MLB 2011 Season

Today the MLB season starts and the Brewers play the Cincinnati Reds in Cincinnati. The pitcher for the Brewers is going to be Yovani Gallardo. I am pretty sure the Brewers will crush the Reds because of their really good offense. Although offense is a big part of baseball the Brewers have a really good pitching staff at they also have a really good defense.  I think that the  Brewers will win the NL Central the Dodgers will win the NL West and the Phillies will win the NL East. I would tell about the American League but I don't really care about the AL teams.   

Metaphors

Authors Note : These are the Metaphors I came up with to describe myself

I am a Blake Griffin
dunking all over everyone
I am as cool as the breeze
I am a gamer
always beating everyone
I am as big as Prince Fielder
but not that round

When The Game Was Ours

Larry Bird and Earvin “Magic” Johnson played each other in the 1979 NCAA Championship, and that game was the start of one of the greatest rivalries ever. In the book, When The Game Was Ours, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird talk about the rivalry they had between each other both in college and the NBA. Playing for the two best teams in the NBA -- Magic for the Lakers, and Bird for the Celtics -- it only made the rivalry better. How would it make you feel to be on one of the best teams in the World and have a rivalry with the best player in the World?

Bird played 13 years in the NBA and, after that, was the coach of the Indiana Pacers for 3 years. In that time, he was a 3-time NBA MVP winner and a 3-time NBA Champion. I think Derrick Rose is the one current NBA player that I think is most like Larry. They both could have gone to big colleges, but chose to go to smaller colleges. At those smaller colleges, they both led their teams into the NCAA tournament as possible Champions. Although Larry has been a MVP, Derrick still has to prove he is a MVP-quality player, and he can prove that this year.

Magic also played 13 years in the NBA, and was also a coach for the Los Angeles Lakers. In that time, he was a 3-time NBA MVP winner and a 5-time NBA Champion. Kevin Durant and Magic Johnson are about the same size -- Magic is 6’8” and Kevin is 6’10”. While they are over-sized to play their positions (Magic as point guard; Kevin as forward/guard), they are both quick enough and use their height against their smaller opponents. The two of them were both named the best college players, and neither completed their 4 years in college. I think Kevin has proved he is a contender for the NBA MVP award.

The rivalries in the NBA now are only between the teams, as there are no rivalries between the players. The player rivalries were one of the main reasons for the NBA’s popularity back then. Now that there are no rivalries between the players, fans aren’t as excited to watch basketball currently.

Childhood Memory

In 5th grade I remember watching the NBA All-Star game when Dwight Howard and Nate Robinson did the Slam Dunk Contest together.  Now my whole family watches the Dunk contest every year and my mom always complains that it isn't fun anymore without watching Dwight Howard or Nate Robison. I think I remember this because it was pretty cool to watch a 5'9" Point Guard jump over a 6'11" Center and do a pretty cool dunk. After watching this I decided I wanted to tryout for the basketball team and when the tryouts were over I got an envelope that  said I had made the team. Something that I had learned from this experience is that no matter how small you are you can do anything someone taller then you can just like Nate Robinson did when he jumped over Dwight Howard in the Dunk Contest .

After that i decided that I wanted to tryout for the Pirates basketball team. When the tryouts ended I got on the boys 6th grade basketball team. At that point I didn't now much about basketball and I started to watch more of the Bucks games to see if I could learn anything from the players. after the season was over I thought I had had a pretty good experience with basketball. Now my season just ended for playing 7th grade basketball and my team was the consolation bracket champions in the end of the year tournament. 

Brewers Spring Training

The Brewers spring training is almost over they have about 2 weeks left. The Brewers spring training was pretty good they found some good prospects, but the star pitcher Zack Grienke broke his ribs and is out for the first 3 weeks of the season. The Brewers still have to do some work to improve and be a playoff team.  The Brewers still need to find their 5th starter to have a complete pitching rotation.

NCAA March Madness

This week the NCAA tournament starts. The first game is going to be played on Tuesday when UNC Ashville plays Arkansas Little-Rock to determine who plays Pittsburgh in the second round. The four teams that I think that will make the Final Four are The Kentucky  Wildcats, The Kansas Jayhawks, The San Diego State Aztecs, and The Brigham Young Cougars. The two teams that I think will be in the Finals are The Kentucky Wildcats and The Kansas Jayhawks. The winning team will be the Kentucky Wildcats.

Hakeem Olajuwon

 

          Hakeem Olajuwon was a professional basketball player for the Houston Rockets.  He grew up in the African country of Nigeria . At the age of 17, he started playing basketball for his country on the Men’s National Team. As people started to hear about him, all the scouts from the U.S. came to offer him scholarships to play basketball for their college. How would you feel if you were being pressured to consider what overseas college you would want to attend?

          Hakeem was always tall like me. At first, he would always hide his height so he didn’t stand out, but when he was becoming a star because of his height, he started embracing that characteristic. Hakeem’s parents wanted him to go to college and the Nigerian school systems wanted their students to be able to go to the finest schools possible.  However, no one thought that anyone from their system would ever be pursued to go to an American college.

          Hakeem played 18 years in the NBA and is a two-time NBA champion and MVP. Hakeem played for the Houston Rockets for 17 years and the Toronto Raptors for 1 year. Since I play basketball I can understand some of the struggles he had during the season and the playoffs. Sometimes you have good games and then not-so-good games. Hakeem reminds me of the Bucks’ center, Andrew Bogut.  Bogut was the first pick in the NBA draft, as was Hakeem. Right away, Hakeem was able to demonstrate it was a good choice to pick him, but Bogut still has some work to do to prove that he is the key to success for a team to win.

          Being a very religious person, Hakeem is always praying for his team to succeed.  However, at the beginning of the 1995 playoffs, he didn’t believe that his team could beat four of the best teams in the NBA to win their second consecutive NBA championship. When his team started playing well, he had renewed faith that they could win it all.  In 1994, Hakeem was voted the NBA MVP.  Rather than accepting the award only by himself, Hakeem had his whole team accept it with him.  His reasoning for this was that he couldn’t have won that title all by himself – it was a team effort.  In my mind, I believe Hakeem Olajuwon is the ultimate team player ever.

Heat

 

           In Baseball, players only get 2 chances to prove they don’t do drugs.  Well, Dwight “Doc” Gooden had those 2 chances. Would you give up a million dollar salary because you were addicted to drugs? In the book Heat by Dwight Gooden, he tells about his struggles on and off the field with his addiction to cocaine. While Doc was great on the field, he wasn’t as good off the field handling his struggles with addiction.

          In the late 80’s and the early 90’s, Dwight Gooden was addicted to Cocaine.  He went to two different rehab facilities, but none of them worked for curing his addiction. This is like me, but I am not addicted to drugs.  I am addicted to the game Tetris -- I play it anytime I can. Even though my addiction isn’t as bad as Doc Gooden’s, it still is an addiction.

          While addictions ruined his career, he still had some good times in the MLB. He played 16 seasons, 11 for the Mets, 3 for the Yankees, 1 for the Indians and he spent half of the 2000 season on the Devil Rays’ and the Astros’ rosters. From reading the book and watching baseball, I can now understand the struggles that baseball players and all other professional athletes have to go through on a daily basis. Dwight Gooden reminds me of the Brewers’ pitcher, Zack Greinke.  Although Greinke won a Cy Young award like “Doc”, ever since then he had has some struggles with pitching.

          Although Dwight went on to have a good career as a baseball player, the city of New York will never forget him for bringing the Mets to the World Series.  Shortly after the ‘86 Mets broke up as a team, Doc’s addiction to cocaine began, and that is where he changed as both a pitcher and as a person.  While Doc struggled personally and professionally through his addiction, he was still able to make an impact in the history of baseball.  The Dwight Gooden story should be a reminder for every MLB team that sometimes struggling players need a second chance to prove they can make an impact.