Day: June 3, 2006

Suns lose! Suns lose!

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I am not a basketball fan by any means. I did enjoy watching the game back in the late ’80’s – early ’90’s when it seemed that every game ended with a score of 135-131, usually on some miraculous buzzer beater. The last decade has been boring as hell for basketball. If the Jordan era was the era of big offense, the last decade has been the era of big defense. I suppose that from a purely technical standpoint the defensive play is a lot better. Technically better doesn’t equate to more fun to watch though; a well executed half court press pales in comparison to an offensive fast break that is capped off with an alley-oop dunk. These plays are still made, of course, but they are usually just in the garbage portion of the game when one team has already benched all of their starters and back-ups, leaving you reaching for the team roster to see if the guys now on the court are actually even on the team.

Growing up in Oregon, basketball was the one professional sport that our state actually had a team in. But rather than support them, I actively hated them. It was my (misguided) belief that if we didn’t have the stupid basketball team we would be able to have a football team, and football was always my favorite sport. Since I felt a need to hate the Trailblazers (and what a ridiculous name that is), I needed to choose someone from their conference to root for. My mother lived in Arizona at the time so I picked the suns, and at a damn good time.

Shortly after I started following the Suns they started what would become their “glory days”. Charles Barkley, Dan Majerle (the fact that I can spell that name is a testament to how much I respect the guy), Danny Ainge, Kevin Johnson, Cedric Ceballos, (what was his first name) Dumas, and others went on a tear that ultimately ended with them losing in the NBA finals to none other than Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls (for my money that was the greatest NBA finals of all time, of course I have only actually watched about four of them so I might not be the best judge. But one game in that series went to triple overtime, and it seemed like they were scoring about 150 points each every game -though a quick google search just revealed that the games were much lower scoring that I remember them).

Perhaps I am a bit cynical, but I really think that so much of the game now is about posing for the sake of posing that the game is virtually unwatchable. The latest high school draft pick needs to get himself a good poster shot that really showcases his signature pair of high-tops. The game, the score, the technique be damned, he needs a good panoramic photo doing a dunk over some nameless white guy in a game that he will ultimately lose 100-47 because he doesn’t know what defense is -and I mean that quite literally. He has really never played defense since he has always stood at half court waiting for one of his teammates to pass him the ball; he has a new 720 Tomahawk slam to try out, after all.

But I digress.

After the run of success that the Suns enjoyed in the early ’90’s, they went on a dry spell for about a decade. In that time there wasn’t a single person here in AZ that was actively following them, and if they claim they were they are dirty liars. As recently as midway through this season, sports commentators here in the valley were all talking about how the Suns were going to fall apart and miss the playoffs completely. Not just one or two of the sports commentators or the fans either, this was everyone. That talk didn’t stop until the Suns had actually clinched the playoff berth, and even then most of the talk was about how they would fall apart in the first round.

I really wouldn’t have cared one bit about whether the Suns won or lost, were it not for the fact that Kobe Bryant said (and I must paraphrase since I can’t find the actual quote) that it was good that they drew the Suns in the first round because they were the weakest of the top four teams (which I didn’t disagree with one bit, but I’ll be damned if I wanted to see that smug fuck win after that statement). I thought that my hatred of the Lakers would be done with once Mr. Ass-Bulldozer O’Neal left (how many thousands of people did he knock down with his huge ass and never draw a foul? He would just back into them and push until they fell over, hell it was Shaq, that was all he could do), but apparently I also hate Kobe (and all rapists for that matter. Before you send me that flaming email, I do know that he was not convicted. I also know that he was not acquitted. The fact that his accuser would not testify doesn’t mean that he didn’t do it; if he really didn’t do it he would never have paid her “and undisclosed sum” in an out of court civil settlement.) So I wanted the Suns to win the first round, just because I hate Kobe and his smug, rape-anyone-I-want-to attitude.

What I was getting really sick of, though, was they way every sportscaster in the state of Arizona was trying to make it seem as though they had been behind the Suns all year; knew they were going to the playoffs; never doubted that they would come back from a 3-1 deficit to beat the Lakers. I know Arizona is a republican state, but we aren’t all that stupid. You can tell the same lie a billion times and it won’t become the truth (George W. Bush would be well served to learn that lesson), and, like it or not, you are on tape saying exactly the opposite thing.

I will use a local radio station as an example (because I know they have audio on their website, you could actually download some of the stuff from earlier this year to hear them dogging the Suns). 98 KUPD had been ripping on the Suns since the very beginning of the season. They were saying things like “well, this is a throwaway season since they don’t stand a chance with Stoudemire on the D.L.” and “Nash is an old man, he has a retirement home in Phoenix”. While the second one may have been said jokingly (at least partially), it was clear that the DJ’s had made up their mind that the Suns sucked outright and had no chance of making the playoffs.

Fast forward to the start of the playoffs.

“I knew the Suns were going to make it. This is the strongest team they have put on the court since the ’93 finals.” When asked point blank about what they said earlier in the season, the DJ’s went into evasive maneuvers, saying things like, “I never said they weren’t going to make the playoffs, I just said that Nash would have to have a standout year and someone would need to make up for the lack of Stoudemire’s 25 ppg.” Which was such utter bullshit that it was laughable. I know that there is a bandwagon that forms when a team starts winning, but can’t they at least be honest enough with themselves to admit that they are just jumping onto it? Apparently not.

To end this how it started: Suns lose! Suns lose! And not a moment too soon. If I had to hear someone say “Sun-sational” one more time, I was likely to climb a clock tower and take target practice on anyone in a Suns T-shirt.

The three hand theory

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If you don’t want to read about poker, please ignore this post.

I have now developed a theory about playing hold ’em at a single table sit and go: Whether you win or lose will be decided by exactly three hands. The only hard part is knowing which three hands they are. As I have been winning sit and go’s I have noticed that I really can single it out to about three hands that really made the difference between a win and a loss. I will recount the last one here. Unfortunately I didn’t take any screenshots so it will just be a lot of text.

I am in the tourney and it is already down to seven people. Chip leader has 5,000, small stack has 1950, I an just above that with 2015 -thanks mostly to not having a decent hand to play thus far.

I am on the button when I get dealt a monster Kc Kh. The first two guys fold outright, the third wants to limp in with 100, but the guy next to me raises it to 250, which will eventually knock both of the blinds out of it. I am really happy with my hand, but the guy who raised hasn’t made a raise the whole game. I don’t want to raise it only to find out that he has aces, so I just call it. The flop brings up 5s 2s 3h, which really shouldn’t help him considering the amount he went in for pre-flop, unless of course he is holding aces, in which case I am probably screwed. He bets into it with 277, which is just a bit more than a quarter of his stack. I am still worried about the ace, but I want to see if he is just trying to bluff me out of it, so I double his bet. He calls. I am actually worried now that he does have the aces, until I get the Ks on the turn. He checks it to me. If he does have the aces, he has just been beat and I want him to know it. I got in 500, I now have almost three quarters of my stack in this pot and wholly expect him to give it up, but he calls. Now I am worried that he might be in it with an A-4 suited, not something I would expect someone to raise so high pre-flop, but you do get all kinds at the sit and go table. The river came up Kd, thus giving me the nuts and I went all in. At this point I went from fearing that he had an A-4 to actively hoping that he did. Instead, his timer ran down to zero, at which point I said in chat “I got the nuts here”. Little did I know that it was going to give him a time bank extension (I though he was already on one), after which he quickly folded. Note to self; Don’t talk about the hand until the next one is dealt.

The game went on for a few more hands with everyone just basically trading blinds; the cards were horrible for everyone and the winning pocket cards weren’t even faces. Then I get another playable hand. Timmy is chipleader with just over 4,800, myself and another guy are about 1,000 behind.

I am in the big blind here when I get dealt Kc Ad, how I do love to have a good hand in that position. UTG folds, the next guy raises 625 in a heartbeat. It folds around to me and I call the 425 to get into the pot. The flop is 7d 7h Ad which gives me top pair and high kicker, time to see if this guy is going to lay down his queens; I bet 25% of my stack to see if he was going to drop his queens, or hopefully he had an ace with a lower kicker. He went all in. This guy hadn’t made an all in move in the game, although he had called a couple. This was also probably only the second pre-flop raise he had made the whole game; he was extremely confident with his hand. There is no way he is going all in with anything other than an ace, but he has to know that I also have an ace or I wouldn’t have bet big, unless he puts me on 7’s, but he has to know that I wouldn’t have called his 3x preflop with a low pair. My pointer hovered over the call button as the timer ticked down then went to time bank. He isn’t bluffing, he has the aces. I have almost half my stack in the pot, but I layed it down. He said “good fold” and showed the aces. I went from second to fifth place on the hand, but I am still alive. Good fold indeed.

The absolute worst place to finish in a SNG is one place out of the money, and everybody knows it. Once we were down to four guys at the table it went back and forth for a good twenty hands with no one really improving their position. Eventually, someone got down to the short stack once the blinds were up to 400/800. He had just under 2,000 while I had 4,000 and was going to be on the blinds for the next two hands. He went all in and I called. I had A-10 to his Q-J. That one really could have gone either way, but I came out on top. In the money now, we all started playing a bit more aggressively.

I am short-stacked with about 2,700 while second place has 4,000 and the leader is running away with over 10,000. I am on the button with a Q-10 offsuit, with the blinds up to 400/800. I am going to have to move or go home. This is far from my ideal hand, but I limp into it. At this point I am pretty committed to the pot and barring some outlandish flop I am going to live or die by this hand. The flop is a 3d 8d Jc, giving me a gutshot draw that I am not at all happy about, but it is checked around to me so I get to see the turn for free. It is the 9 that I needed, but it is the 9 of diamonds, meaning someone could already have the flush. While I am busy worrying about whether or not someone has the flush, the big blind goes all in. I am thinking to myself “Oh fuck, this guy has the flush”, but at the same time knowing that he is the big blind and that he is not in much better shape than me as far as chips. I go all in with a silent prayer. He flips over a Kd-2c, so he doesn’t have the flush yet, and thankfully the river is a garbage heart. He isn’t out of the game, but he is crippled and I would knock him out on the next hand when he went all in on a 35 offsuit.

There were obviously a lot of other hands in the game, but those are the three that really stick out in my mind as being absolutely crucial. While I actually finished second place in that tourney, it is only because we went all-in after about a half an hour in the heads-up play just to end it. My A-J lost his Q-2, which I would call a bad beat were it not for our prearranged all-in call.