Long Weekend Roundup

Sacramento Kings Wins: 6, 7, 8

The plate of crow, and the cost of seats, is getting a bit outrageous.

Bango the Buck

Lucky for Bango, he doesn't have to go on road games. The young lefty looking to upstage the most exciting thing in Milwaukee does. Advantage: Bango.

Actual conversation had between Spike and Charlie T.

CTH: "Did you see Brandon Jennings?"

SW: "No, what happened?"

CTH: "Double nickel vs Golden State and an 8-3 record."

SW: "Who else have they played?"

CTH: quickly googling the Bucks schedule and seeing teams like Minnesota, Knicks, GS, Nettes, Bobcats, Grizz "Uh, nobody really. Some real tests coming up though...@Spurs, @NO, Orl."

SW: "Well there is your answer. Talk to me in about a week."

Anybody on the Jennings bandwagon knows how that stretch played out.

Jay Bilas All-Stars: Anthony Randolph

My fantasy team (which is leading my league with a 27-9 record, a 6 game cushion over the second place team and coming off a 9-0 week all thanks to taking D-Wade with the first overall pick) is in a dilemma. I log on today to calculate my lead over the rest of the league and I see a trade has been proposed to me. Derrick Rose (on my roster) for Anthony Randolph. Straight up. No filler, nothing. Just Rose for Randolph. Its an easy decision really, unless your league gets points for upside, second jumpability, length, and freakish athlete. You know what, I'm not so sure he even outmeasures Rose in most of those categories anyway. Sorry Chazzmichaelmichaels, The Adam Keefes are keeping Rose and his fantasy points. Good luck with those length points.

Weekend Roundup

Bango the Buck:
Scoring 55 points as a rookie is impressive, especially 8 games into the season. Brandon Jennings antics have just about upstaged Bango the Buck as the most exciting thing in Milwaukee, but doing it against the Warriors is about as impressive as this. I mean come on, he is using a trampoline.

Boston Celtics Countdown to 10 losses: 3
Mired in a two game losing skid to the formidable Hawks and Psycho T and the Pacers leaves RaSheed's prediction in doubt for the All-Star game let alone the entire season.

Sacramento Kings Wins: 5
Don't book that trip to Hawaii yet Spike, you might be using that money for courtside seats.

Atlanta Hawks - 'Nique or Keefe:
An 8-2 start with some really quality wins so far (POR, DEN, BOS) leaves us leaning 'Nique on this.

Sacramento Kings: Apparently Faithful Readers Of The Black Converse

It's a bittersweet moment today at The Black Converse.

Sweet because clearly the Kings are our most faithful readers and have used our unfriendly wager as bulletin board motivational material. And it's working. City of Sacramento, you're welcome. We're happy to spur your boys on.

Bitter because, with a W last night (led by...Jason Thompson? Who? [hitting Wikipedia. No good. Hitting ESPN.com's profile page. He went to Rider? He makes $2 million this year?]), the Kings are now 4-4 and waaaaaaaaay ahead of pace to stick Charlie T and me in the lower bowl of Energy Solutions Arena on January 29. Against our will, but true to our word. I believe I heard Charlie T say these words today: "Well, I've never sat courtside at a Jazz game before." Ugh.


Is this guy to Sacto as Paul Milsap was to Utah the last couple years? The secret you hope nobody (aka: Portland) finds out about?

In other Sacramento news, Kevin Martin (since we know you and your Kings are our readership), you may want to brush up on your understanding of Bill Simmons' The Ewing Theory.

PS: Thanks for reading, Kings. The Princes jokes will stop soon.

Win/Win or Lose/Lose

The Jazz are in NYC to face the Knicks, which means a win is a double win (a road win AND another loss towards the Knicks' lottery campaign) and a loss is a double loss (a road loss to a very beatable team AND another win against the Knicks' lottery campaign).

In a season where:

- the Jazz appear to be a very well-motivated hockey team (3 winning and solid quarters, lots of fouls. Come on. If there were no fourth quarter, this team would be killing it. Ah, but there IS a fourth quarter. And this team is getting killed.)
- the Jazz got a loss to a Kevin Martin-less team of misfit toys (potentially the tipping point to The Black Converse having to attend the January 29 Jazz/Kings game)
- the Jazz beat the Spurs on the FRONT end of a back-to-back
- the Jazz let Dirk believe his hair had Samsonian qualities
- the weak interior defense has led many Jazz fans to (silently) wonder what Greg Ostertag is up to

it's not too hard to see how a W against this particular Knicks team could be a bona fide must-win. Unless you're shooting for TWO lottery picks...

910 Conversation: Weekend Roundup

Psycho T Meter: 8
We promised to track the Psycho-ness of Psycho Tyler Hansbrough throughout the season as he tries to translate his college hustle to the pros. Due to a shin injury we have had to put this on the back burner until this weekend when he saw his first action.

In his first professional game he managed to find a way to dive after a lose ball into the stands. We also go our money's worth of Hustle Faces. All that adds up to an 8 on the Psycho T Meter. (see below)



Sacramento Kings Wins: 2, 3
We might have to adjust our wager at this point and change it to Jazz wins by the end of January. I thought the win vs. the Jazz was an aberration, but they backed it up by inching closer to .500 against the Jay Bilas All-Stars. We may be looking at courtside seats at this rate.

Celtics Countdown to 10 loses: 1
Minus the game against Orlando where they sent their "B" team, the Suns went 3-1 on a very difficult east coast swing. The Celtics on the other hand are lucky the Baby Wolves don't know how to finish a game or this would be the Celtics 2nd loss. 72 wins is still technically on the radar.

Memphis Thirtysomethings: 3
Rudy Gay drops 33 on the Clipps. This was without factoring in the Clippers handicap. So in reality he had about 17 which is a solid night. In other Grizzlies news, our favorite Thritysomething Allen Iverson will have to really pick up the pace to appear in thirty games this year.

Phoenix Suns: 1 (pending)
Though he hasn't quite gotten it, Shaq is currently working overtime trying to figure out how to steal this late career rebirth from Steve Nash. Hey Shaq, I might be going out on a limb here, but I doubt its in the Cuyahoga Police Department.

Attention, shoppers, K-Mart is getting shut down

With apologies to the original, er, second original K- Mart (Kenyon Martin), the new K-Mart is getting shut down for 6-8 weeks.

Given our wager with The Kings, this certainly makes 14 wins by January 29 less likely. In honor of that, I made a quick list of things I might be doing in Utah- rather than attending a Jazz/Kings game- on Friday January 29.

- Writing a thank you note to the country of Spain for recognizing the benefits of trading matador for matador. Carlos Boozer will have no trouble with the bulls and the NBA's first bullfighter Ricardo Montoya, if he keeps up that hustle, will have no problem finding Jerry Sloan's good graces.

- Night skiing with Robert Redford, who'll need to decompress after a long Sundance. We'll have our usual talk about Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid and how it was kind of his Catcher In The Rye and how sometimes he wishes he had more Salinger in him.

- Countdown the days until the Vancouver Olympics start while simultaneously watching the Raptors' plummet in their bid to become Canada's Team.

- Watch TMZ.

- Read some message boards about the last season of Lost, wish that ABC hadn't cast Juliet in their new show V because it kind of tells you how limited her role will be, speculate on Sawyer/Kate/Jack replacing Juliet in their love square with...Sun? But then it would be a pentagon, which would explain the government conspiracy...

- Drink the last of my personal hoarded stash of egg nog.

- Burn a couple candles for the Kings at the shrine for St. Lenny Wilkens, the NBA's losingest coach.

Big Night for the 910 Conversation Story Lines

CP3=KG: 1
We know its early in the season but in the game against Boston, CP3 showed some true frustration...and KG envy. A loss last night to the Knicks probably didn't help matters.

Memphis Thirtysomethings: 2

Last night was the first of many disgruntled performances from Allen Iverson, the thirtysomething darling of the Grizzlies. We put you as the first thirtysomething Allen not because we want people to know how old you are but because we knew this would mean a lot to you.
We did what you said, "Go look at my resume and that will show you that I'm not a sixth man," Iverson said. "I don't think it has anything to do with me being selfish. It's just who I am. I don't want to change what gave me all the success that I've had since I've been in this league." And you're right. You are not a sixth man, you're a thirtysomething man...and the first one in our books.
It was also the first thirtysomething point total by a Grizzly of the season, Mr. Zach Randolph. Mayo messed up his chance to be the first by trying to go shot for shot with Carmelo. (for those of you keeping score at home Carmelo's 40+ pt effort doesn't count towards TBC eating a Caramello...because it was against the GRIZZLIES...the same grizzlies who made Kevin Martin look like Kobe Bryant last night)

Sactown Race To 14 Wins: 1

The Kings are moving along at a 25% clip, right on pace to put us in the lower bowl right behind the Osmonds.
Something tells me this won't last.

TBC Smart Points for Daryl Morey: 1

@ricbucher tweeted last night after the Rockets pulled away from the Jazz that "HOU is a 5-man symphony"
We knew after last year they would be scrappy and win some tough games, but with Lil' Chris Rock leading the squad full time now they are looking mighty impressive.

Heat vs. Suns tonight

One loyal reader and Suns fan wrote in wondering if this is a preview for the 2010 NBA Finals.
One can dream...one can only dream.

The Pink Seats Aren't Exactly Beckoning. The Purple Ones? Even Less.

At 0-3, the Kings aren't exactly making us sweat our bet.



Meanwhile, the Knicks are right on schedule. They score FIFTEEN more points per game than Sacramento and still have a worse point differential. Wow. The Jazz could use somebody who blocks shots...UNC's Ed Davis might have that. Only 6 ft 10, though and we might already have a corner on the market of undersized bigs.

Magically 3licious

Pardon the terrible title.

The Orlando Magic set an NBA record for 3-pointers made last night with 23. The record they broke was 21, set by Toronto in 2005. A couple of thoughts:

- JJ Reddick was 4-7. A renowned sharpshooter who has slumped of late, this was his kind of game. I'm guessing there was at least one hypnotist, 2 towels soaked in eau d'Cameron Indoor, three Coach K motivational mp3s, and a couple of "I think there are some NBA scouts in the arena tonight" rumors involved.

- Jameer Nelson was 5-5. I bet Reddick hears about that for awhile. Or he would, if he were actually not in some kind of hypnotic coma.
- The great Marcin Gortat was the only Magic player to attempt a 3-pointer and not make at least one. He too will have an earful for awhile. Dwight Howard can at least say he didn't even try to make one.

- The worst percentage- besides 0%- was PG Anthony Johnson who shot 1-4 (25%), everyone else was: 3-5, 3-5, 1-1, 4-7, 4-6, 1-2, 1-1. They were smoking hot. If I were anyone who'd made a shot, I wouldn't let a practice end without quietly suggesting that Johnson put in a little overtime working on his shot.
- HOW MANY NBA RECORDS ARE SET AGAINST VERITABLE DOORMATS? Sacramento, this record's victim, is sitting on a sorry record of 9-30. I can't imagine Philly was too good when Toronto set the original record of 21 3-pointers (though, Toronto was pretty weak at the time too, as Kobe went for a career-high 81 points a week later against them). If I were John Hollinger or some other skilled statistician/googler, I'd look this up. But you gotta believe that records aren't getting set against great teams, most of the time.