Hole Punch Sports

That’s right: I just got home from watching the Denver Nuggets knock out the Charlotte Hornets, live at the Pepsi Center. And (most of) you didn’t. This was my view in pregame: That’s right: better seats, far worse view. (That guy’s sign, by the way, was something to the effect of how the T enacious N uggets T eam D was worse than swine flu or something.) It also didn’t help that while meeting up with a different friend and his wife to go to this game that I broke my glasses and spent the game watching through a pair of specs with no left side to ’em. Anyway, you (hopefully) caught the game. The first half was tense, with a few great moments, namely Chris Andersen’s ridiculous block on Chris Paul late in the first quarter. Also, there was Nene’s beastly left-handed dunk that was quickly followed by a Chauncey Billups three-pointer. And it blew my mind when Kenyon Martin hit that three. But the Hornets, led by David West, had it tied at the intermission. The second half, though, the Nug...

Did you catch the Nuggets’ 58-point win tonight over the New Orleans Hornets in Game Four? If you live outside of Denver, the answer is probably not, as the game was broadcast nationally on NBA TV. The only thing lamer than a league starting its own TV network is when that league starts airing playoff games on it. As I would have anyway, I caught the game on Altitude here in Colorado. Well, except for the parts that were on when I was catching 24 …did I mention the Nuggets won by 58 freaking points? 121-63 was the final score, and according to the Altitude crew that tied as the highest margin victory ever in the NBA playoffs. There’s not much to say about the game, other than that it was everything Game Three should have been. The Nuggets dominated from start to finish, Carmelo was great, and while Chauncey may have started to cool off just a little bit he still badly outplayed Chris Paul, whom Scott Hastings called the best American flopper in the game today. I love that phrase. ...

Today, I think, was the first time I appreciated how much pressure there is in making decisions in the NFL draft. For starters, there is the sheer amount of decisions to be made. Do we keep the pick? Do we trade it? Do we draft this guy, that guy, or this other guy? Do we go for offense or defense? Can we afford his likely contract demands? If we trade this for a pick next year, where do we think that pick will fall? Do we draft based on need, or do we take the best player we think is available? (I do not think there is a universal right answer to that last question, by the way.) More frighteningly, there are so many important factors which are basically unknown. I doubt I could do it. Personally, if I’m making a decision, I analyze it to death, find out everything I possibly can, and then try to avoid making it. But the quite simple fact of the matter is that it’s impossible to know, or even be all that sure about, how any individual decision will work out. Take, for instance, a s...

The Denver Nuggets made a valiant effort at the end of Game Three of their best-of-seven series with the New Orleans Hornets yesterday, but it wasn’t enough to keep their series lead from being cut in half. Chauncey Billups, Denver’s biggest threat over the first two games, was held to 16 points on 3-of-10 shooting, though he added six assists and seven defensive rebounds. Carmelo Anthony, the team’s star for several seasons, scored 25, had eight rebounds and passed out five assists. But neither player really seemed cold or especially shaken by the Hornets’ defense. The only real change was that the Hornets seemed to key a little less on Anthony, while being determined to give Billups fewer uncontested shots. Anthony, though he wasn’t red-hot, didn’t shrink from the role of go-to guy, and almost pulled it out at the end. I think if he had been the focus of the offense a little more in the fourth quarter we could have gotten our run started sooner. All in all, it’s tough to be to...

I’ve never been to an NBA playoff game before, so when the opportunity arose to attend Game 2 of the Nuggets-Hornets series, I jumped. I have to say, getting tickets to an NBA playoff game was way easier than I’d expected. My secret? Have someone else buy them for you. I arrived at the Pepsi Center around 7:15 for the 8:30 tipoff and started the walk in. Do you know what the arena looks like an hour-fifteen before tipoff? I don’t; apparently they don’t let you in that early. Instead, I met up with a friend of mine, his dad and his wife, and waited in line until the doors were to open, at 7:30. Or at least I thought I was going to. But then the greatest mascot in the history of professional sports showed up and started chucking things off the roof at us: mini-balls, headbands, shirts, and more. I don’t know if it was the wind or what, but almost everything he threw seemed to go to the same spot in line, which happened to be not my spot. One headband started drifting in my general direct...

It's only been one game of the playoffs, but the Nuggets friggin' won, and in any event it appears the world was right and I was wrong about the Allen Iverson for Chauncey Billups trade. (It takes a very dumb man to admit this, as I apparently never wrote about said trade on this blog.) I was upset when the Nuggets lost Iverson; I loved his scoring and entertainment value, and he made the team interesting and prominent in a way Billups never could. That said, I think deep down I sort of knew everyone was right: Iverson was fading fast, and Billups was a terrifically reliable team player, known for his big shots in the clutch. (Not that Iverson hasn't had great playoff moments: Billups has a Finals MVP to his credit, but I'm more impressed with the way Iverson carried an inferior squad to the Finals in his MVP season.) Regardless, with a second-seed (though only in a tightly-packed West) and a 1-0 series lead, clearly the Nuggets didn't lose anything in the trade. Bi...

Congratulations to the North Carolina Tar Heels, my favorite college basketball team and the winners of tonight's national championship game. I don't have much to say about the suspenseless game, other than that Ty Lawson is awesome. People often say that college basketball is better than pro basketball, and those people are morons, but I do think it's cool the impact a great college point guard can have on a game, and how many good points with different playing styles I've seen in the tournament over the years. (Incidentally, I say "morons" because the overall level of play is obviously so much higher in the pros than college, and because many college fans claim the teamwork is so much higher in than sport—all the while ignoring how there are often several players on the floor who couldn't even get a shot off without a well-designed play.) Anyway, it's weird to say this on a night when one of my teams won a championship (which you should never take fo...

I never thought this blog would last longer than Jay Cutler's career with the Denver Broncos. He was a talented young prospect so good that the Broncos, a powerhouse organization only one game removed from the Super Bowl the season before, traded up to get him—or, in other words, a player whose upside was so huge, the team sacrificed its present to get his future. And now? He's gone . How did it come to this? * * * Often I'll play devil's advocate with a move like this; you know, I'll try and explain how it makes sense from the other side of the table. Today, during the most disastrous Broncos offseason in memory—and the draft hasn't even happened yet, so settle in—I just don't have it in me. I don't think move is really defensible from a football standpoint. But what the heck: as the article above says, the Broncos are sending Cutler and a fifth-round draft pick this month to the Chicago Bears for quarterback Kyle Orton, Chicago's first-rounder in t...