Basketball and everything in between

So in all honesty, things are not looking to good for the Cairns Taipans.  There doesn’t seem to be another ‘White Knight’ on the scene and things are not looking to good for the Taipans.  It doesn’t seem as if they will be a part of the new league and the look out for the Taipans is pretty bleak. 

So where to for the Taipans players and staff?  Will any NBL teams want to pick up the players or will they be left doing a ‘Neil Mottram’ and find themselves good enough to play in the league but not have a job. 

Here is my opinion on if each player should get another gig in the ‘New NBL’ and a possible home for them:

Stephen Black: obviously the guy is a class player but has a huge history of having the worst back in the NBL and is very injury prone.  From all reports, the guy is extremely professional and works his arse off to keep himself on the court (his ice baths are things of legend!)  There has been some news that he is exploring Europe as a possible destination for his futre.  Should he have a gig on a NBL roster?  Hell yes!  I think that a team like Sydney (in its current form) and Wollongong (if they are in the league) would be a perfect home for him.  I would also mention the Gold Coast, but I honestly don’t think that Brendan Joyce would recruit him as he would take away time from Daniel!.

Aaron Grabu: this is an interesting one.  The guy is a rock!  He is a foundation player for the Taipans and is very solid at the defensive end.  Aaron’s career has improved in the past couple of seasons and he is in career best form.  But he isn’t a super scorer and he is not the greatest outside shooter.  Should he have a gig on a NBL roster?  I am going to say no.  I think that he is on the wrong side of 29 and doesn’t offer NBL programs more than what they already have.

Darnell Mee: another one that is interesting.  He (along with Cattalini) spent a great deal of the last season on the injured list.  He is long, a veteran and a pretty clutch player.  Should he have a gig on a NBL roster?  I am going to say yes.  He would fit in on veteran roster such as the Blaze or even an in between roster like the Wildcats.  He is versatile and can defend.  It is a huge punt but if you offered the guy a one year deal, I think that it is well worth the risk.

Scott Cook: is one of the few true PG’s in the league.  He has been extremely solid throughout this season and his game seems to be on the improve.  Cook has started some games thoughout this season and played some decent basketball.  Should he have a place in the new NBL?  I say yes.  I think that he would help the NZ Breakers as a solid back up to CJ Bruton and an upgrade on what they have there already.

Martin Cattalini: as I previously discussed in my blog entry, Martin has expressed interest in finishing his career in Perth.  He seems to be playing some solid basketball after an extremely injury prone season last year.  Should he have a place in the new NBL?  I say that if the Wildcats want to roll the dice and give him a shot, it would be awesome but it would be at the expense of a young guy.

Ian Crosswhite: my mate Grandmaster Funk from the TO fame (which we will be reviving very very soon!  Watch out for that!) absolutely pasted this guy earlier in the year.  Since his pasting, it seems as if he has pulled his finger out and found some form and even won player of the week award.  Should he have a gig on a new NBL roster?  I am going to say yes but with conditions.  He would need to play for a coach who could drive him (e.g Brian Gorijian) and get the best out of him.  He would fit in well at the Dragons and the Hawks (but I don’t think that Cooks would be a good match for him)

Garry Boodinkoff: is an outstanding player on the offensive end but apparently can’t defend at all.  He came into the league with much fanfare and had an extremely solid rookie season.  But in my opinion, it has been downhill ever since then.  Should he have a place in the new NBL?  Yes he should in a backup capacity.  He would fit in well at the Gold Coast and be able to add support to their program.

Matt Smith: in one word – no.  I don’t see Matt Smith hooking onto any NBL program.

Dwayne Vale: is another one word answer – no.  He had a solid season last year but this year has not produced the good at all.  He is not overly young and doesn’t bring things to the table that other guys on other rosters don’t.

Kerry Williams – is a local hero in Cairns.  He got a bit of notoriety earlier in the season and Andrew Gaze was mentioning him in the same breath as Patrick Mills.  Williams can not shoot the ball from the perimeter but is quick and slippery.  Should he have a place on a NBL roster?  I say no but that is just my personal opinion.

In regards to imports Larry Abney and Dave Thomas: Obviously Thomas has returned to the Tigers and will problary stick there.  I cant believe that more teams did not pull the trigger on Abney.  I would have hoped that if the Blaze were still in the playoff hunt, they would have cut Whitehad quickly and picked up this superstar.  I personally feel that he is better than Ellis and would fit in well at the Crocs.  He would also be a nice addition for the Hawks (when Rychardt is an Aussie) and would have been a nice pick up for the Spirit but they have no money!

So there you go.  I think that the new NBL is going to leave a lot of guys without gigs especially if the whole points thing is kept.  Guys like Boodinkoff and Crosswhite could find themselves ‘out pointed’ if the new league keeps the points in tact.  I am still hoping that there is hope for the Taipans roster to stay in Cairns but if I was a betting man, I would bet most of my life savings (and Larry Abney’s non salary cap money!) on there not being a team in Cairns next year.

So the other day I was doing my usual scroll through various basketball websites and I stumbled upon this article. The basic theme of the article was the Cattalini wants to finish his career up in Perth next year and would love to be in Wildcats colours.  It is all well and good that he is feeling a bit homesick and would love to go home but the question has to be asked – Would the Wildcats want him?

Perth’s biggest strength over the past decade has been its front court strength.  Once again this year they have a wonderful 3,4 and 5 men with Redhage, Victor, Knight, Loughton and Rogers manning the fort.  Would the Cat fit into that mix?   The biggest strength of Cattallini’s game thoughout his NBL career has been taking advantage of mismatches.  If you put a small 3 on him, he posts you up on the block and uses his size.  If you put a 4 on him, he creates a mismatch by taking them to the perimeter and using his speed and athleticism to his advantage.

So if I was the owner of the Perth Wildcats for the 2009 - 10 season, would I pick him up? My answer would be yes.  I feel that he still has a lot to offer and if he is willing to take a reduced role, you would be crazy not to pick him up.  Yes he is in the twighlight of his career but he was pretty much out for all of last season and that should add another year onto his career.  He seems to still get the job done and I have noticed that he is playing with a lot of spunk this year.  Some people might say that he is taking away a job from a young guy.  That is true but until the young guy can outplay the veteran, the young guy should still miss out. 

If they added the Cat to the roster for next season and kept their exsisiting front court, I would confidently state that it would be the greatest front court ever assembled on paper in the history of the NBL.  Maybe he could help Connor Henry prepare for how to face a zone defense.  I could not believe it when he said that he did not prepare his team to play against a zone in preperation for the Taipans game.  Hello Connor!  The Taipans are undermanned and understrength.  What did you think?  Were they going to come out and press full court?

Anyway enough of my ramble.  I will be back at work in a couple of weeks and the blogs will be back with avengance. 

So last Sunday I travelled down to the Gold Coast with my father to watch the Gold Coast Blaze do battle with the Townsvillie Crocs.  My dad does stats for the Blaze so I was able to acquire a free crappy ticket five rows from the back.  It was my first trip to the Gold Coast Convention Centre.  As my dad was to cheap to pay for parking, we parked in the casino and walked across some bridge.  The stadium is great and new.  I snuck down onto the stats bench and from there parked myself in a corporate box with everybody’s favourite ex NBL team manager Big Joe.

So onto the game – I must say that I was extremely disappointed in the way that the Blaze went about their business.  They looked unimaginative on offense and couldn’t stop anybody.  Russell Hinder was a monster on the defenisve end and everybodys favourite blogger JR hit some sweet shots.  The Blaze had no answer to Corey Williams penertation and the guy who I was pleased with the most was Cameron Toovey.  In real life he is actually quite huge and was pretty bloody awesome at both ends of the floor.  For the Blaze there wasn’t a whole lot of positives to talk about.  James Harvey hit some big shots in the 4th but was pretty quiet for the remainder of the game.  The Crocs had it in the bag pretty early.  I actually think that they missed some easy opportunities that their flex offense created for them.  The final margin could have been even greater.  Another good thing to see was the coaching tactics of the Crocs.  Every time the Blaze even seemed to be getting a sniff, they called a time out and re grouped.  It was a well orchastrated win. 

Due to the fact that my father is a poor driver, we arrived later than expected.  I was hoping to catch up with JR and introduce myself before the game.  They had already entered the 15 minute pre game phase of their warm up and I thought that it wasn’t a good idea to do that.  JR then went to the bench to get a ball and I snuck across and introduced myself.  He knew who I was and he went about his pre game ritual.  I almost did the same thing with my boy Russell Hinder but I didn’t get a chance.  After the game I saw JR talking to some fans and I went up.  He told me to wait a minute and then we could have a chat.  Boy did we chat.  We talked for 45 minutes on a variety of topics.  He is an awesome bloke and the Crocs fans are lucky to have such an ambassdor.  The thing that came across strongly in our discussion is he genuinely loves basketball. 

Overall the Blaze put on a good game day produciton.  My mail tells me that bowl tickets cost around $50 per ticket!  That is super expensive.  I am not a huge fan of either of the Blaze imports, particualary Whitehead.  I can understand last season when they got him mid season and their were no other options around.  I would like to think that if they were in playoff contention that they would have given him the boot and picked up Larry Abney.  They might have had to offer Abney a lot of under the table money, but he is a huge upgrade on either of those two guys. 

So that is that.  I am currently at a public library stealing somebody elses internet connection so I better run.  I really am enjoying the fact that I am now living in civilization.  It is lots of fun.

Hey guys.  As avid readers of Basketball and Everything in Between, you will know that I have been without net access over the last week.  I honestly have not been following much NBL over the past couple of weeks but will try and write an insightful post for you all to read!

- I am currently listening to The OT with JR and DJ Rod.  It is the episode where Larry Abney apparently unloads.  I havent heard it all yet but I am looking forward to it. 

- Once again I pose the question about the Fox Sports TV deal.  What is going on?  Is there any news yet?

- Appartenly Luke Kendall is going to be a Tiger.  I think that this is an awesome move.  I think that this is a positive move for the Tigers and also a positve move for Luke himself.  I feel that he will fit in with that team like a glove. 

- How much longer will the league take to annouce what is going on next year in regards to teams etc?  I think that it is only fair on the guys who are going to be without a program (e.g. Cairns and Wollongong) and give them a chance to negotiate with other franchises.  It is only fair to guys who are trying to earn a living. 

Well that is about it.  I am sitting in Chermside shopping centre and I just added another $1 credit to my public access internet point.  I will try and write again very very soon. 

Hey!  I know that I said that I would be off line for a while but our moving date got changed.  The movers are packing today and my wife and her friends are cleaning, so I thought that I would take some time to talk some smack about the greatest game in the world. 

- Andrew Bogut was on ABC grandstand this weekend.  It was awesome to see that he is willing to fly the flag for the NBL even when he is overseas.  He is even sponsoring the official NBL podcast.  Maybe the NBL could take a page out of his book in regards to promotion etc.

- The Singapore Slingers are taking on the Darwin All Stars tomorrow.  I think that they should kill the All Stars.

- I think that it is absolutley disgusting that Alan Black has been sacked.  This quote really annoys me:

“It has been determined by the administrators that it is not financially viable to offer Alan Black, as head coach, a contract of employment during the administration of the company,” a release from the administrators said.

My point is this: when they got rid of Abney and Thomas, why didn’t they give him the push then?  I am not a huge of the Taipans but their fans still deserve better.  Then to top it off, Dwayne Vale gets caught drink driving!  Can anything else go wrong?

- The Dilema of ‘Derwinism’ is an aweomse blog post  This guy should write for the NBL site.

- Any word on who is going to replace Cortez Groves?  The mail has to be on Dave Thomas.  It would be interesting to see.  I wouldn’t be suprised to see Luke Kendall come across if he is not offered a contract extension by the Wildcats.

- Once again I am mezmorized by the voting in the NBL player and coach of the month.  I congratulate Kirk Penney Andrej Lemanis on their award but I have to question some of the players receiving votes.  How in the hell can Kelvin Robertson and the deserter Julian Khazzouh receive votes?  This is stupid people.  It is very very stupid.

- For the 3rd time I ask the following question: What in the hell is going on with the Fox Sports $35 million deal?

- Oh My God – The NZ Breakers have announced a new huge sponsorship deal.  Thank christ for some positive news!

- Andrew Bogut has done a good interview with Aleks Maric.  Pretty good stuff

- With the likely demise of Cairns next season, which guys from their team will have jobs next year?  I think that Cook, Crosswhite and Boodinkoff should hook on somewhere but would a NBL team take a risk with veterans Martin Cattalini and Darnell Mee?  Darnell seems very injury prone but Cattallini has seemed to bounce back from a injury plagued season last year. 

- John Rillie always provides us with a comprehensive review of Australian basketballers around the world.  Thanks JR for your awesome blog!

Well that will do me people.  I will hopefully be blogging again sooner rather than latter!

Well it is time for another edition of Silly Sollies.  This may (and I emphasise the word may!!) be my last blog entry for a while.  My wife, child and I are moving from our home of four years St George in western Queensland.  We are returning to civilization in Brisbane.  We are both primary school teachers and have been transferred to awesome schools on the north side of Brisbane.  The truck comes on Monday and we unpack on Tuesday at our home in Brisbane.  My mother in law has been renting our house off us for the past four years.  We have had the inside painted, the outside painted, put up a new fence and ripped up the carpet and laid floor boards.  It should be like a brand new home.  By the way, that isn’t my house.  Anyway on with the Sollies!

- If you have been away from the NBL scence this week, you wouldn’t have known that the Cairns Taipans have been placed into adminstration.  I wrote earlier about this in the week.  Everybodys favourite NBL journalist Boti Nagy has wrote a piece entitled Taipans woes have NBL reeling.  Boti basically agrees with my ideology that the Taipans decided that they weren’t going to be part of the league next year and obviously decided to cut their losses mid season.  It would have been interesting to see if they would have cut their losses if they were 12-6 rather than 6-12!   I feel very sorry for Dave Thomas and Larry Abney.  I honestly think that the Dragons may attempt to pick up Thomas.  I think that he would be a perfect pick up for them.  He would be able to play a role for their team and not be asked to be a superstar.  Abney on the other hand would be extremely handy for the NZ Breakers.  I understand it is problary a big ‘we don’t have enough points’ thing but how awesome would it be for Breakers fans to have an explosive Larry Abney in their lineup? 

- Another almost extinct NBL team (Sydney Spirit) have established a fighting fund to keep them afloat.  It is awesome that Andrew Bogut has chipped in some of his own money to help out the Spirit.  If the spirit could just get some other large corporations or famous people to chuck in $30 000 each, they would be laughing.  Every NBL fan (myself included) should try and donate $20.   

- Michael Scibilia has wrote a piece titled Plagrise at your peril I was wondering when I saw the heading what the piece was all about.  It is actually about how the NBL is plagerising the model set out by the A League.  It is an interesting read and provides heaps of statistics in regards to ratings etc.  Well worth the time to disect and think about.

- It was awesome that Boti Nagy took 35 minutes of his Monday afternoon to be the first ever guest on this weeks episode of The TO.  Boti spoke about the old days in the NBL and about his favourite players and villians throughout the history of the NBL.  He also spoke about a flamboynt coach by the name of Ken Cole.  If you haven’t already downloaded it, you really should.  It is a great listen and well worth the investment in time.  He is very passionate about the league and basketball in general. 

- I once again pose the question about the $35 million deal from Fox Sports.  What the hell is going on with this?  Are they negotiating with the new Channel 10 Sports channel?

- Justin Bowen has won the NBL player of the week award and he is a deserving winner.  I haven’t had the chance to actually watch any of this guy live on the TV but he seems like he has a pretty solid all round game.  By looking at his numbers, he seems like a poor mans Julius Hodge.  Is that a fair comparison?

- I used to enjoy the Sydney Spirits website where they had a feature called Spirit Talking.  I guess that feature has gone and they have more important things on their minds (e.g keeping their franchise on the floor)

- The Adelaide 36ers gave the Crocs a hammering on Wednesday night. I haven’t had a chance to watch the game as of yet.  I have it taped and will watch it soon.  In the highlight package it looks as if the 36ers just did what they wanted to against the Crocs.  Julius Hodge seems to get the crowd very excited.    JR talked about the changes in the Crocs attitude and the crisis type meeting that was held.  Whilst I don’t think that they need to hit the panic button again, it must be concerning to all Crocs fans at the fashion in which they got smakced.  I look forward to hearing JR’s analysis of the game on the next episode of The OT

- My boy Stephon Marbury was apparently a victim of a prank call with the subject being a huge contract with Real Madrid This is pretty funny stuff but apparently he didn’t take it to well.  He is not a happy camper and is considering taking legal action against the people who made the call.  If you ask me, it is bloody hilarious.  Whoever was doing the hoax was pretty prepared.  They even talked to the actual Knicks front office staff.   

- So obviously my post on Carrie Graf and the possibility of her coaching in the NBL has inspired Basketball Australia to appoint her as the new Opals coach through to 2012.  Now in all seriousness, I think that this is an awesome appointment.  Our womens team is the real deal people and we should be getting behind them more.  Lauren Jackson and co should still be around for a substancial amount of time and having one of the best players of all time on your roster shouldn’t hinder your medal chances.

- Darko Milicic is one of the most intense guys in the NBA.  I remember a physco YouTube clip where he threatened to kill the baby of the referee or something like that.  Check out his latest Incredible Hulk rip off.  The guy clarly has a screw loose.  At least they are going to auction his singlet and the proceeds will go to a good cause.   I stumbled across the official NBA auction site.  If you are inclinded to get NBA memorabillia, this would be the site for you to visit. 

- Here is a random fact – I am a huge (and I mean huge) Harry Potter fan.  It is pretty sad that a 32 year old man is obsessed with Harry Potter and has read each book in the serious at least 6 times!  But it seems that I am not alone in my obsession.  The best muggle basketball player on the planet Kobe Bryant is also a huge fan and that is awesome in my opinion.  During the NBA finals last year, this is what he had to say:

Kobe Bryant found a magical way to get away from the Game 4 hangover and those old Celtics demons when the Lakers were given Friday off from practice. And he had an assist from his daughters.
“Like five chapters of Harry Potter,” Bryant said. “They just wanted me to read to them, and I swear, it was awesome. (Harry) had more problems dealing with Voldemort than what we have dealing with the media and the Celtics. So that was pretty awesome.”

So this is awesome in my opinion.  I was actually going to write a blog entry comparing Harry Potter characters to those in the NBL.  I still may but I will leave it for the holidays. 

- YouTube really is a great thing!  I was once again just trolling it for random videos and stumbled upon a video entitled Top 10 High School Dunks of All Time.  The first one is awesome where the backboard shatters.  There is nothing like a good backboard shattering!  Oh hang on – it isn’t even in the top 10.  I am watching this as I am posting.  10: Pretty good windmill off the backboard from a teammate.  9: Just jumped over the guy and got a T for some reason!  8: Is unbelievable!  A behind the back alley oop bounce pass!  7: Another backboard breaker 6: Another one like number 9 without the tech.  Pretty good but not as good as 8. 5: A behind the back alley oop passs from between the 3 point line and half way.  The finish is a quick one hand leaner.  4: Is out of this world!  The guy inbounds it at the opposite baseline and throws a baseball pass to his teammate.  The teammate allows it to bounce and catches in rhythm for the alley oop slam.  5 and 4 are both amazing if you ask me.  Lets get to 3!  3: Is a routine two handed alley oop slam over a couple of guys.  Pretty average if you ask me!  2: Is a 360 one hander where the guy pulls down the hoop -  not that great!  1: Is another ‘lets do a Vince Carter at the Olympics and jump over a guy’.  The guy doesn’t even touch the guy that he is jumping over.  It is ok but not as good as 5 and 4 in my opinion. 

- Whilst I was there I found a highlight package of the best of Vince Carter in High School  Some of his stuff was much better than this top ten.  Whilst we are on the High School bandwagon, here is a package of Dwight Howard’s High School career and the Shaq Disel dominating his High School competition.  Finally check out this highlight package of Carmelo Anthony vs Lebron James in High School.  YouTube is to basketball fans what wine was to Jesus!

- This fan defintely doesn’t want Brendan Joyce to be appointed Boomers coach.  Whilst I don’t necessarily agree with his method of getting his point accross, I certainly agree with his message.  I think that BG would have to be a shoe in for it if he wanted it.   

So that is it.  I may not be able to write for a while.  I apologise in advance to you all who really enjoy this average basketball blog.  I will hopefully get my internet connection up and running and we will see how things go.

Merry Christmas to you all!

Ashley

For some reason, I have really enjoyed the play of Dillon Boucher in the games that have been televised by Maroi TV so far this season.  He plays the perfect role for his team.  He is far from a superstar on his team and plays within his limitations.  So that got me thinking about the role of the role player and how they are perceived by the NBL public.

So what is a role player?  I did a Wikipedia search but I couldn’t get a definitive answer.  I then went back to the every reliable search engine Google and found this article at Basketball Fundamentals.  In the article it provides some information about role players and the role that they play.  It states:

We can’t all be super-stars, or even starters. We don’t all have great shooting skills or ball-handling skills. But we can still be important “spokes in the wheel”. We can still be very important to the success of our team. We are important “role players”.
Coaches love good role players, because they know better than anyone that there will be times in a game, or during the season, that they will have to get good play, some good minutes from their bench personnel. Usually, you cannot be a championship team with just five good players. You need important players who can come off the bench and play quality minutes.

I have to say that I pretty much agree with that assessment of the role player.  The article goes on to discuss what makes a good role player:

What makes a great role player?
A role player could be a starter who has a special skill… such as being a great defensive player, or a great rebounder, or a point guard who can handle the ball and pass.

A role player is often the player who comes off the bench. He/she understands and accepts his/her role on the team. While on the bench, the good role player keeps his/her head in the game, and observes what’s going on, where the weaknesses are in the defense, which opposing players are “killing us”, what’s happening on the boards, etc. He/she is “ready to go” when the coach calls

Every quality NBL team throughout history has had role players who have done their jobs for teams to win.  Players such as Warrick Giddey, Tim Morrisey and David Close made a career out of playing a role and playing it well.  David Close was pretty much a spot up shooter.  In the end his career was cut short basically because he could not do anything else but shoot.  Warrick Giddey would probably be considered the most famous role player in the history of the NBL because of the team that he played with and the role that he performed.  Actually Dillion Boucher’s overall game reminds me a bit of Warrick Giddey.

Lets like at the unsung hereos on each NBL roster this season:

Perth Wildcats: In all honesty, I don’t think that they actually have a ‘true’ role player on their roster.  I guess that they have a lot of guys playing a ‘role’.  Maybe Luke Kendall coming off the bench to add some spark?

Adelaide 36ers: David Cooper is a prime example of a role player.  Whenever he hits the court, his role is to block shots and rebound.  He has made a career out of this and plays within his limitations.

Melbourne Tigers: Steven Hoare is another awesome example of a role player.  His overall game is extremely well rounded and he can contribute in a lot of ways.  Darryl Corletto is another type of role player – an assassian off the bench

South Dragons: I am going to say that Tremell Darden is a role player.  Having a non superstar import in a Brian Goorjian coached team isn’t that unusual.  Darden is a starter who plays his role.

Sydney Spirit: Another import – David Gruber.  I have only watched them play on TV once this season but his role seems to be pretty defined.  He is a meat and potatoes type of guy who does not try to do things that he is not capable of.  He will never be a star in the league but he is pretty solid.

Wollongong Hawks:  I truly believe that the major issue with the Hawks at the moment is that they have to many role players and not enough superstars.  Late in his career, Matt Campbell has started to play the role of a defensive player and three point shooter.

Gold Coast Blaze: Casey Frank is an energetic rebounder / garbage offensive type of a player.

Townsville Crocodiles: I am going to say that Brad Williamson is a role player.  His game is pretty much spot up shooting and he is extremely accurate from the perimeter.

Cairns Taipans: Aaron Grabu is another guy who has had a long career out of playing whatever role his coach needs him to play.

New Zealand: As stated above, I think that Dillon Boucher has been fantastic for the Breakers so far this season. 

So who is the most valuable role player in the NBL this season?  I would like to announce that at this point, the two joint favourites to take out the inaguarl Basketball and Everything in Between Role Player of the Year award would have to be Dillon Boucher and Steven Hoare. 

Congraulations to all nominees for this extremely prestigeous and important award.  Your hard work has not gone unnoticed by the wider NBL communty.

At the request of my fellow host of the TO – The Official Podcast of the TO, my next NBL legends feature will be on Dwayne McClain.  Dwayne was a very athletic 2/3 man who took the league by storm when he first arrived in 1991  He was everything that the Sydney Kings needed him to be at that time – an awesome basketball player, African American, super cool and could talk (marketable)  He was the face of a national advertising campagain for Diet Coke which was a first (and still only) for our sport in this country.

Dwayne was a 6″6′ shooting guard who played his college ball at Villanova.  He was also a member of Villanova’s championship team in 1985 against Georgetown.   I ordered that tape from Pontel in 2002 and didn’t even think about it.  My goals was to get as many NCAA championship games as I possibly could.  Anyway, I was watching the introductions to the game and not really paying to much attention and who should run out but a young Dwayne McClain.  It was bloody awesome.

After his college career, Dwayne played in the NBA with the Indiana Pacers averaging 3.5 points per game in the 45 games that he played in.  Dwayne also played professionally in France, Canada, The Philippines, Indonesia and Greece before coming to Australia.  The turning point was when he joined Magic Johnson’s Touring Dadells Veteran Team.  Dwayne was the young leagues in the squad.  I remember him throwing down a huge reverse jam in one of the games. 

His impact on the Sydney Kings was immediate.  He was confident with the ball and backed himself in most occasions.  He wasn’t the greatest shooter but he could get to the rack and was pretty bloody hard to stop.  He came 3rd in the league MVP voting in 1993, was named to the All NBL first team in 1992 and was selected as a NBL All Star in 1991 and 1997.

Whilst everybody loved the Dwayne McClain from the Sydney era, I actually preferred the one who finished his playing career with the Brisbane Bullets.  In the 1996 season, he started out like a house on fire for the Gold Coast Rollers.  After six games, he he tore up his knee and was unable to see out the season.  The Bullets took a punt and recruited him in the 1997 season and teamed up with Steve Woodberry as the imports for the Bullets.  A lot of his athleticism had deserted him by then, so he relied more on his smarts to get the job done.  It was clinical to watch and proved how good of a player the guy actually was.

The NBL was a better place when Dwayne McClain was in it.  He was awesome, had a NBA type game and was extremely marketable.  Schibz Spiel recently had an article titled ‘Hip Hop Hoops’ and it talked about making the NBL marketable again by attracting marquee American guys.  Dwayne certainly would have fitted into that category. 

Episode 4 of The TO is up for your listening pleasure.  In this podcast we talk about various NBL things including game reviews, game previews, Grandmaster Funks rant about the Cairns Taipans and my rant about Corey Williams. 

In this podcast we had the pleasure of having Boti Nagy join us in the podcasting lounge (Grandmaster Funk’s messy office)  It was awesome that he spent 35 minutes talking to us.  He is interesting to see his opinion on all things NBL and go through the history of the Adelaide 36ers.  It is well worth the listen.

Listen to The TO here

Once again if you are having trouble with downloading it please email me at ashleyproud@gmail.com so that I can sort it at.  184 people have downloaded our crappy little podcast.  Please continue to do so.  This may be our last podcast for a couple of weeks (which we explain about in the podcast)

After having an awesome middle session with my year 5 class on podcasting, I open up my email account eating my lunch and scroll through my usual crap.  I then decide to go to Ozhoopsboards and I noticed this topic about the Cairns Taipans being put into adminstration.  This was not good news people and I let my year five kids know.  One kid said to me “What does that mean?”  When I told him that means that the team could go under and not finish the season, his response was “That is pretty crap!”  An honest but blunt response!

I then found this article which also talks about the current situatioin. The thing that ticks me off about this whole situatioin is this quote:

He said the club was losing “hundreds of thousands” of dollars each season

If this is the case (and I am not doubting that it is) then why is he continuning to pump money into the team?  To me it smells a little bit more of a conspiracy theory.  I think that they were given the word that there was only going to be one team from Far North Queensland in the NBL next year and they just decided to pull the pin now.  I think that this is so irresponsible of the owners to allow the situation to develop into this type of a situations. 

In the above article it is also quoted that the Taipans are losing $800 000 a season!  If this is true, what the hell is going on?  $800 000 is not just a tax write off for some rich man.  That is a hell of a lot of money.

So once again the NBL is back to the drawing board.  They saved the Spirit and what will they do now if they can’t find a new owner?  Has a precendent been set?  It will be interesting to say the least.  Lets not make any bones about it – Sydney is much more important to the NBL than Cairns.  I love the Taipans and they have awesome fans, but they don’t have 4 million people. 

Will Nathan Jawai be able to chip in some money like Andrew Bogut did to make sure that his former team mates are getting paid?  The smartest man in this entire scenario is former assistant coach Aaron Fearne.  I am not sure who is paying Aaron (the Raptors or Nathan himself) but at least he still has a job.  Alan Black could be without one very very soon!