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It boggles my mind that Mavericks Center Erick Dampier is not being fined by the NBA for his comments made postgame about Spurs Point Guard Tony Parker.
Dampier told the Dallas Morning News, “Every time he drives the lane, we have to put him on his back. The first foul has to tell him he’s in for a long night. My first foul Thursday night is going to put him on his back. I guarantee it.”
Hmm, that sounds like a Dampier is admitting that he is going to commit a flagrant two foul early in the next game. Maybe the NBA should slap him with a nice fine so he learns to shut is mouth and not have dirty intentions on the court.
Players get fined in sports for so much less in this day and age and when a player is talking about maliciously harming someone before it happens, then the league needs to take a stand to prevent further things like this from being said.
Maybe Dampier and the rest of his team should actually learn how to play defense and not let Parker penetrate every time the ball is in his hands.
What is really funny is that Dampier of all people made this comment. He is averaging 9.5 ppg and 7.5 rebounds in the postseason and is basically a non factor for the Mavericks. Maybe if a respectable Maverick like Jason Kidd or Dirk Nowitzki made these comments then it would have some more credibility, but wait, they are respectable players and would never say anything so stupid.
Dampier responded to all the media hype surrounding his statement by saying, “I probably shouldn’t have said it like that. Maybe the way it came out, it sounded bad. I’m just going to go out there and play the way I’ve been playing.”
Well that’s a nice little retraction from what you said earlier Erick. But have fun going out and “play the way you’ve been playing” because if you do that then you’ll only endure another 105-85 point spanking like in game two.
-Sam Gerb
Sam can be reached at sgerb@ut.edu
Well MLB umpires have made another bonehead call, but this one really has my blood boiling. I am currently watching the Cleveland Indians play the New York Yankees in a game that is truly bullspit. It’s the seventh inning and Trevor Crow, Indians outfielder, has just been robbed of making a spectacular play at the right field wall.
Some stupid fan reached his glove over the wall and knocked Crowe’s glove out of the way. Crowe almost recovered and made the catch on the ground when the ball fell back into play. To my naked it eye, it was completely clear to see what had just happened. So why did I see some stupid ignoramus waving his finger around in the air signaling for a home run? Are you kidding me ump? I could’ve made that call from the space station and you had a perfect view of it.
So obviously I assumed Eric Wedge, Indians manager, would come out and protest and he did just that. I was ecstatic that the umpires actually convened and discussed whether or not to review and they ended up agreeing that the best thing to do was to take a look at the replay. So, I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that the umps would go look at the replay and rule that it wasn’t a homerun.
BUT THEY DIDN’T! THEY LEFT IT STANDING ON THE SCOREBOARD!
How can any competent person, umpire, or anyone with a functioning brain make that absurdly erroneous call? Because of that call the Indians, instead of being up one run in the seventh inning, they were down by a run. I mean, this is truly a game changing decision. How can you just rob the Indians of a hard fought game by being so completely blind?
It boggles my mind that two professional MLB umpires, with tons of experience, could actually look at a perfect replay of the dispute at hand, and actually uphold the decision of a homerun. I’m just so furious about this. Why even have replay in baseball if these obtuse umpires can’t make an obvious call about whether or not a homerun has been hit or not?
I’m not saying that the ball that Jorge Posada hit wasn’t going over the fence or even that Trevor Crowe would have caught the ball, but his glove was right there with the ball at the wall. He had the opportunity to make a great play and a fan clearly interfered with him. I’m tired of baseball always having problems with fan interference. I have a solution to all this interference nonsense. Remove the first rows from every area of the field where a fan has the potential to interfere with a play. There; problem solved.
I’m still trying to calm myself down about this, but I’m just in shock at the lack of intelligence that has just been displayed. I have no doubt now that the Yankees will win this game, and they shouldn’t. Hopefully in the future of instant replay in the MLB, these idiotic conclusions will not be made.
All that is left to be said is one name: Jeffrey Mayer. The right field wall in Yankees Stadium, new or old, is truly an enemy to all that dare challenge it.
-Sam Gerb
Sam can be reached at sgerb@ut.edu
If someone told me that Johan Santana would pitch 7 scoreless innings, giving up only 3 hits, 1 walk, and striking out 13 then I would put a substantial amount of money on a win for the New York Mets. But somehow once again, the Mets have managed to fail themselves and Johan’s brilliant pitching efforts. How can they lose when their ace pitches a gem like this? I mean for God sakes, he almost struck out 2 batters per inning.
As an avid Mets fan I am truly ashamed of their beyond poor effort tonight. Swing your bats for once when Johan is on the bump. They only have to face Florida Marlins pitcher Josh Johnson. I mean, he’s not that bad of a pitcher, but Johan can’t bring the RBIs in too. The heart of the lineup needs to step up their game a lot more if the Mets are to reach the playoffs this year.
The expectations could not be higher for them this season. Sports Illustrated picked them as their favorites to win the World Series, not to mention they are playing at a new state of the art stadium. Even with the Mets off to a lackluster start, I believe they will still pull off a close and ugly win of the NL East division. And hopefully at the very least they will take the NL wildcard, but they are a better team than that. But as all baseball fans know in the past, the Mets are not the most reliable team down the stretch.
Of course, it is so early in the season, but often you can get a feel for how the season is going to go. Obviously, I hope the best for the Mets, but things are going to have to change after tonight’s performance or else it will be another very disappointing season.
-Sam Gerb
Sam can be reached at sgerb@ut.edu
It is officially time for all obnoxious ESPN SportsNation voters to punch themselves in the face for voting that Tiger Woods would in the 2009 Masters. In a nation wide ESPN poll, the question was asked, “Who will win the 2009 Masters: Tiger Woods or the Field?” How ridiculously absurd that 66% of fans picked Tiger wins to win. Are you freaking kidding me?
I have one statistic to cite to make my argument about why you always pick the field to win against Tiger Woods at a major. Woods has never ever in his “illustrious” career come back to win a major after trailing after 54 holes. Well if Tiger is so “clutch” then this feat should be simply routine for him. Well SportsNation, let me tell you that he is just not as clutch as you think. The media and uneducated golf fans glorify him for reasons unknown to me. They have made him the hero of golf so that everyone pays extra attention to him, when he is just not that much better than everyone else. In my opinion, Tiger does not usually win tournaments and majors, other players lose them. Now granted he does have spectacular performances sometimes that I can’t take anything away from, like back in the day at Pebble Beach, but that was back in the day. His so called glory days are over and is just as good as any other player on the tour now.
My hat is off to Angel Cabrera for winning the Masters and taking the spotlight off Woods and his unnecessary coverage. Cabrera is a consistent golf player who came up clutch when he needed to. I’m glad players like Kenny Perry and Chad Campbell were in the mix to because these are the real unsung greats of the PGA tour. I’m a fan who likes parody in sports and especially golf and I’m glad to see players other than the undeserving Tiger get some time in the limelight.
What really pisses me off about Tiger Woods is this injury he just dealt with. Not only do I have to hear about him all the time being such a great player, but if he doesn’t win the media uses it as an excuse for him. And if he wins then they all talk about how amazing his win was even with his prevailing injury. I could care less. Plenty of players play hurt all the time. When he plays a contact sport then we can talk about it. Last time I checked Brett Farve played over 200 straight games at quarterback in the NFL, so when Tiger does that then I’ll give him some credit.
All in all I’m simply ecstatic that I didn’t have to watch Tiger put on the green jacket. I hope that more people will educate themselves about golf and realize the fraud that Tiger Woods actually is. And just to clarify, I am not denying that he is one of the all time greats, he just gets more credit than he actually deserves, but that is all too cliché is this day in age in the sports world.
-Sam Gerb
Sam can be reached at sgerb@ut.edu
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