It all started when Michigan got beaten by Appalachian State. Throughout the whole game they were outplayed by them. Then at the end when it looked like they survive the game with a win, Appalachian State blocked a last second field goal and almost took it back for a touchdown. This play destroyed Michigan’s National Champion hopes. Also with the loss they were kicked out of the AP Top 25.

After the game coach(or soon to be former coach) Llyod Carr said that they were going to start over and go out and beat Oregon. Once again Michigan’s fans were silenced by a worse team. The score ended up being 39-7 and it pretty much ruined there Rose Bowl hopes.

Next week they have Notre Dame and Freshman QB Jimmy Paulsen coming to town. If they lose this game there season is pretty much over as that would mean they would be completely kicked out of a major bowl game. Last season Michigan beat Notre Dame 47-21 but that seems like a distant memory at the moment.

Right now all Michigan fans are in a living night mare that just won’t end. The worst part is that they have Penn State, Wisconsin, and Ohio State left on there schedule. If they lose even one of these games there Big Ten Title hopes might be over as well.

One reason that strikes my mind is the Bo Schemblecher curse. Ever since he died they’re 0-4 losing to Ohio State, USC, Appalachian State, and Oregon. Maybe they’ll never win again for all we know, Bo Schembechler dieing has cursed them to somethign they don’t like, but they still don’t know what it is.

HOUSTON — Former Minnesota Timberwolves forward Eddie Griffin died last week when his sport utility vehicle collided with a freight train in a fiery crash, the Harris County medical examiner’s office said Tuesday.

Investigators used dental records to identify Griffin, 25, who began his tumultuous pro career with the Houston Rockets in 2001. He was waived by the Timberwolves in March.

“The cause of death and manner of death, which also includes toxicology results, is pending,” said Beverly Begay, chief investigator for the Harris County Medical Examiner’s office.

Griffin, a five-year veteran who was the No. 7 pick in the 2001 NBA draft, had battled alcohol problems since coming out of Seton Hall. He was suspended by the league for five games in January for violating its anti-drug program.

“Basketball was never an issue with him. He needed more life lessons, and unfortunately he was never able to reach his potential,” former Timberwolves coach Dwane Casey said.

Houston police said in a report that the driver of the SUV ignored a railroad warning and went through a barrier before striking the moving train about 1:30 a.m. Friday. The resulting fire burned the SUV and the side of a railcar carrying plastic granules, police said.

The driver’s body was badly burned and there was no identification.

“I was able this afternoon to get some dental records from the one dentist he had gone to see in Houston, and they were able to use that apparently to positively identify him,” said Derek S. Hollingsworth, an attorney who has represented Griffin in criminal cases.

Hollingsworth said he spoke with Griffin’s mother, who was devastated by the news.

“Everybody tried to help him from the top to the bottom of the organization,” said Casey, who coached Griffin for 1½ seasons. “He just couldn’t get it straight. It’s a tragic ending for a beautiful kid. He had a beautiful heart.”

Casey said he hadn’t talked to Griffin in five or six months but he knew that Griffin was spending the summer trying to get back in shape to play in Europe next season.

Casey said he regretted not having reached out to Griffin in the past few months.

“The entire Minnesota Timberwolves organization is deeply saddened by this tragic news. Eddie will be missed by everyone who knew him,” said Kevin McHale, vice president of basketball operations for the team. “Our thoughts and prayers are with Eddie’s loved ones.”

Casey said Griffin was “like a son to Kevin. Kevin really enjoyed working with him and taking him under his wing.”

Mark Madsen, a former teammate in Minnesota, said Griffin was a mild-mannered person and “one of the best shot blockers and defensive rebounders I’ve ever played with.” He said Griffin will be missed.

“Eddie Griffin is someone who was never a super loud or boisterous guy in the locker room, but he was someone who everyone loved in the locker room,” Madsen said. “When he was doing well on the court we were all so happy for him. And when he was struggling, we were all struggling right there with him.”

Griffin had a series of suspensions, court dates and missed practices during his first two years in the NBA with Houston and New Jersey. He spent time in the Betty Ford Center for alcohol treatment in 2003-04.

Hollingsworth said he found Griffin to be kind and gentle — behavior inconsistent with how the player was described in police reports.

“He had a problem with alcohol, and I think that was a medication for him, and I think that led to a lot of issues,” Hollingsworth said.

Griffin, who played forward and center, signed with the Timberwolves as a free agent before the 2004 season. He showed enough promise as a shot-blocker and rebounder to be signed to an extension, but was waived in March after playing in just 13 games last season with the Wolves.

The Wolves put his locker right next to star Kevin Garnett, hoping the former MVP could help straighten Griffin out.

Griffin put up some big numbers on occasion with the Wolves, but continued to get into trouble off the court. He pleaded guilty last season to inattentive driving after he hit a parked car while out late one night in Minneapolis.

The Rockets released a statement saying the organization “is devastated and saddened by this terrible tragedy. Our thoughts go out to Eddie’s family and friends during this very difficult time.”

Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press

R.I.P. Eddie Griffin

What’s your reaction to this?

This is Loftons 3rd stint with Cleveland playing for them in 1991-1996, then 1998-2001. Tonight in his first plate appeareance as an Indian in 6 years, he got a standing ovation. So far he is 2-4 in the game with a RBI and a SO. The Indians are hoping that Lofton can help them make it to the world Series and hopefully win the World Series.

Now trade talks between the 2 teams have resurfaced, including a deal that included San Antonio that fell apart today. Now the 2 teams are talking about a deal that would send Drew Gooden and Damon Jones to Sacramento for Bibby. I like this deal since Jones is making like $4 million for sitting on the bench, and so now Anderson Varejao will want to resign with Cleveland more, knowing that he’d be the starting PF. Also since Bibby is around $13 million, the deal would work out financially since Gooden is making $6.4 million.

I will be keeping you updated daily by posting a new blog everyday until a deal gets done, or if it falls apart. The forum is now open!

But the team with the hardest pick of all was Portland, Oden or Durant. That was the big question surrounding there franchise for over a month. they even had a poll on there website asking the fans who they would rather have. Oden got 2/3 of the votes.

Then the day before draft day Portland announced that they were drafting Oden, which meant Durant was going to Seattle, a team in the same division as Portland. Also on draft night Portland sent Zach randolph packing with Dan Dickau and Fred Jones to the Knicks for Steve Francis and Channing Frye. Now i’m trying to figure out if they made the right moves.

Here was there line up before the draft.

C-Lamarcus Aldridge
PF-Zach Randolph
SF-Darius Miles
SG-Brandon Roy
PG-Jarret Jack

Now by looking at this line up you see 2 major holes-SF and PG. At SF they have an overpaid player in Miles and a young player in Jack is there PG. Since Durant is a SF, i thought they might of taken Durant to make there line up Aldridge, Randolph, Durant, Roy, and Jack. A pretty good line up. Instead they took Oden which made it Oden, Randolph, Miles, Roy, and Jack. So they pretty much got a better C.

Since they knew they needed a PG and they didn’t really need Randolph, they traded Randolph with 2 backups for Steve Francis and Channing Frye which made there lineup as follows.

C-Greg Oden
PF-Channing Frye
SF-Darius Miles
SG-Brandon Roy
PG-Steve Francis
Key Bench-Jarret Jack(PG), Lamarcus Aldridge(C)

So now they have a former franchise player in Francis and a good young PF in Frye to join Aldridge and Oden. So, were these two moves good moves? In my mind yes. They went from having 2 holes in there line up to having 1 hole with Miles which isn’t that big of a hole. I’d have to say that this franchise has sure changed from that 21 win season a year or 2 ago.

1.Portland
Portland as we all know had the first pick in the draft and used to draft there franchise player, Greg Oden. Also during the rest of the draft they traded for the rights to SG Rudy fernandez and traded for the rights to Petteri Koponen. Also they drafted Josh Mcroberts, Taureen Green and Demetrius Nichols. All 3 players being pretty well known college players.

2.Seattle
After Portland i have Seattle. In the draft they picked Kevin Durant with the 2nd pick. then a little later they traded Ray Allen and the rights to Glen Davis(there 35th overall pick) to Boston for Delonte West, Wally Zerbiac, and Jeff Green(Boston’s 5th overall pick). By doing this they traded away a 32 year old for a young Guard to take his place in West, Zerbiac to take up Ray’s salary and Jeff Green to help out the team with his scoring ability.

3.Atlanta
Altanta had the 3rd and 11th overall picks and used them wisely. With the 3rd pick they took Al Horford to help them out with there low post scoring. Then with the 11th pick they took Acie Law, a great shooting PG who will be the future PG of the team. Now they have Law and Joe Johnson as there backcourt, 2 great shooters, then Josh Smith Horford and whoever there center may be to round out the lineup.

Losers

1.Boston
Boston had the 5th overall pick and did the worst thing they could do with it-trade it. They drafted Jeff Green with it then traded him with Delonte West and Wally Zerbiac for Ray Allen and Glen Davis. This trade may be better for them now, but it hurts them badly for the future since Allen is already 32 years old.

2.Milwaukee
Milwaukee had the 6th pick in the draft and also made a horrible decision. Drafting Yi Jianlian. Before the draft Yi told Milwaukee if they drafted him he would not show up to trainging camp or anything. But still they drafted him when they could of got Cory Brewer or Brandon Wright or somebody else.

  Just look at him, a 22 year old NBA Superstar that pretty much carries his team every game. Like in Game 5 of the Detroit series where he scored Cleveland’s last 20 points and won them the game in double overtime.

  He has carried this team on his back for years, going back to his first season. In his first season they were coming off of a horrible season in which they went 17-65 and won the Lebron James lottery. Then the following season the Cavs went 35-47, 18 more wins then the previous season.

  The season after that they went 42-40, 7 more wins. Then in 2005-2006, they really started playing good. They went 50-32 and made the playoffs where they eventually got eliminated by detroit in 6 games in the 2nd round.

  Look at how far they have come since Lebron was drafted, and mostly because Lebron carried them. They have never had a great team or even a 2nd scorer after Lebron, but still they won 50 games again this season.

  Now they’re in the NBA Finals 4 wins away from the NBA Championship trophy. They’ve gotten there revenge on Detroit this season, and also they have ended the dreams of the Nets and Wizards, all because Lebron has carried them since Day 1.

All-NBA Old School Team

Since all of my players had to of had there rookie season before 1985, there are some great players who can’t be included. Micheal Jordan barely made it since he started in 1984, but enough of that here is my All-NBA Old School Team starting lineup. Note-I’m only doing a starting lineup.

C-Wilt Chamberlein

I think this was a pretty easy pick considering he’s one of the greatest players of all time. As you all know he scored 100 points in one game and had an high points per game average his whole career, including a season in which he scored on average 50 points per game. On NBA message boards whenever someone asks, “Who do you think is the greatest player of all time”, i always say Wilt. He even has his own cartoon character(Cartoon Network’s Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends. The character is the tall one named Wilt obviously). Some other things about him is that he also grabbed a lot of boards hitting 20 rebounds a game more than once in his career.

Notable-Bill Russell

PF-Karl Malone

This was a hard one considering that i really couldn’t think of any PFs from the oast for some reason for awhile. So, i decided on Karl Malone. This was a close one since his first season was 1985. He’s here because he could easily do 20 points and 10 rebounds per game, and he played for 20+ years, which is pretty long for professional players. I’ve heard people say that John Stockton is the reson he was so great, but they’re wrong.

Notable-Charles Barkley

SF-Larry Bird

This was also an obvious pick considering that he is one of the greatest shooters and all around players of all time. If you ask a Celtics fan who there favorite all time Celtics player is, i guarantee a lot of them would say Bird, if not Bill Russell. He might of never scored 100 points in a game, but if got in a rhythm, he just couldn’t miss. He is a good SF for this great shooting team.

Notable-Julious Erving

SG-Micheal Jordan

This was super easy since Jordan is probally the greatest player of all time in most people’s minds(not mine). He averaged 30+ points on average per every game of his career. Also he is in the Top 10 of most points in one game. Same with Bird, he might of never scored 100, but he still was a great scorer. He even averaged 28 in his rookie year.

PG-Magic Johnson

A hard choice since there have been some great point guards in history. I ended up picking Magic mostly because he could play any position, and i ended up picking PG for him. He averaged around 20 points and 10+ assists his whole career which was cut short because of when he was diagnosed HIV positive in 1991. If he wouldn’t of developed HIV, he probally could of played a little longer.

Notable-Isiah Thomas

Well, there’ my list. Now, how about yours?

Yesterday Mavericks Owner Mark Cuban announced that he was going to try to make a new football league to compete with the NFL. Full Story-

Yahoo.com wrote:

Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban is part of a group considering formation of a football league that would compete with the NFL for players drafted lower than the second round.

The league, still very much in the preliminary stage, would play its games on Friday nights. The NFL does not play then because of the potential conflict with high school football.

“It’s a pretty simple concept,” Cuban said in an e-mail to The Associated Press. “We think there is more demand for pro football than supply.”

The proposal was first disclosed by The New York Times on its Web site, which said it was the idea of Bill Hambrecht, a Wall Street investor who was a minority partner in the Oakland Invaders of the USFL, which played in the spring from 1983-85. Sharon Smith, a spokeswoman for Hambrecht and Company, had no comment and said Hambrecht was traveling and unavailable to talk about the idea.

NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said he was aware of the proposed league, but had no further comment.

There have been numerous leagues that have tried to compete with the NFL and a few that actually played games, starting with the AFL, which began in 1960 and fully merged with the NFL a decade later. It included such current franchises as New England, Oakland, Kansas City, San Diego, Buffalo, the New York Jets and Denver.

More recently came the World Football League in the early 1970s, which raided the NFL for such stars as Larry Csonka. Then came the USFL, which played in the spring before folding after receiving only $3 in an antitrust “victory” over the NFL.

The USFL featured such future Hall of Famers as Jim Kelly, Reggie White and Steve Young, but lost millions of dollars trying to compete for players. It also had internal struggles among a majority of owners who wanted to stay in the spring, and the best known among them, Donald Trump, who wanted to move to the fall and try to force a merger with the NFL.

The most recent pro football league was the XFL, founded by the World Wrestling Federation and televised by NBC. The XFL lasted just three months in the spring of 2001 and was best known for a player named Rod Smart, called “He Hate Me,” who later played as a return man and backup running back in the NFL.

So far, the proposed new league is in its infancy and Cuban is the only potential owner for what the founders hope will be an eight-team league.

Cuban said in his e-mail he believes the salary cap makes it easier to compete financially with the NFL because of the salary imbalance that leaves lower-level players with lower salaries. That would allow the new league to fill its rosters with players taken lower than the second round, as well as late NFL cuts and free agents who escape the NFL draft.

Many such players, including Tom Brady, a sixth-round pick of New England, have become NFL stars.

“That’s not to say it will be easy. It won’t,” Cuban wrote. “We still have to cover quite a bit of ground and have a lot of milestones to hit. That said, if we can get the right owners I obviously think we can make this work.”

Do you think that a new football league would work out and do you think it could compete with the NFL?