Dmiles23

You know... it would be great entertainment to see Danny G play point for a night or 2. I don't think you could find more comedy than that on Comedy Central.

The piece that is news to me is that the Rangers and Sheets had agreed to a 2-year deal. We knew they were in talks, but recent reports were that the talks were dead. The article said they agreed late last week, and the rumors that talks were dead came early this week. So it makes perfect sense. He went in for his physical late last week, didn't pass, and thus the talks were dead. I might be time to start questioning our medical staff's abilities somewhat. I know it's not an exact science but obviously Texas doctors saw something the Brewers didn't. I don't quite understand this logic. The Brewers medical staff looked at Sheets what? 3 months ago? I'm willing to bet that some of this was on Sheets. There is a reason the Brewers hardly attempted to sign Sheets after he declined arbitration. The Brewers doctors could have said "There's a 90% chance you'll need surgery, 10% chance you can rehab." And maybe Sheets was hoping he could rehab well enough to get a big deal before he needed surgery. If the Brewers would have signed Sheets to a big deal, and then noticed he'd need surgery, then I'd question the medical staff. But it's hard to place blame on them... because there is a reason the Brewers didn't pursue him as a FA.

I was just looking at the NBA standing to see how badly the Bucks would have to do to move up in the draft, and I realized... there are A LOT of bad teams in the NBA this year. My estimate for Bucks wins this year is 30, and that would probably put them around the 8th-9th pick in the draft this year. Last year, 30 wins puts you in the 7th spot. In 07, 30 wins gets you the 4th pick. In 06, 30 wins gets you the 6th pick. In 05, 30 wins gets you the 6th pick. And in 04, 30 wins gets you the 7th pick. So this is a horrible year to be trying to tank. The sad part is, the Western Conference top 9 teams are so good, that the bottom teams don't stand a chance against most of them. Oklahoma City, Memphis, Sacramento, LA Clippers, Minnesota, and Golden St(especially with all the injuries they've had) have no chance to compete in the West. The East probably has 3 of the 4 top teams in the league, but after that it's anyone's game. Looking at the Bucks schedule, they play 52 games against the East and 30 against the West. So my question is... what would the Bucks record be if they played in the West? Are they really THAT much better than the likes of OKC, Mem, Sac, LA, Min, and GS? To me, having an unbalanced schedule like that may hurt the bottom teams in the West, but it definitely makes it easier for them to get higher picks, so, if they are smart, an easier time to rebuild. And the West being the stronger conference is not a new thing. Looking back at the last 5 seasons, the West has had 28 50+ win teams, compared to the East's 12. But it's not the same teams every year for the West. Over those 5 seasons, 12 of the 15 teams have won 50 or more games at least once. Compared to the East, where 6 of the 15 teams have(Detroit won 50+ each year). So it just seems that the East is stuck in mediocrity. And in my opinion, with the unbalanced schedule where Eastern conference teams play substancially more games agains the East, the East will be stuck in mediocrity for quite a few more years.

I'm not a big Marquette watcher, as I've only seen them play maybe 3-4 times this year, but in my opinion there isn't any way McNeal doesn't get drafted. I don't think he's a first rounder, but he will get drafted... and I'd put my money early in the second round. The guy can play. The thing with him is, he's a little small, 6'2'', to play SG in the NBA. And, at least to my knowledge, hasn't spent much, if any, time in college playing the point. Wade had played a little point at Marquette, even with Deiner there.

I'm still not sold on Griffin and his defense maybe he will improve his defense and become a great player I'm just not sold on it. I could live with a guy putting up 25 and 12 every night and only being average on D. A guy with his size, strength, and athletic ability should be able to get those numbers nightly, if he stays healthy. I see him as a little better Carlos Boozer. And if Boozer were healthy, I'd love to have him on the Bucks, even though he plays average D. Of course he's not LeBron's territory, but I'd put him up with Rose and Howard (on draft night). I am not a fan of Mullens at all. That's how I was the first couple times I've watched him. But as of late, he has been much more productive, and he moves very well for a 7'er. I obviously wouldn't take him extremely high in the draft. But if the Bucks had a pick around #10-12, I'd love to have him. Based on pure upside, I would be all over Demar DeRozan. My only question does he want to take a paycut amongst other cut fringe benefits (not the least of which is location) and declare for the draft? Ha... you saying USC pays out more than the NBA?! For a second I thought you misspoke and were talking about Brandon Jennings, who went to Europe to play. Then I read it again, and came to the conclusion that you were taking a swipe at USC. I like it.

I've been a huge fan of Griffin since I first saw him play last year... and was hoping he'd declare last year and fall to the Bucks. No luck. He is the clear cut #1 pick in the draft, and nobody else is even close. I don't understand how anyone who has seen the guy play can say he's not worth the #1 pick. He's a beast on offense, even though he needs to work on his outside shot. He's an unbelievable rebounder. He has a great NBA body. He's unbelievably athletic. But my favorite characteristic about his is his intensity. There aren't many players that have his talent and his intensity. He gives 110% every second he's on the floor. His D may be suspect, but that's something that people with his athletic ability can vastly improve on with some coaching. That being said, there are a number of other guys I'd love to have in the draft. Everyone is saying this is a weaker draft, but in my opinion there are a bunch of guys I'd like to see in a Bucks uni. Thabeet, Harden, Hill, Aminu, Henderson, Mullens, and Monroe. And as much as I hate to admit it, because I hate Duke, unless the Bucks get a really high pick, I would love for them to take Henderson. He has really improved over the last couple of year, and has really impressed me this year. As for Curry... Unless the Bucks make a run here and don't pick until the late teens or early 20's, there is no way I even consider Curry. A 6'1'' shooting guard will get eaten alive in the NBA. But that's just my opinion.

I'll agree with that. That was rather disturbing. My favorite line was Andy at the beginning when Dwight lit those fire crackers: "The fire is shooting at us!!"

I'm bad at ages... but I'd say late 20's.

He's best recognizable by the scar on the side of his face... but besides that, he usually has a really short hair cut.

I witnessed him do this, and I witnessed him get caught. He puts a Shouse 8x10 on top, and then Sheets 8x10's underneath. So once Shouse signed the top one, he just moved the top one up a little so Shouse couldn't see that the bottom 8x10 wasn't of him.

This appears to be correct according to THIS from MLBtraderumors. That's the closest form of proof I could find.

That's a good point. I was trying to find out the Bucks lease situation with the Bradley Center, but couldn't find it. I found an article from 2006 that said the Bucks were close to signing a 5 year lease, but I couldn't find a confirmation article. If that's the case, the Bucks would have 2 more seasons in the BC before something needs to be done. And I thought I read somewhere that Stern visited the BC in the beginning of the year, and said it would be a useful building for 5-8 more years... if I remember correctly. So there's a little time, but not much.

I'm pretty sure he's still in school... last I heard he was going to graduate this spring, but he seems to say that yearly. I looked on his Facebook page, and it says he's going to be graduating in '10... so who knows.

But if an ownership group comes along and agrees to pay for all/most of a new arena, that would change pretty quickly. I'm just hoping the Bucks don't leave in the same manner as the Sonics. The Sonics were only bad for a couple years, but it must have pained their fans to watch a team with Durant, Green, and a high lottery pick in the 08 draft to leave town. It would be bad enough for me to see the Bucks leave town... but it would be even worse if they finally start to get some talent on the team before they leave... Not that I haven't enjoyed watching players like Tim Thomas, Keith Van Horn, Anthony Mason, Michael Redd, Daniel Santiego, Marcus Fizer, Bobby Simmons, Steve Blake, and Royal Ivey over the past couple years.

Don't forget Seattle as a possible destination for the Bucks, if in fact they do move. Stern has said that if they could get their act together and build a new arena, that basketball would be back in Seattle. But Herb has said time and time again that he wants to keep the team in Milwaukee... and only wants to sell the team to someone who vows to keep it there. But Herb isn't getting any younger (I was slightly surprised when I read he was only going to be 74 on Feb 7. I would have guessed him to be 5 or so years older than that).

And what I'm saying is that yes, the Redd haters will get to see the team without Redd... but that is insignificant. The Redd haters wanted Redd traded, so something would come back to the team. The Bucks are obviously going to be worse now because they just lost their "best player" for nothing. If Redd was traded, something would have come back to the team... to help improve the team in the future. So I don't see how this has anything, whatsoever to do with the Redd haters. (I can do this too, it's fun)...now if you read what I actually wrote, I didn't say you said people wanted Redd to get hurt. That was my opinion, whether it was right or wrong... but I'm guessing it was right. It's like saying the people who think the Brewers would be better off without Fielder, and would rather have Dunn playing first. They don't want Fielder to go down with an injury. They are hoping the Brewers can acquire something for Fielder to make the team better. So my original point was, I don't see how anyone (even Redd haters) can be happy with this situation. Yes, the Redd haters will get to see the Bucks without Redd. But that's insignificant because they still didn't get their way, which was a trade to improve the team in other areas.

I don't think this has anything to do with the Redd haters. I may be wrong, but I'm guessing that none of the Redd haters were really hoping Redd would go down with a serious knee injury. I guess I could be considered a Redd hater, although I think hate is too strong of a word, and I think this sucks. The Redd haters wanted Redd traded, so something would come back to the team. Now he has no trade value at all, and probably won't until the final year of his contract as an expiring.

I got there about 8:40 and was, I'd guess, like 300 people back. I was VERY happy the line was inside, and also VERY happy I got there when I did. The line was farther back than I could see and starting to loop around by 9. I thought it was very organized and actually well thought out at the beginning of the line, but it kind of seemed they didn't expect that many people; so the longer the line got, the less organized it became. I got into the Fielder/Weeks line. We were probably about 120-130 people back. It seemed to go pretty smoothly. We got up there in around 20-25 minutes I'd guess. I got a Weeks 8x10 that I took signed, and I got Fielder on a bobblehead. Both guys were very nice and cordial. And like someone else said, I was VERY impressed with the condition Fielder seemed to be in. He walked by us on the way to the autograph stage, and my jaw dropped. He looked lean... or as lean as Fielder is going to be. After the Fielder/Weeks line, I went to the Hart line. That's who I really wanted. It was a REALLY long wait, but it was nice having entertainment around. My only complaint about this was, that there seemed to be mass confusion about the lines. Braun was still signing when we got over there, and there was a Hoffman line next to the Hart line. And if just seemed like nobody had any idea what was going on. Then a little bit later, the Gallardo line was back and standing next to us. So the Hoffman line, Hart line, and Gallardo line were all together... and people were trying to get to the food court, so they had to make their way through this mob of people. Then, Fielder/Weeks and then Hardy showed up at the photo place and it was just 1 huge mob of people. But in the end, it all worked out. I was 114th in the Hart line, and I got another bobble signed. We made it through just before 3, and then headed for home. We had had enough standing for 1 day. All in all, I thought the event went well. They had LOTS of things to do. The only minor things I would have improved was the lines and the vouchers. The lines were unmarked and didn't have any barriers (except at the very front). But I'm not sure how they could fix that without limiting the walking area for the event. Also, I thought them passing out the vouchers only 30 or so minutes before the player signed was kind of stupid. I can see if at the beginning of the event, so people don't run around and get vouchers from every line before many people have an opportunity to enter the event. But after the first group, they could have started handing out the vouchers probably 90 minutes before each session. The only reason I say this is because it would help with line confusion, and by that time the line is long enough to where it was close to 250 people anyways.

I just looked more closely at the weather forecast for Saturday morning. The high for Saturday is 12... but that's supposed to be at midnight and the temp will be falling from there. They say 9 at 4am and 5 at 7am... and I'd guess falling from there down to the low of 0. So if you are planning on waiting in line for any length of time... DRESS WARM!!

This is kind of what I thought too. Prince seems to be a guy that likes money, and not having it guaranteed may be the best way to keep him in shape. But if Fielder is/is not in shape now, not much is going to change between now and when they report for spring training. And then next offseason, he'll be preparing for his last arby contract. So in my opinion, a 2 year deal still "keeps the carrot out in front of him." I'd be excited if they can get this done. Hopefully he can get back to bashing 50 homers and make the deal look like a bargain!

I'd imagine that the chilly temps may hinder people getting there too early. It's supposed to be a high of 10 Saturday. It's much different than the regular On-Deck events where it's in the 30's if not the 40's or 50's.

Please explain to me how rebounds and assists are meaningless? Because if you can, maybe I'm missing the whole point of the game of basketball.

That's awesome that he's going to be there. But thinking about this, and I know this is a conspiracy theory, but I wonder if him not originally going to be there had anything to do with him possibly being involved in a trade? In one of Haudricourt's blogs this morning, he wrote that Melvin dismissed the notion of trading Fielder, and then a couple hours later he's added to the list of the On Deck? I know this is probably wrong, and has nothing to do with each other, but it's an idea. Maybe Melvin had told Fielder that they were listening to offers for him, and then just recently assured him he would be in Milwaukee in '09. Oh well... Good deal. And hoping he shows up looking more like a football than a bowling ball.

I'm ready for tear down mode, and have been ready for tear down mode for quite a while. I hated the Redd contract when they gave it to him and knew it would come back to bite us in the butt. But I'm hoping Redd continues to play fairly well(in other words, score lots), but the team tanks between now and the trading deadline. I hope some team will look at his ppg of late and give up more than necessary to get him. But I still laugh at his other stats. In the last 5 games, he has played 198 minutes. In the last 5 games, he has a total of 6 rebounds... or 1 rebound every 33 minutes of play!! And in the last 5 games, he has a total of 9 assists... or 1 assist every 22 minutes of play!

Thanks Hawing, I called the ticket office and they said you can buy tickets to the Saturday event at Miller Park Mon-Fri 9-5 at the home plate ticket office, window 6. So if anyone else was curious, that's the answer.