Greg Oden Sucks...but not as much as Tommy Amaker

Here at the Frobozz Magic Rambling Company, we find that our readers fall into three groups: those who like posts about politics, those who like posts about sports, and those who like posts about creepy craigslist sex postings (incidentally, extensive market research shows the breakdown of those groups to be 2%, 2%, and 96% of our readers, respectively).

Well, I have bad news for groups 1 and 3: It's March. And that means the staff here at FMRC has just one thing on our collective (and slightly schizophrenic) mind. Basketball.

That's right, folks, it's just about Tourney time. So be prepared for a couple posts in a row of non-stop hoops action. I tell you what though, I promise that my next non-hoops related post will be about craigslist, okay?In the meantime, Michigan is about to play Ohio State University (wait, which Ohio State University? -ed.) THE Ohio State University. (ohhh, I always get all those Ohio State Universities confused -ed.) Don't worry, happens to everyone.

Anyway, we're about to play THEOSU with our season on the line. In honor of our inevitable victory and entrance into our first Tourney in almost a decade, I thought I'd do a live post during the game.

However, at the moment I have about 15 minutes before tip-off, so I’m going to head over to addictinggames.com and do my daily jigsaw puzzle. Be back in a bit.

12:00 PM – Okay, I’m about 2/3 of the way through a mad fucking trippy jigsaw puzzle. It’s like a fucking Jackson Pollack painting and the shit turns photo-negative when I connect pieces. Anyway, some guy named Dave O’Brien is replacing Brent Musburger today, which pisses me off. Oh well.

12:01 – Dave just called OSU “Greg Oden’s Buckeyes”. Doesn’t this have to piss off the seniors? Those guys were the Big Ten champs last year, had a strong tournament, and now it’s “Oden’s Buckeyes” or “Conley’s Buckeyes” every game. That’d tick me off.

12:03 – Good sign number 1: OSU is wearing the new supertight uniform tops. For those unfamiliar, these are a new uniform with tops that fit tightly, that a number of teams will be playing in the tourney will wear. Strange note on these tops. They’re from Nike, and apparently they have the LeBron on them. LeBron, who never played in the NCAA. Strange.

12:04 – Good start, already had our first turnover. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

12:06 – Steve Lavin thinks both teams look much better than they did to start the day yesterday. I disagree, I think OSU looked fantastic in their hotel rooms.

12:09 – Okay, the first timeout of the game gives me my first chance to talk about something random in basketball news. Up first we have Dwayne Wade’s decision to rehab his shoulder and return this season. Dwayne, listen to me: SHUT IT DOWN, LITTLE MAN. (side note, do you ever find yourself referring to basketball players who are a foot taller than you in diminutive terms, simply because they play with people so freakishly large they seem much smaller? Cause Wade could whoop my ass without either hand or foot, and I just called him “little man”, simply because he’s so much smaller than Shaq.) Anyway, this might sound like I just don’t want the Pistons playing you in the playoffs, but that’s really got nothing to do with it. Dwayne, you’re 25. You’ve got years left in your prime. Give it up this season, and come back next year healthy. Do you honestly think Shaq or Riley would risk their health for you? They’d dump you faster than…something that gets dumped quickly. Metaphor fails me.

12:15 – Ekpe Udoh just came in. Nothing really important about that, but it gives me a chance to type Ekpe Udoh and you a chance to read it. And that’s fun the whole family can enjoy.

12:17 – Petway just slammed it home hard, giving ESPN an excuse to show his ridiculous haircut. His girlfriend shaved the famous wings of the Michigan helmet into his hair. Which would be fine, except they did it backwards. Instead of making his hair into the wings, they shaved the wings out of his hair. It looks absurd.

12:20 – Incidentally, Ekpe Udoh is a 6-10 240 black man who grew up in Oklahoma. That had to be an interesting childhood. I imagine he was used as a local reference point. “The gas station? Well, go about a mile down that road, until you see a 6-10 black kid, and then turn left.”

12:25 – Steve Lavin informs me that the United Center has some of the best hot dogs in the Midwest. Good to know, Steve.

12:26 – Ooooh good news, Erin Andrews on the sideline. Several hundred college boys flipping between this and the UNC came on ESPN2 just set down their channel changers.

12:27 – Thad Matta’s (OSU’s coach) daughter apparently didn’t want to stand for the national anthem. Lesson: the Buckeyes hate our troops. Alternatively she may have been 4 years old and engrossed in her pizza…speaking of which, I should grab lunch.

12:32 – Steve Lavin just commented that Michigan needs to win this game “if they want a chance to make the tournament.” Which raises an interesting possibility. Maybe we don’t want a chance. Maybe Tommy Amaker hates the NCAA tournament. That would explain a lot about the last few years.

12: 38 – Harris cuts it to 1. TOURNEY BABY! Okay, actually there’s 23 minutes left, so I may be speaking too soon.

12:40 – Okay, second totally random basketball aside: Scottie Pippen coming back to the NBA. Some of my readers may not be familiar with Scottie (which is sad), but he played with Jordan on the Bulls…which was 10 years ago for those who don’t recall. In fact, Scottie hasn’t even played in 3 years and he’s now 41 years old. Now, if Scottie wants to come back, that’s fine. If he can play well enough to get signed, then good for him. But I wouldn’t want to be a young player on the team that signed him. Every damn time you laced up your shoes he’d be leaning over your shoulder “In my day we didn’t have all these fancy sneakers. We played barefoot when we had too. And the floor was uphill…both ways.”

12:44 – My friend just informed me that the a television pilot is being developed around the cavemen from the GEICO commercials and a movie is being made for the Burger King. I think the idiocy of both of these ideas pretty much speaks for itself, so I’ll just leave it at that.

12:45 – Dave O’Brien is comparing the “coaching styles” of Thad Matta and Tommy Amaker. I can sum that up pretty quickly: one of them is a good coach, the other is not. I leave it to you to decide which one is which (here’s a hint: one of them has never been in the NCAA Tournament). Anyway, they were actually talking about how animated Matta is and how deadpan Tommy is. This prompted Steve Lavin to compare Tommy Amaker to John Wooden. Now, I’m not saying comparing Tommy Amaker to John Wooden (who won 10 NCAA championships) is like comparing apples and oranges. I’m saying it’s like comparing the number 72 to Baroque music. It’s like comparing conjunctions to the Cuban Missile Crisis. It’s like comparing John Wayne Gacy to the theoretical dark energy that may be driving the acceleration of the expansion of the universe.

12:50 – Jay Bilas is explaining why Duke will still be an 8 or 9 seed at the lowest. This is where, as a blogger, I’m supposed to rail against the Duke Bias in the media, and how Coach K is the devil, etc, etc. But I really like Duke. I always liked Duke, and I like them even more now, cause their law school sent me a USB key, despite the fact that I really have no intention of going there. Go Duke!

1:01 – Dammit, I just bit my lip on my pizza. Also, I think I have a cavity. In case you wanted to know.
1:03 – ESPN just showed a commercial for an online dating service called “ItsJustLunch.COM.” Basically the commercial shows a guy at work who gets mocked after his co-workers saw his online dating profile. ItsJustLunch offers you an online dating service with “no photos or online profiles”. ItsJustLunch.com, for the online daters who want to skip getting to know each other and go right to being brutally raped and murdered by serial killers. I’m all for online dating, but this particular service is just fucking creepy.

1:10 – Greg Oden was just surrounded by four Michigan players and still grabbed the rebound. I fucking hate that guy.

1:11 – Steve Lavin tells us that Michigan needs to make sure we don’t allow OSU to go on one of its “patented runs”. Which leads me to something I’ve noticed recently: we use “patented” too much. I think it might be a problem particular to sports, but maybe it extends further. Anyway, if something is patented, then only one person/group can do it. OSU’s runs are not “patented”. Many teams go on runs. For example, the good ones. Tom Brady’s comebacks (much as I love them) are not “patented”. Many QBs lead comebacks. You want something patented? Try Drew Stanton’s poor decisions. Those are fucking unique.

1:14 – Mike Conley just had to come out after running into a screen from Petway. Lesson: Buckeyes are pussies (who hate our troops).

1:19 – Steve Lavin tells me that some of the greatest gangsters of all time hail from Chicago. Also there’s good shopping on Michigan Avenue. I had no idea how much Musburger held this team up.

1:33 – Okay, Michigan is now within 4, with the ball with 9 minutes left. It’s possible I’m going to zone out and watch the game for a while. I’ll leave you with a cute picture of a puppy to entertain you.

2:00 – Anyone who wants to start a “Fire Tommy Amaker” club, I’m down for it. I’m off to lay down in the fetal position in the shower and cry.