USC Men's Basketball Stresses Me Out

I'm not sure what lead me to watch last night's UC Irvine-USC matchup, but I did. I'm kind of glad I did, because it allowed me to take a look at a Big Six program in sore need of a change.

Now, though I'm glad I watched the game, the act of watching the game was scressful. Not stressful, scressful. That fact that a major school like USC struggled against an okay mid-major (UCI was picked third in the Big West preseason poll....but it's the Big West....) and then lost irked my soul.

And they looked bad losing. They shot 40% from the field, took ten fewer shots than the Anteaters, and turned the ball over 16 times. Omar Oraby was the only bright spot for the Trojans scoring 12 points in the second half. Senior leader Jio Fontan was anything but, scoring only 2 points off of 1-6 shooting and turning the ball over 4 times. Irvine shot only slightly better (42%), but Daman Starring was able to rack up 23 points. UCI actually had moments where they shot horribly, and the fact that they did shootaround at their school since they were only 45 minutes away instead of at the Galen Center showed. Yet USC still couldn't capitalize.

It was scressful.

It's not as if I just helicoptered in on one game and formed my opinion on that. I've actually seen them in a few more instances in the calender year of 2012. First, there was their Pac-12 Tournament game last season against UCLA at Staples. The Bruins quickly escorted the Trojans out of the building to the tune of 55-40. USC shot 29%, and only five of the seven players that played scored. Three of those seven players have transferred to other programs this season.

Then there was the beatdown they received in Maui at the hands of Illinois. The final score was 94-64, but it was 57-26 at the half. Statistically, USC actually was okay, just off from three (25%) and just below average from the field (44%). They also managed to lead Illinois in the second half 38-37. However it was too little, too late, as the Fighting Illini shot 68.8% and went on a 50-20 run in the first half that put things out of reach early.

Then there was Thursday night. USC came out with an uninspired effort. There was at one point late in the second half when they tried to make a run, but like the Illinois game it was too little, too late.

The Trojans are now 0-3 in games I have watched, and 4-8 (0-1) between the first game I watched and the last one.

It shouldn't be this way. It's shouldn't be this "scressful" to watch USC basketball.

USC plays basketball in the Pac-12 (a pretigous hoops conference) in Los Angeles (a beautiful, entertaining, vibrant metropolitan area AND a decent place to discover high school talent) in the Galen Center (a beautiful 10,000-seat arena). I understand a team hitting a down year in a major conference, but to be this bad over a year-and-a-half span (10-33 from last season to today) with that much working for you is mind-boggling. And they're getting left behind in their own conference: They are the only team below .500 this year in the non-conference schedule.

I can't help but point the finger at Kevin O'Neill. Nothing about his record screams "winner". His record simply shrugs and says "meh". He is in his 16th season as a college head coach. He has made the tournament only four times, and has advanced past the first round once (a 1994 Sweet Sixteen appearance with Marquette). At USC, he has only made one tournament appearance: 2011, where they lost by 13 to eventual Final Four participant VCU.

After the UCI game, Kevin O'Neill pointed out the team's lack of effort in the first half:

"For whatever reason, we ease into every first half," O'Neill said. "We won the second half, but that doesn't matter because we were down by 12 at the half at home."

Also, this:

O'Neill characterized the team as a "rudderless ship in terms of effort and energy.

And then, this:

"The bottom line is, we have a responsibility as individuals to prepare for games and play as hard as we can, and until we do that, we're going to find ourselves on the short end of a lot of things," he said.

But why? 11 games into the season, and the team is still lacking effort? USC is in a conference where they could walk into the NCAA Tournament as long as they play hard. They just have to beat the teams put in front of them by the AD and they can earn an at-large berth. Yet they still lack effort? Lack of talent is one thing. Lack of cohesion is one thing. But considering that they have good talent on paper and neither O'Neill nor Eric Wise, who was also quoted in the story, cited chemistry, then those aren't the cases.

It falls on the coach, either he is not motivating his troops to get up for each game and play 100% for 40 minutes, or he's recruiting guys that lack the work ethic to at least be competitve in the Pac 12.

For all the talk about Ben Howland being a "Fired Man Walking", I'm surprised there isn't any about Kevin O'Neill possibly being shown the door.

Come to think of it, there isn't much talk about USC basketball at all. That's unfortunate. When I was looking for reaction online to the UCI loss, I found little. When I was scouring Twitter for talk about the game, I didn't find much of that either. ESPNLA doesn't even have much coverage of the men's basketball team. It's all football. Football rules at Southern Cal.

That has to change. It's one thing to be a football school, but the least the USC administration could do is work to make their men's basketball team presentable.

Now, to be fair, I'm sure that Kevin O'Neill was hired as a departure from Tim Floyd. Floyd was accused of providing improper benefits to OJ Mayo to get him to come to the school. An NCAA investigation into the issue lead to self-imposed sanctions that vacated 21 wins and saw them withdraw from conference and national postseason consideration in 2009-10, O'Neill's first season.

The mandate on him was probably to focus on graduating players, and he has done a fair job of that with a APR in 2010-2011 of 960. We shall see how the 2011-12 APR looks somewhere down the line. However, success off the court does not necessarily have to forgo success on the court. Teams like Stanford, Duke, and Notre Dame have shown that you can get good players and still keep your academics up. USC needs a coach that can bring in smart AND good, hard-working players. I'm not sure what Kevin O'Neill is bringing in.

Again, I haven't seen much talk about O'Neill going out the door like I have heard about Howland so it might be a longshot to see Kevin going out the door mid-season. Time will tell how much longer AD Pat Haden can tolerate this underacheiving men's hoops program before changes are made.

In the meantime, I'm prepared for more "scressful" hoops as USC approaches their conference schedule.

Celtics vs. Bulls: LIVE From The United Center

On Tuesday, I was able to see the Bulls play the Celtics. I was excited about the opportunity because of my love for the NBA and the sheer awesomeness of seeing it live. I was originally concerned about the Bulls' chances on this night as they had lost the previous night in Memphis. But I would soon see that the Bulls would do just fine at dispatching the struggling Celtics

I got to the arena right at tip-off. Upon taking my seats in the 300 level, I realized that I had forgotten how big the United Center. While I knew that the UC seats over 21,000 people, and I had been to a few Bulls games and several other events before, it was still a shock to see just how spacious the building was. Even after 18 years, the United Center is still one of the best arenas in the country.

I had come into the game worrying about how the Bulls would do against the Celtics. The Bulls just played the night before on the road and lost. That 80-71 decision against the Memphis Grizzlies was the lowest point total for Chicago in about six years. There was also the fact that the Bulls had lost to the Celtics at the UC earlier in the season. I figured it was going to be all bad.

However, I had not taken into account that the Celtics had lost the first two games of their three game road trip by an average decision of 102-89. The Celtics as a whole have been struggling so far this season, and I had the privilege to witness those struggles in realtime. Any fears I had of the Bulls losing went away when Chicago went on a modest run in the middle of the second quarter.

Coming into the game, all of the previews I came across (on NBA.com and on ESPN Radio 1000) highlighted the fact that the Bulls needed to stop Rondo. The Bulls did not do that, as he went on to lead all scorers with 26 points and 8 assists. However, he was one of the few bright spots for Boston. I noticed that Rondo would occasionally break out a behind-the-back pass, even when it didn't seem necessary. I guess he just did it because he could. Hey, why not?

The Bulls did quite a few things right to get this win: 1) the beat Boston in the post and 2) they were effective on offense. In terms of 1), Boston was out-rebounded 43-35, and out-rebounded defensively 31-24. The Bulls also out-blocked the Celtics 10-2. In terms of 2), six players were in double-figures for Chicago, including 21 for both Carlos Boozer and Luol Deng. Boozer had a double-double (21/10) and Joakim Noah had a triple-double (11/13/10). I didn't realize Noah had a triple-double until midway through the 4th quarter when he went to the bench for a little bit. I had only been noticing his negative aspects throughout the game; is issues with footwork at times, stagnating the offense when he would just stand there when he got the ball, and his three turnovers. However, when I saw he had a triple-double, his better moments began popping up in my mind. He was definitely a huge part of the team effort that lead to this Bulls win.

Another key part to the win was Nate Robinson, who came off the bench and scored 18 points. The way he was playing, however, I figured he had scored 50 before I saw the final box score. He made all five of the Bulls' threes and attempted all but two of their nine threes. He was all over the place out on the court and he was not afraid to shoot the basketball. That's exactly what the Bulls got him for.

The crowd was cool. For the most part, it was more subdued than I expected, but there were plenty of moments where people were excited and up on their feet. The loudest I heard everyone was during a timeout late in the game when they had the Donut Race. This is when they would have three different virtual Dunkin Donuts products race on the UC scoreboard and the product that won would earn a free prize for any fans that had them on a ticket that was handed to them at the front gate. Of course, there was free stuff on the line. Of course people got excited.

And speaking of free stuff, everyone in the arena earned free Big Macs because the Bulls reached 100 points.

Needless to say, I had a great time at the game, and the win made it even sweeter. I hope to get out to another game sooner rather than later, and hopefully the Bulls can keep up the winning momentum as they continue Life Without Derrick.

Chicago State to the WAC is a Good Thing. Will It Last?

Ever heard of Chicago State University?

For Chicagoans, it may be that school over on 95th & King Drive that a friend or family member goes/went to.

For long-time Summit League fans, this is the school your conference kicked out in 2006. At that time, the athletic department was a compliance nightmare, the president was allegedly spending the school's money for herself, and the graduation rate was abysmal.

Some fans of bigger schools may even remember this school as the one your men's or women's basketball team beat by 40 a couple of November's or December's ago.

For the rest of the country, though, you probably haven't. To most, the name may sound like a generic university from a television sitcom or one of those online colleges that are advertised during the day.

But on Wednesday, December 5th, the Chicago State Cougars may have found themselves inching ever closer to relevance in the college sports scene when they accepted an all-sports invitation into the Western Athletic Conference.

For Chicago State University, this is a big moment in the school's athletic history. It is a huge step in the school's quest to rise from its mid-2000s depths. The charge is lead by new AD Dan Schumacher, who arrived at Chicago State in July after six years at Lewis University in nearby Romeoville. According to a Sun Times profile from around the time of his hiring, the first thing he did at CSU was buy the school a ticket machine. From there, his department has moved forward with the addition of men's and women's soccer teams, a small TV deal with Lakeshore Public TV, the construction of a new baseball and soccer stadium, and, of course, a deal to be added to the Western Athletic Conference.

Inclusion in the WAC will give Cougar athletes a chance to get into an NCAA Tournament, something they haven't had for seven seasons. The idea of simply having a shot at the Tournament should do wonders for recruiting.

It also makes the five year-old, 7,000-seat Jones Convocation Center seem less like wasteful spending.

For the WAC, this move keeps the lights on for now. The conference has come a long way from when they started with six schools in 1962. Things went south in 1996 when the 10-team conference added 6 teams. Half of the conference found the arrangement untenable and left the WAC to start their own conference (the Mountain West) in 1999. Since then, it's been a carousel of schools, most coming and eventually leaving for either the Mountain West or Conference USA. Even four of the five schools they added for the 2012-13 season to cover the losses of other schools are bolting for new conferences. Most of the defections were from schools that have football teams, so the WAC will no longer be sponsoring that sport with only two football schools slated to be left by 2013-14.

So what is a once-proud and stable conference on the verge of collapse to do? Well, you select schools the same way George Clooney and Brad Pitt assembled heist team members in the Ocean's movie series. The WAC has something to offer (an automatic qualifier spot in the Tournament), the schools have something to offer (the desire to be members, thus keeping the conference alive), and both have the same goal in mind: competitive athletics and relevance.

What outsiders see as a conference of misfit toys may have more potential than most think. For 2014-15, the season after current member Idaho leaves for the Big Sky Conference, the WAC alignment will consist of holdovers New Mexico State and Seattle as well as the new additions of Utah Valley, Grand Canyon, Cal State Bakersfield, Texas-Pan American, and Chicago State. That's a strong basketball school in New Mexico State, access to the Seattle, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, and Chicago markets, and possible pipelines into Los Angeles, Houston, and San Antonio. If these schools can stay together and develop their athletic programs, this conference could become a viable mid-major conference.

But even though the WAC rebuilt their house, that house is still made of cards. NMSU is still looking to defect from the WAC, as they are looking for an FBS home for their godawful football team. Seattle - a private, West Coast school that doesn't have a football team - has been looking to get into the West Coast Conference - a conference full of private, West Coast schools that (with the exception of Brigham Young) don't have football teams - ever since they returned to Division I in 2009 after a 29-year absence. Then there's the matter of who else the WAC will add. Where will the next school come from? Division I? Division II? Thin air? The WAC carousel continues to spin.

For now, though, Chicago State's inclusion in the Western Athletic Conference, a conference with a long pedigree of successful schools that will now be including other up-and-coming athletic programs, is a historic and exciting moment for the Cougars. It will be interesting to see what happens next as Chicago State looks to become a major player in mid-major athletics.

My First WNBA Game

I love basketball. I. Love. Basketball. All forms of it: Pro, College, Men's, Women's. I love it all. So what is a boy to do when it's summertime in the Windy City? Go catch a Chicago Sky WNBA game. However, due to being busy at some times and broke at others, I was never able to make the trek up to Rosemont (or to the UIC Pavilion when they played there).

Well, all of that changed yesterday.

Someone from my church happened to have a bunch of free Sky tickets left over for Friday night's game against Connecticut, so I figured I'd pick up two; one for my mother and one for myself.

Instead, the guy just gave me the remaining six he had.

So I start cold-calling friends to see if they are interested in coming to the game, but everyone I talked to was busy, and I didn't get any interested parties when I solicited the four free tickets on my personal Twitter.

Welp, looks like it's just a party of two.

So we head up to Rosemont, taking the Tri-State Tollway since going the Dan Ryan/Kennedy was a no-go (According to Google Maps, it would've taken two hours to get from my house to the Allstate Arena going that way). It only took a little under an hour going this way, only because there was some congestion around Roosevelt because of gapers looking at a car that rear-ended another in the right lane.

We get to the arena just in time for the opening tip. More specifically, they were just getting done honoring Sylvia Fowles and Swin Cash as they prepare to join the US Olympic Team. This is my first time actually being inside of Allstate Arena. I've only seen it through DePaul and Rush and Sky games I see on TV. On TV, it doesn't look all that impressive. But in person, the place looks kind of cool. I always get giddy when I go to major sports arena. Between the live atmosphere, the numerous banners in the rafters (Wolves, DePaul, and Rush banners. There were even banners up in the rafters for the 16 teams in the Big East), the low, wooden (?) ceiling, and the sheer size of this 17,500 building, I really found Allstate Arena to be a cool place.

So after the Olympic presentation, they meet at center court and tip-off

The Sky get off to a hot start, opening the game on a 13-2 run, including a 9-0 start. This can be credited to Ruth Riley essentially being all over the place as well as the hot shooting of Tamera Young.

However, as I almost expected, Connecticut found their way back into it, mostly on the back of Tina Charles. The Sky may have gotten off to a hot start, but I was seeing too many errant passes and a couple airballs to have me believe the lead would stick. So, after one quarter, the Sky were only up 15-13.

The second quarter was the quarter that made me hate Courtney Vandersloot. From my view in Section 105, I got a Russell Westbrook kind of vibe from her: looking to score first, which can be a good thing and a bad thing. It seemed to be a bad thing, because the offense looked stagnant, and she was just chucking up a shot whenever she thought she had it. However, when I checked my Center Court app to see how much harm she was inflicting on the team's offense, I saw that she was 5-9 at the moment, and looking at the play-by-play as I write this I see she was 4-8 in the second quarter, so she really wasn't all that bad.

Allstate Arena's neat center scoreboard. I wonder when they got this.

Plus, by the half, the Sky were still up, 35-26. As bad as she looked to me, Vandersloot had led the way for Chicago, and the Sun shooters were ice cold. Tina Charles had 13 for Connecticut, but everyone else was 5-26.

In the third quarter, Connecticut came out of the locker room, full steam ahead, as they pulled to within three with 5:46 left (41-38). However, the Sky finished the quarter on a 12-2 run to make it 53-40.

Then came the fourth quarter. Renee Montgomery got hot for Connecticut (10 points in the quarter), with help from Mistie Mims (9). With 1:56 left, the Sun managed to get within two; 66-64.

In the two-minute drill, the Sky couldn't take advantage of opportunities. After a Tamera Young miss with 1:35 left, Connecticut had the ball. Kara Lawson misses a jumper, and a scramble between Vandersloot and Danielle McCray leads to a jump ball. There was a size disadvantage (McCray had three inches on her), but the Sky still had a chance to corral the tip. However, all that was moot when Sonja Petrovic was called for a violation on the tip, and the Sun got the ball automatically. Ugh.

Okay, so all's not lost, the Sky just have to make a defensive stand, which they had done numerous times throughout the game. And they did, as they forced Montgomery to turn the ball over. There seemed to be hope that the Sky could hold off the big, bad Connecticut Sun. Until Mistie Mims stole the ball from Fowles with 45 seconds left.

So now, the Sun have another chance to tie or take the lead. But the Sky are playing tough D once again. So much so, that they are able to run the shot clock down to two seconds. Kara Lawson had the ball at this moment, and had no choice but to throw up a shot. Fortunately, the shot was off. Unfortunately, Vandersloot bailed her out with a foul. Grrrrr. Lawson makes both free throws, so with 24.5 seconds left the game is tied at 66.

Okay, I figure, the Sky can just hold the ball and get a shot off near the final buzzer. And that seems to be there plan. They get the clock all the way down to 2.9 when Vandersloot makes a bad pass that ends up in the hands of Allison Hightower. Doom looks certain, and Hightower charges downcourt for what seems to be the game-winning lay-up. However, there just enough time left that Allison couldn't make it all the way to the basket, and instead was forced to throw up a floater, which she misses.

So after the Sky found themselves up by as much as 13, and had lead the entire game, it was overtime in Rosemont.

An announced crowd of 5,988. Pretty good turnout IMO

Overtime was pretty close. Allison Hightower hit a lay-up to make it 79-78, Sun, with 8.9 left. Coming out of a timeout, Chicago had time to set up a play and take the lead back. However, Sonja Petrovic traveled, and Connecticut got the ball with 5.2 left. Kara Lawson hit 1 of her 2 free throws, making it 80-78. The Sky had one last chance to tie or win, by Shay Murphy missed a three at the buzzer.

Welp, the Sky lose.

Coming out of the game, I was sort of miffed at the loss, but all-in-all, I had fun. The crowd was loud, the music was loud (almost to a fault. One, sometimes the music was so loud that coming out of timeouts I couldn't here the whistle from on court and, two, the music just wouldn't stop. There were only select moments where they was sileence). It was a vibrant atmosphere, with is great for a league like the WNBA that is looking to attract more fans.

On the way I saw a poster congratulating Swin Cash and Sylvia Fowles on being on the Olympic Team and wishing them luck...

...and as I was heading to the car in the parking lot, I decided to take a picture of the illuminated arena logo sign...

...as soon as I took the picture, a low-flying plane swooped overhead as it was set to land at nearby O'Hare. Scared the dear life out of me. Whose bright idea was it to build a sports arena near an airport anyways?

But at the end of the day, I was glad I had a chance to take in a WNBA game. I hope to catch another one in the near future. Maybe after the Olympic break, maybe next year, who knows? I would also love to check out other area sports teams like the White Sox or Cubs. It may be summer, but there's still a lot of sports in my backyard.

The Miami Heat Won Because the Refs Cheated

On the night of June 21st, the Miami Heat were crowned the 2012 NBA World Champions after defeating the Oklahoma City Thunder 4 games to 1. For the next day or so, talking heads will give out all sorts of reason and analysis as to why the series turned out the way it did. But when it comes down to it, none of that matters because we all know the real reason why the Heat came out on top.

It's because the referees and the league screwed over Oklahoma City and gave Miami all the breaks in a sort of Yellow Brick Road to their second championship in franchise history.

Of course.

No, it isn't because the Miami Heat just happened to be the superior team in this series. No, that would be absurd. It wasn't because of LeBron James leading what became his team by being consistently dominant throughout the playoffs. It's not because a man that plays like Magic but is built like Malone took charge and put up performances that associate him with the greats.

LeBron? The guy that is only the 8th player in NBA history (Like, the whole history. All 66 years of it.) to have 3 or more Regular Season MVPs and now a championship? LeBron? The guy that came through each time his team fell behind in a series? The one that racked up 40, 18, and 9 when they trailed the Pacers 1-2?  The one that put up 45, 15, and 5 when they trailed the Celtics 2-3 (a performance only bested by Wilt Chamberlain only 47 years ago)? The one that lead the charge when his team started the Finals 0-1, finishing the series with a triple-double in the clincher (a feat only done by Duncan, Bird, Worthy, and Magic twice)? Nah, it's not him.

It's not because the Heat made the necessary adjustments throughout the series, such as starting Bosh, or putting LeBron on Durant, or having Battier bother OKC's big man. Naw, it wasn't that. It wasn't because Oklahoma City didn't seem to make the right adjustments in the series. Not because they didn't utilize their interior presence of Perkins and Ibaka to impose their will, and ended up getting swallowed up by a small lineup. It's not because Durant found himself in foul trouble in multiple games during the playoffs.

It's not because Miami's role players came through in the series to aid a Big Three that was at the top of its game throughout. What would make you think contributions from guys like Chalmers (12 in Game 1, 25 in Game 4, 10 in Game 5) , Battier (17 each in Games 1 & 2, 11 in Game 5), and Mike Miller (23 in Game 5) would have any bearing on the outcome of the series? To think that Oklahoma City lacking a third scoring option in three of their four Finals losses (Harden struggling in Game 3 & 4, Westbrook in Game 5) would be one of the possible reasons for the series' outcome is so outrageous.

It's not because the Heat came into the series with memories of last year deep in there mind. Not because they took those mistakes from last year and applied them to how they carried themselves this time around. Naw.

Not because Oklahoma City, while being a young and athletic squad, faced this motivated buzzsaw and found themselves slightly in over their heads. It wasn't because this incredibly young team making their first appearance on this stage simply fell into a long line of young franchises that had their parades rained on due to a lack of a veteran or veterans that could contribute greatly to the cause. The Thunder had Derek Fisher off the bench and Kendrick Perkins starting while most teams in recent history that won in their first trip to the Finals had more dominant vets than that, like the '94 Rockets with Hakeem, the '99 Spurs with David Robinson, the 2000 Lakers with Shaq and Ron Harper, the 2004 Pistons with four of their five starters, the 2006 Heat with Shaq (again) and Alonzo and Antoine and Payton, and the 2008 Celtics with Pierce, Garnett, and Allen. But still, that can't be a reason behind their loss.

No, the Heat won the NBA Finals because the National Basketball Association and the referees they hired  played the part of puppeteers from headquarters in New York City and from their three positions on the court, respectively.

It's clearly because the referees were screwing over, not screwing up. What do you mean refereeing is a difficult job? What do you mean it's humans making subjective calls based off of what they see in the heat of the moment from a vantage point on the court that is not always ideal? Naw, screw that. Those refs are getting paid. They love LeBron and the Heatles so much that they decided to give them all the calls. All of them. All. Of. Them. Any mistake made by the ref was the result of compensation, not because they just did a bad job.

Everyone in the league office is getting paid. Duh. Clearly the league is rigging games in favor of one team for reasons that are unclear. They denied LeBron a championship on two occaisions, but this time they decided to give him one because ????. Can't you see? The league picks the winners every year. One owner is pre-determined to win it all, while the other 29 owners sit back, say nothing, and watch all the money that most of the teams aren't making roll in.

It's all a conspiracy, and it unfolded right before your eyes.

If it isn't clear by now, I make all of the above statements with the utmost sarcasm. Personally, I feel that things turned out the way it did because one great team beat out another great team in a short, but entertaining, series. There are numerous reasons at play as to why the series turned out the way it did, including many I didn't even mention. I strongly, strongly, believe that cheating is not one of them. Assuming this championship is tainted or that there is foulplay involved in the series' outcome is, in my opinion, disrespectful to the hard work that these teams and their players and staff put in on a daily basis. Trying to peg the outcome of these finals or any other games on refereeing or league involvement is akin to losing a video game that you aren't good at and saying the computer is cheating. It's trying to find a go-to reason for something that is complex and essentially random in nature.

My point is not to make LeBron critics like him or the Heat. It's okay to want them to lose. Even for me, as a Bulls fan, I'm hoping for their downfall every time Miami and Chicago face off. However, I reached my boiling point about all the LeBron hate because people were so busy talking out of the side of their neck just to disparage anything that he or his team had done. All I want is perspective. If one wants to criticize LeBron, or anyone else for that matter, at least have facts to back it up.

That's all.

Lastly, instead of trying to find conspiracies where there aren't, why not just enjoy the game for what it is? We are in the midst of a new era of exciting basketball. To think that what you see from the stands or on your TV screen is not organic is only doing a disservice to yourself.

Welcome Mat

Hello and welcome to the Coliseum Sports Network!

I'm Raymond Simms and I have been blogging about a myriad of sports topics on an on-and-off basis for the past four years. I have started blogs about broadcasters, sports fiction, and general sports talk. However, I found myself neglecting those blogs for various reasons (read: laziness). The Coliseum Sports Network is another foray for me into the sports blogosphere, but this time it comes with a deeper commitment to consistency and insight as well as an ambitious media outreach plan.

The reason I'm calling this the Coliseum Sports Network as opposed to just Coliseum Sports Blog is because this project will go beyond just this webpage. There are also accompanying Twitter, YouTube, and E-mail accounts. I will also be holding a periodic sports talk broadcast over on Blog Talk Radio. All of those links will are accessible through the Navbar.

In the coming weeks I will be experimenting with when and what I post here and what I present on my other accounts. Bear with me during this period and hopefully I will find a consistent posting pattern that is beneficial for everyone.

I appreciate everyone's support through my past ventures, and I appreciate your support as I work to develop the Coliseum Sports Network into one of the top forces in the sports blogosphere! I'm very excited and committed to make this a great site.

Thanks for reading, and most importantly, enjoy!