Ohio State students jump in Mirror Lake one night early
November 26, 2013“Kyrie Irving has to start making his teammates better”: WFNY talks with Antonio Davis
November 27, 2013Cleveland sports fans are waiting. Thus, while we’re all waiting, the WFNY editors thought you might enjoy reading. Because you never know how long we might be waiting. So here are assorted reading goodies for you to enjoy. Send more good links for tomorrow’s edition to tips@waitingfornextyear.com.
“In Week 11, I blamed QB Jason Campbell for having a horrible game and not seeing open receivers. This week, for what little time he played, the issue was different: Pittsburgh seemed like they knew exactly what was coming.
I was encouraged with what I saw from QB Brandon Weeden. Yes, he is still super slow and fumble prone when he tries to scramble (and for god sake, stop scrambling to your right!), but when he threw the ball this week, I thought his decision-making was much better, and he was zipping some accurate passes to his receivers. If we get this Weeden next week and he can stay away from the turnovers, we can pick apart the Jaguars.
Defensively, QB Ben Roethlisberger used the same strategy that worked for the Packers and Lions against our defense: get the ball our in 1-2 seconds and neutralize our pass rush. It worked. I’d like to see Ray Horton come up with something to force quarterbacks to hang on to the ball longer.” [Pokorny/Dawgs By Nature]
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Milwaukee fans are trying to raise money for a pro-tanking billboard. This is where we are now in the NBA. “In order for the Bucks to regain their footing with the fans and the community, they need to drastically improve the product on the court. As we have seen with the Packers in 1992 and the Brewers in 2004, moribund franchises can be turned around quickly. The Bucks can be a successful small market franchise both on the court and financially. However, for the Bucks to do this, they need to change their approach. One way to help change this approach is if the fan base can let the organization know that they will support a full rebuilding of the team under a new front office direction. This means being willing to part with high-priced journeymen veteran players and focus on building around young talent acquired with high draft picks. The talent rich 2014 NBA draft is the place to start.” [Dwyer/Ball Don’t Lie]
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“Three games remain on Ohio State’s schedule and the one this Saturday is actually the least exciting and important. Blasphemy and truth meshing for the first time.
Next week, Ohio State will play Michigan State for the right to go to the Rose Bowl and possibly the national championship game. Still, in the annals of time, it’s difficult to find an Ohio State-Michigan game where the Buckeyes looked elsewhere. Even during the Rich Rodriguez era, The Game was still the most anticipated spot on the schedule.
But this year presents almost unprecedented circumstances with the Big Ten Championship Game looming. Not since 1942 has Ohio State played a game the week after Michigan. Fans surely are hoping for the same result, though. The Buckeyes won their first national championship that season with head coach Paul Brown at the helm.” [Rowland/Eleven Warriors]
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“So, what if we make those adjustments to Gomes’ 2013 numbers, dropping his BABIP to .309 (the in between point of AL average and what Gomes’ minor league BABIP might lead us to predict), boosting his walk rate from 5.6% to 6.6%, and docking his isolated power by 10%, what kind of numbers do we get?
.272/.330/.441
If you think any of the adjustments I made were unfair or unlikely, you can certainly adjust your own ‘projections’ accordingly, but I feel pretty good about my back-of-the-napkin methodology. I think the adjustments I made are realistic, which means the batting line just above is too. That’s not tremendous offense, but it’s good. The 2013 Indian it’s closest to is Nick Swisher (.246/.341/.423), and his OPS+ was 117, which would drop Gomes from ‘elite’ among catchers, but keep him in the top ten. I think Gomes is the real deal, and will be one of the Indians’ best players in 2014.” [Lukehart/Let’s Go Tribe]
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“There’s nothing niche about Thanksgiving. When you are one of the bigger sports fans in your family — as I suspect many of you reading this site are — Thanksgiving becomes the day where you spend half your time trying to explain why your relatives’ dumb, uninformed opinions on sports are wrong and the other half trying to look past the screaming children frothing from sugar rush so you can watch the damned game. Everybody pretends they care about sports on Thanksgiving. Which is a real pain for the rest of us.
Thus, diehards find themselves discussing tons of topics on Thanksgiving that they’ve already grown bored of. You need to be prepared for this. Thus, a new Thanksgiving tradition here at Sports On Earth: Your Guide to the Tired, Exhausting, Overdone Sports Conversations You’re Going To Have On Thanksgiving Day, And How To Deal With Them.” [Leitch/Sports on Earth]