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Thursday, May 20, 2010

Day 15 Recap (With KBA Superlatives)

The Return of Tone and Cebron is of No Help as Cartier Brown Makes Case for League MVP

Team Cartier Brown 35
Team Kyle Bailey 31

I was extremely impressed with Cartier Brown's last performance against Team Parks, a game in which he scored 25 points. I was even more impressed with the dominance he displayed in Wednesday's encore in Team Brown's (5-4) victory over Team Bailey (2-7). Brown's back must have been hurting after this one, because he was carrying his team for the entire first half and a large portion of the second as well. He scored 14 of his team's 18 first half points. What I liked about Team Brown today was their unselfishness. They knew that Brown was on fire. Rather than try to get theirs, they continued to let the big dog eat. Besides, Dimitri Baker was too concerned about making sure he called everyone on the other team "soft" at least once, to even worry about trying to put up numbers. Brown ended up finishing the game with 21 points and 6 rebounds. Two of those 21 came with four seconds left as Brown sealed the deal by hitting back-to-back free throws to give his team a 4 point lead. Thomas Hood (9 points) was the only other notable scorer for Team Brown, however, Michael Darty did a brilliant job guarding Antonio Boyle in the second half, making him earn each and every one of his points. The victory gave Team Brown a much coveted third seed in the playoffs, while Team Bailey's loss resulted in a five seed. Cartier Brown was able to capture his first KBA scoring title in the victory. Note: Thomas Hood did something that has not been done in well over four weeks. He airballed consecutive free-throws a la Marques Hudson earlier in the year.

Even with the return of Antonio Boyle and do-it-all forward Cebron, Team Bailey had no answer for Cartier Brown. With this game having astronomical playoff implications, the loss was a crushing blow to Team Bailey's chances for a championship. This game was very winnable and has a lot of "what ifs" attached to it for The Bailey Bunch. Most notably, what if Antonio Boyle had just shot a lay-up instead of badly missing a dunk that could have extended his team's lead in the second half? I think if that were the case, the order of these two paragraphs would be switched around and we'd be talking about Team Bailey as a three seed. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. If you can't dunk, lay it in. Even with Boyle's faux pas, they still had a chance with under a minute left. Trailing by two, it looked like Derrick Gaddy was going to lay the ball in and put the game out of reach for Team Bailey. Bam Brisco had other plans as he skied into the air and beat Gaddy's ball off the glass at the speed of a scud missile. The KBA Block of the Year led to a transition opportunity in which Keith Spencer launched a three with less than ten seconds left. His shot came up short (Although Spencer argued for at least an hour after the game that he was fouled) and Team Brown was able to eek out a victory after Cartier Brown's free throws ended the game. Antonio Boyle finished the game with 15 points and Vinnie Sanchez added eight. While the loss hurt, don't be surprised if this team makes some noise in the playoffs. All they need is for Kyle Bailey to regain his confidence and start shooting the ball like I know he can.

Team Afure Shocks the World in Double OT!!!

Team Afure Obeabor 39
Team Denzell Hargrove 37

Danny Manning and the Miracles, Namath's Jets, and Buster Douglas are mere mortals in the world of the underdog after Team Afure's (1-8) shocking upset of Team Hargrove (6-3). Seriously, look back in the parentheses after the word Afure. The fact that the one looks so foreign and out of place proves just how monumental this victory was. The win certainly did not come easy. With the game tied at 36-36, Hargrove's Travis McBride strangely decided to foul, much to the dismay of Coach Hargrove. Rob Siler headed to the line, with a chance to win the game at the end of regulation. Siler missed the front end of the one and one, thus giving Team Hargrove their own chance for victory with four seconds left. Fortunately, the execution out of Denzell's Hargroves timeout was suspect, as they were not able to even get a shot off (Note: Not sure if Hargrove was able to communicate properly what he wanted as he spent most of the time out repeating the phrase,"Yall need to stop tweaking"). In overtime, it looked again like Team Afure was going to fall a bit short as they fouled Phaelen Lewis with zero seconds left on the clock. After making the first to tie the game, Lewis missed the second, and thus gave Team Afure new life. The second overtime featured a sudden death format where the first team to score wins. A Devonje Johnson steal at mid-court led to a wide-open layup for himself and ended the game in thrilling fashion. It's fitting that Johnson was the hero at the end, because he was phenomenal throughout. His 20 points kept his team in the game against the number one ranked team in the league. Without him playing his best game of the season, Team Afure may have been blown out. Instead, they will go down in the KBA history books, as the most improbable victor of all time. Afure Obeabor was the second leading scorer, finishing with 8.

With the number one overall seed locked up for the playoff's, Denzell Hargrove decided to rest himself and only coach in the last regular season game of the year. While this was great from a "this will provide great material for the blog" perspective, it was terrible from a "now we are going to head in to the playoffs with no momentum and show how vulnerable we are" perspective. Didn't Hargrove learn anything from the Indianapolis Colts who rested Peyton Manning for the last two games of the regular season and ended up getting upset by the New Orleans Saints in the Super Bowl? Or how about the Cleveland Cavaliers who rested Lebron James late in the year, only to get absolutely embarrassed by the Boston Celtics come playoff time? Apparently, Hargrove does not think that history will repeat itself once again. We shall see. What I do know, is that if Hargrove truly wanted to rest himself, then he should have not coached either. He probably expended more energy running up and down the sideline screaming at his players than he would have by playing. While I appreciate Hargrove's concern for my battle with writer's block, I do not think this bolds well for his team. Red Washington scored 12 points and Phaelen Lewis added 10 in the loss.

Team Jones finishes Up Year on a High Note, Team Conner Doesn't

Team Jeff Jones 47
Team Turean Conner 34

It's always nice to end the regular season with a victory, even if it has no impact on your inevitable first round defeat on Friday. Team Jones (3-6) will gladly accept the win even if it is technically irrelevant. They competed much harder and played much better than the completely disinterested Team Conner (5-4), who was more concerned with arguing with each other than they were about actually winning. Hassan Hall and Arieus Fitch each had eight points, but the big news was the emergence of Delando Dallas who finished with 13. Dallas, a free agent acquisition, kept telling Coach Rodgers before his first game last week how he used to kill it in my PE class first semester. He'd always want me to confirm this for the commish, but the fact that I did not remember him do anything of the sort made me think that he had far too high of an opinion about his game. After the way he play today however, it makes me wonder how I could have overlooked his scoring abilities and knack for finding the ball on the offensive glass. I guess it just proves that some guys slip through cracks on occasion during Gym Class.

Wow..........I do not even know where to begin with Team Conner so I'm not going to.

KBA Superlatives: Each year across the country, yearbooks are filled with senior superlatives highlighting the best students that their schools have to offer. In that same vain, I decided that we should do the same for the KBA.

Most Athletic: Cartier Brown

Best Defender: Michael Darty

Most Clutch: Travis McBride

Most Versatile: Patrick Glostner

Best Backcourt: Corey Williams and Remy Price

Best Dunker: Kevin Swanson

Most Likely to Hear the Phrase "If you can't dunk, lay it in" next year: Kevin Swanson

Funniest: Markise Wilson

Most Likely to not admit when he's wrong: Laquinn Parks

Most Underrated: Squirt Polk

Fastest Talker: Keith Spencer

Most Likely to co-star with Ice Cube in 2016's Barbershop V: Courtney Ealy

Most Likely to run for office: Cebron with Daniel Palm as running mate

Best Hair: Marques Hudson

Most Likely to Grow up and Dominate Everyone in the League: The Ogunleye Brothers

Most Likely to still be calling people soft ten years from now: Dimitri Baker

Most Likely to believe in the phrase, "If I'm hot, keep shooting. If I'm not, shoot until I'm hot": Three Way Tie- Cash Jones, Kyle Bailey, Denzell Hargrove

Most Likely to be asked "How Tall are You?" thousands of times in his life: Jermaine Johnson

Most likely to bench 500 lbs. first: Demario Lofton

Most likely to still be mad at each other at KBA 10 year reunion: Phillip Strong and Cash Jones

Least Likely to not Argue a Bad Call and thus most likely to get the next call: Michael Darty

Most likely to get criticized at a family reunion: Jeff Jones for trading cousin Cash

Best Family Guy Nickname: Stuey Salley








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