Tuesday Grind

Good lord, what an athlete. That was 50 lbs and 5 kids ago, but still, the Reign Man was shockingly amazing. Youtube search Shawn Kemp some time, and the highlights are overwhelming.

Why lead off with a picture of Shawn Kemp and the Sonics? Because Save Our Sonics has come forward with a compelling letter to the NBA Board of Governors, outlining the reasons – with FACTS no less! – as to why the NBA would be foolish to allow the Sonics to move. I won’t re-post the letter as it’s far too long, but it’s a very, very good read. I know some of you give a collective “meh” when it comes to the NBA, but I encourage you all to read it right here. Just taking off the green-n-gold glasses for a moment, when you read that letter you realize just how flippin’ INSANE the whole idea actually is.

Other things floating around:

• So Alex Brink believes he opened some eyes at the combine? Great. I know this is open fodder for Brinkhater, and the kid has taken a lot of crap from all angles, but I hope he makes it.

• Bud Withers has weighed in on his Tony Bennett view. Interesting angle that our own Brinkhater has brought up before, but the idea of what Pullman is, and that it’s not the 24/7/365 pressure cooker that is hoops in Bloomington. Maybe his sister will help him see the light, that it might be nice to double your salary, but at the same time, the grass isn’t always greener? Withers himself said she resigned and is “out of the business.”

What I wonder about is what are Tony’s ultimate goals? Withers lays out the idea of how father Dick stuck it out for a long time at WISC-Stevens Point and WISC-GB before finally getting to Wisconsin. Maybe there is something to the idea of building and learning something of substance at your current situation, and only move on when you’ve learned what is to be learned and experienced everything that you can? OR, as WSU Football Blog has been told by a “source” in the past, does Tony have his sights set much higher than his Dad ever did in the business? As in, the NBA?? Remember, Tony played briefly in the NBA, he was overseas for a bit, and he’s been an assistant and now a head coach at BCS conference schools. He’s had a real taste of the hoops business, on all angles. Maybe he knows what he wants to do and we’re just part of the plan? We’ve also been told this week that Sterk is currently “sweating this one out”. We’ll see how this goes, but the rumor-mongering is in full swing around the local scribes.

• Have ya SEEN the new Bracketology from Joe Lunardi, the most accurate bracket-seeding picker around? We’ve now slid down to a 7-seed, with a first-round match-up vs. St. Joseph’s. But what’s looming in the 2nd round is pretty scary, a match-up with 2-seed Duke….in Raleigh, NC!?!? Double-yikes. Let’s hope we don’t slide down to “bubble watch”, because even if we worst-case-scenario lose out and finish at 9-9, we’re still likely in this year. All the talk is the Pac-10 will be rewarded with a 9-9 team getting in.

It’s difficult to predict what we are going to do this week, either way. We know this much – home court in the Pac-10 this year? Meaningless. The conference is treading water at barely above .500, so it’s not like you look at Cal and at Stanford and say “uh-oh”. And let’s not forget, sure, Cal and Stanford won in Pullman, but they were both games that came down to the last possession. Both games were certainly winnable, and both games had us with 2nd-half leads. It’s not as though they came in and ran us off the court. So even though we aren’t playing our best right now, I’m thinking we will split this weekend. Brinkhater will outline the reasons why later, but that’s where I sit.

Finally, Rooster and I will be at the football dinner on Friday. I’m thinking it’ll be pretty similar to the event that Hooty covered earlier in the month, so we’ll spare you the details that he already provided. But hopefully we’ll get something else out of it that is worthy of reporting. There’s always some surprises here and there that come out of events like this. And there’s supposed to be another stadium renovation update, so we’ll report what we can.

Happy Tuesday!