2023-24 Running NBA thread

Damn it had me going for a bit. Kerr is such a great person, I'm blasting anyone who ever would do something bad to him, even Draymond.

Secondly, how much of sicko are you that you think "this is just a joke"?? People's lives are at stake, its close to swatting someone in the public domain (of course, I always say its upon us to consider the source, but still.)

 

Dude, you gotta do better.

 

Wow. I should have read the article. That’s crazy

 

That is one of the greatest passes I have ever seen. And Chris Marlowe, the Nuggets play be play announcer, talks right over it about some trivial thing I know Jokic is incredible but how can announcer take that for granted?

 

Joker makes so many insane passes, I guess you get numb to it. His passing game from the low post all the way to the three point line is simply ridiculous.

 

Jesus, Chris Marlowe. He was in LA 35 years ago. These guys hang around FOREVER.

 

Marlowe was a star setter on the volleyball team at Palisades High in Pacific Palisades (a '69 grad). Went to San Diego State and won a national championship in 1973. Was the last cut for the 1984 USA Olympic volleyball team. In the final exhibition game before the Olympics, the backup setter suffered a broken leg. So Marlowe was brought back and earned a gold medal. He's a very good volleyball announcer (indoor and beach). He announced basketball for the local L.A. regional channel. I never really cared for his basketball announcing, and I guess that followed him to Denver. I've known him for a long time.

 

Palisades High is the key to Marlowe being in Denver. Kiki Vandeweghe is a Palisades High grad and was working in the Denver front office when Kroenke started his cable network. Marlowe played up the connection.

To threadjack for a moment I always thought beach volleyball was the lingerie version of indoor volleyball. I recently met a former indoor college coach who told me that collegiate beach players had superior overall skills than their indoor counterparts. Indoors players can specialize in one skill while beach players had to have a more complete skill set.

 

I've long thought indoor volleyball had at least one too many players on each side. I think the sport would be much more entertaining, with a lot more action and athleticism on display, if it was 4v4 or 5v5 in the same space.

 

A couple of observations:

Good point about the Vandeweghe connection. I covered Kiki's games in high school. His dad, Dr. Ernie Vandeweghe, played for the Knicks and was teammates with Mel Hutchins. The team traveled a lot by train. Hutchins' family picked him up at the train station and Ernie got to meet Hutchins' sister Colleen, who went on to become Miss America. Ernie and Colleen connected and were married, producing Kiki and a bunch of kids (including Olympian Tauna). It was very weird to go to some seedy, dank high school gym to see this gorgeous, statuesque blonde woman sitting there with her obnoxious little boy Bruk, who continually shrieked, "Give it to Kiki ... give it to Kiki."

I read a book written by USA Olympic men's volleyball coach Doug Beal. There was a chapter on Sinjin Smith, who went to Loyola High and UCLA. He was an All-American in college and record-setting performer on the beach. Beal cut him before the Olympics, allegedly because Smith missed a practice as he was late returning from a modeling job in New York. Beal wrote that Smith was one of the best players ever on the beach and was really good at just about every skill, but he wasn't great at any single skill. Indoors has specialists at every position, beach needs all-around players (incidentally, Karch Kiraly could do it all). I showed Smith the book and after several F-bombs toward Beal, he said the team was given the weekend off. They players earned little money so he accepted the modeling job. He said he didn't miss the practice, but the job required two cross-country flights in three days, so he might not have been in the best condition for the practice.

 

Man, Sinjin Smith and Karch Kiraly, two names that bring back the memories of the glory days of beach volleyball and neon volleyball wear of the late 80's. (Yeah I mention the 80's a lot.)