Great Moments in Sports Card History: Virginia Squires

Has any franchise in the history of pro sports ever put together a roster of guys with such fascinating hairstyle/facial hair combinations as the ABA’s Virginia Squires did back in the 70’s?:

When Jackson and Wise posed for those pictures that would become part of the 1975 Topps set, the Squires were already in the process of circling the drain. It was a fitting end for a franchise that, despite some great successes, never could get it right.

The Squires were actually founded in 1967 as the Oakland Oaks with singer Pat Boone being part of the ownership group. To be honest, I can think of no pop icon less suited to be a pro sports owner than Pat friggin’ Boone. But with that goober running the show the team pulled a genuine coup before the 1968-69 season by signing Rick Barry, who had sat out the previous season after a contract dispute with the NBA’s Warriors.

Despite a knee injury that put Barry on the shelf after 35 games, the Oaks finished 60-18 in the Western Division and went on to beat the Indiana Pacers in the ABA finals. The problem was that in the midst of those turbulent days, not a whole lot of folks in the Bay Area seemed to care about ABA basketball, even if the local franchise was winning big.

Boone and his partners were forced to sell the team to lawyer Earl Foreman, who then moved it across the continent. Despite now being the Washington Caps, the ABA made the goofy choice of keeping the team in the Western Division. That forced Caps management to schedule some odd “home” games during the 1969-70 season in locales like Wichita, KS and Mexico City.

The following season, Baltimore Bullets owner Abe Polian muscled Foreman and the Caps out because he wanted to move his own outfit to Washington. That’s the point when the team morphed into the Virginia Squires. The Squires were based in Norfolk but were actually a regional franchise, playing home games in Hampton and Richmond as well.

In terms of being an effective owner, Foreman wasn’t exactly in the league of Jerry Jones. Under his ownership the franchise was perpetually operating in the red. Before the move to Virginia, Foreman was forced to trade Barry to the New York Nets for a draft pick and cash. Over the next couple of years, he’d end up selling Dr. J and Iceman Gervin as well.

Think about that for a second: the Virginia Squires basically sold THREE Hall of Famers to get cash to pay the bills. What that team could’ve achieved had it kept three scorers of that proficiency together on the same roster. Alas, by the time Jackson and Wise were showing off their afros to Topps in 1975, there wasn’t a Hall of Famer to be found on the Squires.

With paychecks bouncing and fan discontent growing over the talent drain, the ABA was actually forced to buy the team from Foreman in 1974. The Squires were on the verge of collapse in early 1976 and even a $250,000 loan from a Virginia bank couldn’t keep them afloat. The franchise was folded up by the ABA in May of that year because it couldn’t generate a $75,000 league assessment.

At that point it got downright tragic, not because the franchise was disbanded, but because Foreman was only a couple of years away from really cashing in. Had he been able to find a way to keep the team afloat under his watch he could’ve shared in a massive windfall:

After the 1975-76 season — the ninth year of a costly talent war with the ABA — the NBA relented and agreed to accept four of the remaining six ABA teams into the league. The Denver Nuggets, Indiana Pacers, New Jersey Nets and San Antonio Spurs made it. The Spirits and Kentucky Colonels did not.

Colonels owner John Y. Brown received a $3 million payoff from the remaining ABA teams. Spirits owner Ozzie Silna wasn’t willing to go away that easily.

As part of a concept he had come up with months earlier, he negotiated to receive four-sevenths of a share of the NBA’s annual TV revenue for as long as the NBA was around. At the time, it was worth about $300,000 a year. Today, that deal nets the Silnas and their attorney about $15.6 million a year. Overall, they’ve collected about $168 million since the merger, an amount that has grown mightily through investments. (Associated Press)

Great Moments in Sports Card History: Albert Belle

Great Moments in Sports Card History: Antoine Walker

Great Moments in Sports Card History: Michael Irvin

The Larry King-ish Stream of Consciousness Column for 4/28

In this edition of the LKSOC we discuss the never ending butthurtedness of USC faithful, the NCAA’s slow play with UNC, a flawed Knicks roster and douchebag Boston Bruin fans:

◊ USC fans are still tossing rocks from in front of a glass house

Have you noticed that lately when a college football program outside of Los Angeles has even a hint of trouble, USC fans use that as an opportunity to start bitching again about how bad the NCAA stuck it to them over Reggie Bush? It’s become a veritable rite of passage with those folks.

You heard their chorus of bellyaching over Cam Newton’s troubles at Auburn. “Cam didn’t know what was going on? Well Reggie didn’t either! Set us free! SET US FREE!!!”

Now we have the train wreck at Ohio State that was wrought by Jim Tressel’s inability to be forthcoming with the NCAA. And that means that the butthurtedness of Trojan fans and the program’s biggest media supporters has been kickstarted once again. In their eyes, what’s going on in Columbus means the NCAA pretty much has to play nice with USC in regard to its appeal:

Homerism is homerism, it’s a basic tenet of college football fandom these days. But it’s hilarious how it creates a huge blind spot in regard to how fans view their own programs.

The company line amongst USC fans has pretty much evolved to this: our coaches did nothing wrong, Reggie Bush was railroaded by a slimeball criminal and programs like Auburn and Ohio State are where the true evil in college football resides. Homerism, it’s a beautiful thing.

It’s a given in the eyes of the most butthurt USC fans that Auburn paid the Newton family $180,000 to come win the school a national title. That’s despite the fact that no paper trail has been produced, you know, like the paper trail that Lloyd Lake produced in regard to the money that flowed to the Bush family.

Therefore, what USC fans (and any other fan who throws around the “Cam took $180K” line) are doing is making an assumption based on wrong doing that wasn’t proven but only speculated about. That’s a “Where there’s smoke there’s gotta be fire” mode of thinking.

Hmmmm, fire where there’s smoke, okay. Let’s say there’s a college football program that was stuck in the mud for a decade. From 1991 to 1999 this program averaged five losses a season. Then it hires a has been NFL coach who hadn’t actually recruited a college football player since 1983. Within two years, that program is on the road to being a world beater.

I just described the situation USC was in during the 90’s and what happened once Pete Carroll was hired. Now when a program rights the ship that quickly and starts winning national titles, it could very well be a case of a sleeping giant awakening. Or, if you’re looking for fire where there’s smoke, it could be an indication that a coaching staff cut a lot of corners to get that good that quickly.

To a USC fan, the notion that Pete Carroll may have been a little Ron Meyer-ish in the way he rebuilt that program is flat out batshit nuts. But is that because the homerism-generated blind spot prevents Trojan fans from even entertaining the notion that something might not have been on the up and up with USC?

So Trojan fans will continue to throw rocks at the programs they believe to be infinitely more nefarious than their own. But it’s pretty damn funny that those rocks are being thrown from the porch of a glass house.

◊ Staying on the subject of teams in hot water

Dan Spears of the Wilmington Star News had a fascinating take on why the NCAA is taking its sweet time in dealing with North Carolina football:

Granted, the NCAA’s investigation of the Tar Heels is exponentially more complicated than that of the higher-profile Buckeyes. There are more players involved, two separate issues with which to deal, involvement from the N.C. Attorney General’s office and the death of a key figure in the controversy, sports agent Gary Wichard.

But to this point, nearly a year since allegations of improper benefits and academic misconduct first became public, the NCAA has still yet to issue UNC a formal letter of inquiry or a notice of allegations.

It’s almost as if the Tar Heels’ file gets buried further toward the bottom of a mountainous pile of paperwork the moment somebody else’s transgressions come to light. (Wilmington Star News)

So the giant mess Tressel has created might actually make Butch Davis look better by comparison.  Hey, if you’re North Carolina, you’re looking for lenience any way you can get it.

◊ The Knicks roster really is a train wreck

Back in the mid-80’s, the Seattle Supersonics put together a roster that included Dale Ellis, Tom Chambers and Xavier McDaniel. That’s not one, not two but THREE guys who would’ve preferred gouging out their own eyes rather than passing the basketball.

In 1986-87, the trio led Seattle to an unremarkable 39-43 record in the regular season before a remarkable playoff run propelled the team into the Western Conference finals, where the Lakers were waiting with a broom. The next season, Seattle improved to a 44-38 team but was taken out by the Nuggets in the first round. After that campaign, Chambers was traded away to Phoenix.

Each member of the trio averaged 20+ ppg in each of those seasons but didn’t even have a 50-win campaign to show for their efforts. As a result, those Sonic teams told a cautionary tale of what happens when too many alpha dogs are brought together on the same roster. And apparently it’s a tale that the New York Knicks have never heard.

Hey, I understand that Knicks GM Donnie Walsh had to make a splash and he did just that by pairing Carmelo Anthony with Amare Stoudemire. But while its not the extreme case that Seattle was back in the day, there are still not enough basketballs in play to satisfy both Anthony and Stoudemire.

I hear you screaming that the make up of the Heat is no different with LeBron, D-Wade and Bosh toiling together on that roster, but you’d be wrong. No player in the league has better court vision than LeBron, who’s more than willing to give up the rock to an open guy. Compare that to Carmelo, who sucks in the ball like a Dyson and doesn’t part with it. Add the fact that Amare demands an awful lot of shot attempts himself and you see why New York’s pairing of stars doesn’t mesh quite as well as the one Miami has put together.

It would’ve been interesting to see the Knicks at full strength against the Celtics in the first round of these playoffs. Without the injury bug, New York would’ve put up much more resistance than it did. But over the long term, there’s a dynamic at play here that just won’t work. Like Seattle’s trio of scorers did back in the day, this version of the Knicks will entertain a lot of people. It just won’t bring home any championship hardware.

◊ Reason # 3,638 why pro sports crowds are Doucherific

What happens when a guy in a Montreal jersey goes to the bathroom at TD Garden during a tense series between the Canadians and the Bruins? A NSFW video is generated:

The Larry King-ish Stream of Consciousness Column for 2/23

In this edition of the LKSOC we discuss the Deron Williams trade, a homeless Harvey and Kate Winslet’s lust for crotch blood:

◊ Does Knick nation REALLY love the Melo deal?

You wanna see a schizophrinic fan base? Look no further than the New York Knicks. Yesterday, Knick fans were on cloud nine after their team finally engineered a trade that brought in Carmelo Anthony (with Chauncy Billups being a nice throw in). It wasn’t hard to find tweets proclaiming that a new NBA title banner would be hanging in MSG sooner as opposed to later.

Fast forward to this morning and the mood of many in Knick nation has changed a little bit. That’s because word came out that the Nets, who aggressively pursued Anthony themselves, had shipped Devin Harris, Derrick Favors and two first round picks to the Jazz in exchange for Deron Williams. BOOM.

So before Anthony has even played his first game as a Knick, you’ve got the Nets stealing their thunder. That’s because all of us, Knick fans included, realize just how valuable a commodity an elite point guard is in the NBA. Hell, just ask the Hawks, who passed on both Williams and Chris Paul in the 2005 draft and haven’t been able to break out of the middle of the Eastern Conference pack ever since.

Hey, I’m not saying that casual Knick fans aren’t still thrilled to be reveling in the buzz that comes with acquiring a superstar.  But judging from copious feedback on Twitter, many hardcore Knick fans wouldn’t have minded if Williams had been the prize instead. Pairing a top shelf point with Amare Stoudemire might yield better results than a Amare-Melo duo will.  But hey, only time will tell.

I guess in this torrent of NBA trade activity, it’s easy to lose track of the facts. Here’s the Oakland Tribune crediting Williams with having gone to Melo’s school:

Kelly Dwyer provided an interesting perspective on these trades over on Yahoo! Sports:

If Williams extends his contract with the Nets later this year, both he and Brook Lopez (assuming he re-signs) will be working under contracts developed under the next collective bargaining agreement. This means the deals that could be worth about 60 or 70 percent of what Stoudemire and Anthony will earn in New York. And while Lopez and Williams aren’t as good as Stoudemire and Anthony in total, they’re certainly better than 60 or 70 percent as good as New York’s flashy duo. (Yahoo! Sports)

◊ Tree killer Harvey Updyke completes his march to inevitable homelessness

From the “Not a word of this is shocking” files:

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The man accused of poisoning the famed Oak trees at Auburn University is living in a car and bathing himself in a creek, his friend told the Montgomery Advertiser.

Wayne Barnes said he would not disclose the location of his friend, Harvey Updyke, who has been charged with first-degree criminal mischief after the trees were poisoned. Authorities say Updyke is free on bond. (Associated Press)

You know what this means?  Some poor bastard in East Alabama is going to be strolling down a country road and stumble across Harvey, who’ll most likely be dressed in full Tide garb at the time, dropping a deuce in the weeds. If that won’t generate spontaneous blindness I don’t know what will.

◊ What the hell is Bryant Gumbel writing in between “Real Sports” segments?

Word came out this week that HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumble” is preparing a piece in which Stanley McClover will say he was paid to play football at Auburn and Chris Keys will say the same thing about Alabama. But apparently, McClover’s story is already being torpedoed by some.

I like “Real Sports,” I think it’s a superior show to anything of a similar format being put out by ESPN. But the only knock I have on it is what goes on between segments. If you’ve seen the show, then you know this is when Gumbel sits across from the reporter to discuss the previous segment. In the instance below, he’s talking to Bernard Goldberg about his piece on Victor Conte:

What the hell is Gumbel writing down while he’s talking? Are we to believe that he’s taking notes based on what Goldberg is saying? Hey, Bryant, there are easier ways to get your notes taken, they’re called INTERNS. And you do realize it’s all being videotaped, right? That precludes you having to keep a detailed personal journal.

It reminds me of the mad scribbling that Jackie Sherrill used to do on whatever college football sideline he was patrolling. He appeared to be the only head coach in the nation writing down a detailed account of the entire football game being played in front of him.

◊ When mascots turn on their own

What was the bigger Nashville collapse, the one that the Vanderbilt basketball team had last night against Tennessee or was it the singing career of Mindy McCready? Well, at least Vandy has an NCAA bid to fall back on after this 60-51 defeat.  McCready’s backup plan was Celebrity Rehab and a sex tape.

But I’m more concerned with what happened in the stands last night at Memorial Gym.  One pitiful Vanderbilt fan not only had to endure watching the Commodores implode, he also had to deal with this:

You know what makes that bloody nose worse? It was “white out” night at Vandy, which is pretty much the worst possible time to get clubbed in the face by a menacing robber baron. Ah, the stains on that shirt will be a constant reminder of a game gone bad.

Now that I think about it, I thought mascots only hit other mascots?  Below is just such an instance, and I think it’s hilarious that the Bobcat puts his head back on before resuming his attack. Hey, NEVER leave off your protective headgear (i.e. giant head) in a mascot fight, that’s rule #1:

◊ Kate Winslet: Queen of the Train Wreck Endings

So last night I finally got around to watching “Revolutionary Road,” the DiCaprio-Winslet flick based on the Richard Yates novel. Here’s a recap (spoiler alert): a wife talks her husband into moving the family to Paris, he gets cold feet, they have ugly confrontational shouting matches, there’s adultery and then she dies trying to perform an abortion on herself. Seriously, that’s it in a nutshell.

Is the acting good? Sure, these are pros. Does the film look good? Definitely, the set design was great. But it’s hard to endure a movie where not one person on the screen comes off as likable. Seriously, not one.

This isn’t the first time a Winslet movie has ended with a character bleeding from the privates at his or her own hand. Remember “Little Children,” where Jackie Earle Haley’s pedophile performs a self castration? If there’s a solid script floating around Hollywood right now where a lead character takes a shotgun blast to the crotch, I’m sure Winslet will be interested.

Neophyte blogger sets world record for longest sentence

His name is Wardell Sherman, and he was as impressed as the rest of us at the 51-point outburst that the Heat’s LeBron James had in his team’s win over the Magic last night. He blogged about the game on SportsTalkTV.com, and he was so enamored with the performance of King James that he uncorked the following whopper:

This was obviously Lebron’s best game of the season, as he came out on fire in the first quarter scoring 23 points, as I sat watching the game I saw a very focused Lebron who look like he was out to make a statement to Orlando Magic General Manager Otis Smith, after Otis had questioned Lebron’s competitiveness in the off-season, not to mention Orlando’s Dwight Howard mocking Lebron before the game with the “powder toss” and taking pictures with his fellow teammates. (SportsTalkTV.com)

That’s an 82-word sentence my friends.  And just for good measure, Sherman cranks out this 80-word monster in the very next paragraph:

He has played at the top of his game in all of Miami’s big games thus far this season scoring 38 points in his return to Cleveland where he completely dismantled the Cavs, they haven’t been able to recover since taking that beat down, Christmas Day going into Kobe’s house and recording a triple-double and not to mention his first game in New York in a Miami Heat uniform burning the Knicks for 32pts, 11rebs and 10asts. (SportsTalkTV.com)

Do you see what this guy did?  That first sentence was an 82-yard touchdown jaunt right up the gut.  But just to show you it was no fluke, he went around end on his very next carry for an 80-yarder.  Now that’s STOUT.

Please don’t get me wrong, I’m not here to bury Wardell.  On the contrary, I was just as starry eyed over LeBron’s effort.  In fact, it might be one of the more impressive regular season games a player has EVER had.  No, seriously.

James generated those 51 points on just 25 shots (making 17 of them) while going 14-of-17 from the free throw line.  He also pulled down 11 rebounds and handed out 8 assists.  Think about that for a second: in the course of having a highly efficient 50+ point game himself, he damn near messed around and got a triple double.

If ever there was a performance worthy of an 82-word sentence, it was this one.  Personally, I can’t wait for Kobe Bryant’s next scoring explosion.  When writing about that, Wardell might be able to push a sentence into the triple digits.

Bad stats, bad stats, what you gonna do? (1/22 edition)

Why bother highlighting the less fortunate? Because those who forget bad stats are condemned to repeat them:

• CBB - It was a week full of meager scoring outputs in college hoops, with Stanford managing 42 in a 23-point loss to USC, Auburn generating 40 in a 5-point loss to Florida and Wake Forest scoring 39 in a 35-point loss to Georgia Tech. Auburn at least gets a pass for being in it at the end, but Stanford and Wake get no such love. The worst individual performance in these games goes to Wake guard J.T. Terrell, who was 0-9 from the field and produced more turnovers (3) than assists (2).

• CBB - They say offensive rebounding is a great way to measure a team’s guts and determination. With that in mind, Mississippi State was pretty damn gutless against Georgia today. In dropping an 86-64 decision, MSU pulled down TWO offensive rebounds the whole game. For the contest, Georgia outrebounded MSU by a 43-21 count.

• CBB - We all knew that the SWAC was a pretty crappy college hoops conference. But I bet you didn’t know they were this bad: four of the seven worst free throw shooting teams in the nation come from the SWAC. Prairie View A&M (59.3), Alabama A&M (58.9), Grambling (58.2) and Alabama State (a national worst 57.0) are the teams that can’t throw it in the ocean.

• CBB - I shouldn’t pick on Mark Macon and Binghamton since that program is still pretty much buried in rubble. But hey, bad stats are bad stats. In losing to Albany by a 76-37 count this past Thursday, the Bearcats were a collective 1-for-18 from 3-point range. Sophomore guard Jimmy Gray was the worst offender, going 0-for-7 (1-for-10 overall) himself.

• NBA - Last night, the Hawks were missing injured starters Al Horford and Marvin Williams. The players who actually did take the court for Atlanta lost to New Orleans by a whopping 100-59 count. By letting that happen, the Hawks became the first team in NBA history to lose a home game by 40 or more points after entering the contest at least 10 games over .500. Well, at least they made history.

Next Page »