Friday, January 22, 2010

No mo Mo


Despite Thursday night’s impressive victory over the defending champs, no Mo Williams, may equal mo problems for the Cavaliers.

Williams, despite many of his numbers being down from last year, in my opinion is having a much better season this year.

Averaging nearly 17 points a game and five assists, the Cavaliers are losing their true second scoring option. A guy who can easily explode for 20 to 25 points any night of the week while splashing four to five threes.

Not to mention, he is showing signs of becoming a better point guard. More driving and dishing, instead of just shooting or standing at the top of the key and dishing, which explains why his assists are up from last year. He’s almost perfected the back door pass to cutters running to the rim and he in Nash-like fashion, has become quite effective driving to the hoop, turning around and dishing it to either Shaq or AV.

Delonte West is in as the starting point guard right now. The problem is, West is about as reliable as a your local cable man installer. You know, the type that say they’ll come to install your cable between the times of 8 a.m. and midnight...Tuesday or Wednesday. The point is, you don’t know if or when he’ll show up, mentally or physically. Literally.

Daniel “Boobie” Gibson is back in the rotation, but if he isn’t knocking down threes, the guy is borderline worthless. Can’t play a lick of defense, has trouble creating his own shot and isn’t physical on either side of the ball.

I know a thing or two about knocking down threes. In junior high, they called me White Wesley (in reference to my fourth favorite Cavalier of all time, Wesley Person). Currently in my Lost Nation Sports Park Basketball League, I’m referred to as the white Larry Bird. I can knock down threes all day, so Danny Ferry, if you’re reading this, I’m available. Trust me, you won’t be disappointed.

On a serious note (seriously though, Danny, hit me up) I’m not sure what the Cavaliers should do here. The point guards available or on the trading block aren’t tickling my fancy and four to six weeks isn’t the end of the world.

Clearly though, someone has to step up. Jamario Moon is to return to action in the next week or so which may cause the Cavaliers to play bigger, and in return, knock Boobie back out of the rotation due to the emergence of Hot ‘Wad Williams.

Translation, the Cavaliers are going to survive during the next six weeks, however, the ride may not not be as smooth.

-Nick Carrabine
NCarrabine@News-Herald.com

Thursday, January 7, 2010

Arenas? Cribbs? What in the world is going on?

















I’ll start off with Joshua Cribbs, who has been begging for a new contract for the past year.

Let's get this out in the open right away, the man deserves more money. A lot more money.

He is the most exciting player on the Browns since they came back to Cleveland in 1999, hands down. He loves playing for the city and he’s undoubtedly one of the best kick/punt returners in league history, perhaps the best.

He’s most often compared to the inferior Devin Hester, kick/punt returner now turned wide receiver, for the Chicago Bears.

He too was in a similar situation as Cribbs. In 2008, he was only (only?) making $445,000 a year and asked for a new contract.

His salary now sits at more than $5 million per year.

Cribbs was recently offered a new contract at $1.4 million, which insulted him so much he posted on his twitter late Wednesday night, “I feel like I’ve been betrayed by my best friend.”

Thursday morning, he posted: "I don't want to sound greedy, but fair is fair..."

Cribbs has threatened to demand a trade or sit out. The Browns aren’t trading him and he still has three years left on his contract, so if he sits out — which is unlikely — it’d be a long time before he ever plays again.

Now to my opinion.

I don’t have a problem with Cribbs asking for more money. This is the way the NFL is structured with non-guaranteed contracts. This happens all the time and is the reason you see so many holdouts every season.

To people who say things like “Well he’s already getting paid more money then I’ll ever make, stop complaining” doesn’t understand market value in sports.

Yes, athletes are overpaid by obscene amounts of money for doing something everyone could only dream of, but Cribbs market value is far, far more than the contract he has now.

Don't hate the player, hate the game.

If you worked for a company and were getting paid, say, $50,000 per year, and your company was making millions upon millions and you look around and see others who are less skilled than you at the same position getting paid triple, or quadruple, the amount as you, you’d be complaining, you’d think about leaving and above all, you’d be hurt.

The problem I do have, and I love Cribbs — who as I said, genuinely loves playing for this town — is voicing his frustration publicly so soon regarding his new offer.

Mike Holmgren, the teams new president, hasn’t even been in town for one whole week and has already been bombarded by Cribbs’ agent.

You’d think they’d let Holmgren settle in before making demands. Not to mention, Holmgren has bigger things on his plate, like trying to decide who is going to coach this team next year.

So in that aspect, I’m a bit disappointed with Cribbs, who needs to be patient. The money will come.

In an effort to maybe patch things up with fans, Cribbs had this to offer on his Twitter page Thursday afternoon: "I'm so gracious for browns fans all over... This is why I love playing here their the best fans ever..."

Speaking of disappointment, Washington Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas has officially gone off the reservation.

Talk about being a few sandwiches short of a picnic basket.

This guy brought nothing to the picnic, except maybe a few guns.

For those who haven’t heard — and there are multiple stories of what really happened, and no one really knows at this point — is there was some sort of situation in the Washington Wizards locker room where Arenas allegedly laid four unloaded guns down near a teammate’s locker with a note that said “pick one.” This was in response to the teammate's joke/threat to shoot Arenas in his surgically repaired knee following a poker game on the team plane a few nights prior.

Let's get this out there on the table right now, Gilbert Arenas is a self-proclaimed goofball. Always has, always will be. Doesn’t seem to take himself too seriously and unfortunately, doesn’t seem to be taking the gun incident situation too seriously.

Carrying guns into the locker room is one thing, but to openly flaunt them in front of others and to make jokes about shooting off said gun is another.

This town knows a thing or two about gun incidents, after all, we got our own Desperado in the locker room in Delonte West. (Does anyone else find it ironic that the Wizards — formally known as the Bullets — were in town to face the Cavaliers at the height of this controversy?)

The difference between the two is, West has kept quiet about his situation understanding the seriousness of it while Arenas thought it was a joke, proceeded to write blogs and tweets saying people take things too seriously and that he was just goofing around.

Not to mention, West is actually diagnosed with mood disorders. There is no clinical diagnosis for just being stupid. (If there was, it'd be called Gilbert disorder.)

He then, in one of the dumbest things I’ve seen of all time, gathered his teammates together before a game on Monday - after the controversy, mind you - and pointed his index finger at his teammates pretending to shoot them to poke fun of his situation. The Wizards, who have truly become a poor excuse for a franchise, all laughed. NBA Commissioner David Stern, and the rest of the country, didn’t.

Arenas will now have a long time to think about not only his actions, but his strange, erratic behavior following the locker room incident trying to undermine what he had done.

He truly doesn’t get it yet and with his personality, probably never will.

It’ll be a long time before you see Arenas play another professional game.

Hopefully, it won’t be the same case for Cribbs.

Nick Carrabine
NCarrabine@News-Herald.com

Monday, January 4, 2010

Browns finish season on very respectable note


I haven’t written a sports blog since last year, literally.

(And here we go with the first of many lame jokes in 2010).

Honestly though, I haven’t written one in months, but what was I going to write about?

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