1 - Be honest: a) how many NCAA softball games did you watch last weekend, and b) how many did you watch in your entire lifetime before that?
2 - Who has a better chance of winning their NCAA baseball regional: Missouri, Kansas, or Kansas State? (To see the teams in each regional, go here.)
3 - A potential Denver-Orlando NBA Final...this is exactly what everybody was expecting, right?
4 - If Notre Dame and Army play at Yankee Stadium, can we arrange for Mizzou and Illinois to play at Busch? Or Mizzou and Iowa at that, uhh, Field of Dreams field?
The Beef: 1 - I was able to see about 1 out of the first game on Saturday night as we were leaving a VERY lovely restaurant in Chicago (Sullivan’s…one of the best steaks I have EVER had). I then was able to see from about the 2nd inning on in the second game on Sunday. As for how many Mizzou Softball games I have watched in my lifetime before that….I might wager it is more than everyone else in this roundtable combined.
2 - I really like Mizzou’s chances of getting through, especially with the unfortunate health issues with Ole Miss’s ace. There is a lot of discussion around the net on how Coach TJ should approach the starting rotation for the regional, and he does actually have some options. I guess a follow-up question to this would be: Do you pitch Kyle Gibson against Western Kentucky or do you roll the dice (a bit) and try to steal a win and save Gibson for the all-important 2nd game? K-state got a TOUGH draw I believe against Rice, and kU is up against an equally tough bracket…if not actually tougher with a couple of Carolina schools in the mix.
3 - Nope…I did not think Orlando would win more than one game for a number of reasons (lack of heart by not crushing a tired Boston squad, poor coaching decisions and late-game usage of Dwight Howard). I really figured the Lakers would pull their series out in probably 7, especially as the hype of a Lebron/Kobe finals would be building at that point.
4 - Field of Dreams Field is a little more likely than Busch I think. Not entirely sure they could get a football field in there these days given the configuration of the field. As for Notre Dame/Army, the way the Irish are going, that might actually be a decent game in a few years. That’s right Puddin O’Doom…I said it.
Michael Atchison: 1 - I watched at least part of all three, including the big fly that ended it. Before that, I had watched negative seven softball games on television.
2 - I don’t know KU’s and K-State’s bracket and I’m not even going to look. Mizzou.
3 - I’m mildly sick about Cleveland – I really love to watch LeBron play. Unfortunately, LeBron is the only one playing right now for the Cavs. And how ridiculous has Rashard Lewis been at closing time? Onions! As for the west, I’ve been rooting for Denver hard. Chauncey Billups is everything that’s good about the NBA.
4 - Yankee Stadium is the perfect venue for those anemic offenses. Did you see that Mark Texeira hit a broken bat home run there the other day? And the obvious answer here is that Missouri and Illinois should play at Simmons Field.
ZouDave: 1 - The answer to both is 0.
2 - You might as well be asking me who has a better chance at winning the Mayoral Election in Nashua, MT. I will go with Missouri, because f*** kansas.
3 - In the category of "Things I care less about in sports", one of the only things lower than the NBA finals is the NHL finals.
4 - Can we? Sure. Should we? No. The dome is fine. I may not be a huge fan of domes, but there's nothing wrong with it...especially in the August heat. We have enough neutral site games, so if we ever play Iowa I hope it's either in place of Illinois or it's a home-and-home.
ZD's Roundtable answers have been brought to you by the letter "U", as in
The Boy: 1 - Live, I watched none. We don't have cable yet in the new house. I did, however, watch the Game 1 and 3 replays on ESPN360, so there's that. Many props to tiemmel, jihad, etc., who did a wonderful job in the live threads for those games, by the way.
2 - MIZZOU!!!!! KU drew #4 North Carolina, so they're going to be fighting uphill. K-State is in pretty good shape going to Rice's region--I believe Rice is only the #14 national seed, but if you believe in any sort of experience factor, KSU is pretty barren in that regard. Mizzou knows what it takes to win one of these, and they drew only the nation's #11 seed, so they're in pretty good shape. Plus, as we know, they're quite hot overall.
That said, Ole Miss's pitching scares the hell out of me.
3 - I have no problem with Denver. They've got Kleiza, Billups really is great, Carmelo is turning it on, and they're super-duper crazy, which is fun. That said, I REALLY wanted this to be the year that LeBron won a title, but that's on life support at the moment. Orlando has looked infinitely better against Cleveland than Boston (it's all about matchups!), but still...I was hoping for Denver-Cleveland, which means I'll get LA-Orlando.
4 - Others already made the "offensively-challenged" joke, so I've got nothing left to say on this one. Boo.
rptgwb: Just a heads up - I'm swamped this morning on about four different deadlines. I may get to this later this afternoon, but no guarantees.
The Boy:
ZouDave: congrats on your new trophy, btw
Doug: 1 - I believe I flipped past one on ESPN. My eyes started burning and I decided to not go back until I was sure softball was over. I developed the whole "burning eyes" thing early in my life as a way to avoid softball games.
2 - I have no idea.
3 - Someone better call David Stern and possibly put him on 24-hour suicide watch.
4 - If Notre Dame and Army play at Yankee Stadium... will they actually sellout the stadium? Because the Yankees sure can't! Ba-dum-ching!