. But who cares? It's all supposed to be fun.... RIGHT! "Refs" suck, wearing sweaty pennies sucks, and so does playing in a crappy gym. Oh, and having shin splints every night sucks too -- hopefully I'll have some shins left after playoffs.

In other notes, there was absolutely nothing on TV tonight.....

So considering it's 12:00 Midnight, there's nothing on TV and we resorted to watching old school America's Funniest Home Videos shows, which totally sucked.

Let me just say.... Bog Sagget was never funny and STILL isn't funny. I just want to tell him to shut the heck up because his "jokes" are so freakin' stupid and corny. The guy that does the new version of the show has better jokes than him and they suck too. Oh, and another guy that really bugs the crap out of me is the Casey Casem wannabe on Animal Planet's Funny Animal videos show.

Lesson: Get Bog Sagget out of my face when I'm tired and still cooling down from a loss.

The last random thought on my mind tonight is the fact that there are only about 3 weeks left in the Spring 2005 semester. I just realized I will be bogged down with papers, presentations, tests, projects, and then Finals Week on top of that.

Chances are I won't emerge from my desk until the last day of exams when everything is packed up and I head home to the mean streets of Chester. The semester is drawing to a close REAL fast, which brings me to the next subject: SUMMER.

Summer this year should be fun; working at Ukrop's and completing an Internship at the same time should be real fun. Other than working, I plan on going to NY City for the first time ever with Maria and her fam, travelling to Puerto Rico with Fernando, and hitting up the beach for a couple days. That summer should breeze by like every summer since high school graduation and pretty soon I'll be pushing a 9-5 for the rest of my life.

College: The time interval between graduating high school and entering the "real world" full of bills, debt, bossses, and more bills.

Enjoy college folks, become a Van Wilder if you must because having to pay bills sucks and you don't want to take any crap from "The Man."

2 random thoughts

This is a pretty random blog entry, but it's 1:00AM and I'm wide awake with no sign of falling asleep for another hour or so. What else is there to do but post a new blog entry for my faithful readers (if there are any)?

Random Thought #1: Intramural basketball has ups and downs

Ups:
meeting new people to team up with since all the "solid" open gym regulars decided to put themselves on one gigantic team. . .

being able to throw a few elbows here and there, with the absence of REAL referees, to all the guys that did it to you in the past (It's payback time fool)

being able to say a team of 6 players went 4-2 in the regular season while playing teams with 2 squads

getting to have a real excuse for delaying or completely disregarding school work

Downs:
having your team as a target for the opposing team for reasons other than sportsmanship: some of the teams we've played (not to mention specific groups or frats) have taken the game a little too serious and pushed the meaning of assault (josh... thanks for having our backs man)

dealing with poor officiating and watching the refs play favorites

winning 2 of your 4 games by forfeit


Random Thought #2: Procrastination CAN pay off

It is Sunday, 2:00PM, you have to read a 150 page book and write a 3-5 page IN DEPTH review that you must turn in on Monday at 9:00AM sharp. You have an intramural game at 6:00pm and you haven't started reading until now (2:00pm). You also have your friend about to leave for bootcamp over for the weekend so you must hang out with him. What do you do?

Step 1: Look for the section of the book titled "Introduction" where you can find the author's thesis. Copy down simple notes regarding his thesis OR highlight it.

Step 2: Spend a few hours skimming through the "Introduction" as well as the first and concluding couple of paragraphs in each chapter. Chances are, the author has included the main idea with a few supporting facts in both the beginning and ending of a chapter. Highlight those.

Step 3: Chill with your friend before the 6:00pm game.

Step 4: Play your 6pm game AND win it too!

Step 5: Eat some dinner (just so happened to be Big Mac & fries with a tea)

Step 6: It is now 9:00PM and you have 6 more chapters to skim (by skim I actually mean reading the intro and concluding paragraphs in depth).

Step 7: In between skimming and playing FIFA, you begin to ponder what to include in your paper and get started. It is now 12AM and you've played games of FIFA with little spurts of skimming.

Step 8: At 1AM you finally decide to get down to business on your measely 3 page book review. Because you have all the main points from each chapter down AND the author's thesis, you should roll with the paper quite easily.

Step 9: Finish your 3page minimum book review by 2AM, which ended up having 5 solid pages full of nothing but factual, supported analysis (a.k.a. BS).

Step 10: Listen to your iPod and sleep it off and wait a week for your A!

Most of my papers are put off until the very end simply because I work better under pressure and am far too busy with other things (like FIFA, napping, chilling). Some people might say I committ suicide by waiting until the very last minute; to them I say:

"I have cheated death (in this situation) by not only procrastinating, but by earning A's on the papers I have procrastinated with!"

So if you are bold enough and can withstand the pressure, keep on procrastinating and learn from the Master Procrastinaor himself (me).