PSoTD

He has a ways to go yet, but Drew Rosenhaus appears quite capable to earn the top position.

Sorry, Dallas Mavericks. No Jerry Stackhouse team has ever won the NBA title. But I bet you already suspected that...

I can't wait for his statements.

"There comes a time in every man's life, and I've had plenty of them."

"Managing is getting paid for home runs someone else hits."

"They examined all my organs. Some of them are quite remarkable and others are not so good. A lot of museums are bidding for them."

"You have to go broke three times to learn how to make a living."

"All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming him, but you won't succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy."

Yeah, you're right, I just used this story as a cheap excuse to throw some Casey Stengel quotes around.

From The Bellingham Herald:

If I were in the stands when Barry Bonds breaks the all-time home run record, I would:

14.7% Cheer loudly.
19.9% Boo loudly.
21.4% Turn my back in silent protest.
44.0% Catch the ball and start taking bids.

but if California State University, Sacramento's athletic program had a smart athletic program, they ought to contact Rick Adelman for the head coach job of the men's basketball team. I read where he wants to stay in Sacramento one more year because his son's finishing high school. So... he's likely to stay in Sacramento, and not likely to take another NBA job for the next year. It would be a great way for him to jab the Maloofs. And a boost for the school's program. But as I said... IF...

I don't think it was smart or right that the Kings fired Rick Adelman. I'm not the only one:

YAY Sports: This move is pretty much making everyone but the Maloof brothers unhappy.

Bag O' Bits: What are the Maloofs thinking?

The Mighty MJD Blog: Bottom line… the Maloofs wanted him gone, and he’s gone. There’s a rumor circulating that the Kings want to hire Don Nelson… which, if true, means that the Maloffs are either 1) looking for a drinking buddy, or 2) just not paying attention to anything at all that has happened in the NBA or the world over the past two or three years.

The Scores Report: I don’t know who the Kings are going to hire that is going to do a better job than Rick Adelman.

Oops, I've Done It Again: Sure he had some problems during his 8 year tenure but still, that's not the way to reward a coach with flippin the script on the franchise with one helluva diverse team year in and year out. I'd say that going to the playoffs 8 straight years is pretty dwam successful, and coming DWAM close to a championship in 2002. I personally liked the guy, he was straight up on all facets of the game and hasn't been doing a "bad" job, persay. What else do you expect from a coach when the players are being rotated in and out like a carousel at Great America?

I sure hope Geoff Petrie knows what he's doing, because I don't see a whole lot of better coaches available right now.

And thanks to Rick Adelman. The 8 best years of franchise history came under his tutelage. The Kings had never had 8 straight winning seasons prior to Adelman's tour in Sacramento.

Okay, I'm a Sacramento Kings basketball fan, I used to have season tickets when I lived in Sacramento (of course, those were the dreary, awful seasons of Reggie Theus and Joe Klein and, dare I say it, Bill Russell as head coach...) And I have, in the past, said that Rick Adelman should be removed as head coach of the Kings, primarily because of his postseason coaching capabilities. But that's not my point of view today.

There are reasons to replace Rick Adelman as head coach of the Sacramento Kings, but if you're going to write a sports article and say that the Kings should replace Adelman, you should be forced to give those reasons, not just say it's time to "roll the dice".

I mean, this writer actually ends his article with:

Adelman might have done his best job as Sacramento's coach in the second half of his final season, but it's best to let him leave on that high note. It's time for a new voice and a new style in Sacramento.

Wow. He's done his best job since coming to Sacramento - and considering he's 395-229 since coming to Sacto, that's saying something. So it's time to fire him now?

It's not about voice or style. It's about results. I'm intrigued with what Adelman's delivered with the "new" Kings. He took a team everyone considered dead in the water, and coached them to the playoffs and two wins against the world champion Spurs. All while transitioning with new talent and injuries and having to create a new offensive style on the fly. I suspect Adelman could build considerably more into this, and will, if given the chance.

About the only complaint I have, and it's more about the player than it is about Adelman, is why Mike Bibby is still so incredibly weak at playing defense. That should be fix number one for next year.

And it should be Adelman's responsibility - I think Adelman's earned another year.

When I was 9 years old, my Dad took me to my first major league baseball game, with the Cincinnati Reds at Crosley Field. He took me to an old hot dog/sausage place in Cincy first, then we went to the ballpark and watched the players throw the ball around. We yelled to Lee May, then the Reds first baseman, and he smiled and waved back to our section.

I don't even remember who the Reds played, or if they won or lost. I just remember how big that ballpark was, the crowd excitement during the game, the finely mowed field, how close the players seemed to me, and my Dad in his extreme joy of showing me the ins-and-outs of a day at the ballpark.

Last Sunday I was The Dad. I took our 9 year old daughter to her first Major League Baseball game, Mariners versus the Orioles at Camden Yards. It was one of those delicious, not-ever-forgotten "parent" moments. She loved it - the crowd, how cool the park looked, the cheers, the home runs, the silly stuff run on the Jumbotron or whatever they call it, the Oriole mascot, the swag we bought, the food we bought, everything. And I got to watch her and sometimes see myself, and remember the joy as the child and simultaneously feel what my Dad must have felt, and these moments just happened over and over and over again. Keep my glove on in case there's a foul ball... The thrill of having a Foam Finger! Hey, let's go sit in the sun in the outfield and watch an inning! C'mon, you can boo louder than that. CHARGE! Why are they playing Jeopardy music?

It didn't hurt that Camden Yards is a beautiful place to watch a baseball game, and that we had good tickets, and that the people around us were energetic but courteous - no drunken cussing, no loud complaints.

After the game, we grabbed dinner at the Uno Restaurant in Inner Harbor (I do not recommend that) and drove home. She slept a bit. We stopped at the Maple Donut shop outside of Harrisburg for a quick doughnut snack, which I promised in lieu of buying dessert at Uno. Love their Maple Donuts. We got home, and she quickly burst into an excited description of the whole day for both mom and brother. Her brother's only 5, but I could tell, he liked what he heard. I'll get another day of the introductory joy at the ballpark someday again.